15 Messed Up Facts You Didn’t Know About The Lindbergh Kidnapping

9. “Cemetery John” Collected The Ransom

Once John Condon got involved in the Lindbergh case, he pretty much started to run the show, receiving letters from the kidnappers, delivering them to police, and then doing whatever they told him to do from there. After some six or seven letters, Condon met with a mysterious man he called “Cemetery John,” who conveniently stood in the shadows and made it hard for Condon to accurately describe him. Regardless, Cemetery John and Condon went on to exchange notes that raised and lowered the ransom amount several times, before finally agreeing to a drop-off on April 2, 1932. Condon delivered the money to a man who “wandered off into the woods” after giving him one last note, claiming the child could be found in a boat near Martha’s Vineyard. Police searched the area without finding a thing, and though Condon swore he could identify Cemetery John if seen again, his story more or less stops here.

10. Little Lindy’s Body Was Found Near His Home

The only worse experience for a family than learning their infant child has been kidnapped would be the inevitable second act to this sort of story. Two months after his disappearance, Charles Lindbergh, Jr.’s body was found partially buried and badly decomposed less than five miles away from his parents’ home. Allegedly, a trucker had stopped along his route to relieve himself in the woods, discovered the body while doing his business, and immediately contacted police. Charles Lindbergh and nurse Betty Gow both identified the body as that of the missing child. Initially, the FBI had been interested in the case as mentioned, but without many leads, there was nothing the organization could really do. Nonetheless, now that the kidnapping case became a murder case, President Hoover declared that all government agencies should lend their full resources to the New Jersey police.