On August 4, 1962, Marilyn Monroe’s body was discovered in her Los Angeles apartment. Although the finding was reported at the crack of dawn, the precise timing still remains unclear. She was half-naked, resting on her stomach with her arms over the landline receiver. The 36-year-old performer allegedly overdosed on sleeping tablets and then committed suicide, as stated in the official report. The postmortem examination that ensued revealed that her bloodstream was filled with Nembutal. Moreover, chloral hydrate was discovered in her stomach. Both of these compounds fit the description on the vial of sleeping tablets next to her bed.
There was initially little reason to suspect anything was amiss. Marilyn had been depressed and self-conscious for a long time due to her history of unsuccessful relationships and her inability to conceive a child. People who abuse sleeping tablets often have some of the fragments still in their guts, but Norma did not. Some have speculated that she was forced to get injections, which would account for the missing pills. The postmortem results ruled out this notion since they showed no indication of an injectable. Still, there’s a lot of data that points out that something else transpired that night.
The Testimonies That Followed
Many people, throughout the course of time, have cast doubt on the final decision. The most compelling explanation involves three people: Marilyn’s maid Eunice Murray, her psychotherapist Ralph Greenson, and her doctor, Hyman Engelberg. Murray’s recollection of the incident is riddled with contradictions. The maid informed Officer Clemmons that she saw a flashlight shining from below Monroe’s door at night when she was initially interrogated. Marilyn should not have been up this late, so this was alarming, Eunice said. However, when questioned later by Officer Sergeant Byron, Murray gave a different time, namely 3:00 in the morning.
Murray claimed that she then pounded on the wood, but received no response from the people in the chamber beyond the lock. As her worries grew, she decided to get in touch with Greenson. The psychotherapist arrived quickly and shattered a window to gain entry to the bedroom, only to find Marilyn lying lifeless on her bed, half-naked. The cops were summoned around 4:30 am. This part of the story is particularly dubious since Murray afterward confirmed that Marilyn’s door did not have a working lock. Therefore, there was no cause for them to break into the room through the open window. Moreover, Greenson reported to Officer Clemmons that he was the first person to see Monroe’s body. Later, though, he revealed to Officer Byron that Murray had really been the first person to see the body.
The Possible Coverup
The postmortem showed that Marilyn had a darkened sigmoid colon. This discoloration was probably brought on by an enema. This hypothesis raises two doubts: (1) how did she get an enema in her system, and (2) what was in it. A toxicology report on Marilyn revealed the presence of both chloral hydrate and Nembutal. Combining the two may be lethal since the latter hinders the system from digesting the former.
Ultimately, Engelberg acknowledged advising Munro to take Nembutal. And on the day she passed away, Greenson might have prescribed chloral hydrate, not realizing that Engelberg had already administered her Nembutal.
Explanation: Greenson and Engelberg, upon realizing their deadly error, would have required hours to think of ideas to render her death a suicide; thus, they didn’t call the authorities till 4:30 am. Murray attempted to escape suspicion by lying about the time she first noticed anything was off from midnight to three in the morning during her testimony. This cut off any chance of them conferring and getting the place ready for the cops before they came.
The Kennedy Angle
However, it’s Marilyn’s friendship with the Kennedys that generates the most interesting debate. Although there is little evidence supporting this theory, it is undeniably fascinating. During his time as a United States Senator, John F. Kennedy often visited Hollywood. Some people think he had a genuine affection for Marilyn Monroe because of his appreciation for attractive women. If you missed it, Monroe once sang “Happy Birthday” to President John F. Kennedy with such a sensual intensity that it couldn’t have been missed by the crowd of 20,000. The lyrics poured out of her lips like slowly melting caramel. Even before JFK’s sarcastic comments about the performances, rumors of a romance between the two were spreading.
The “Seven Year Itch” star died of a drug overdose a couple of months later after the rumor of her affair with JFK surfaced. Marilyn’s official death certificate has always stated that her overdose death, which occurred three months later, was unintentional. It is commonly acknowledged that President Kennedy had several relationships during his marriage to Jackie. The late President is even suspected of employing his personal secretary, Dave Powers, to arrange women who would sleep with him. There are rumors of JFK admitting that he would have severe headaches if he did not have sex every day. Many believe that Jackie Kennedy was aware of Monroe’s alleged affair with her spouse and that the news greatly irritated and infuriated her. But John wasn’t the only Keneddy “The Gentlemen Prefer Blondes” star was associated with. Despite the ongoing mystery surrounding the rumored romance involving JFK and Hollywood Heartthrob, there is considerably more evidence to support the claim that Monroe had a liaison with Bobby Kennedy, who was then working as United States Attorney General. A guy whose actions significantly contributed to Marilyn’s unfortunate demise.
Norma was confident that she’d end up marrying and starting a family with Bobby. But Bobby Kennedy had already been warned by his closest advisors that having a relationship with the performer was a major violation of protocol. Bobby didn’t show up to his Saturday night rendezvous with Marilyn in August because he was either pressured to cancel or really came to the understanding that the relationship couldn’t go further. Heartbroken, lonely, and chronically dependent on antidepressants, Adderall, and sleeping tablets, Marilyn started calling her handful of contacts, including Sidney Skolsky, to the writer with whom she had spoken in the past about her romance with JFK. If what Sidney says is true, Marilyn was already fuming when she visited her that afternoon since she had been fielding calls all day. He continued to confirm that Marilyn was quite disgruntled because even after being Marilyn Monroe, she was lonely and crying for a date.
Marilyn’s fairly shaky coping skills appeared to collapse when she was left unattended and ignored by both JFK and Bobby. Who found her body first and when is still widely debated, but by morning, the whole world was mourning the loss of a queen who symbolized much more than the glamor of Hollywood in the 1960s. There are rumors that the FBI was secretly monitoring Marilyn because of her relationship with Bobby and recorded several tapes, which are yet to be made public. It’s likely that they were erased when Bobby was in the throes of his own bid for the presidency, an endeavor cut short when the candidate was shot dead in 1968. Whatever relationship Marilyn might have had with JFK, it is evident that Bobby’s denial of Marilyn played a much larger role in her suicide.
See more: Who Was Marilyn Monroe? What Was She Like In Real Life?
