Hey there, DETECTIVES! DETECTIVE WRITER here to tell you all about another unsolved crime that happened in New York City, but occurred over a century ago, the 1920 Wall Street Bombing.
On September 16th, 1920 at 12:01 P.M. EST, in the Financial District in Manhattan, Wall Street of New York City had been bombed. A horse-drawn wagon had stopped by at noon across the street from the headquarters of J.P. Morgan & Co. bank at 23 Wall Street. The wagon had 500 pounds of sash weights, and 100 pounds of dynamite inside that exploded due to a set timer detonation. The sash weights tore through the air, the wagon was blasted and the horse was killed in small remains. But the crazy thing is that witnesses saw the wagon driver leaving the scene and escaping through a side street of the city.
143 people were seriously injured, and 30 people were immediately killed with an additional number of 10 people soon dying from wounds sustained from the bombing. Due to the blast, over US$2 million ($27.1 million today) was lost in property damages with quite a bit of the interior spaces in the J.P. Morgan & Co. building also being destroyed.
The next day, September 17th, 1920, the Justice Department’s Bureau of Investigation presented the contents of a flyer that was discovered in a post office box on Wall Street right before the bombing occurred. On a piece of white paper, written in red ink, the words said “Remember, we will not tolerate any longer. Free the political prisoners, or it will be sure death for all of you.” The words on the bottom of the flyer were: “American Anarchist Fighters.” Although, the city’s local police and BOI tried to figure out the culprit(s) of the bombing, the motive, and who was the driver of the wagon for three years, unfortunately, they were unsuccessful. To this day, this case remains unsolved. Also, the spooky aspect that I can confirm is that even over a century later, on 23 Wall Street, you can still see the damage left behind by the bombing, it is absolutely mindblowing. *This is NOT my image, PSA).
I hope you have enjoyed this storytime as much as I did, DETECTIVES! Please let me know in the comments if you want more storytime! Have a great day, night, afternoon, or evening, DETECTIVES! Stay tuned for next week’s post; until then, keep on sleuthing, DETECTIVES!
Detective Writer 