#2 Assassination plot

Pushed from the train by an assassin

Having studied Freud for over 25 years, Paul Scagnelli, Ph.D., a clinical psychologist, concluded that Emanuel Freud was murdered, by his younger half-brother, the learned Sigmund Freud of Vienna. Scagnelli revealed his idea in his work, Deadly Dr Freud: The Murder of Emanuel Freud and the Disappearance of John Freud in1994. Unfortunately, even though the circumstance of Emanuel’s death were suspicious, having no hard evidence, Dr. Scagnelli could only speculate about how Emanuel’s death was plotted by his younger half-brother.
This is what Scagnelli had to say about the alleged chain of events leading to Emanuel’s untimely death: in October of 1914, soon after WWI had begun, the train mishap that took Emanuel Freud's life was not a mere accident. … He was pushed from that train by … an assassin [who] committed this murder at the direction of Sigmund Freud, who probably paid a tidy sum for this killing. (1)
Scagnelli believed that the reason for Freud's lethal hatred for his eldest half-brother was related to Freud's childhood, and that the choice of a journey by train as a means for the killing was based on Freud’s bizarre conviction that a train travel was a symbolic death.

 A murder plan

As Scagnelli explained:  The idea that Freud devised a serious murder plan by late June 1914 ... assumes that in the aftermath of that planning, in July and August, he would have continued to exhibit evidences of irrational behaviors and thought. (6)
Knowing Freud, it is not implausible that he could hatch a murderous plot for who knows what reason, Scagnelli's problem is to prove that it was the case.
This was Scagnelli's circumstantial proof: thus he claimed, that young Anna Freud [aged 19] was sent to England by her father in the summer of 1914 … to arrange the killing of Emanuel Freud. … Anna acted as an unwitting courier for her father. 
This is a far-fetched idea. Finding an assassin, especially in a foreign country, is not an easy task.
And this is how Scagnelli speculated how Freud's murderous plan was executed. Anna's letters from England ... kept him [Freud] informed about ... Emanuel’s plans for train travel ....  [on October 17th], so that this information was able to be mailed by Freud … to a chosen assassin … in England.
The whole arrangement doesn't sound feasible. What if a letter arrived too late or, even worse, got list in the mail? Mailing back and forth doesn't seem like a viable proposition. How about sending telegrams instead? Maybe this was how it was done, if Scagnelli's idea about an assassin is true.
Moreover, Scagnelli believed that, Anna probably carried with her …  a “payoff” ... to recompense the assassin for killing Emanuel.’ (7)

Implausible idea

Although, if Scagnelli was right about Anna carrying the payoff, then she wouldn’t have been an unwitting courier, rather she must have been aware of Freud’s murderous plans. Even though not totally implausible, this plan, unfortunately, has no support in any evidence other than the fact that, a few months before Emanuel’s death, Anna Fred had visited England. No wonder that Scagnelli found it hard to convince anyone about his claim.
Moreover, there’s a serious flaw in this theory. If Freud wanted Emanuel dead, why not go to England himself, and murder Emanuel? Or why not travel together with Anna, and find an assassin? Using his daughter for this purpose doesn't sound reasonable. After all, on at least a couple of occasions, Freud had been a visitor to Manchester in the past, and since he wasn’t working during the summer he was free to go to England. Thus, assuming Freud wanted to hire an assassin, Freud had enough time before the start of WWI on 28 July 1914 to go to England, and arrange the murder. But he didn’t. If  Emanuel had to die, it had not only, to happen on a certain day, by also by Freud's hand.
Could Sigmund Freud, the famous psychologist, a doctor, and a professor at that, be a killer? Of course, not!  Scagnelli must have been out of his mind. This is, no doubt, what most people - oblivious to the fact that murder committed by educated people, doctors in particular, is not uncommon - would have thought. Was Freud capable of killing Emanuel? Of course, he was. But whether Scagnellis’s conspirational theory revealed the true course of events leading to Emanuel’s death is doubtful.

My father is my grandfather

As a matter of course, if we only have circumstantial evidence, then we need, at least, to be able to prove, to a believable extent, that Sigmund had both the desire and a way, of arranging and/or committing the murder of Emanuel.
This is not hard to prove. In his writings, Freud openly talks about his hatred of the father, and about the son’s wish to murder the father to have sex with the mother. Moreover, Freud killed Jacob Freud, whom he believed to be his father until, as he alleged, he was told by Emanuel that he was the third generation in relation to his father, (8) who thus was Freud’s grandfather. Apparently, as he recounted in the dream book, Freud seriously entertained the idea that Emanuel was his biological father. True, or false, for a madman truth is what he believes. But, if Freud believed Emanuel was his biological father who rejected him, it would explain why he hated Emanuel.
The part that is missing is the explanation of how the killing of Emanuel could have been possible. Emanuel died on October 17, 1914, thus two months and 21 days, after the beginning of the First World War, which started on July 28, 1914. And since Austria and the U.K. were the enemies, how could Freud and Emanuel find themselves in the same place, in Manchester, which for Freud was the enemy territory, riding together (?) on the same train toward Southport?
Unless Freud was a magician, it doesn’t sound possible. Fortunately, there are Freud letters from that period that possibly may throw some light on the matter.
(1) Scagnelli, Paul, Deadly Dr Freud: The Murder of Emanuel Freud and the Disappearance of John Freud, (1994, p. 322).
(2) SE 5. p. 385.
(3) Schur, Freud: Living and Dying, (1972, p. 180).
(4) Freud, Sigmund, The Complete Letters of Sigmund Freud to Wilhelm Fliess, 1887-1904, (1985, p. 268).
(5)  Schur, (1972, p. 97).
(6) Scagnelli, Paul, Deadly Dr Freud: The Murder of Emanuel Freud and the Disappearance of John Freud, (1994, p. 371).
(7) Scagnell, (1994, pp.373-274).
(8) SE 6, p. 220.

Freud British Family Papers

Can we find any clues regarding Emanuel’s death in Freud’s correspondence with his family in the U.K.? Unfortunately, this is not the case. True, there’s a collection of letters exchanged by Freud with his family in Manchester, in the possession of the University of Manchester Library, in total 145 letters.
Unfortunately, even though Freud was an avid letter writer, in the collection, there were no letters written between 1876 and 1914. The first extant letter from the exchange between Freud and his English nephew Sam, dated July 7, 1914, relates to Freud’s daughter, Anna's stay in England. Interestingly, in the letter, written just over three months before Emanuel’s death, referring to Emanuel, Freud wrote, I am glad to have learned by his handwriting that the great older man [Emanuel] - an old one I am myself - is unchanged. (1) Freud was 68 at the time, Emanuel 81. Oddly, Freud had learned about Emanuel’s health by looking at his writing, rather than being told by Emanuel about it. Maybe their brotherly love was illusory? After all, brotherly discord can happen in almost any family, so why not in Freud’s?

Your father died leaving the train

Writing to Emanuel’s son, Samuel, after the end of WWI, Freud simply stated, Your father died leaving the train. (2) Cohen doesn't provide the date or the source of this information. This was the only time Freud mentioned Emanuel’s death in the extant correspondence with the English Freud family.
What is striking about this message is the fact that it was Freud in distant Vienna who informed Emanuel’s son in Manchester about Emanuel’s death, and how he died, rather than vice versa. So, how did he know about this event, if during the war years, Freud’s correspondence with the British Freud family wasn’t maintained? And, the first letter after the war, in the collection, is dated October 27, 1919. Thus it was written almost exactly, five years after Emanuel's death.
How Freud could have known about Emanuel’s death and how happened - when leaving (?) the train - is a mystery, since, due to the cessation of the postal services during the war, Freud wouldn’t be able to receive any correspondence from Manchester. Also, what is notable is the tone of the message, totally devoid of any emotion, as if Freud was talking about a stranger rather than his, as his biographers insist, beloved half-brother. There’s no mention of the terrible loss, of the tragic death, of the mourning. This is not how a loving brother would react but this is how the killer would.

Travel toward death

At the time of Emanuel’s death, Freud's company office was in Manchester's textile district at 61 Bloom Street, but Emanuel had moved home to Southport, a suburb by the sea. Even though in his early 80s, Emanuel still commuted daily to his workplace (which confirms that he was capable of independent travel.
The location of Emanuel’s untimely death, Parbold, located approximately one-hour travel from Manchester, is to this day still a small village, with a likewise small train station, where express trains wouldn't stop. Since Emanuel's destination was Southport, the whole train journey would have lasted approximately 1 hour and 20 minutes. Another 20 minutes, and Emanuel would have safely arrived home, but it was not to be.
When you think about it, there's little chance that an octogenarian would have been reckless enough to open the train doors and walk out into the empty space to face his death. After all, already the fact that Emanuel survived intact to this respectable age, is the best proof that he wasn't a reckless man.
Assuming that Emanuel's half-brother from Vienna, Sigmund Freud was the assassin, there’s a good question. Why would Freud have pushed Emanuel out of the train at the Parbold train station rather than anywhere else on the journey? Why indeed? Maybe the fact that Emanuel fell to his death at the station, rather than between the stations, reflects the Freudian symbolism: the Parbold station being the end station of Emanuel’s journey in life. (There’s also the favourable circumstance that - since the train wasn’t stopping at Parbold station - unlike the Southport station - the chance there would be any spectators was minimal. )

Daring and fearless

Would Freud dare to take the risk of coming to England during the war?  It would take a very courageous person to attempt this kind of feat. Was Freud that man?
As he explained in the letter of February 2, 1886, to his fiancé Martha, Dr. Josef Breuer (Freud’s intimate friend and benefactor), told me he had discovered that hidden under the surface of timidity there lay in me an extremely daring and fearless human being. I had always thought so.  (3)
So, would a man like that, on a killing mission, hesitate to go into the enemy territory? And if he wouldn’t, isn’t it conceivable that Freud did kill his half-brother, Emanuel, having travelled, during wartime, in England?
(1) Cohen, The Escape of Sigmund Freud, (2009, p. 48).
(2)  Cohen, he Escape of Sigmund Freud, (2009, p. 49; 2002, p. 61).
(3) Freud, Sigmund, The Letters of Sigmund Freud, (1960, p. 202).

Continued on #3