Charles Manson and the Infamous Killings of the 1960’s

Editor’s Note: The following article contains graphic detail. 

Charles Milles Maddox, better known as Charles Manson, was born on November 12, 1934. The 82 year old is notoriously known for several crimes he and his “family” committed. In the era of flower power, peace, and free love arose the Manson family in the beauty of California. When the family started to form, Manson was an unemployed former convict, who had spent nearly all of his life in correctional institutions.

As a child, Manson did not have an easy life. His mother Kathleen Maddox was just 16 years old when she had Manson. His mother was an alleged heavy drinker and she once sold her son to a waitress for a pitcher of beer and a few days later his uncle went to retrieve him. When he was young, his mother and his uncle were sent to prison for five years for robbing a bank.

While Manson’s mother was serving time in prison, he went to live with his aunt and uncle. Two years after the crime, she got released from prison due to parole. She got Manson back and lived with him in several hotel rooms. Being so young, his mother put Manson up for foster care, however failed because there were no such homes available for him. However, the stories that he told about his mother and his childhood were alleged because he told many interviewers different stories about his early life and some were untrue.

As a young kid, Manson was robbing liquor stores, but eventually got caught in the act and was sent to Indianapolis juvenile center. He tried escaping but was recaptured and was placed in Boys Town which, four days later, he and another young boy escaped and the two committed armed robberies. Being caught again after breaking into grocery stores, he was sent back to Indianapolis juvenile center. After many failed attempts of escaping he finally escaped with two other boys.

In 1951, they got caught in Utah for driving a stolen car while on their way to California. Before getting caught, they robbed several filling stations. Manson was charged for the federal crime he committed which was stealing a car. Manson was sent to Washington, D.C.’s National Training School For Boys. After that imprisonment he was in and out of prison three times.

Before committing his biggest crime he had a life. Manson was a singer-songwriter on the edge of Los Angeles music industry, and after he got charged for the crimes he committed in the late 60s, his songs were released commercially and various artists covered many of his songs. Manson was also married two times and had three children.

Manson murdered several people, but he was not the only one who did the malicious job, he sent several members of the Manson family who joined his cult to murder as well. Manson’s followers committed a sequence of nine murders in four locations over an interval of five weeks. The most famous murders they committed were Tate murders and LaBianca murders.

On the night of August 9, 1969 Charles “Tex” Watson, former cult member of the family, took orders from Manson to direct three women to accompany Watson and to kill everyone in the Melcher’s former home; which Manson had known as the Melcher’s residence. The family continued to kill five people: Sharon Tate, who was 8 months pregnant with her first born, Jay Sebring, Abigail Folger, Wojciech Frykowski, and Steven Parent, who had been visiting the caretaker of the home. One of the members wrote the word “pig” with blood on the front door of the house. These murders created a nationwide sensation.

The next night on August 10, 1969 six family members, four that murdered the previous night, and Manson along side with them drove a few hours and arrived at the home of supermarket executive Leno and Rosemary LaBianca. Manson snuck into the house by himself and came back to tell the family that he had tied them up. Manson then instructed one of the members to put pillow cases around the couple’s head and tie the pillow cases with lamp cords.

Manson ordered some of the other members to kill the couple. One of the members stabbed Leno LaBianca with a chrome-plated bayonet and continued to stab him a total of 12 times. After he was done with his gruesome job he carved “WAR” on LaBianca’s abdomen. The family members moved on to Rosemary LaBianca and stabbed her with a kitchen knife.

Manson instructed one of the male members to make sure the girls take a part in the stabbing. So one of the girls took over and stabbed Rosemary 16 times in the back and on her buttocks. They left her dead with 41 stab wounds. After the killings one of the members wrote “Rise” and “Death to pigs” on the walls and “Helter Skelter” on the refrigerator door in LaBianca’s blood. One of the girls later gave Leno LaBianca 14 puncture wounds with an ivory-handled, two-tined carving fork which she left in his stomach and left a steak knife in his throat.

Manson, Patricia Krenwinkle, and Charles Watson were convicted of all seven murders: five on August 9 at the home of Roman Polanski and actress Sharon Tate, and two on August 10 at the home of Leno and Rosemary LaBianca. Susan Atkins was convicted of five murders August 9 and during August 10, she remained in the car. Leslie Van Houten was convicted of the two murders on August 10.

The following killers were sentenced to death but were later sentenced to life due to the California Supreme Court’s 1972 ruling in People vs. Anderson: Manson, Krenwinkel, Atkins, Watson, and Van Houten. Steve Grogan remained in the car during the two murders committed on August 9th and 10th. Later that month he was convicted of the murder. Linda Kasabian was charged in all seven but was granted immunity in exchange for testimony.

Charles Manson is now 82 and has had hundreds of rules violations and has gotten in trouble for having a cellphone and homemade weapon while incarcerated. He has been in Corcoran Prison since 1971. He has been denied parole 12 times and his next parole hearing is scheduled for 2027, when he will be 92 years old.

In 2014 Manson got engaged with 27-year-old Afton Elaine Burton but their marriage license expired before they could marry. Recently, Manson was sent to the hospital from prison due to gastrointestinal problems but a few days later returned to prison.

Actor Al Lewis, who hired Manson to babysit his children on a couple of occasions described Manson as he knew him:

“He was a nice guy when I knew him.”

Charles Manson describes himself and his life during his testimony in 1970:

“I never went to school, so I never growed up to read and write too good, so I have stayed in jail and I have stayed stupid, and I stayed a child while I have watched your world grow up, and then I look at the things that you do and I don’t understand. You meet and you kill things that are better than you are, and then you say how bad, and even killers, your children are. You made your children what they are…”