When were the Longbottoms attacked? (was Re: Did the Potters know the prophecy?)

[quigonginger]

No: HPFGUIDX 117420


Eustace Scrubb said:(re: how people knew so quickly that LV was gone:)
(much, much snipping)
> Now as to the effect of LV's defeat on the Dark Mark and therefore 
on
> the DEs, I suspect that those folks _would_ have had an 
instantaneous
> notice that the boss was gone.  I would guess that the ones who
> thought quickly enough about saving their own skins prepared their
> stories for use as soon as the rest of the WW caught on.  But I also
> think that this makes it even more likely that the LeStrange gang 
went
> after the Longbottoms soon after Godric's Hollow--they would have 
been
> just as aware that LV was gone as the Malfoys' ilk, but would have
> been feverishly trying to find out what happened...now I really 
doubt
> they waited weeks or months to try to find LV.

Ginger replies:
I'd agree on that last part except for Sirius' description in GoF of 
the Longbottom incident.  When the trio visits him in the cave, they 
start talking about young Barty.  Sirius says, (ch.27, p.527 US 
paperback) "Crouch's son was caught with a group of Death Eaters 
who'd managed to talk their way out of Azkaban.  Apparently they were 
trying to find Voldemort and return him to power."

Sirius was in Azkaban within a couple days of LV's demise.  Since 
Bella was his cousin, he'd have taken special notice of her arrival 
compared to the arrivals of strangers or near strangers.  I would 
think that talking one's way out of Azkaban would take a bit of 
time.  

Earlier in that same paragraph, Sirius said, "When Voldemort 
disappeared, it looked like only a matter of time until Crouch got 
the top job" (referring to Minister).  "But then something rather 
unfortunate happened."  

It's kind of hard to interpret that paragraph.  Crouch definately had 
supporters for his fight against LV and the DE's; that much is 
clear.  When LV disappeared, people thought he'd be the next 
Minister.  How long did it take for them to go from just supporting 
him to veiwing him as the heir-apparent?  He seems to have had enough 
time to gather that type of support from enough people that it was 
later mentioned that when it was time for a new Minister, not only 
did Fudge get it, but Crouch was "shunted sideways into the 
Department of International Cooperation".

I read that as though the shunting happened at the same time as Fudge 
got the job- perhaps as a result of it.  With the Quibbler article in 
OoP saying Fudge had only been in office for 5 years, this sounds 
like I read it wrong.  

So Lestrange, party of three, had time to talk their way out of 
Azkaban and Barty had time to gather support for Ministerial 
candidate between the time Harry Vapourflected and the time that the 
Longbottoms were hit.  Sounds like a bit of time to me, but I could 
well be reading it wrong.  Thoughts?

Ginger, who FINALLY finished raking!