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1932: The Tragedy of the Lindbergh kidnapping
1932: The Tragedy of the Lindbergh kidnapping
When Charles A. Lindbergh landed outside of Paris on May 21, 1927, completing the first successful solo trans-Atlantic fight, he immediately became the most famous person in the world. But his celebrity would lead to tragedy. In the dark of the night on March 1, 1932 without warning, the unthinkable happened. Twenty month old Charles Augustus Lindbergh, Jr., the first born son of the famed aviator and his wife, author Anne Morrow Lindbergh, was taken from his crib in the family home near Hopewell, New Jersey. On May 12, 1932 the baby boy was found lying in a shallow grave in the woods five miles from home, hideously murdered. The global outrage that resulted was overwhelming.
On March 1, 1932, Charles Augustus Lindbergh Jr., the 20-month-old son of aviator Charles Lindbergh and Anne Morrow Lindbergh, was abducted from his home in Highfields, New Jersey, United States.
His body was found not far from the address on May 12 .
Due to the high profile nature of his parents, and the horrific nature of the murder, the press jumped on to it and wrote upteen stories and articles about the kidnap, payment of a ransom and then the murder of the young boy.
In September 1934, Bruno Richard Hauptmann was arrested and, after a trial lasting more than a month, he was found guilty of first-degree murder and sentenced to death. He always claimed to be innocent of the crime.
The trial of the century led to Congress passing the Federal Kidnapping Act, commonly called the “Lindbergh Law”, which made transporting a kidnapping victim across state lines a federal crime
The Lindbergh house is now a rehabilitation center. The home was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1994.
Destination: New Jersey, East Amwell Author/Guide: William A. Cook Departure Time: 1932
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