Monday, March 18, AD 2024 10:08pm

February 14, 1929: Saint Valentine’s Day Massacre

Ninety years since the event that made Chicago infamous around the globe.  Ironies abound in the Saint Valentine’s Day massacre by which Chicago gangster Al Capone sought to destroy his competitor gangster Adelard Cunin, known to infamy as George “Bugs” Moran.  Moran had made a failed attempt on Capone’s life, which led to Capone, leading the Italian dominated South Side Gang, to target Moran and Moran’s Irish dominated North Side Gang.  Capone had a false call made to Moran on February 13, 1929 tempting him with a truck load of liquor from Detroit that he could have at a bargain price.  Moran ordered that the truck deliver the liquor the next morning at 10:30 AM at the garage of the S.M.C. Cartage Company on North Clark Street where Moran kept his bootlegging trucks.  Instead, two of Capone’s men, disguised as cops, appeared at the garage and ordered the seven men present to line up against a wall.  Two professional killers then entered the garage with tommy-guns and, with the aid of the two fake cops, murdered the men, only gangster Frank Gusenberg survived long enough to make it to the hospital and honor the gangland code of silence prior to his death, refusing to say anything about who was responsible.  Ironies to take note of in this example of gangland savagery:

  1.  If Moran hadn’t slept in that morning he would have been among the dead.  Albert Weinshank, one of the dead, looked like Moran and probably when he was seen entering the garage caused Capone’s hit squad to go into action.
  2. Two of the seven men killed had the abysmal bad luck to simply be in the wrong place at the wrong time. One was optician Reinhardt Schwimmer who liked to gamble and palled around with members of the gang.  The other was mechanic John May who was working on a car.
  3. Moran was not put out of business by the murders, but kept control of his territory through the end of prohibition.  He would die in prison in 1957.
  4. The two probable Capone hit men involved in the Saint Valentine’s Day Massacre did not live to see another Valentine’s day.  The bodies of John Scalise and Albert Anselmi were found in the wee hours of the morning on May 8, 1929 on a lonely road near Hammond, Indiana.  They were joined in death by gangster Joseph Giunta.  The three men had been severely beaten and then shot to death.  It is likely that they had been involved in a plot against Capone.  Capone, ever a fanatic baseball fan, had worked them over with a bat before having his gunmen finish the task.
  5. Public revulsion against the Saint Valentine’s Day Massacre was so intense that the Federal government made a maximum effort to get Capone.  Capone’s tactical victory in the Massacre led directly to his eventual downfall for income tax evasion.
  6. Both Al Capone and Bugs Moran repented their sins before their deaths and may have stolen Heaven in the tradition established by Saint Dismas.
  7. I sat next to one of the last survivors of Al Capone’s gang back in the eighties during a Chamber of Commerce dinner.  Now a kindly great grandfather, he had gotten out of Chicago decades before and invested in farmland in Livingston County.  I resisted the temptation to ask him if any gangster bodies were buried in said farmland.

 

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Ernst Schreiber
Ernst Schreiber
Thursday, February 14, AD 2019 7:13am

“Only Al Capone kills like that.”

T. Shaw
T. Shaw
Thursday, February 14, AD 2019 8:36am

“What are you prepared to do?”

Sean Connery won “Best Supporting Actor” Oscar for his role in “The Untouchables.”

Urban legend was that the M1921 Thompson submachine was “big” with the IRA, reportedly not true.

In addition to the Thompson, gangsters used the Browning Automatic Rifle (BAR) – harder to conceal, though. .

Ernst Schreiber
Ernst Schreiber
Thursday, February 14, AD 2019 8:42am

You left the gaahuuurrrrrr off the end there.

Great movie.

“Where is Nitti?”

“He’s in the car.”

Foxfier
Admin
Thursday, February 14, AD 2019 3:40pm

I resisted the temptation to ask him if any gangster bodies were buried in said farmland.

Good.

While no doubt many folks did do that, but that the annoyance was part of his penance– while refraining from that kind of annoying of someone who seems to have corrected himself is a good work on your part.

Plus, it means that he wouldn’t have to add lies to his list of sins.

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