DNA tests last night confirmed that the dashing aviator and rugged all-American hero Charles Lindbergh had a secret second family in Germany, fathering three - and possibly more - children outside his marriage.
The German offspring's lawyer, Anton Schwenk, last night said that he was "99% certain" that Lindbergh - who became internationally famous after making the first solo non-stop flight across the Atlantic in 1927 - was indeed their father.
Speaking from Munich, he said: "They never had any doubt about the question."
Scientists from Munich university had compared their DNA with a sample from Lindbergh's family in the US, he said. Lindbergh's three German children - Astrid Bouteuil, 43, and her brothers Dyrk and David Hesshaimer, 45 and 36 - made their beliefs known in August.
The children said they had learned of the identity of the man they knew as Careu Kent after his death in 1974. They said Lindbergh fell in love with their mother, Brigitte Hesshaimer, a 24-year-old German hatmaker, on a visit to Germany in 1957. He continued to visit them until his death.
The children were born between 1958 and 1967. They were listed in official records alongside the category "father unknown", but Lindbergh went on to support them financially.
The existence of Lindbergh's German offspring adds an extraordinary twist to the life story of a man who was apparently happily married to an American, Anne Morrow.
The couple had five children. In 1932 the world was gripped by the kidnap and murder of their baby son, who was taken from the family mansion.
This summer Lindbergh's German children told the S
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