Charles Manson

Charles Milles Manson was born on November 12, 1934, in Ashland, Kentucky. His final arrest took place in Los Angeles County, California, on October 12, 1970, on the charges of murder and conspiracy to commit murder. He was originally sentenced to death, but his sentence was commuted to life in prison in 1976. Since March 15, 1989, Charles Manson has been housed at the California State Prison in Corcoran, California.

Charles Manson possesses a kind of charisma that enabled him to attract many (approximately 55) wayward, itinerant, desperate, and directionless people to form a cult. He referred to these individuals as his “family,” and they would later be responsible for one of the most infamous murder sprees in U.S. history. Manson was fixated on his belief that to create the social changes promoted during the 1960s, the oppressive social order needed to be dissolved into chaos. He believed that because of the intense fear and confusion generated by this state of chaos, people would run “helter-skelter” in the streets—and he convinced his followers to do just that. The homicidal acts in which they engaged sparked national unrest regarding our views on personal safety. No other cult group has captured the imagination of contemporary society quite like the Manson Family.

Some sociologists have argued that the sociopolitical climate was just right for someone like Charles Manson to emerge. At the time, he seemed to have developed as the product of all that was wrong in 1960s American society. He was an illegitimate child who was frequently handed over from relative to relative and occasionally cared for by his mother, Kathy Maddox. At the time she gave birth to Charles, Maddox was living with a man named Bill Manson, though he was not the boy's real father. Some documents indicate that his biological father was a man named Colonel Scott, an African American cook from Ashland, Kentucky. The perception that his father was a black man has important implications regarding Charles's twisted philosophies, theologies, and his worldview in general.

The parent-child bond between Manson and his mother was tenuous at best. She took Charles with her to the bars and street corners where she hustled. Thus, his developing sense of self-worth was significantly affected even before his subsequent involvement with the juvenile justice system. He grew up as an outcast [Page 292]during the later part of the Great Depression, without a stable family to ease the stresses of poverty and emotional isolation.

Manson was taken from his mother and placed with her relatives when he was still very young. In 1940, Kathy Maddox was arrested and convicted of armed robbery and sentenced to Moundsville State Prison in West Virginia. Charles, then 6 years old, was sent to his maternal grandmother's house to live, the same home that his mother had run away from at the age of 15. His life was characterized by an environment of strict religious discipline, thanking the Lord at mealtimes, long prayer sessions before bedtime, and turning the other cheek to every aggressive act from another child. His grandparents were fanatical in their religious practices, fulfilling their Christian duty by taking care of Charles. His grandmother dominated the household, apparently stern and unwavering in her interpretation of “God's plan,” demanding that those under her roof abide by her practices. Drinking and smoking were forbidden in the house. Any display of emotion toward the opposite sex was considered sinful. Facial makeup was evil and only used by the women of the streets. Anyone cursing or using the Lord's name in vain in her presence brought instant righteous condemnation. Charles never witnessed any display of affection between his grandparents. His grandfather was apparently chastised as being a sinner every time he tried to express any warmth or comforting emotions to his wife, and he maintained the harmony of the home through acquiescence and letting his wife rule the house as she saw necessary. He became psychotic and died in an asylum from kidney failure secondary to alcoholism.

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