Do you know anything of the kidnap of Charlie Chaplin?

Charlie Chaplin was one of “The Greats” from the silent era.  Compared to the careers of other film directors and comics the career of Charlie Chaplin reached the stratosphere. 

Like many film makers he settled in America.  However, in 1952, he left America for one last time.  He had fallen foul of the authorities who believed he had communist sympathies.  Chaplin certainly had left wing sympathies.  In 1940 he produced a satirical film called The Great Dictator.  It ended with a speech that criticised blind obedience to patriotic nationalism.  In 1942, he spoke out in favour of opening a second front in Europe and, according to a quote in the Daily Worker, he suggested not just that Communism would sweep the world but that it would be a good thing for human progress.  During the 1950s in the  fiercely anti-communist McCarthy era he was under investigation as a suspected communist.  When he travelled to London to attend the premier of Limelight in 1952 the US authorities closed the door and refused to let him back into the country.

Chaplin settled near Vevey, a picturesque town on the north shore of Lake Geneva in Switzerland.  Here, he spent the rest of his life.

Charlie Chaplin died in his sleep following a stroke at the age of 88 on Christmas Day 1977.  Two days later following a quiet family service his body was laid to rest in the little cemetery of Corsier-sur-Vevey.

Three months later, on 2 March 1978, press headlines loudly reported that the grave of Sir Charles Chaplin had been violated.  The body was missing.  The Swiss police began an investigation.  Interpol was alerted.  There was one small clue.  A man said that shortly before midnight he had heard the sound of a pick axe coming from the cemetery.

In public, the police searched for motives.  The author Frederick Sands mentioned in a book that the comedian had once expressed a wish to be buried in his homeland, England.  Was the kidnap the work of a group of devoted followers who wanted to bring the body to England? Was there any significance in the fact that Chaplin who was Jewish was buried in a Gentile cemetery?  In public, the investigators were stumped.  There seemed no motive.

In private the Chaplin family were receiving threatening calls.  It took the kidnappers took two weeks to pluck up the courage to call Lady Chaplin.  Lady Chaplin was so deeply upset that the call was taken by her daughter, Geraldine.  The kidnapper threatened to shoot Geraldine’s younger brother and sister unless his demands were met.  He wanted £330,000 and would call back.   Lady Chaplin was in no mood to yield considering that ”Charlie would have found the whole thing ridiculous”.  Jean-Felix Paschoud, the family lawyer, arranged  to take the calls.  The police had already tapped the line and were installing listening devices in public phone booths across  Lausanne.   There was hope. The kidnapper was lowering his demands in each successive call.  Then came an ultimatum. The kidnapper would call back the following morning with instructions for the final ransom. 

The police were ready.  They kept watch on over 200 public phone boxes and made an arrest the following morning.  They arrested Roman Wardas, a Polish motor mechanic.  Wardas immediately confessed but refused to name his accomplice.  The police quickly worked through a list of acquaintances.  The accomplice was Galtischo Gamev, a Bulgarian motor mechanic. 

When the pair were questioned it was discovered that they were highly incompetent.  Wardas had read a newspaper report about a grave-robbing in Italy and had decided to give it a go.  The pair had taken the corpse fifteen lies from Corsier, to a cornfield on the edge of Lake Geneva where Wardas used to go fishing. Neither could remember precisely where they had buried the body.  The police had to locate it using mine detectors.  Wardas was sentenced to four and a half years of hard labour. Gamev was given a suspended sentence of 18 months.

The corpse was reburied in a tomb lined with concrete in the little cemetry of Corsier-sur-Vevey.