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By 1962 there had been 12 escape attempts at America’s most notorious prison, Alcatraz
Federal Penitentiary, and all of them had failed.
The authorities believed they had finally created a lock-up that no man could escape
from, after all, the prison sat on an island just off the city of San Francisco and even
if a person breached the walls they’d still have to swim through choppy waters and get
to land.
And then in ’62 some men went missing from their cells after hatching an elaborate escape
plan.
These guys vanished into thin air, but subsequent investigations ruled that they must have died
in the water.
There’s no egg on our faces, said the authorities.
Well, that might not be true, and a recent letter could be proof of that.
It all began on June 11, 1962 when four men went missing from their cells.
They were Clarence Anglin, John Anglin, Allen West, and Frank Morris.
The two guys with the same last name were brothers, and they were true tough guys in
the physical sense.
In their childhood they were very strong swimmers and they liked nothing more than to swim in
Lake Michigan, even when the water was very cold.
Hmm, now where should we imprison a couple of brothers who love swimming through ice
cold water?
Anyway...
If the two brothers were strong, Morris could equal them in brains.
He had a high IQ and he was the one who formulated the escape plan.
With homemade tools including sharpened spoons, the guys started digging around a ventilation
vent.
That vent was too small to crawl into, so they had to widen the hole.
They did this over weeks while Morris would play an accordion to drown out the scraping
sound.
As that hole got bigger they placed over it a piece of cardboard that looked just like
the wall.
They knew very well that once they were able to get through the hole they could reach a
utility tunnel.
This became a kind of store room.
Those guys knew very well that even if they did get over the wall they’d have to get
through the water, so they spent months building a raft and they hid it in that tunnel.
This raft was created by sticking together around 50 raincoats they had stolen.
They used a heating process to make the thing air-tight so the raft could be blown up and
could float.
They also made paddles so they could get themselves to land and freedom.
Of course if the guards saw men missing from their cells they would immediately blow the
whistle and the game would be up, but the men created dummies that looked like real
people.
They even used hair they collected from the prison barbers to stick on the dummies’
heads.
The heads themselves were made out of cement and then painted to give the appearance of
human skin.
On the night of the escape the man called West didn’t get very far at all.
He couldn’t get the grill off his vent and he ended up going nowhere.
The fact he remained behind is why we know so much about the escape.
The other guys in short got to a roof, then over fences.
They had their raft intact, but needed to blow it up.
That’s not easy for human lungs, but the guys had another useful tool.
They used the accordion as a kind of pump.
So, what next?
Well, they weren’t seen again.
Bits of the raft were found, but the men’s bodies were never discovered.
And let’s face it, if they had of drowned surely one of them would have been found.
But no, nothing, they were gone, and it’s not like every bit of water wasn’t scanned
for a long time to come.
It wasn’t until 1979 that the FBI closed the case.
Those guys must have died said the FBI, and that’s that, we are closing the book.
But you know what, a lot of people didn’t believe those guys had died that night.
Their escape was a victory to some criminals.
Movies were made about their daring escape and people wanted to believe that they had
been successful.
There were some sightings of the fellas from time-to-time, but no identification has been
conclusive.
Some people say one of the Anglin brothers even attended a funeral, but we can’t say
for sure if that is true.
Then in 2013 a bombshell was dropped.
This is the famous letter that was allegedly written by none other than John Anglin.
(Insert letter.
Credit KPIX 5 https://www.news.com.au/entertainment/tv/alcatraz-escapees-possibly-survived-infamous-prison-break-in-1962/news-story/8859584fc53695221b92c8263c6c7207) While the cops got hold of it in 2013, its
existence to the public didn’t become known until 2018.
This is how it went: “My name is John Anglin.
I escape from Alcatraz in June 1962 with my brother Clarence and Frank Morris.
I’m 83 years old and in bad shape.
I have cancer.
Yes we all made it that night but barely!”
The letter goes on to say that the brains of the operation, Frank Morris, died in 2008,
but the brothers lived on and did so in the United States.
Clarence apparently died in 2011, though.
It seems that John Anglin wanted to come clean since he was sick.
The letter also includes this: “If you announce on TV that I will be promised
to just go to jail for no more than a year and get medical attention I will write back
to let you know exactly where I am.
I am 83 years old and in bad shape.
I have cancer.”
The authorities didn’t follow-up on the letter and it’s not clear why.
It seems they did reopen the case, but contact with the letter writer was never made.
Whoever wrote the letter hasn’t come forward again.
John would be 89 now.
Surely if a man is in his 80s and about to die then he would step out into the light.
If you’re on your deathbed then you likely don’t need to hide from the police, but
John hasn’t appeared.
Did he even contact his family to perhaps say goodbye to them?
Well, a nephew of the brothers said this to the media, “It's always been talked about
through the family.
My grandmother received roses for several years after the escape.”
But still no John.
Even if that nephew knew for a fact John had escaped, surely after his death the family
would have told all and even allowed some DNA tests, but no body has ever been found.
By the way, the letter was analyzed for DNA but the results were inclusive.
People who have written extensively about this case say that if they really did escape
and live long lives, surely someone in this world would know.
If Morris really did die in 2005 surely someone from his family would have said something.
Where is his body?
Was there a funeral?
Still, their bodies weren’t found in the water, either, and we now know that athletes
swim through that water.
Those two brothers with their strong swimming skills could have made it is what many people
think.
Others say they all drowned and the reason their bodies were never recovered is because
they were swept into the Pacific Ocean.
Dutch researchers a few years ago created simulations of the movement of the waters
that night and their conclusion was that on that raft those guys could have escaped, still,
that doesn’t necessarily mean they weren’t swept away.
We looked to see if anything else came up after that letter was sent, and there is nothing.
For that reason, we think that it’s unlikely that the letter was written by John.
In his death throes he would have told someone who he was and we would have heard about it.
It just makes no sense that the letter is real, although we won’t say the men didn’t
escape and just kept their heads down their entire lives.
Maybe you disagree.
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