Anne Morrow Lindbergh: Her Life

by Susan Hertog

  “Do you have the baby, Mrs. Lindbergh?” asked Betty.

  “No,” said Anne. “Maybe the Colonel has him.”

  Disturbed by Anne’s answer, Betty hurried down to Charles.

  “Do you have the baby, Colonel?” she asked. “Don’t fool me.”33 Charles was a practical joker and had occasionally hidden the baby to tease Betty. But this was beyond laughter. Frightening Betty with his leap, Charles catapulted up the stairs to the nursery. Finding the crib empty and the sheets in disarray, as though his child had been yanked up by his head, he crossed through the bathroom to the bedroom to find Anne. Pale and dazed, Anne asked, “Do you have the baby, Charles?” Then he turned away. The silence confirmed Anne’s worst fears.34 In the twenty months since the baby’s birth, Anne believed they had been fighting a “war,” against their enemy, the public.35

  While Anne searched the baby’s room, Charles took his rifle from the bedroom closet and instructed Whateley to inform the local police. On hearing the news, Elsie ran up the west stairway to comfort Anne, who was leaning out the window, wildly scanning the field for Charlie. Anne thought she heard a baby cry, but before she could speak, Elsie told her it was the shrill of a cat. Later, Anne was certain it was the howl of the wind.36

  Elsie helped Anne dress, and the three women scoured each closet and drawer, looking everywhere the baby might be hiding. Charles and Whateley searched the grounds. After finding nothing, Charles called his lawyer, Henry Breckinridge, in New York, and the New Jersey State Police. By 10:40 state troopers joined the local police on the scene, and by 10:46 the news had been teletyped on the open wires: Charles A. Lindbergh, Jr., had been abducted from his crib in the Lindbergh home between 7:30 and 10:00 P.M.37

  Soon, the world was shocked by an event nearly as traumatic as a presidential assassination or an outbreak of war. But for the moment it was the Lindberghs’ private nightmare, a terrifying betrayal by the American public who adored them. Anne had sometimes wondered what their arrogance had wrought as they flew the skies into unseen lands, disturbing the flow of native life with their big silver flying machine. Was this the punishment for their “intruding gaze,” mirrored back through the half-closed shutters of a darkened nursery? Was this the fire of an angry sun that had scorched the wings of Icarus? Forever, Anne would ask herself those questions.

  12

  The War

  Charles Augustus Jr. celebrates his first birthday, June 22, 1931. (Popperfoto)

  … Listen, my heart as only

  saints have listened…

  Listen to the voice of the wind

  And the ceaseless message that forms itself out of silence.

  It is murmuring toward you now

  From those who died young.

  —RAINER MARIA RILKE,

  The First Elegy,

  TRANSLATED BY STEPHEN MITCHELL

  MARCH 1, HOPEWELL, NEW JERSEY

  Swaddled in warmth and darkness only an hour before, the Lindbergh home was now ablaze with light. When the Hopewell police arrived, Charles stood, gun in hand, waiting for them at the door. He led the officers up to the nursery and then outside, to the grounds beneath the southeast window, to search for signs of the intruders. They found two deep impressions in the mud and two sets of footprints,1 one of which led southeast to a ladder. Assuming it had been used by the kidnappers to climb up to the window, they left it untouched, and returned to the house to wait for the state troopers.

  In his initial search of the child’s room, Charles had found a small white envelope on the windowsill beneath the warped shutters. Assuming it contained a note from the kidnappers, he had left it unopened. Now, Corporal Frank Kelly, an expert in fingerprints and crime-scene photography, dusted the envelope for prints. Finding only a single smudge, he handed the envelope to Major Schoeffel, the state official in charge, who, in turn, gave it to Lindbergh. Inside, Charles found a note written in a large scrawling hand in blue ink.

  Dear Sir!

  Have 50,000$ redy 25000$ in 20$ bills 15000$ in 10$ bills and 10000$ in 5$ bills. After 2–4 days we will inform you were to deliver the Mony. We warn you for making anyding public or for the Polise. the child is in gut care. Indication for all letters are signature and 3 holds.2

  The signature was a symbol on the bottom right-hand corner of the note: two blue interlocking circles joined by a solid red mark pierced by three square holes.

  Fifty thousand dollars. It wasn’t a huge sum. Small, in fact, for a “professional gang,” but to anyone else, it must have seemed a fortune. Nineteen thirty-two was the darkest year of the Depression. The stock-market crash of 1929 had initiated a steady and broad decline in the country’s economy. With the failure of banks worldwide and a quagmire of unpaid war debts, the American economy was shrinking fast. During the three years following the crash, the GNP shrank by nearly a half, and unemployment tripled. In New York City alone, a million people were unemployed.3

  Violence had become a tool for economic survival. Organized gangs multiplied to protect bootleggers, and a new professional class of criminals emerged. Gunmen and racketeers, hired to ward off competing gangs, made the easy slide into gambling, extortion, and kidnapping. In 1931 there were 279 kidnapping cases in the United States, and it was estimated that six hundred cases had gone unreported. Kidnapping had become a highly organized business, requiring a division of labor among as many as twenty people. They preyed upon the powerful and the well-to-do, choosing and studying their targets with mathematical precision.4 The Lindberghs’ wealth, publicly estimated at half a million dollars, made them prime targets for those harboring greed or dissatisfaction.5 While millions walked the land homeless and hungry, the Lindberghs, silent and seemingly immune, shuttled from the Morrows’ lavish Englewood estate to their $50,000 mountain retreat in the comfort of chauffeur-driven limousines.

  By eleven o’clock on the night of March 1, only twenty minutes after Lindbergh called the police but two hours after he had heard the inexplicable “crack,” every major bridge, tunnel, ferry, and highway leading to New York was blocked, and every incoming vehicle and its driver was searched and recorded. In New Jersey, roads were barricaded and hospitals were alerted. Within hours, criminals and suspects across the state were summoned for investigation.6 The crime had turned the mirror back on the public. This time the public was being hunted, and Charles Lindbergh was at the head of the pack.

  By midnight, Colonel H. Norman Schwarzkopf,7 superintendent of the New Jersey State Police, was on the scene. He was an experienced military man and administrator, but he was not a criminal investigator. He had served on the front in France during World War I, and his command of the German language and his administrative skills had made him a prime choice as a law official in the occupation force in Germany after the war. In 1921, back in the States, and having resigned from the military, he was appointed superintendent of the newly formed state police. During the force’s fledgling years, he found it difficult to maintain discipline. Harmless incidents of neglect and poor judgment had mushroomed into a public issue in 1926, when fourteen troopers were found guilty of various offenses, including murder, while serving a warrant to a family suspected of abusing its cattle. Thereafter, Schwarzkopf tightened his control, modeling the organization on the army’s structure of command and discipline. Although some resented his style of leadership, Schwarzkopf, an imposing figure at six feet, had the respect of his troopers and officers. He was a friendly and gregarious man, as congenial as he was authoritative and demanding; a man bound by friendship as much as by duty.8

  Schwarzkopf admired Lindbergh for his pioneering flights, and from the moment he walked onto the crime scene he was bent on cultivating Lindbergh’s friendship. To prove his sincerity and his admiration, Schwarzkopf gave Lindbergh free run within the bounds of his command.

  Henry C. Breckinridge, a tall and dashing Wall Street attorney, arrived in Hopewell soon after Lindbergh’s call. A former assistant secretary of war, he had been Lindbergh’s adviser after his
transatlantic flight, earning his complete trust and confidence. But he, too, was intimidated by Lindbergh and was willing enough to let him rule. While both men made it clear to Lindbergh that he was in charge, the truth was Lindbergh didn’t know what to do. A meticulous strategist who left nothing to chance, he prided himself on his logic and methodology, but his reason was fading with his mounting desperation. Lindbergh wanted his baby back, and he made it clear to Schwarzkopf and Breckinridge that he would do anything to ensure his safety.

  At one A.M., while the experts combed the house and grounds for clues, Lindbergh and several state officers formed an old-fashioned posse. For three and a half hours they penetrated the darkness of the roads and nearby homes with their flashlights, questioning all who walked, drove, and lived in the area.

  Although Schwarzkopf and his troopers attempted to protect the southeast corner of the residence, by morning the crime scene was out of control. Once Wednesday dawned, no one could keep the swarms of reporters, photographers, and sightseers from overrunning the grounds and stamping out clues. No one knew how much evidence was lost.9 A fruitless night had left Lindbergh, Breckinridge, and Schwarzkopf exhausted and depressed, sitting in the living room, attempting to formulate a plan.

  Charles was ubiquitous, but Anne seemed to disappear. Since the evening before, she felt that nothing and no one was real. Sequestered with her mother and Elisabeth in the upstairs bedroom, Anne knew that to maintain hope, she had to stay in control—and hope was the essence of survival. Betty Morrow, as usual, was disciplined and stoic, trying to nourish Anne with courage and optimism, but her efforts could only buffer the chaos.10

  Local, state, and federal police moved in and out of the house at will. The public rooms became dormitories and, even in her bedroom, Anne lost her privacy. The garage was converted into a command station; the west wing became a meetinghouse. Policemen lounged in the kitchen along its walls and stairways, talking to one another, reading newspapers, and making telephone calls, and Whateley served them coffee as if they were houseguests.11

  In the town of Hopewell, the local telephone exchange was forced to expand to three times its normal size, which required huge quantities of equipment and help. Temporary telephones were installed in private homes, where reporters vied for accommodations. The hotel lobby was a mass of reporters and curiosity seekers twenty-four hours a day.

  Anne remained in her room, supported by her mother and sister. By the afternoon of March 2, she was tired from not sleeping but was sufficiently in control to compose a letter—straight, factual, and full of optimism—swearing her mother-in-law to secrecy. After relating the details of the crime as she knew them, Anne relayed the information that had not been released.12 The intruder knew their schedule in Englewood and Hopewell and was familiar with the baby’s room. But the search had yielded no fingerprints, because everything was handled with gloves. Meticulously done and precisely planned, it seemed like the work of a professional. “I was afraid of a lunatic,” Anne wrote.13

  And so was Schwarzkopf. While Anne relayed small bits about the investigation, Schwarzkopf and his dogged investigator, Arthur T. Keaton, thought the unthinkable. They believed the baby was dead. The appearance of the crib suggested that he had been yanked from the bed sheets by his head, and the ransom note, uncharacteristically, contained no threats against the baby’s life.14 While they tried to assuage Anne’s fears, they believed that what had taken place was a cold-blooded killing—desperate and mercenary, but not the work of professionals. Nonetheless, they encouraged Anne’s guarded optimism and begged her patience and understanding. They hoped the nationwide dragnet of police along with the outpouring of media coverage and public interest would coerce the kidnappers to return the child.

  In fact, the sympathy and the publicity were working against them. While the world chattered, the kidnappers kept silent. Broadcasters and reporters clogged the radio and telegraph wires with sentimental talk devoid of substance, and the newspapers, seeking to feed the public interest, cranked out thousands of stories more imagined than real. Newspapers worldwide had made the kidnapping front-page copy. From Pittsburgh to Paris, news about the Lindbergh baby superseded issues of domestic and foreign concern. On March 2, millions of Chinese peasants were still being battered by floods as thousands of their soldiers were killed by the Japanese invaders.15 Nonetheless, all eyes were on Hopewell, New Jersey.

  The rivalry grew intense among city, state, and national agencies, which vied for power and jurisdiction. Each wanted to be “the charging knight on horseback, slaying the dragon for public acclaim.”16 Since there was no federal kidnapping law permitting the police to apprehend criminals across state lines, and the crime had occurred outside the city in a rural town, the New Jersey State Police held their ground. Bent on proving that he and his troopers were worthy of their task, Schwarzkopf eschewed the help of the New York City police and the FBI. He would not share his information, and J. Edgar Hoover, head of the FBI, was riddled with jealousy.17 He wanted the spotlight and the center stage, and was put out by his inferior status. Still, it was estimated that 100,000 policemen, including the 35,000 local officers, were searching for Charlie, as well as thousands of ordinary citizens.18 Calling the Lindberghs a testimony to American youth and decency, Commonweal magazine wrote, “It is hardly an exaggeration to say … these two young people … are under the whole world’s protection.”19

  But Lindbergh didn’t want protection. He feared that the authorities would scare the kidnappers away and thwart his efforts at communication. To make matters worse, Governor Harry A. Moore of New Jersey had publicly announced that he would seek to make kidnapping a capital crime, and he offered a $25,000 reward to anyone who could guarantee the baby’s safe return. Deeply concerned that public sentiment would alienate the kidnappers, Charles persuaded the governor to rescind the offer.20 Charles continued to remind the police that the safety of his child, not justice, was his prime concern. Schwarzkopf, whose moves were complicated by his friendship with Lindbergh, tried to play the middle ground. Outwardly, he complied with Lindbergh’s rules; covertly, he authorized Keaton to circumvent them.

  Thirty-five policemen representing the state as well as adjacent cities and counties patrolled the Lindbergh estate, screening all visitors who entered on foot or by car. Despite an illusion of progress, by the end of the second day the police had come up with nothing. False leads abounded, yet the police could hardly ignore anyone with a reasonable story. Well-intentioned housewives, thrill-seeking teenagers, good-hearted neighbors, and observant and earnest citizens had produced nothing but false leads and further intrusion.21

  Anne was the primary object of curiosity. Everyone wanted a glimpse of the bereaved mother. The press observed her every move, following her even on her daily walk. One man, suited like a “gentleman,” convinced the police as well as Charles that he had made contact with the kidnapper. He demanded to speak with Anne immediately, but once in her private quarters, he began to rant and rave, in Shakespearean cadences, about the “slings and arrows” of human fortune. He had to be tackled and dragged out the door.22

  The Lindberghs received thousands of letters, requiring the efforts of two policemen eight hours a day to sort and peruse. Beginning the day after the kidnapping, the mail—about seven hundred letters a day—was dumped, pound by pound, into barrels.23 The dreams, tears, and idiocies of the public clamored for the Lindberghs’ attention, even in their grief.

  Nonetheless, Anne, knowing her mother-in-law’s keen sense of order and public decorum, wrote to her on March 2 that everything was under control. Charles was remaining cool and lucid in the face of so much confusion.

  In fact, nothing was under control, and nothing was happening. Frustrated by the lack of progress, Keaton quietly interrogated the servants, against Charles’s instructions. From the beginning, Charles had made it clear that the Lindbergh and Morrow servants were above suspicion. The equation was simple. To suspect them was to implicate himself—to expos
e his flawed judgment. Not only was his reputation at stake; his psychological integrity was, too. If the servants had duped him, then no one was in control. That burden was more than Charles could bear, and he instinctively protected himself and Anne.

  Keaton, however, pursued his theory that it was an “inside job.”24 Although it was clear that someone could have gleaned sufficient information from newspapers and newsreels and from careful observation of the patterns of the household, it was possible that some of the thirty-odd servants inside the Lindbergh and Morrow homes had worked in concert to inform the abductors or to protect their movements.25 Any one of the servants might have had reason enough; several of them could have created a phalange of lies. While coincidence is always the enemy of the truth, the servants’ relations with one another and with the Lindberghs raised questions that begged to be asked.

  Except for a factor of incredible luck, it was nearly impossible to time the crime with precision. The servants had reported that no one but the baby was on the second floor between 8:35 and 9:10, and the Lindberghs’ dog, Wahgoosh,26 had not barked. Had he heard strangers, Wahgoosh, a fox terrier with acute hearing, would have made their presence known. But he had not been on guard as usual outside the baby’s room on the second-floor landing.27

  Anne was haunted by the dog’s silence, but was too frightened to ask the obvious. Instead of confronting the servants, questioning why the dog had been removed, she tried to think of reasons for his not barking. The extreme force of the wind, she reasoned, had drowned the sounds of the intruders’ movements. Furthermore, Charles had designed the house with eighteen-inch-thick stone walls and reinforced concrete floors and ceilings to prevent a fire from destroying it, as had happened to his childhood home in Minnesota. Ironically, the fortress Charles built against his fears muffled the sounds that might have permitted him to save his child.