Charles Manson Essay, Research Paper

On Saturday, August ninth, nineteen

sixty-nine, all hell broke loose with more than six dozen plunges of a carving

fork and knife, and the peaceful dyll was shattered. Out of the chaos caused by

the senseless, horrific murderers, Charles Manson emerged as one of the most

feared notorious criminals of all time. In the twenty-nine years since the

so-called "Tate-La Bianca" murders, many people have speculated about

what caused Charles Manson to become the monster he turned to be. To be able to

fully comprehend what could cause an innocent child to evolve into a ruthless

calculating cold- blooded killer, one must completely examine the events of his

life. Charles Manson was born Charles Milles Maddox, the son of an unwed mother,

in Cincinnati Ohio on November twelfth, nineteen thirty-four. His father, he

stated in his autobiography, was a "young drugstore cowboy", a

transient laborer who abandoned Charles’ mother when he learned that she was

pregnant. Shortly after Charles’ birth, Kathleen Maddox lived with a man named

William Manson, and they eventually got married. William Manson gave his new

stepson his name, although the marriage dissolved shortly thereafter. Raised in

a strict, religious home, Kathleen Maddox- Manson rebelled after the breakup of

her marriage. She reveled in her newfound freedom by drinking a lot and loving

freely. Like many young mothers, Kathleen was not yet ready for the

responsibilities that go along with the raising of a child. She had fled a

stifling home life and rushed into marriage, and she had a lot of living to do

before she settled down. Charles was passed from relative to relative to

baby-sitter, and was soon sold to a waitress in a restaurant in exchange for a

pitcher of beer. An uncle tracked him down and took him home several days later.

When Charles was five years old, his mother and a man were convicted of robbing

a service station in Charlestown, West Virginia. They’d used a Coke bottle to

knock the attendant unconscious. Caught and sentenced to five years in

Moundsville Prison, her work assignment was near death row. West Virginia was a

hanging state at that time, and part of Kathleen’s job was to clean the area

that included the scaffold. One day as she was cleaning, she saw a man being

escorted to the scaffold. Normally on hanging days, nobody except the person to

be executed and the prison officials were allowed near the hanging area, but on

that day, by accident or oversight, the prison officials neglected to inform

Kathleen of the day’s plans. Afraid she might be in trouble for being in the

vicinity, she hid in a nearby broom closet. When the trap sprung, the inmate’s

weight and sheer velocity caused the rope to sever his head, and as Kathleen

opened the door to get a glimpse of the hanging, it promptly rolled to

kathleen’s hiding place. She told Charles years later that mans eyes were still

wide open and death literally stared her in the face. Twenty-seven years after

that incident, Charles Milles Manson was placed on Death Row. In his

autobiography, "Manson: In His Own Words", he explained a sobering

moment."I looked at the gas chamber. The rooms two viewing windows looked

like two huge eyes of death. Instantly my mind flashed to my mother, and I had a

vision of her looking into the eyes of death. During that moment, I understood

more about my mom than any other time in my life". Charles’ mother was

released from prison when he was eight years old, and again he was either being

passed from relative to relative, or they moved around a lot. Eventually, when

Charles was twelve years old, his mother found a steady boyfriend. He soon tired

of having Charles around and gave Kathleen an ultimatum: him or Charles. Charles

was placed in the Gibault Home for Boys in Tierre Haute, Indiana. It was a

strict Catholic religious-oriented school, and the punishment for even the

tiniest infraction was either a wooden paddle, or a leather strap. Eventually,

living at Gibault got to be too much for Charles, and he ran away. He slept in

the woods, under bridges, and wherever else he could find a place. He finally

reached Indianapolis where he burglarized a grocery store for something to eat.

He found the cash register change in a cigar box under the counter. It was

slightly over a hundred dollars, and the first thing he did was rent a room in

Skid Row, and eat as much as he could possibly handle. A few days later he was

broke and tired so he’d steal whatever he could to accumulate a little extra

money. One day he stole a bicycle and was eventually arrested, the police

realized he was a runaway and located his mother. Unable to provide a stable

home life, Charles was placed in Father Flanagan’s Boy’s Town. Four days later,

he and another boy ran away. They stole a car and wrecked it, followed by

committing a few robberies resulted in their arrest, and they were placed in a

juvenile home. Charles’ stay there was a repeat of his stay in the previous

homes, and he was placed in a bonafied reform school. It was at the Indiana

School for Boys at Plainfield that Charles Manson was beaten and raped

repeatedly for over three years. He finally escaped successfully when he was

sixteen years old. Headed towards California, he and a friend stole cars and

robbed stores along the way. Again he was arrested, and during the next

thirty-eight months he spent time in four different institutions. In May of

nineteen fifty-four, at the age of nineteen, he was finally paroled. Shortly

thereafter he was married. Working at a race track at the time, he stopped by a

card room and played a few hands of poker. He racked up quite a pile of winnings

and was surrounded by a group of girls. Paying them no attention, he caught the

eye of a girl across the room. She was with her father, a coal-miner. Later,

Charles managed to speak a few words to her. They started dating, and married

shortly thereafter, in January of nineteen fifty-five. She became pregnant

almost immediately. Desiring to head to California but needed a car to take him

there, Charles stole a ‘51 Mercury. Predictably, he was caught. He was sent to

the Federal Penitentiary at Terminal Island, San Pedro. He was, by then,

twenty-one years old. Those first few months in prison, Charles had a positive

outlook on life, with thoughts of leading a straight, crime-free life when he

was paroled. Before the baby-little Charlie-was a year old, Charles’ wife

stopped visiting. He heard from his mother that his wife had left the state with

her new boyfriend, a trucked. Devastated, he wrote her several letters begging

her to return, but to no ovail. In his autobiography, Charles Manson states,

"when I gave up on her, my attitude of wanting to be Mr. Straight left me.

I went back to being bitter and hating everyone". Shuffled from home to

home as a child, knowing his prostitute mother never wanted him, being in and

out of juvenile homes and adult jails, Charles Manson was becoming the Charles

Manson we’ve all heard about and feared. He was released from Terminal Island

and served several years. Paroled in nineteen sixty-seven at age thirty-two, he

asked if he could stay. "You know what, man, I don’t wanna leave! I don’t

have a home out there! Why don’t you just take me back inside? I’m serious man!

I mean it! I don’t wanna leave". He did, however, leave Terminal Island

that day. It was March twenty-first, nineteen sixty-seven, and the last time

he’d pass through those doors. Charles Manson headed to San Francisco. Once

there, he liked to hang out at the University of California-Berkeley campus and

play his guitar. One day, while doing so, he was sitting on the grass when a dog

started sniffing his feet. He raised his foot as if to kick it, and it’s owner

appeared. Her name was Mary Theresa Brunner, and she would become the first

member of his "Family". She was tall and thin, a straight-laced

redhead. Charles convinced her to let him stay with her, but there was to be no

sex involved. Eventually, however, the situation changed. Charles somewhat

changed Mary’s personality. She let her guard down and became more open-minded.

She quit her job as the University of California-Berkeley librarian and she and

Charles stole a car and traveled. They slept at waysides and such and they’d go

to beaches where occasionally they would find a homeless girl. The girl would

then join the group. Thus began the Manson family. The family soon grew to more

than thirty people. They moved into Spahn’s Movie Ranch, just outside of

Chatsworth California. Few of the Family members actually held jobs, so they had

to scrounge for food in the dumpsters at local supermarkets. Their only other

needs or desires were sex and drugs, both of which were readily available in the

nineteen sixties. Charles Manson and the Family lived at the ranch until the

arrests and convictions of those hideous crimes in August of nineteen

sixty-nine. Los Angeles Police Department officers were called to 10050 Cielo

Drive in Bel Air. They were met with a crime scene so horrible and bloody that

it might well have come from a Hollywood movie. There were five victims, all

viciously slain. They were Abigail Folger, Voytek Frykowski, Jay Sebring, Steven

Parent, and Sharon Tate-Polanski. On the door to the home where they lost their

lives, a word was written on the door: PIG. It was later established to be

written in the blood of Sharon Tate. The Family members physically involved in

the killings were Charles "Tex" Watson, Patricia "Katie"

Krenwinkle, Susan Atkins, Leslie Van Hueten, and Linda Kasabian. As the five

about-to-be killers started to walk up the driveway, they saw headlights. A car

appeared and the killers crouched down in the shrubbery. When the car stopped,

Tex Wattson approached the driver, Steven Parent. Watson pulled out his

twenty-two caliber Buntline revolver and shot Parent. They then pushed the car

back off the driveway. Assured that the shots fired hadn’t alerted neighbors or

authorities, they entered the house. A man, Voytek Frykowski, had fallen asleep

with the lights on. Shouting "wake up", Tex Watson approached him and

shot. Susan Atkins, meanwhile, had been exploring the rest of the home. Tex

ordered her to bring the rest of the occupants of the house to the living room.

Folger, Sebring, And Tate herded into the room. Tex ordered Susan Atkins to tie

a rope around the prisoners’ necks, and the Sebring lunged at Watson, Tex

stabbed her and she fell to the floor. Susan was adding more bonds to Frykowski

when she was ordered by Tex, "kill him" she stabbed away, while he

struggled. Somehow he escaped and Watson chased him into the yard, delivering

the fatal thrusts. Reentering the house, he hit Folger on the head with his

revolver. Dead she fell to the floor. Sharon Tate was still frozen with fear and

stupefaction. Remembering her, Tex Watson and Susan Atkins ignored her pleas for

her unborn child’s life and stabbed her to death. The killers then scribbled

messages such as "HELTER SKELTER" and "PIG" everywhere,

using their victims blood. The next night, the grisly horror was repeated at the

home of Leno and Rosemary La Bianca. Leno La Bianca was dead as a result of

twenty-six stab wounds. A fork protruded from his stomach, and a knife from his

throat. When his body was discovered, Rosemary La Bianca had been found stabbed

forty-one times. Again messages were scrawled on the walls in the victims blood:

"DEATH TO PIGS", "RISE", and "HELTER SKELTER" A

couple of months later, all of the hands-on killer’s, plus Charles Manson were

arrested. Ultimately tried and convicted, all spent many years in prison, with

the exception of Linda Kasabian. She became the prosecutions star witness and

was given immunity in exchange for her testimony. The rest of the killers were

sentenced to death. Shortly thereafter, however, the state of California revoked

the death penalty and their sentences were communed to life. To date, one of the

women has been released, the remaining two are still in prison, and of course ,

so is Charles Manson. Even now, twenty-nine years after the terrible tragedies,

people still speculate as to why Charles Manson turned into such an inhumane

monster. His past speaks for itself but all I have to say is, parents: take care

of your children. Stand up for them, lead them, teach them, and don’t turn away

from them, maybe that way, you won’t be responsible for what might happen to

them.