On the rainy night of March 1, 1932, nurse Betty Gow found the crib of 20 month old Charles Lindbergh Jr. empty at the Highfields estate in East Amwell, New Jersey. Investigators found muddy prints, a broken homemade ladder and a $50,000 ransom note signed with interlocking blue and red circles punched through the paper. Crowds of reporters and locals trampled the grounds, and no adult fingerprints were found in the nursery. Charles Lindbergh effectively steered the case, Al Capone offered help from prison in exchange for his release, and retired Bronx teacher John F. Condon, known as Jafsie, became the go between, meeting a man called John in Bronx cemeteries and handing over the ransom in exchange for a false tip about a boat named Nelly.
The child’s remains were found on May 12, 1932, a few miles from the estate. Investigators had recorded every serial number and paid largely in gold certificates, which became conspicuous after Franklin Roosevelt’s 1933 gold order. In September 1934, a Manhattan gas station manager wrote license plate 4U-13-41 on a $10 gold certificate, leading to Bronx carpenter Bruno Richard Hauptmann, whose garage held more than $14,000 of ransom money. At the 1935 Flemington trial, wood expert Arthur Koehler matched ladder rail 16 to Hauptmann’s attic. Hauptmann was convicted on February 13, 1935, refused offers to confess and was executed on April 3, 1936.
- Servant Violet Sharp took her own life during intense questioning, and her alibi was later verified.
- Hauptmann claimed the money came from a shoebox left by Isidor Fisch, a former partner who had died in Germany.
- Condon’s address and phone number were found penciled inside a closet in Hauptmann’s home.
- Four slanted nail holes in rail 16 lined up with holes in the joists of Hauptmann’s attic floor.
- The case produced the Federal Kidnapping Act, known as the Lindbergh Law, and Anna Hauptmann sued New Jersey twice in the 1980s to clear her husband.
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