| Charles Bracht | |
| Nationality: | Belgian |
| Sport: | Alpine skiing |
| Birth Date: | 7 January 1915 |
| Birth Place: | Bloemendaal, Netherlands |
| Death Place: | Oelegem, Belgium |
Baron Charles Victor Bracht (7 January 1915 - 7 March 1978) was a Belgian businessman who founded the multinational industrial conglomerate, N.V. Bracht-Aegis and became one of the wealthiest men in Europe. He was formerly an alpine skier who competed in the men's combined event at the 1936 Winter Olympics.[1] With the creation of Bracht-Aegis, he became a wealthy businessman and was kidnapped in 1978. His body was found with a bullet wound to the head.[1]
Bracht was born on 7 January 1915 into a wealthy Antwerp family. He was a son of Victor Théodore Bracht (1883–1962) and Dorothée Emilie Bunge (1889–1918).
His maternal grandfather was the Belgian businessman Edouard Bunge of Bunge Limited.[2]
Bracht became one of the wealthiest industrialists in Europe,[3] by running a multinational corporation "dealing in commodities, property, banking, insurance and construction. His companies had interests in Zaire, the former Belgian Congo; Indonesia, Malaysia, Australia, Brazil and in West European countries. He also controlled a bank in Antwerp and was involved in an Antwerp insurance concern, Bracht‐Regis."[4]
Bracht was created a Baron in 1967 for his services to industry.
On 11 November 1941, he married Geneviève Marie Joséphine de Hemptinne (1916–2010) in Sint-Denijs-Westrem. She was the daughter of Charles de Hemptinne and the former Jeanne Marie Joséphine Surmont de Volsberghe. Together, they were the parents of:
Bracht was kidnapped from his car in an underground garage in Antwerp on 7 March 1978. He was found dead in a garbage dump on 10 April 1978 and his autopsy showed he had "succumbed to injuries apparently suffered while trying to resist the kidnappers."[7] At the time, he was the second Belgian nobleman to be kidnapped that year, the first being Baron Edouard‐Jean Empain, who had been abducted in Paris but was released months later.[8]