| Address |
| 2122 N Clark St, Chicago, IL 60614, USA (Chicago, Illinois)
|
| |
| Information |
The Saint Valentine's Day Massacre
This address is the former location of the SMC Cartage Company, site of the infamous Saint Valentine's Day Massacre. On February 14, 1929 members of mobster Al Capone's gang executed members of fellow mobster Bugs Moran's gang in the garage that stood here. A total of five gang members were slain as well as two other men before the day was through.
Gang Warfare
Tensions between Capone's Italian gang from the North Side and Moran's Irish/German gang from the South Side had escalated during the year prior. The two gangs struggled with each for control of Chicago's bootlegging and gambling profits. In the months leading up to the massacre, two men associated with Capone's gang had been murdered. On September 7, 1928, Capone's consigliere, Antonio "The Scourge" Lombardo, had been shot to death. Months later on January 8, 1929, Capone's associate Pasqualino "Patsy" Lolordo was shot and killed in his home. Moran's gang was likely complicit in both crimes. There had likewise been two attempts on the life of Capone gang member, "Machine Gun" Jack McGurn.
"Machine Gun" McGurn appears to have been the driving force behind the massacre that was to occur on Valentine's Day in 1929. Two members of "Bugs" Moran's gang that had reportedly tried to kill McGurn (as well as being involved in the firing of roughly 1,000 rounds of ammunition into Capone's headquarters years earlier in 1926), Frank & Pete Gusenberg, were among the men executed during the Saint Valentine's Day Massacre. Besides wiping out the Gusenberg's and other members of Moran's gang, the plan was to take out Bugs Moran himself. Bugs wasn't present for the massacre on that bloody day however and would live for nearly another 3 decades (outliving Capone himself) before succumbing to lung cancer while serving time at Leavenworth Federal Penitentiary.
The Massacre
Members of Moran's North Side gang were in the SMC Cartage Company. What they were doing at the Company is still unknown. A group of four men, suspected to have been Fred "Killer" Burke, Ray "Crane Neck" Nugent, Gus Winkler and Bob Carey, carried out the murders. It is alleged that there may have been as many as five lookouts hired by Capone from the street as well as members of the Purple Gang. "Shotgun" George Ziegler (AKA: Fred Samuel Goetz) also is suspected to have played a part in the massacre. The story has it that one of the lookouts falsely signaled the hitmen that Bugs Moran had entered the garage along with other members of the Moran gang. However, Moran was not actually present.
In the mid-morning, two hitmen, dressed as police officers and armed with shotguns, entered the garage of the SMC Cartage Company. It appears that they convinced the men inside that this was a police bust and managed to line them up against the back wall. The other two hitmen, dressed in regular clothing, then entered the room with Thompson sub-machine guns and opened fire on the victims. In all, seventy machine gun rounds and two shotgun shells were fired during the course of the massacre.
The two hitmen dressed in street clothes then walked out with their hands in the air, while the remaining two, disguised as officers, walked behind them as if the first two were being arrested. The ruse worked and bystanders on the street mistakenly believed that the situation was already under control. Instead, the killers got away. Ultimately, the suspects were never convicted and the crime technically remains unsolved to this day.
In the wake of the massacre, besides the Gusenberg brothers, gang members Albert Kachalik, Albert Weinshank and Adam Heyer were slain or mortally wounded. Frank Gusenberg supposedly survived long enough from his injuries that he was able to talk with authorities later at the hospital, but refused to finger the men who had shot him and his cohorts. Also slain in the violence was SMC Cartage Company mechanic John May and optometrist Reinhard Schwimmer (a friend of Moran gang members, but not a member himself). They just had the misfortune of being in the wrong place at the wrong time and having dangerous choices in who they associated with.
The only survivor of the massacre was May's German Shepherd dog, Highball. The animal was discovered by police, cowering underneath of a beer truck in the garage, its mournful howls piercing the chilly morning air as its master lay nearby with six other wounded/dead men in a steadily deepening pool of blood on the cool concrete floor.
Bedeviled Bricks and Dismayed Dogs?
The building in which the massacre occurred was demolished in 1967. Entrepreneur George Patey, purchased the bricks from the wall against which the victims had been lined up. He used the bricks in the construction of the Banjo Palace, a Roaring Twenties themed bar in Vancouver, British Columbia. The bricks were used to build a wall in the men's room of the bar. After going out of business, Patey sold the bricks off individually.
The story has it that horrible misfortunes befell anyone who dared to purchase one of these infamous bricks. Various levels of bad luck followed, from divorces to deaths. Other bricks from the property are said to have been sold (as well as some fakes) with similar results for the unlucky buyers. If the curse is real, perhaps the people conned into purchasing unauthentic bricks were actually the lucky ones.
There are also claims of ghostly occurances in the location where the garage once stood. It is now just the empty lawn next to a nursing home, but some claim that strange sounds and sensations have been experienced near the bloody massacre spot. There are reports of locals walking their dogs past the spot witnessing strange reactions in their animals. Dogs whimper and sometimes howl in fear and dismay just like poor Highball, the German Shepherd who cried for his master there so many decades ago. |
| |
| GPS Interface |
Save Waypoint to Garmin Device.
|
|
| |
| User Trips |
| There are no user trips associated with this location. |
| |
| Related Sites |
My Al Capone Museum
An online collection of images and information pertaining to infamous Chicago mobster, Al Capone. It includes the Saint Valentine's Day Massacre. |
Wikipedia: Saint Valentine's Day Massacre
Wikipedia entry for the Saint Valentine's Day Massacre. |
Crime Library: Al Capone
Crime Library's article on mobster Al Capone, including a section on the events surrounding the Saint Valentine's Day Massacre. |
Weird Chicago
Official website for Weird Chicago Tours. |
Chicago Hauntings Tours
Web site for Chicago Hauntings Tours; a business offering guided tours of paranormal and darkly historic sites in the Chicago, Illinois area. |
| |
| Similar Destinations |
| Idle Isle Cafe and Candy Company |
| The Farrar Schoolhouse |
| Hollywood Forever Cemetery |
| |
| See Also on TheCabinet.com |
| Blog: Dark Destination's Birthday: Top 25 Destinations (08/05/08) |
| Blog: The Saint Valentine's Day Massacre (02/16/09) |
| Blog: The Dark Destinations Top 50 for Spring 2009 (05/24/09) |
| |
| Available from Amazon.com |
St. Valentine's Day Massacre |
The St. Valentine's Day Massacre |
Classic Crime Collection - Street Justice (Murder Inc., The French Connection, The St. Valentine's Day Massacre, The Seven-Ups) |
Unsolved History ~ Valentine's Day Massacre |
The St. Valentine's Day Massacre: The Untold Story of the Gangland Bloodbath That Brought Down Al Capone |
The st Valentine's Day Massacre, 1929: FBI Files Relating to the Murder of Seven Members of the Bugs Moran Gang on 14 February 1929 (Uncovered Editions) |
The St. Valentine's Day massacre (A Dell book) |
The St. Valentine's Day Massacre |
The St. Valentine's Day massacre |
St. Valentine's Day Massacre: The Gangland Hit that Shocked America (Amazing Stories) |
[FBI documents regarding the St. Valentine's Day massacre] (SuDoc J 1.14/2:98026097) |
| |
