October 23, 1935
Truly one of the most hated gangsters in New York, there was actually nothing attractive at all about Pretty Amberg. Nature had given him a rather unfortunate appearance, to put it mildly, but Amberg could not have cared less about his looks. Supposedly once offered a job in a circus as the missing link, Amberg, far from being offended by this, claimed bragging rights on the offer.
Amberg was a loan shark and bootlegger and ran some rackets in Brooklyn with his brothers Joseph and Hyman. He liked things on the tough side and would reputedly spit into diners’ soup bowls as he entered a restaurant. He also had a nasty habit of killing transients on the street. Once sarcastically described by author Damon Runyon as being in the laundry business, Amberg would stuff his victims into a bag and tie them up with wire in such a way that they would strangle themselves as they struggled. For a while the Brownsville section of Brooklyn was littered with laundry bag corpses. All in all, Pretty Amberg was a pretty gruesome customer.
The Ambergs’ rackets stayed modest for only a while and as the brothers began to rake in the money, interest from the other mobsters grew, including such heavyweights as Owney Madden and Legs Diamond. Dutch Schultz took quite a fancy to the Amberg operation and once commented to Amberg that it might be a good idea if they went into business together. Amberg was less than enthusiastic about this idea, to say the least. Actually Amberg suggested that Schultz take his own gun and shoot himself with it.
But the Ambergs were also drawing into competition with Louis “Lepke” Buchalter and Jacob “Gurrah” Shapiro for what was becoming increasingly valuable territory. Madden, Diamond and Schultz (especially Schultz) were dangerous enough, but when the Ambergs started locking horns with Louis Buchalter, they were also locking horns with the Syndicate’s assassination arm—Murder Incorporated.
The Amberg gang began to disintegrate pretty rapidly after that. Brother Hyman had already died in 1926, killing himself after a failed prison escape attempt. Joseph and Louis were still around—though it must be said, they weren’t around for long. In September of 1935 Joseph and his bodyguard/chauffeur Morris Kessler were killed in what was to be one of the first major jobs for the murder organization. They were gunned down while collecting protection money from a Brooklyn auto repair shop.
Pretty Amberg was soon to follow. In fact less than a month later, on October 23, 1935, he met his demise. His body had been bound with wire and set ablaze inside a car. As it turned out that week in October was a busy one for Murder Incorporated. Buchalter and his buddies also rubbed out the legendary mobster Dutch Schultz the very next day.