Manson’s life of crime began at an early age. At 12 he had been sent to reform school. He escalated from started by robbing stores to stealing cars and eventually orchestrating seven murders. He is pictured in 1966
Charles Manson was not destined to become a household name. It wasn’t in the cards for him to become the focus of a national bestseller, featured in splashy news headlines or have an adoring family of followers.
He was meant to remain among the dregs of society, to follow in the footsteps of his incarcerated mother and definitely not raise to the rank of celebrity. Yet, he did both.
‘Maybe I should have killed 400 or 500 people… then I would have felt better,’ Manson said in 1987. ‘Then I would have felt I really offered society something.’
The notorious ‘mad eyed’ killer from Cincinnati was in prison after he was convicted in January 1971 for conspiracy to commit murder.
He directed his mostly young, female followers to murder seven people including actress Sharon Tate, the pregnant wife of filmmaker Roman Polanski. She was stabbed 16 times by cult members.
At 36, life in confinement was not new to Manson. He was in reform schools and juvenile centers when he was 12, a pattern of incarceration that would continue throughout his life.
It started with robbing liquor and grocery stores, escalated to stealing cars, pimping women, and committing forgery and ended with to orchestrating cold-blooded murders.
‘I’m special,’ Manson said. ‘I’m not like the average inmate. I have spent half my life in prison. I am a very dangerous man.’
Cult leader Charles Manson (pictured left in August 2017 and right in October 2014) has died aged 83
Patricia Krenwinkel (center) with Manson Family members Susan Atkins (left) and Leslie van Houten in 1969. All three were convicted of murder
Manson was an accident. He was born to 16-year-old Kathleen Maddox November 12, 1934, who was unready for the motherhood. She often left her young son in a relative’s care so she could continue with her wild lifestyle.
At one point the teenage mother allegedly gave Manson to another woman for a pitcher of beer.
Manson showed ‘dangerous’ signs of his penchant for violence at the start of his adulthood. At 18 he was moved to a high security reformatory after he sodomized a boy while a razor was held to the boy’s throat.
‘If I wanted to kill somebody I’d take this book and beat you to death with it and I wouldn’t feel a thing,’ Manson said. ‘It would be just like walking to the drugstore.’
Charles Manson is pictured smiling while wearing a suit and tie. His life of crime started young
In prison Manson became obsessed with music and learned how to play the steel guitar. He began singing and making music. He believed his musical talents would earn him fame and a following.
In a way, it did. After his release in 1967, he moved to California and attracted his young, impressionable followers with music. Manson was a fan of the Beatles, who he believed were angels.
He thought their song Helter Skelter was a message about an upcoming race war started by blacks. When no race riot erupted, Manson took it upon himself to help start it.
The American public first heard of Manson and his Family when actress Sharon Tate, 26, was viciously murdered at her home. She was eight months pregnant with husband Roman Polanski’s child when she was stabbed to death, with an X cut into her stomach and one of her breasts cut off, according to a Time article published in 1969.
The gruesome Manson Family didn’t stop there. In addition to Tate’s murder, Manson orchestrated his Family to murder six other victims.
Manson was eventually revealed as the mastermind and convicted of conspiracy of murder. He was given the death sentence but it was changed to life sentences after California abolished the death penalty.
Front page of the Los Angeles Times on January 26 1971 reporting on the conviction the previous day of Charles Manson and three members of his ‘Family’
Although Manson did not personally kill any of the seven victims, he was found guilty of ordering their murders.
He was later convicted of ordering the murders of music teacher Gary Hinman, stabbed to death in July 1969, and stuntman Donald ‘Shorty’ Shea, stabbed and bludgeoned that August.
Manson’s life in prison wasn’t all grim. He was caught twice with a contraband cell phone and was engaged to Afton Elaine ‘Star’ Burton when she was 27 and he was 80, in 2014. Their marriage license expired and were never married. Burton first started seeing Manson when she was 19 after she moved from Illinois to California so she could visit him.
Manson died Sunday aged 83 one week after he was admitted to hospital.