Dion
O'Banion was the owner of a florist shop in Chicago.
After the passing of the National Prohibition
Act he was also one of the main providers of illegal alcohol in
Chicago. In 1926 O'Banion was shot dead outside his shop. His gang
were convinced that the murder had been ordered by Al
Capone, a rival bootlegger. Soon
after O'Banion's death eight cars filled with gangsters, raked Capone's
headquarters with machine-gun fire. This heralded the start of Chicago's
gar wars. Over the next few years over 500 gangsters were killed in
the city. The most notorious case was an event that became known as
the St. Valentine's Day Massacre.
At half-past ten on 14th February, 1929, six members of the Bugs Moran
gang were sitting in a garage waiting for a consignment of illegal
alcohol. Instead a Cadillac arrived carrying three men dressed as
policemen. They were accompanied by two men in civilian clothes. The
policemen entered the building and told the six gangsters and John
May, a mechanic working in the garage, to stand in a row against the
wall with their hands in the air. This was common procedure during
a police raid and the men did as they were told. The two civilians
then entered the garage and mowed them down with sub-machine gun fire.
Although it was assumed that the murders had been ordered by Al
Capone, no one was ever convicted of the crime.
John Miller, St. Valentine's Day Massacre (1929)
(1)
John Miller, photographer with the Chicago American (February,
1929)
I was on assignment at Van Buren and Ogden Avenue, and had just called
the office. They told me to go to Garfield and North Clark where there
was a shooting. I got into my car, raced through red lights, and got
there just as the first bunch of cops were going in. I went with them.
Sprawled grotesquely at the base of the bullet-riddled stone wall
were six distorted bodies; a seventh lay slumped over a wooden chair.
One of the officers called out, "This one's Pete Gusenberg, an
ex-con and the chief gunner for the Drucci-Moran gang. Here's Al Weinshank,
the North Side booze runner, and Artie Davis from the West Side mob.
And this was James Clark, Bugs Moran's brother-in-law. Here what's
left of Doc Schwimmer." The other mobster was Frank Gusenberg,
the only one still alive. He died within half an hour without giving
the police any information.
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