Shanet Clark

TOSH PLUMLEE also had contact with Roselli in or near Dallas on 11/22/63.

James' point alone tends to discredit the scenario I think.  Plus I think mafioso at his level tend not to do the "dirty work" anymore.  (Someone can correct me if I am wrong.)  Then again, the opportunity to shoot the president might have given  Rosselli an incentive to enter a sewer.

There is, however, an apparently reliable report that Rosselli was at the Desert Inn in Vegas when the shots were fired.  His presence in Vegas does not exclude the "dapper don" as a conspirator, of course, but it does invalidate all stories (including Giancana's, Bonanno's and Files') which claim Rosselli was in Dallas.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Highly recommended reading.

Interesting reference to Porter Goss.

One of the many online articles on the murder of Bethesda film specialist PITZER:

The Untimely Death of

Lieutenant Commander William B. Pitzer:

The Physical Evidence[1]

by Allan R.J. Eaglesham and R. Robin Palmer

January 1998

The Pitzers rose a little earlier than usual that fall Saturday morning, 29 October 1966. Bill fixed breakfast while Joyce made preparations in anticipation of a visit from her mother for a few days. Late morning saw them raking leaves in the yard as their 14-year-old son Robert washed the car. When, around noon, a neighbor dropped by to invite the boy to join her in a couple of rounds of golf, Bill finished polishing the automobile. After lunch, he dropped Joyce off at the beauty salon for a 1.00 PM appointment, drove over to the golf course to remind Robert to have a haircut, then stopped in at work to prepare a lecture he was to deliver at Montgomery Junior College the following Wednesday. Joyce missed the 3:07 PM bus, but caught it at 4:07 PM, and was surprised that Bill was not already home when she arrived there. She called his office, and, getting no reply, assumed that he was on his way. As time passed, feeling increasingly uneasy, she called the office again, and again, his club and the hospital emergency room. At 7:20 PM, she called the main switchboard at Bill’s place of work: the National Naval Medical Center (NNMC), Bethesda, Maryland. The duty officer was alerted. Ensign J.M. Quarles and Security Patrol Officer T.E. Blue opened the locked door to Pitzer’s television-studio office at 7:50 PM, and found a body on the floor, the head resting in a pool of coagulated blood, a revolver lying close by. Death was pronounced by Medical Officer Lieutenant Commander R.W. Steyn at 8:10 PM, and identification was made by Captain J.H. Stover and Lt. Cdr. J.G. Harmeling; the corpse was that of Lt. Cmdr. William B. Pitzer of the US Navy Medical Service Corps.

Captain Stover, Bill’s superior officer, went immediately to the Pitzer residence with Lt. Cmdr. C.A. Holston to impart the devastating news. In view of the personality and life philosophy of her husband, Mrs. Pitzer found it impossible to accept that he could have taken his own life. In due course, however, investigations by the FBI, the Naval Investigative Service and an NNMC Informal Board of Investigation would all reach the same conclusion: the wound to Lt. Cmdr. Pitzer’s head was self-inflicted.

Over the years, the family and friends of Bill Pitzer continued to doubt the official conclusion on the nature of his demise. And for Mrs. Pitzer there was the nagging thought that if, unbeknownst to her, her husband were to have reached the point of suicide, he would not have committed the act on US Navy property, thus embarrassing the institution that he so loved. As stated in the Informal Board of Investigation’s Report:

“Mrs. Pitzer could offer no explanation as to why Subject would take his own life and although appearing somewhat resigned to this fact, she still exhibited doubt that suicide was the true cause of death.”

LINKS WITH THE KENNEDY AUTOPSY

William Bruce Pitzer was in the US Navy for over 28 years. He served his country in World War II and in the Korean conflict, and looked forward to a well deserved retirement in 1967. He began his naval career as an X-ray technician and was Assistant Head of the Graphic Arts Department and Chief of the Educational Television Division of the Naval Medical School, and had top-secret clearance, at the time of his death. His specialty was the then-new field of closed-circuit TV. Greatly respected and highly regarded by all who knew him, he was the “perfect image of a Naval officer” in the words of a colleague. In private life he was community-oriented: a member of the Board of Directors of Help for Retarded Children, Inc. and treasurer of the Takoma Park PTA. He was active also in the Masonic Order.

Lt. Cmdr. Pitzer was a mentor to Petty Officer First Class Dennis D. David, and a friend; they played bridge together regularly. On the evening of 22 November 1963, Dennis was Chief-of-the-Day at Bethesda Naval Hospital, part of the National Naval Medical Center, and it was his duty to supervise the unloading of the casket that contained the body of President Kennedy prior to postmortem examination.[2] Early in the following week, Dennis dropped by Bill’s office with questions on the professional exam for the Medical Service Corps. He found Pitzer working on a 16-mm film, slides and black and white photos of the Kennedy autopsy.[3] Vivid in his memory is his agreement with Bill Pitzer that those materials showed what appeared to be an entry wound in the right frontal area with a corresponding exit wound in the lower rear of the skull. Thereafter, on occasion, Dennis heard Bill refer to contacts he’d had with “agents” about the Kennedy autopsy materials on which he had worked. These references, made in the company of others and thus precluding further discussion with Dennis, were couched in matter-of-fact terms without hint of threat or intimidation.[4]

Although Petty Officer David assumed that Lt. Cmdr. Pitzer personally had filmed the Kennedy autopsy, Pitzer’s name does not appear on any list of personnel involved in the autopsy or present in the morgue at that time.[5] On the other hand, Jerrol F. Custer, X-ray technician for the Kennedy autopsy, recently stated that Pitzer was present in the morgue and had photographed the military men occupying the benches.[6]

In December 1965, Dennis David was sworn in as an Ensign in the Medical Service Corps. He left the National Naval Medical Center immediately thereafter and had no further contact with Bill Pitzer; he achieved the rank of Lieutenant Commander before retiring. He recently told us that he is “certain” that Bill Pitzer had the Kennedy autopsy photographs etc. in his possession at the time of his death.

A curious coincidence is noteworthy. During the weekend on which Lt. Cmdr. Pitzer died, the Kennedy family transferred formal possession of the materials relating to the late president’s autopsy to the National Archives. A check of the inventory revealed that some items, tissue sections etc., were missing, including a stainless-steel container that presumably held the brain.[7] Six years later, Dr. Cyril Wecht discovered that the brain was indeed missing from the National Archives.[8]

ITEMS OF EVIDENCE

On 1 November 1966, Commander H.H. Rumble II of the Naval Investigative Service Office Washington signed a covering letter (page 1, page 2, page 3, page 4) listing the following items of physical evidence that had been gathered from the TV studio and sent to the FBI for analysis:

A .38 caliber Smith & Wesson (S&W) revolver, military issue, serial #311546 found near the body.

A .38 caliber S&W, Western, cartridge case found in the weapon (Item 1) in the cylinder positioned under the hammer.

A .38 caliber S&W, Western bullet found in the cylinder of Item 1 in the next firing position.

A .38 caliber S&W, (R-P) blank cartridge found in the cylinder of Item 1 in the second firing position.

A spent projectile found at the scene.

An envelope containing three .38 caliber S&W blank cartridges found on the deceased’s desk.

A pair of eyeglasses found in the vicinity of the body.

A dented section of blackboard located near the body.

Four notes containing apparent work notations found near the body.

An 8x10½” lined note pad found on a chair near the body

A blue grease pencil found on a chair next to Item 10.

Fourteen latent prints lifted from two chairs and three beer cans at the scene.

Work note on the desk of the deceased’s assistant.

Same as Item 13 above.

Half of a paraffin cast of the deceased’s right hand prepared at the time of the autopsy.

The other half of the paraffin cast (see Item 15 above).

Samples of paraffin used in obtaining Items 15 and 16 above.

Twenty-one cards containing finger and palm prints taken from the body.

FINGERPRINTS

Commander Rumble’s covering letter (page 3) requested the FBI to process Items 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 9, 10, 11, 13 and 14 for latent fingerprints. This is the single and only place in the 140 FOIA-released pages in which reference is made to fingerprints on the revolver (Item 1).

None of the fingerprint lifts in Item 12 matched those of Lt. Cmdr. Pitzer (Item 18). On 12 January 1967, Cmdr. Rumble sent to the FBI fingerprint cards of eight individuals, presumably naval personnel, who might have left the prints on the chairs and beer cans (Item 12). The paper work dealing with these other people’s prints refers to Lt. Cmdr. Pitzer as “Victim” (rather than as “Deceased” in other documentation) and the eight individuals are listed as “Suspects.” The suspects names are redacted - in any case, none of their prints matched those found at the scene.

To repeat: there is nothing in the FBI files in our possession, in the FBI Report, nor in the NNMC Informal Board of Investigation Report, that states that Pitzer’s fingerprints were on the revolver (Item 1), on the spent cartridge (Item 2), the live round (Item 3) or on the blank cartridge (Item 4).

THE REVOLVER

A revolver was found on the floor of the TV studio, about twelve inches from the deceased’s left knee. On 12 October 1966, a .38 caliber Smith & Wesson revolver and six blank cartridges had been signed out by enlisted man L.R. Andre, on behalf of his superior officer Lt. Cmdr. W.B. Pitzer. A photocopy of a hand-written note to this effect, signed by Supervisory Guard R.L. Bray, is part of the NNMC Informal Board of Investigation Report; no serial number is included in that note:

“To the best of my recollection, at about 1400 on 12 Oct. 1966 I issued a S&W 38 caliber revolver and six (6) rounds of blank ammunition to L.R. Andre HM2. This weapon was issued after a telephone call from Lt CDR W.B. Pitzer, stating that same would be used for instruction purposes

Russel L. Bray

Supervisory guard”

The FBI documents include the following notation as their proof of origin of the weapon found beside the body:

“The Firearms Logbook contained in the Security Office, National Naval Medical Center, Bethesda, Maryland, was examined and in the front of the book was located an undated notation that a .38 caliber revolver, serial number 311546 had been checked out for Lieutenant Commander WILLIAM B. PITZER. The signature under this notation was illegible.”

It would be reasonable to conclude that the illegible signature was that of Mr. Bray, except that his signature on the hand-written note is of exemplary clarity. We wonder why a photocopy of the weapon-release entry in the firearms logbook, showing the serial number and Mr. Andre’s signature, is not part of the FBI record. Certainly it is surprising that the official record of release of the weapon was, according to the FBI, undated.

The weapon assigned to Pitzer is defined as a .38 caliber Smith & Wesson (see above), whereas a hand-written note by the FBI ballistics investigator reveals that the weapon found at the scene was actually a S&W .38 Special. On advice from colleagues knowledgeable of firearms, we believe that there is not necessarily a discrepancy here; the .38 caliber S&W was obsolete by 1966, therefore, it is likely that in military and law-enforcement parlance the qualifier “Special” was routinely dropped. Surely, however, the notation in the logbook documented that the weapon released to Mr. Andre was a .38 Special.

The serial number of the weapon found in the TV studio (see Item 1) was the same as that described in the above-quoted FBI document. It was impossible for the FBI ballistics expert to determine with certainty that the slug found on the floor of the studio, about six feet to the right of the body, had been fired from that particular .38 S&W:

“Specimen Q2 (i.e. Item 5) is a caliber .38 S&W copper-coated lead bullet. The few remaining rifling impressions on specimen Q2 are the same width as those found on test bullets fired from specimen K1 (i.e. Item 1). However, due to the mutilation of specimen Q2, the microscopic markings remaining on its surface are insufficient to permit identification of the particular weapon from which it was fired.”

Ballistics tests showed that the spent cartridge in the cylinder had been discharged in that weapon. Neither that cartridge nor the live round in the revolver were Special ammunition, and must have been loaded with “extreme difficulty,” according to the FBI lab report. Pitzer obtained only blanks with the revolver; there is no record of his acquiring live ammunition at the NNMC or anywhere else.

EYEGLASSES

An intact pair of eyeglasses was found on the floor of the TV studio, a couple of yards from the body (Item 7). The lens prescription was determined by the FBI, but no link is made in the FBI files to suggest that they belonged to Bill Pitzer. Neither did they carry his fingerprints. When asked about it, Dennis David told us:

“I do not recall ever seeing Bill wearing glasses.”

Of course, it is possible that Mr. David’s memory of 30 years ago is faulty. Unfortunately, our efforts have been fruitless to determine from Pitzer-family sources if Bill used eyeglasses. It may be significant that the FBI assigned the eyeglasses a “Q” (“questioned”) notation, rather than “K” (“known”) as for the revolver and the blue crayon pencil.

A DAMAGED BLACKBOARD

There was a blackboard in the TV studio “located near the body.” Unfortunately its precise location is not shown in a hand-drawn sketch of the scene that is in the FBI Report. Dennis David remembers a blackboard in the studio, the mobile type on wheels, not wall-mounted. It was struck by a bullet, as revealed by analysis of residual metal particles in the indentation (Item 8):

“possible [sic] by the projectile after passage through the skull of the deceased.”

Apparently, this was a source of puzzlement for the investigating officers; given the locations of the corpse, revolver, spent bullet, and blackboard, there had to have been another point of ricochet:

“Extensive examination of the scene failed to determine what the projectile struck resulting in the extensive indentation.”

The metallic residues within the indentation were in insufficient amounts to match them conclusively with the slug found on the floor.

Referring to the spent bullet, Cmdr. Rumble requested the FBI to:

“Examine for all foreign matter on the surface with particular attention to determine as to what the projectile struck and if it struck Item 8.”

Nothing in the FBI Report addresses this request; however, the hand-written notes by the FBI ballistics expert include the following:

“Bone fragments on bullet.

One side of bullet split open. However, no other material found to assoc. w. any other object bullet may have struck.”

And there is no mention of bone fragments on the blackboard indentation.

REMINDERS

According to his wife, William Pitzer was an inveterate note-maker, and this was evident when his body was discovered. Sheets of paper were scattered around, bearing the names of colleagues (even these are redacted from the FOIA-released photocopies) to whom messages were to be conveyed, written with a blue-crayon pencil found on a chair near the body. Therefore, if he took his own life, we must deduce that in his final hours and minutes he jotted down work-related items lest he forget them, but did not take a few seconds to explain his final act. The following note was found on an assistant’s desk:

“Remind me to return gun to the sec. [sic: security] office.”

If Pitzer committed suicide, certainly it was without premeditation.

One of the note-pages lying on the floor bore a partial heel print that was not linked with the deceased - described as a style used by the Goodyear Rubber Company. The print was photographed by the FBI “for possible future reference.”

PARAFFIN TEST

The paraffin tests of Pitzer’s right palm and back of hand were negative, indicating the absence of nitrate, therefore no exposure to gunpowder. While false positives are not uncommon with this test due to contact with tobacco, cosmetics, certain foodstuffs etc., a negative result is usually accepted as evidence of no recent contact with a discharged firearm:

“Examination of (the) paraffin cast reflected no substance characteristic of, or which could be associated with, gunpowder or gunshot residue.”

If Bill Pitzer committed suicide, could he have held the revolver in the other hand, consistent with Dennis David’s observation of him dealing cards with his left? Not so: the autopsy report is definite that the bullet entered on the right side of the head and exited on the left.

THE WOUNDS

When interviewed by an FBI agent on 30 October 1966 after completion of the postmortem examination, Lt. Cmdr. H.B. Lowsma, who assisted in performing the autopsy, stated that the muzzle of the revolver had not been in contact with the skin at discharge, nor did he find powder burns around, or powder particles imbedded in, the entry wound in the right temple.[9] However, he stated:

“… the gun could have been very close to the head, but not touching it but so close there would have been no time for the powder to have spread out after leaving the muzzle and thereby leaving no outside indicating (sic) of splatter burn or imbed powder particles around the wound.”

There was an area of “charring” around the wound that may be interpreted as a margin of soot deposit, yet the autopsy report describes the skin around the entry wound as having “no deposits of foreign material.” And there is no mention in the autopsy report of soot deposit around the defect in the skull bone, which would indicate a shot from very close range. Prosector Lt. Cmdr. J.G. Harmeling is reported by the FBI to have stated on 1 November 1966 that:

“(T)here was no evidence of powder burns on the right side of the head where entry was made... (He) explained that he could not say how far from the head the gun was held as he was no expert in this field.”

Subsequent FBI laboratory tests of the .38 Special showed that the gun would have to have been held at a distance of 3 feet or more to preclude powder burning of the skin.

In the 30 October interview, Lt. Cmdr. Lowsma stated:

“(T)he death was caused by a gun shot wound in the head from the right temple, exiting near the left temple…”

This seems peculiarly vague, “…exiting near the left temple.” In the autopsy report, Lt. Cmdr. Harmeling was precise: bullet entry was in the right temporal area, and exit was in the left parietal area, “5 cm. posteriorly in a diagonal from the attachment of the anterior helix.” In layman’s terms, the exit wound was behind the left ear. But, the autopsy report further states that internal examination revealed a defect in the left sphenoid bone and supra-orbital plate, i.e. at the left temple:

“After removal of the brain a third defect in the bony skull is encountered. This consists of a large defect in the left supra-orbital plate measuring 3.0 x 1.0 cm.”

Apparently, the autopsy doctors were unaware of this third head wound until the brain was removed - no corresponding wound is described as part of the external examination of the body. And yet, as stated on the Naval Certificate of Death, dated 1 February 1967 (why the three-month delay?), Naval Medical Officer Lt. Cmdr. Robert Steyn, when viewing the body in the TV studio twenty minutes after its discovery, observed a wound in the left temple:

“A left temple wound was visible, the right side of the head being hidden, lying against the floor…”

Why did the autopsy doctors fail to describe the external wound in the left temple that was seen by Steyn, but did describe a large internal defect in the skull bone at the same location? The path of the bullet through the brain is described in detail in the autopsy report, and there is nothing to suggest that the projectile fragmented, causing part of it to exit at the left temple. As verbalized by Lt. Cmdr. Lowsma:

“The bullet went on a straight line from one side of the head to the other.”

How, then, did Bill Pitzer come to sustain the third defect in the skull?

Dr. John G. Ball, the local Deputy Medical Examiner stated on the Montgomery County Death Certificate, dated 30 October 1966, that the deceased “shot self in head with 38 cal. pistol.” In an interview with the FBI on 2 November, Dr. Ball confirmed this:

“It was (Dr. Ball’s) opinion that death was caused by self-inflicted gun shot wound because when he examined the body on the night of November [sic] 29, 1966 in the TV Studio at the National Naval Medical Center, he observed powder burns on the head. From his observations on the situation in the room at the time he first observed it, and after having been advised that things were in the same condition as when the body was found, he concluded that PITZER was probably sitting in a chair and shot himself in the head...

...When he observed the wound in the head on the night of November [sic] 29, 1966, he observed muzzle marks around the wound and powder burns.”

Strangely, these descriptions of powder burns and muzzle marks are at odds with the autopsy report and the statements of the autopsy doctors. We are submitting an FOIA-release request for the autopsy photographs in the hope of resolving this issue and of understanding the nature of the wound in the left temple and its relationship, if any, with the third defect in the skull.

When Mrs. Pitzer requested the return of her husband’s wedding band, she was informed that his left hand was so mutilated that removal of the ring was impossible. She never did receive it. Yet, the autopsy report states that there were no wounds on the body other than those to the head:

“The upper and lower extremities are bilateral [sic] symmetrical and exhibit no remarkable gross lesions… No evidence of abrasions, contusions, or lacerations are noted in any other part of the body with the exception of the head wounds.”

Why did the US Navy apparently lie to a grieving widow, and deny her most reasonable request?

UNDER HIS WING

The FBI Report is structured in eight sections, as follows:

I. Crime scene investigation II. Interview with family members III. Medical examination and autopsy IV. Interview of associates and co-workers V. Deceased’s activities on October 29, 1966 VI. Psychiatric treatment of [name redacted] VII. Miscellaneous VIII. Investigation of deceased’s activities in Pensacola, Florida

The most heavily redacted section is VI, which deals with an enlisted man who had been under psychiatric treatment. When interviewed by the FBI on 1 November, 1966, a NNMC psychiatrist stated:

“In connection with the patient’s rehabilitation, he was placed under the supervision of WILLIAM PITZER at the National Naval Medical Center and with the cooperation of Mr. PITZER the rehabilitation of this patient worked out very well.

During the late summer of 1965, WILLIAM PITZER told [name redacted] that he was having a problem” [approximately 50 lines redacted].

The following one and half pages are redacted except for three and half lines in which the psychiatrist states that Lt. Cmdr. Pitzer had never received psychiatric treatment nor had he ever shown any indication of mental disorder. The final page of this section has been withheld in its entirety, not only for protection of personal privacy, the rationale for the large majority of the many many redactions in the FOIA release, but also because it is:

“material reporting investigative efforts pertaining to the enhancement of criminal law including efforts to prevent, control, or reduce crime or apprehend criminals.”

On the day before he died, Bill Pitzer telephoned the NNMC psychiatric unit, to make arrangements for this enlisted man to be seen by a doctor early in the following week. Apparently, the FBI investigators saw this coincidence as significant, and suspected this individual of playing a role in the death of his benefactor.

THE LETTER

Given the amount of physical evidence that seems to point away from suicide towards homicide, the reader must be curious as to how the FBI, the Naval Investigative Service Office and the NNMC Informal Board of Investigation reached verdicts of suicide. The Informal Board of Investigation apparently failed to take into account the physical evidence generated by the FBI - none of it is mentioned in its report. There is no reference to the third defect in the skull nor to whether the revolver was close to the head at discharge; the autopsy protocol was appended to the Informal Board’s Report, but it is referred to only in the following terms:

“(A)n autopsy was performed on 30 October 1966, at the Naval Hospital, Bethesda, Maryland, which disclosed the cause of death to be a gunshot wound in the head.”

The NNMC Informal Board of Investigation gave weight to the declaration of the Montgomery County Deputy Medical Examiner Dr. Ball, that the deceased had “shot self in head with 38 cal. pistol.” It seems strange that they accepted this opinion without commenting on Dr. Ball’s other assertions vis-à-vis muzzle marks and powder burns that conflict with the autopsy report.

The FBI Report presented the physical evidence, but placed no emphasis on it, instead using reasoning similar to that in the NNMC Informal Investigation Report for the verdict of suicide: Lt. Cmdr. Pitzer had been so weighed down by overwork and personal problems that he reached a point at which he could tolerate no further burden. A difficulty with this theory is that none of the witnesses who attested to Bill Pitzer’s stress were of the opinion that he was likely to take his own life as a result. His troubles were no worse than those shouldered by huge numbers of Americans at one time or another.

He attended the funerals of two colleagues in the last week of his life, and commented to Mrs. Pitzer:

“That’s two this week, I wonder who the third will be.”

He then stated a wish for a military funeral. Certainly, such utterances may be made by those considering self-destruction. But then, who has attended a funeral and not contemplated personal mortality? And the popular notion that untoward occurrences run in threes may also explain the remark.

It was pointed out above that although Bill Pitzer (a habitual note-maker) had the opportunity and the wherewithal to write a suicide note, he did not do so. However, according to the FBI and the Informal Investigation Board, he did write a letter that afternoon. Apparently, he put it into the mail at the NNMC, and it was received in due course by an associate in Florida, with whom he had visited during a recent trip to Pensacola to provide audiovisual support at a lecture course at the US Naval Aerospace Medical Institute. Although the general tone of that short letter is positive with reference to his returning to Florida a few months later, there are two passages that give cause for thought, particularly since it appears that they were written within an hour or so of his death:

“I am in deep trouble at home”

“Until you hear from or of me, I am etc.”

It is understandable that the Informal Board of Investigation and the FBI Reports put emphasis on these phrases. On the other hand, the term “deep trouble” may be mere hyperbole to get a point across, and “until you hear of me” could be a reference to the fact that the associate moved in navy circles in Pensacola. Again, such statements might be made by someone contemplating suicide, but do they constitute proof in the absence of supporting physical evidence?

Although the FBI and Informal Board of Investigation Reports include various photocopied items, this putatively last letter by Bill Pitzer’s hand is included not as a photocopy of the original, but, instead, retyped. Given the importance of this item of evidence, this is surprising [10]. Pitzer began his letter by acknowledging receipt of a letter “yesterday,” i.e. on Friday 28 October. However, according to the associate in Pensacola, that letter “should have arrived in Bethesda about 24 or 25 October,” i.e. on the Monday or the Tuesday. Pitzer’s letter, supposedly written on Saturday 29 October, was received in Florida on Monday 31 October. We suggest that he actually received the letter from Pensacola on Tuesday 25 October (the date on the postmark is stated to be illegible), wrote the reply on Wednesday 26 October and mailed it on Thursday 27. If not written during the last minutes of his life, this letter loses much of its possible significance as a suicide note.

CONCLUSION

The evidence that Lt. Cmdr. W.B. Pitzer committed suicide is purely circumstantial. The physical evidence is inconsistent with suicide and indicates homicide. But, this conclusion is of little consequence - our obligation now is to bring the recently released information to the attention of the appropriate authorities, with requests that the case be re-opened. There is no statute of limitations on the crime of murder. The good name and exemplary reputation of a fine US Naval Officer have been tarnished for 31 years. The time for redress is long overdue.

If the soon-to-retire Pitzer had in his possession photographs and slides of John Kennedy on arrival at the Bethesda Naval Hospital morgue, and, perhaps more importantly, that he had in his possession a movie film of the autopsy procedures (or lack thereof), these materials might yet be in existence somewhere. And, the possibility remains that covert forces would, at any cost, have blocked the dissemination of such materials at a time of mounting controversy over the conclusions of the Warren Report and, in particular, its coverage of the president’s autopsy.[11]

Of potential significance is the inclusion in the FBI Report of a whole section on a man in Pitzer’s command who had been under psychiatric treatment. Moreover, there is the coincidence of Pitzer’s phone call on the day before his death to an NNMC psychiatrist regarding this individual. Therefore, it is possible that the death had nothing to do with possession of photographs and film of the Kennedy autopsy. But why would the US Navy and the FBI cover up such an incident?

Notes

This article is based on new information on the FBI’s investigation of the death of Lieutenant Commander William B. Pitzer at the National Naval Medical Center, Bethesda, Maryland, on 29 October 1966. The FBI Report and ancillary documents were obtained by a request made under the auspices of the Freedom of Information Act by ex-Special Forces Colonel Daniel Marvin (Retired). The article also draws on the report of the National Naval Medical Center Informal Board of Investigation into Lt. Cmdr. Pitzer’s death, provided to Col. Marvin by Mr. Harrison E. Livingstone, author of several books on the assassination of President John F. Kennedy that highlight the potential importance of Pitzer’s death, e.g. High Treason 2 (New York: Carroll & Graf, 1992) pp. 556-559, and Killing Kennedy (New York: Carroll & Graf, 1995) pp. 336, 340. We are grateful to Col. Marvin for sharing this information.

David Lifton, Best Evidence (New York: Carroll & Graf, 1988 Paperback) p. 572.

Dennis David interview on The Men Who Killed Kennedy VI. The Truth Shall Set You Free, produced by Nigel Turner (A&E History Channel, 1995).

Dennis David, audiotaped responses to written questions from Colonel D. Marvin, 16 December 1996.

New Developments on Previous Articles: Colonel. D. Marvin, September 1997 The Fourth Decade, p. 27.

Walt Brown, An Interview with Jerrol Custer. 1997 JFK Deep Politics Quarterly, Spring.

Harrison E. Livingstone, High Treason 2 (New York: Carroll & Graf, 1992) pp. 556-557.

Cyril Wecht M.D., J.D., Cause of Death (New York: Dutton, 1993) p. 37.

This was reported by Harrison E. Livingstone in High Treason 2 (New York, Carroll & Graf, 1992) p. 558. Mr. Livingstone was in possession of excerpts from the autopsy report that deal with the appearance of the entry wound.

Our skepticism in this regard is similar to our doubt vis-à-vis the release of a .38 S&W to Mr. Andre; a photocopy of Supervisory Guard Bray’s hand-written statement, detailed herein, is included in the Informal Board of Investigation Report in lieu of a photocopy of the official logbook entry, and in the FBI Report there is a typed statement, also detailed herein, again in lieu of a photocopy of the logbook entry.

Colonel Daniel Marvin claimed that the CIA had a contract out on Lt. Cmdr. Pitzer’s life in Bits & Pieces: A Green Beret on the Periphery of the JFK Assassination, May 1995 The Fourth Decade, pp. 14-18, and on The Men Who Killed Kennedy VI. The Truth Shall Set You Free, produced by Nigel Turner (A&E History Channel, 1995). We are skeptical of his claims - see [5] above, and Interpretations of New Information in the Pitzer Case.

_____________________________________

John,

Thank you for the distilled version of your theory.

It is logical and consistent with the facts.

However, I believe it does not go quite far enough.

You mention Suite 8F and Fred Korth, former Secretary of the Navy.

Another Suite 8F member, Robert Anderson, was also Secretary of the Navy.

Because of Sgt. Dinkin's prior knowledge of the assassination (learned while listening to international signals intelligence and wiretaps), I believe the intelligence agencies of the US Defense Department were involved.

This would explain the nuclear "football" being shut off during the ambush.

This would explain the fact that the telephones in Washington DC went out at the same time.

This would explain the forged X-Rays, Autopsy Photos and Autopsy conclusions.

This would explain the use of Mannlicher Carcanos taken from Rome by the US military in 1943.

This would explain General Edwin Walker's claim of an Oswald murder attempt on him.

This would explain the failure of the Secret Service to behave normally in Dealey Plaza.

It may be that executives in the Suite 8F group co-ordinated the ambush, but they were acting with the witting knowledge of executives inside the government.

Mr. Kennedy had lost his security clearance, was considered to have "incapacity" and was removed from office in a bloody government coup............

Great cv and great picture and great countryside, Shanet!

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Thanks Tim.

The photo was taken in the Great Valley of Virginia, a farm region between the Allegheny Mountains and the Blue Ridge Mountains, near Staunton.

The purpose of this topic posting is twofold:

One, to establish my credentials with participating FORUM readers; and

Two, this links the name I was known by for many years with my current postings.

{It is essentially a search engine tactic for my former associates.......}

Thanks for the support,

Shanet Clark / Shan Clark

PHOTOS NOT VISIBLE? CLICK ON PHRASE: "SHAN CLARK FULL VERSION" scribners.org

Curriculum Vitae

D. Shanet Clark

shanetclark@yahoo.com

Degree:

B.A., History, summa cum laude, Georgia State University, Atlanta

Current Program:

Graduate Program in History, Georgia State University, Atlanta

Areas of Interest:

U.S. Political History, 1607-1865

Political and Economic Geography of Virginia and West Virginia.

Nineteenth Century Culture, U.S Political Events 1920-1980.

Minor in Political Science, Interest in Map Geography.

Awards:

E.I. Woodruff Fellowship in Southern History, GSU, (Cash Award) 2003-2004

GSU History Department and Middle East Center: Graduate Assistant, (Cash Award) 2003-2004

Malone History Scholarship, GSU, (Cash Award) 2002

Dean’s Key and Faculty Scholar, GSU, 2001-2002

Honors History Student of the Year, Georgia Perimeter College GPC (Cash Award) 2001

United States Senate Youth Scholarship (Cash Award - 1 of 100 nationwide) and the

William Randolph Hearst Scholarship (Cash Award) Marshall University 1986.

99th Percentile – Graduate Records Exam, Verbal Test, 2002 (GRE 760/610)

99th Percentile – College Level Equivalency Exam, CLEP, English (British) Literature

Conference Presentations:

“Seceding from Secession: Strategic and Geographic Factors in the

Political History of Virginia and West Virginia, 1800 -1863” (Presented at:)

The Georgia Interdisciplinary Conference; UGA Athens, GA, February 21, 2004

The Florida Historians’ Conference; Lake City, Florida, March 3, 2004

The Organization of American Historians’ Southern Regional Conference; Atlanta, July 17, 2005

VPI Blacksburg, Va. Graduate Conference (April 2005)

New England Historical Association annual conference (April 2005, Regis College, Boston)

Archival and Special Collections Research:

“Executive Order 12036: President Carter Restructures the Intelligence Community”

Jimmy Carter Library, Atlanta.

Revised under Peer Review for Presidential Studies Quarterly

Teaching Experience:

Welfare to Work Adult Literacy Program, Fayette County, KY, 1992-1995

High School At-Risk Dropout Prevention Program Teacher, Lexington KY, 1992-1995

Active Memberships:

Organization of American Historians

American Historical Association

Southern Historical Association

National Council for History Education

Thanks to all members of the international EDUCATION FORUM for your support.

WRONG AGAIN

Although the manipulation has not been publicly recognized by all shades of the press, the fact is that

POLITICAL PRESSURE WAS BROUGHT TO BEAR

There were no WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION

There was no connection of September 11th to Iraq under Hussein;

and the forces of SECRETARY RUMSFIELD and VICE PRESIDENT CHENEY

were invoked to falsify the available information......

{Few of us are as gullible as Mr. Gratz.}

Jumping in here, the image was snapped no longer than 30 seconds after the shooting. Here is the uncropped version of that photograph.

James

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

The overpass looks airbrushed. The people there are FUZZED OUT.

If you are interested in this line of thought you should read my seminar paper

"Was JFK's Assassination 'Legal'?: Dallas and the 25th Amendment"

Seymour Hersh's book "Dark Camelot" is an accurate and realistic view of john Kennedy's private life.

Whatever private biographical material that emerges now in the public press should be considered part of the ONI and NSA files on John Kennedy.

If the man was stripped of his security clearance and suffered EXECUTIVE SANCTION, then it is not character assassination to discuss these problematic personal anecdotes.

JFK's relationship with ANGIE DICKINSON, MARY PINCHOT MEYER, ELLEN ROMESCH and other women is documented, his ADDISON'S DISEASE and drug usage is well documented.

Although I am a "radical" coming from the "left" I find it imperative to address squarely these unflattering facts:

because these earthy realities may well have served as the rationale and excuse for his murder..................

Just off the top of my head I would recommend:

MARK LANE

PLAUSIBLE DENIAL

EDWARD EPSTEIN

LEGEND<LEE HARVEY OSWALD

Dr. David Livingstone:

Cultural Approaches to an Important Victorian Figure

Introduction

In his most well known narrative account of his expeditions, Missionary Travels and Researches In South Africa (1858), David Livingstone gives us this introduction to his coast-to-coast traversa of Africa with his typical understatement and optimism.

"Having sent my family home to England, I started in the beginning of June, 1852 on my last journey from Cape Town. This journey extended from the southern extremity of the continent to St. Paul de Loando, the capital of Angola, on the west coast, and thence across South Central Africa in an oblique direction to Kilimane (Quilimane) in Eastern Africa. I proceeded in the usual conveyance of the country, the heavy, lumbering Cape wagon drawn by ten oxen . . . Wagon-traveling in Africa has been so often described that I need say no more than it is a prolonged system of picnicking, excellent for the health, and agreeable to those who are not over-fastidious about trifles, and who delight in being in the open air."

We can now compare this blithe promotion of African exploration with the posthumously published letter sent out during the same period (on 12 September, 1855) to his father-in-law and fellow African missionary, the Reverend Robert Moffat:

"I am longer away than I intended, but it could not be otherwise without cutting my work down the middle. Disease prevented quick traveling. I have had fever in severe forms twenty-seven times, once with inflammation of a part of the head (meningitis), which kept me down 25 days and left me nearly blind and almost deaf. I can treat it pretty well now, but a sudden check to the perspiration brings on distressing vomiting of large mouthfuls of pure blood . . . I was literally a skeleton by dysentery at Loanda, but soon became stouter than I ever was before."

These two passages, describing the same expedition, show the difference between the popular constructed version of Livingstone’s African experience and the reality as shown by more recently published primary records. We will use both type of sources to look at the inimitable Dr. Livingstone, the African explorer and missionary, a model British mid-Victorian literary and cultural hero. We will show that Livingstone combined many of the strongest strands of identity common to the imperial mid-Victorian period--by personifying science, religion, abolition and empire building--and that he deserves study.

As Antoinette Burton and others have emphasized, four driving social forces marked the Victorian Period. These four internalized assumptions of the period are found deeply embedded in Livingstone’s writings and the writings about Livingstone. First, the values of the Western European Enlightenment are found throughout Livingstone’s writings and underlie the contemporary reception of his life. Secondly, the Victorians in Britain were proud of their success in the abolition of slavery within the Empire in 1833 and led efforts to abolish slavery elsewhere in the world. Livingstone’s writings show this inclination towards abolition in a high degree. Third, evangelical Christianity was a central motif of the period and Livingstone was an actual missionary, although this was not his first priority (as we shall see). Fourth, Victorians after 1859 were deeply affected by Charles Darwin’s Darwinism and its corollary, Social Darwinism. As an African naturalist and ethnologist, Livingstone was linked to this school of thought as well. The Victorian period in Britain was also marked by a fifth universal factor: strong interest in advancing their Empire, specifically through commercial or mercantile efforts to maximize profits in the Empire, and again Livingstone personified this effort. He was a direct proponent of commercial British expansion in South Central Africa. The synthesis of Enlightenment values, abolitionism, evangelism, contemporary natural history with commercial Empire building in the person of David Livingstone make his writings an important subject for historical enquiry.

Victorians perceived Livingstone as a larger-than-life figure and he appeared to his contemporaries as a robust Renaissance man. The combined characteristics of physician, geographic explorer, missionary of the Gospel, linguist and anti-slavery proponent came together to give unprecedented status to Livingstone. But his fame was also a product of technological and commercial changes in the production and distribution of popular literature. His was largely a middle class popularity. Mass produced illustrated magazines, newspapers and inexpensive books all debuted in this mid-Victorian period, and David Livingstone was one of the chief beneficiaries and objects of the new middle class journalism.

As Richard Altick states:

" To the Victorians the printing press, driven by the steam engine, was indeed the most pregnant emblem of their achievement and aspirations. . . . The audience for the literature…was concentrated therefore in the middle class. It was primarily there that printed matter in all its forms became a much more familiar accompaniment to everyday living. "

The popularity of natural science and exploration, as presented to mass middle-class audiences by the newly popularized illustrated magazine and inexpensive book formats, help us understand the great degree of influence Livingstone had in the Victorian period. We can show that this unprecedented public exposure made Livingstone an icon to the mid-Victorian readership, and that the adulation of Livingstone stemmed from his personification of the central trends and ideals of mid-Victorian thought, namely abolition, evangelism, colonization and natural science. His position as a scientist anchored the reception of his total persona, and we will detail his scientific achievements after we first look at the chronology of the period, a short biography and the existing body of Livingstone criticism.

Chronology

Livingstone’s literary and cultural impact can be better understood in reference to the events of the period. A short chronology of contextualizing events will make his centrality to the classic mid-Victorian period more evident.

In 1837 the reviled William IV died and Victoria ascended the throne of Great Britain, and in 1840 she married her consort, Albert Saxe-Gotha. In 1841 Livingstone sailed for Africa, via India. In 1847 chloroform was used for the first time in surgery (Livingstone’s medical qualifications and status are important in this paper). In 1851 Prince Albert sponsored the Crystal Palace world exhibition. In 1855 the Newspaper Tax was abolished and the first mass circulation daily, the Daily Telegraph, was established in Britain. These set the stage for Livingstone’s watershed publication of Missionary Travels in 1858, which established his fame. Darwin’s Origin of Species was published in 1859. The 1860s, the peak of Livingstone’s career, saw such classic Victorian events as Benjamin Disraeli’s (and Gladstone’s) ascendancy as Prime Minister, the passage of the Second Reform Bill, the abolition of compulsory church tithes, Lister’s antiseptic surgery and the publication of Huxley’s Man’s Place in Nature. Darwin published his Descent of Man in 1871. Livingstone died in Africa in 1873. The publication of Thomas Hardy’s first novel in 1874 may be seen as marking the end of this classic mid-Victorian period in literature and culture. Thus Livingstone occurs at the high tide mark of the classic mid-Victorian period, neither too early, before illustrated magazines, nor too late, when experimental modernism broke forth. Also important to periodization, the enthusiasm for Livingstone’s grand expedition to cross Africa (the traversa) is linked to British insecurities over the civil war in India, the Sepoy Insurrection of 1857.

To understand David Livingstone as an important Victorian figure, we need to briefly recap his own background. His Scottish ancestry and his working-class youth experiences helped to form his identity. His great grandfather died at Culloden, still loyal to the last reigning Stuart King, James II, and disloyal to William of Orange, William III, who ascended the throne in the ‘Glorious Revolution’ of 1688. His father, Neil Livingstone, worked in a “responsible position” at a cotton mill and his mother Mary Hunter Livingstone raised a large family on the River Clyde, north of Glasgow.

David Livingstone worked in the fabric mill from six a.m. to six p.m. six days a week with one-hour mid-day lunches. One of Livingstone’s biographers, Cecil Northcutt, believes young Livingstone read Mungo Park and other popular books on Africa. At 15 the mill spinner was reading “books on travel, geography, botany and chemistry” and he taught himself Latin and Greek during the winter semesters. As a young adult he was admitted into the practice of medicine. Before he left the British Isles for Africa he was ordained an orthodox Congregationalist minister, of the Knox Scot Kirk confession.

Livingstone commenced his missionary and exploration adventures in 1841, but his writings were not widely published until 1858. His death in April of 1873 in Africa was by no means the end of his literary fame, but this period from 1858 to 1873 marks the peak of Livingstone’s popularity and marks the classic mid-Victorian era as well.

The long period from 1841 to his discovery of Lake Ngami in August 1849 forms an opening era, before Livingstone was well known. During this period he remained south of the Kalahari Desert, close to his extremely remote mission in Kolobeng. He was in the ‘Contact Zone,’ living a few weeks march north of the next most remote mission at Karuman and a six-month hike from Cape Town, or “civilization.” Comparison of his exploration maps to post-colonial maps of Africa show Livingstone’s solo adventures predicting and telescoping much of African colonial history. For example he experienced Boer depredations in the Transvaal, he suffered from many Angolan mercenary raids and Livingstone confronted Zanzibar’s Arabic slave-trading oligarchy. These three historically important forces were the principle political forces confronting him to his south, west and east.

Livingstone’s period of greatest celebrity from 1850 to 1873 can be split into two phases. After the publication of the Travels in 1857 his career was ascendant, his public career peaked with the traversa (the east to west crossing of the African Continent) and his subsequent return to a hero’s welcome in Britain. Then, in 1858, he was named Consul to Africa (Consul to Quilimane, technically) and was fitted out by the British Government with 5000 pounds sterling and two ships to navigate the Zambesi River, the Ma-Robert and the Pioneer. This sailing, in uniform, on the heels of the traversa and his potent addresses to all major Scottish and English universities mark the highpoint, the dramatic center of the story.

The final and tragic phase began around the year 1864. Livingstone explores Africa for the sake of exploring Africa, ignoring his own health. He doesn’t quite ‘go native,’ but he gets drawn into the self-destructive activity of playing the role of the famous Dr. Livingstone.

The tragic behavior is the subtext and enduring theme of the Stanley and Livingstone story. David Livingstone was lost, rumored dead (again) and the American reporter Henry Stanley found him, near Lake Nyasa, on November 10, 1871. Cecil Northcutt quibbles at this, pointing out that Livingstone knew where he was at this time and wasn’t “lost.” But knowing one’s own rough bearings, in a jungle with no medicine, beset by mutinous camp followers and having no news flowing in or out for months all show us that Dr. Livingstone, if not lost, then was certainly running out of luck, time and resources. Stanley begs Livingstone to return to the East coast of Africa and to recuperate in Britain, but Livingstone refuses. Livingstone withdraws back into the interior of Africa and then dies in late April of 1873.

This self-destruction was foreshadowed in the earliest period. At Kolobeng and Kuruman (the frontier missions) in the 1840s he had acclimatized his body for the Kalahari trek to Lake Ngami with Oswell and Murray in 1849. He brought his wife and children on this extreme adventure, and they watched as the African tribal guides dug grave-sized mud wells in the traditional damp spots of the Kalahari Desert. Their pack animals often ran amok and went into convulsions due to the biting tsetse fly. Livingstone’s willingness to force his wife Mary Moffat Livingstone to endure this (and even childbirth under similar circumstances) is one enduring and memorable criticism of the explorer. After Ngami he dispatched his family back to Britain and emotionally abandoned them, in terms of immediacy, participation and “quality time.”

Revisionists of the Livingstone Story

Livingstone’s suicidal mania in the 1870s and his spousal and child abuse are favorite themes of the revisionists, and understandably so. The charge of his taking unfair credit for others’ explorations, a thesis put forth by Judith Listowel, is unfounded, though. Livingstone was scrupulously fair in the record regarding Mungo Murray and William Oswell’s rights to co-discovery of Lake Ngami. They were the first Europeans (or historically documented Africans) to find and announce to the world the exact location of the rumored lake north of the Kalahari Desert. Oswell and Murray made it possible for Livingstone to find the lake, they were with him when it was found and Livingstone gives proper credit to them. Judith Listowel, who claims that Livingstone suppressed Oswell and Murray’s contribution to the discovery of Lake Ngami, is refuted in this effort to revise.

Similarly, Listowel tries to make the case that Livingstone belittled and suppressed the achievements of Lazlo Magyar. Livingstone was certainly unconcerned with the Hungarian explorer and he didn’t help Magyar in his efforts to explore Africa. Lazlo Magyar did not get much credit for his extensive African explorations, but the Hungarian government and scientific community are to blame for this, not Livingstone. Once again Listowel, the over-reaching revisionist, has no real case against Livingstone.

David Livingstone’s notes also dispense with another explorer as a simple slave trader, while Listowel shows that explorer to be a Portuguese explorer of good reputation. Livingstone probably made a mistake in underestimating these contemporaries, even slurred them, in passing, in his journals. No, Livingstone did not cooperate with or encourage the Hungarian or the Portuguese explorers in their African adventures, and these two were much less well known than David Livingstone, but Judith Listowel’s indictment of Livingstone appears to be petty and overblown.

Cecil Northcutt, another biographer of Livingstone writing in the same period (the early 1970s) also attempted a revision of the Livingstone story, centering on his family problems, his self-destructive mania and his geographical miscalculations. Northcott’s attempt to reduce the stature of the “great man” is as unsuccessful, if somewhat less forced, than Listowel’s attempt at historical revision.

These ad hominem arguments, whether valid or not, are not really necessary to ‘de-bunk’ the myth of Livingstone, as Listowell and Northcott attempted to do in the 1970s. The entire fabric of British Victorian discourse is the content of the meta-narrative known as “Livingstone in Africa.” We need not dig so deeply into his personal foibles and faults. Although we may well find evidence of “spousal abuse” or “hostility to other explorers” this is a narrow, petty and ultimately unsatisfying critique.

Recent biographical authors fall flat in their attempts at revision by overstating minor quibbles and misjudging Livingstone’s obvious intent. Narrative lines linking him to events after his death are flawed by teleology. He is casually linked with Cecil Rhodes and the Rhodesia Corridor, and he is indicted in the carving up of Africa, neither of which he foresaw or participated in. True, Livingstone felt that the British had a responsibility to drive a wedge between Angola and the Mozambique slave ports, and he was a harsh critic of the Boer depredations, and both are political positions that can be called pro-British Empire. But more fundamentally these geopolitical extrapolations into later colonial events do not adhere to Livingstone. His great cruciform (X-shaped) expeditions into Africa were undertaken in solemn peace with just a thin lifeline back to an interior mission. Signaling ahead and sending gifts before coming into contact with African tribes, he enjoyed the love and support of many African chiefs and guides.

Certainly Livingstone had some prejudices inhering in his identity, but his ability and desire to embrace the Africans one to one in Christian charity softened his biases. In his descriptive prose he celebrates the Caffres (Zulu) and berates the timid Bakwains, but his overall view of the African is that of a fully human and historically potent people. He often saw “the true Egyptian” in the African visage and therefore credited them with a racial heritage equal to the Greeks, Jews and Gentiles.

Despite his humanitarian and inter-dependent relationship with Africans, Livingstone occasionally slips into a racist discourse typical of his time and background. If his categorizing of African tribes is often observant, subtle and harmless, when he describes less developed tribes he sometimes slides into descriptions like this, (one of the more blatant examples of Livingstone’s racism):

"The Basinje…seem to possess more of the low Negro character than either the Balonda or Basongo; their color is generally dirty black, foreheads low and compressed, noses flat and expanded laterally, though this is partly owing to the alae spreading the cheeks, by the custom of inserting…reeds in their septum; their teeth are deformed by being filed to points; their lips are large. They make a nearer approach to a general Negro appearance than any tribes I met . . ."

Livingstone should be viewed in his time and place contexts, a middle-class hero, exhibiting and exemplifying the values of his day; he was uniquely posited in time to benefit from large social, intellectual, political and technological currents. All this led, of course, to his virtual sanctification, with a corpus verging on hagiography, as David Livingstone lived out many of the dreams and fantasies of the middle and upper class mid-Victorian English speaking world. This adulation of Livingstone’s achievements and progressive attitudes stimulated this attempts at revision, many of which were unsuccessful. In this paper we will look at Livingstone from a new critical and culturally determined point of view. We will show that Livingstone’s immense popularity and continuing historical importance comes from his harmonizing with the major trends of Victorian thought, primarily Enlightenment scientific values, but also abolitionism, evangelism and commercial colonization.

David Livingstone’s Identity as an Enlightenment Scientist

As stated above, Livingstone’s status as combined physician, geographer, linguist and natural historian propelled his fame and celebrity, and these attributes still help define his larger meaning relative to the Empire of mid-Victorian Britain. Livingstone was an accredited medical doctor, trained in his native Scotland. This is important for two reasons. First, the medical degree gave him legitimacy and access to elites in Britain and helped propel his acceptance as a great man, (the historically ‘great man’ as defined by Carlyle). Physicians carry the highest status in the west and Livingstone’s professional credentials helped elevate him in the public mind above other explorers, naturalists, missionaries and authors of the period. Secondly, Livingstone’s actual life-saving skills built priceless good will with the native Africans that he encountered and these skills even saved his own life repeatedly, allowing him to thrive and surpass the life expectancy of other explorers in Africa. His famously hardy constitution was complemented by his self-treatments in the field. The combined self-medication and his medical treatment of others gave his career a durability and respect well above his contemporaries, both within his African milieu and his European clientele and audience.

Livingstone had other scientific competencies, and these also enhanced his reputation while sustaining his life. His greatest achievements were in the field of geography. He carefully recorded temperatures and was devoted to his locational devices, the sextant and chronometer. The primary documentary record that Livingstone amassed is full of latitude and longitude measurements--although his ability to accurately compute longitude was chronically limited by the inaccuracy of his oft-damaged chronometers. He also carefully documented temperatures, such as this entry: “(14 February, 1853) At Lotlakane. Thermometer in shade, 96 degrees, In sun on leather cushion 122 degrees, on green painted box in sun 126 degrees, Two inches below soil 128 degrees.” He could calculate longitude from lunar sightings, which only highly trained geographers dared to attempt.

Known primarily in his day as a geographer, was the first known European to traverse (traversa) the continent of Africa near the equator. Livingstone was not only familiar with the frontier west of the farthest outposts of Portuguese Mozambique; he was equally knowledgeable about the frontiers east of the farthest outposts of Portuguese Angola. His penetration of this interior region laid the basis for British claims on present-day Malawi, Botswana, Tanzania, etc. He kept careful logs of geographic locations and he was the first individual (known African or known European) to understand the inter-relationship of the Limpopo, Congo and Zambezi Rivers’ watersheds. With William Cotton Oswell and Mungo Murray he discovered Lake Ngami in 1849, and this was his first great geographic achievement. His understanding of the Congo/Zambezi relationship was equally important to science, as no western scientist had understood where the Congo drainage area ended and the Zambezi drainage area began. Livingstone’s reputation as a geographer suffered later in his career, however, when he misread the ancient question of the farthest source of the Nile. His conclusions in the 1870’s about the relationship of Lake Edward, Lake Tanganyika and the White Nile were in error, but overall he was the greatest South African geographer of his age and easily the equal of his contemporaries in African exploration, Richard Burton and John Speke.

Livingstone’s geographic career had geo-political and cultural consequences that must be considered. As Nancy Leys Stepan states, “If there is a lesson to be drawn from (the) history of science, race and liberalism, it is that science is always a social product and tends to reflect in general terms the political and social values of its times.” This is especially true in this case. Livingstone’s geographical efforts cannot be separated from their ultimate political results. Be exploring and, by extension, by claiming south central Africa for his native Britain, Livingstone’s legacy becomes entwined with that of Cecil Rhodes. Present day Malawi, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Namibia and Botswana (formerly Rhodesia) owe their current post-colonial British Commonwealth status largely to Livingstone’s mapping. This strip of former British colonies stood between the Portuguese coastal realms of Mozambique and Angola. Rhodes’s subsequent scheme of a British security corridor to include these countries plus Kenya, Uganda, Sudan and Egypt was premised on the ‘Britishness’ of the central frontier--as first described in detail by David Livingstone. It was only after 1919 that “the high expansionist imperialism of the late 19th century, when…Rhodes dreamed of a white central and south Africa, faded.” Rhodes’s aggressive, exploitive plans for central Africa should be kept separate from the activities of Livingstone one generation earlier. Livingstone’s friends Sechele and Sekelutu ruled over most of his immediate political contacts, the Bechuana Bakwains and the Makololo tribes were the primary political entities of that period. They, the Africans, were relatively benign agents who welcomed him, and later political developments cannot be used to criticize Livingstone’s peaceful educational activities in central Africa.

As an ethnographer and linguist (sociology had not been coined yet, but this discipline is what Livingstone practiced in documenting African societies), Livingstone appreciated the human qualities of the Africans he studied and worked with. Arriving in Africa on 15 March 1841 at Simons Bay “Livingstone took up the cause of the African and remained his friend to the end of his life…He got on appreciably better with Africans than with white men, who never took to his leadership.” While his relationship with missionary, geographic and governmental institutions remained strained; his survival from 1841-1873 shows us that his way with African Tribal leadership was relatively affable and winning. He was, essentially, an exile in Africa, with mixed feelings for both Britain and his Scottish labor class identity. He preferred the company of native Africans to elite Europeans.

Upon his first inland mission in Africa, Livingstone recognized the basic African social dynamic that would carry him through until the final tragic period. As he ranged north of Karuman into the land of the Bechuana (who were terrified of the Mzilikazi) he noticed that the Bechuana (Bakwains) were “glad to have a white man live amidst them, hoping he would give them security….Livingstone showed his talent for languages by learning Sechuana in three months …. (and he preached to) the Bakaa, a tribe that had recently murdered four white men.” So Livingstone was involved in the daily lives of the Africans and he engaged in transcultural exchanges, documenting and giving voices to the remote Africans, in contrast to other westerners in Africa who saw only primitive savages and potential slaves.

Livingstone’s major conflicts within Africa stemmed from his constantly crossing linguistic, tribal and quasi-political frontiers. His alliance with one tribal chief could be a serious handicap on a contested frontier. His abolitionism and eagerness to please the black African tribal leadership would often play against the Portuguese, Arab and Dutch Boer interests he encountered, while theft and petty mutiny were everyday irritants. These socio-political problems were added onto the chronic thirst, hunger and tsetse fly pestilences he would typically encounter in Africa. Livingstone was an ethnographer with sensitivity toward those whom he studied. He engaged in transactions with Africans and these were not one-sided. The openness of spirit with which he engaged to Africans in learning their languages is notable. Biographer Judith Listowel’s analysis of Livingstone’s relationship with Africans gets right to the heart of his success in the African continent:

From the time he first arrived in Africa Livingstone studied tribal customs and treated Africans with patience and tact; though tactless, even overbearing with Europeans, he seemed to have an instinctive understanding for the Africans. To this approach, coupled as it was with his calm courage practically all Africans responded (italics mine).

Countless examples exist of these trancultural exchanges as Livingstone learned and communicated in the native languages. His long sessions of question and answer with native speakers carry with it an implicit respect absent from much Euro-African contact. One amusing example he cites is the royal herald who accompanied him in the name of the Makololo chief Sekeletu “whose writ ran thin on the Barotse frontier.” As the Scottish missionary explorer would enter a village in train, the herald would shout, “Here comes the lord, the great lion!” This is interesting in itself, but Livingstone eventually asked the herald to stop, because they had crossed into another dialect group whose word for “sow” was the Makalolo word “lion.”

Early in his main narrative, the Missionary Travels, he tells the story of Oswell and Murray confusing the perfect form of “Kia Timela” with the phrase “Kia Itumela,” one of which means “thank you” and the other “I have wandered.” Livingstone takes a page or two to transcribe a dialogue between the British explorers and the lost African Guide, which is punctuated by Oswell hearing ‘Thank you very much’ in place of ‘I am lost.’ The humor and the linguistic mastery combine with a healthy awareness of the Britishers’ own dependence on the Africans and their language. Livingstone tells a funny story, based on African language subtleties and he makes it a warm and transcultural exchange, sensitively told. The story finishes with another translated punch line:

"We enjoyed a hearty laugh on the explanation of their midnight soliloquys. Frequent mistakes of this kind occur. A man may tell his interpreter to say he is a member of the family of the chief of the white men; “Yes, you speak like a chief,” is the reply, meaning, as they explain it, that a chief may talk nonsense without any one daring to contradict him. "

David Livingstone was a participant in and beneficiary of the popularity of natural history, which was a standard element in Victorian exploration literature. He was not a great participant in the debate over Darwin, but his journals, reports and summary narratives are filled with detailed descriptions of flora and fauna. The Travels, his best-known work, is actually structurally weakened by the constant digression into the animal life and unusual plants he describes, as this breaks up the narrative considerably. Obviously he values the genre and puts special emphasis on the habits of the lion, the elephant and the giraffe. His disparaging of the mythic qualities of the lion is amusing, considering the mauling he endured in 1841 (when he lost much of the mobility in his right arm). His characterization of the lion as a relatively harmless animal is ironic. Livingstone’s description of snakes, rhinos and other African wildlife sometime carry a simplistic tone, as if the lectures on lions, giraffes and other animals had been delivered to many youngsters. Often the natural history paragraphs, close to half of his total output, have a lighter and breezy tone compared to his descriptions of natural geography and human ethnography. His popularity among less educated and middle-class readers can be seen in these passages, and they are often illustrated by the inexpensive lithography of the period.

Livingstone’s writings on natural history and medicine are often related and fail to fall into either medical or natural history categories. He became quite adept at identifying animal diseases, and of course his arch-nemesis was the tsetse fly. Much of this medical, veterinary and biological material reflects a transcultural exchange of native and western information (italics mine):

“Inquiries among the Bushmen and Bakalahari, who are intimately acquainted with the habits of the game, lead to the belief that many diseases prevail among wild animals. I have seen the Kokong or gnu, the Kama or hartebeest, the tsessebe, kukama, and the giraffe, so mangy as to be uneatable even by the natives. Reference has already been made to the peripneumonia which cuts off horses, tolos or koodoos. Great number of zebras are found dead with masses of foam at the nostrils…I once found a buffalo blind from opthalmia standing by the fountain Otse … the rhinoceros often has worms in conjunction with his eyes . . . all the wild animals are subject to intestinal worms…the zebra, giraffe, eland, and kukama have been seen mere skeletons from decay of their teeth as well as from disease.”

Livingstone as a Commercial Colonist, Missionary and Abolitionist

Livingstone was deeply in harmony with the evangelical Christianity, which Antoinette Burton and others point to as a central motif of Victorian cultural tradition.

He had originally planned to enter China as a missionary but was forestalled by the 1838 Opium War. After over ten years of relatively stationary outpost mission work teaching hygiene, English and moral development in remote Africa, Livingstone decided that Christianity, (synonymous with civilization and progress, to him) must follow exploration.

His own preference of science and exploration over Christian ministry is indicated by the fact that Livingstone chose to dedicate his first major book, Missionary Travels, to the Royal Geographic Society rather than the London Missionary Society. After 1852 he can be more accurately described as an exploring geographer than an evangelical missionary. Nevertheless his approach to the natives he encountered remained evangelical and charitable, and he never lost the aura of the church. His restlessness and outright boredom within established mission camps drove him to go farther afield, and his pride and personal goals complicated his relationship with the Mission Society from the first. After this, much of his evangelism was addressed not to Africans but to his popular audience within the English-speaking world. He encouraged bright young Britons to follow him and take up his work in Africa. His writings are full of homilies and moral reinforcement. Ultimately his missionary identity became more of a state of mind than a true vocation, and by the time he was made Consul to Africa, he had become more of a public scientist than a gospel evangelist.

Livingstone was perpetually at odds with the African slave trade. He castigated the Portuguese and Arab slave traders and sought for British military support to put down the slave trade. The sight of young women chained together haunted him after the traversa, and his need to occasionally link up with the slave “oligarchy” to survive caused him anger.

Livingstone saw a need to bring additional commodities and mediums of exchange to Africa, to augment the existing currency in ivory, gold and captive humans. Anti-slavery efforts, missionary work, and commercial trade were linked together in all of Livingstone’s major announcements.

"Sending the Gospel to the heathen must…include much more than is implied in the usual picture of a missionary, namely a man going about with a bible under his arm. The promotion of commerce ought to be especially attended to, as this, more speedily than any thing else, demolishes that sense of isolation which heathenism engenders…. my observations on this subject make me extremely desirous to promote the preparation of the raw materials of European manufactures in Africa, for by that means we may not only put a stop to the slave-trade, but introduce the Negro family into the corporate body of nations. "

Livingstone saw himself as a geographer with missionary goals. “The end of the geographical feat is the beginning of the missionary enterprise,” was one of his mottoes.

In a similar fashion, Livingstone’s evangelistic and colonializing strands cannot be disentwined, as he believed “(as) missionaries…we can influence the commerce of the world in this great city (London) of merchant princes, in such a way to have Christianizing results.” Trade, emancipation and mission work were inextricable for Livingstone. His stated goal in 1855 shows this, “My object in returning to Africa is to try to get a permanent path to that central region from which most of the slaves have always been drawn…to propitiate the different chiefs along (the Zambesi)…endeavoring to induce them to cultivate cotton and to abolish the slave trade.”

Conclusions

David Livingstone was a model type among Victorian historical figures. He combined in his persona many of the characteristics most highly valued by his British and American nineteenth-century readers. Livingstone was foremost a scientist in the Scottish Enlightenment tradition. He was an accredited physician, an acclaimed geographer, a talented transcultural linguist, a careful naturalist and an early ethnological sociologist of African culture. Other aspects added to his celebrity because of their conformity to Victorian values. These aspects were his evangelical mission, his hatred of the slave trade and his support of mercantile colonization of Africa (in support of Christianity and Abolition). Illustrated magazines and illustrated books were emerging into a modern mass market during Livingstone’s career, and all this together brought David Livingstone unprecedented upper and middle class fame throughout the English-speaking world.

When we look into the assumptions of British mercantile colonialism, the biases inherent in Encyclopedic natural history, and the limits of even well-intentioned Euro-African transactions, then a critique emerges that doesn’t hinge on the personal, but in understanding the biases common to the language and cultural assumptions of the mid-Victorian period. Colonization via evangelical missions and an African Empire built upon abolitionist moral superiority were manifested by the direct sponsorship of Livingstone by the British government, and these had results which must be critiqued, but the political results of later times need to be carefully differentiated from the actions of the individual. Celebrated for his scientific achievements and opposition to slavery, David Livingstone remains a formidable historical figure, and his legacy as scientist and human philanthropist continues to resist hostile revisionism.

Appendix

Remaining Questions For Further Study

Was the popular dramatic saga of David Livingstone part of a deeper tradition of representing legitimacy? Were the Sextant, Chronometer and Bible important to Livingstone’s role, since he was always pictured holding them? Are kingly, priestly and sacrificial strands of narrative found in the Livingstone saga? Is the rapid innovation of mass illustrated magazines circa 1860 important to the Livingstone drama? Do dramaturgical approaches illuminate the Livingstone saga? Do transcultural and transactional analyses shed light on the explorer’s narratives? Are the complicated values, courtesies and mores of British Victorians important to understanding the unprecedented popularity of the Livingstone saga? Do traditions of the ‘law-giver’ relate to Livingstone’s totemic Bible? Are the chronometer and sextant symbolic of a royal orb and scepter? Does the compound status of physician, priest and surveyor inform the received image of Livingstone by his Victorian audiences? What assumptions underlay his relationship with Africans? With Europeans? Do Livingstone’s travels, suspenseful absences and re-appearances have overtones of earlier royal and priestly drama? How did Henry Stanley go about appropriating the Dr. Livingston mystique?

A cultural, dramaturgical and deep iconic analysis of the Victorian period is overdue. David Livingstone, a geographer, missionary and physician often cast himself as a law-giver and a kingly force, carrying a book of law, the Bible--and an orb and scepter of scientific legitimacy, his sextant and chronometer. His suspenseful “offstage” disappearances and death rumors go to a deeply archetypal trope of sacrifice and resurrection. Livingstone’s character, physical sturdiness and writing style need to be reviewed in analyzing the causes of his unprecedented popularity and status. The gap between Livingstone’s intentions and his perceived qualities should be aired. There are important issues concerning Livingstone’s popular representation and signification, including the courtly, kingly and iconic elements of the Livingstone saga. His disappearances and re-appearances, rumored murder, totemic icons and rarefied stature need investigation. The dramaturgical approaches of Geertz, Goffman and Stahlins can be applied to the drama of Livingstone. Bernard Cohn’s research into the language and the preferred deference policies used in British India also bring up angles of inquiry for the Livingstone corpus.

In the period from 1858-1873 innovative mass media techniques of low cost illustrated printing brought the Livingstone story to a broad audience. Women, youth and marginalized observers became part of the hagiographic and dramaturgical representation of Livingstone. Unprecedented mass publics saw staged elements reminiscent of royal grand tours, “law-giving,’ and a Phoenix-like re-emergence, all within the surface story of Dr. Livingstone’s African explorations and Christian missionary efforts. The political aspirations of colonizing Britons was given legitimacy by the exploits of Livingstone, but many of these themes lie below the surface. A cultural, iconic and dramaturgical look at the writings and images of David Livingstone could yield illuminating insights into the Afro-British colonial experience, and the broader Anglo-American Victorian experience.

Shanet Clark

Woodruff History Fellow

GSU Atlanta

Dr. David Livingstone:

Cultural Approaches to an Important Victorian Figure

Introduction

In his most well known narrative account of his expeditions, Missionary Travels and Researches In South Africa (1858), David Livingstone gives us this introduction to his coast-to-coast traversa of Africa with his typical understatement and optimism.

"Having sent my family home to England, I started in the beginning of June, 1852 on my last journey from Cape Town. This journey extended from the southern extremity of the continent to St. Paul de Loando, the capital of Angola, on the west coast, and thence across South Central Africa in an oblique direction to Kilimane (Quilimane) in Eastern Africa. I proceeded in the usual conveyance of the country, the heavy, lumbering Cape wagon drawn by ten oxen . . . Wagon-traveling in Africa has been so often described that I need say no more than it is a prolonged system of picnicking, excellent for the health, and agreeable to those who are not over-fastidious about trifles, and who delight in being in the open air."

We can now compare this blithe promotion of African exploration with the posthumously published letter sent out during the same period (on 12 September, 1855) to his father-in-law and fellow African missionary, the Reverend Robert Moffat:

"I am longer away than I intended, but it could not be otherwise without cutting my work down the middle. Disease prevented quick traveling. I have had fever in severe forms twenty-seven times, once with inflammation of a part of the head (meningitis), which kept me down 25 days and left me nearly blind and almost deaf. I can treat it pretty well now, but a sudden check to the perspiration brings on distressing vomiting of large mouthfuls of pure blood . . . I was literally a skeleton by dysentery at Loanda, but soon became stouter than I ever was before."

These two passages, describing the same expedition, show the difference between the popular constructed version of Livingstone’s African experience and the reality as shown by more recently published primary records. We will use both type of sources to look at the inimitable Dr. Livingstone, the African explorer and missionary, a model British mid-Victorian literary and cultural hero. We will show that Livingstone combined many of the strongest strands of identity common to the imperial mid-Victorian period--by personifying science, religion, abolition and empire building--and that he deserves study.

As Antoinette Burton and others have emphasized, four driving social forces marked the Victorian Period. These four internalized assumptions of the period are found deeply embedded in Livingstone’s writings and the writings about Livingstone. First, the values of the Western European Enlightenment are found throughout Livingstone’s writings and underlie the contemporary reception of his life. Secondly, the Victorians in Britain were proud of their success in the abolition of slavery within the Empire in 1833 and led efforts to abolish slavery elsewhere in the world. Livingstone’s writings show this inclination towards abolition in a high degree. Third, evangelical Christianity was a central motif of the period and Livingstone was an actual missionary, although this was not his first priority (as we shall see). Fourth, Victorians after 1859 were deeply affected by Charles Darwin’s Darwinism and its corollary, Social Darwinism. As an African naturalist and ethnologist, Livingstone was linked to this school of thought as well. The Victorian period in Britain was also marked by a fifth universal factor: strong interest in advancing their Empire, specifically through commercial or mercantile efforts to maximize profits in the Empire, and again Livingstone personified this effort. He was a direct proponent of commercial British expansion in South Central Africa. The synthesis of Enlightenment values, abolitionism, evangelism, contemporary natural history with commercial Empire building in the person of David Livingstone make his writings an important subject for historical enquiry.

Victorians perceived Livingstone as a larger-than-life figure and he appeared to his contemporaries as a robust Renaissance man. The combined characteristics of physician, geographic explorer, missionary of the Gospel, linguist and anti-slavery proponent came together to give unprecedented status to Livingstone. But his fame was also a product of technological and commercial changes in the production and distribution of popular literature. His was largely a middle class popularity. Mass produced illustrated magazines, newspapers and inexpensive books all debuted in this mid-Victorian period, and David Livingstone was one of the chief beneficiaries and objects of the new middle class journalism.

As Richard Altick states:

" To the Victorians the printing press, driven by the steam engine, was indeed the most pregnant emblem of their achievement and aspirations. . . . The audience for the literature…was concentrated therefore in the middle class. It was primarily there that printed matter in all its forms became a much more familiar accompaniment to everyday living. "

The popularity of natural science and exploration, as presented to mass middle-class audiences by the newly popularized illustrated magazine and inexpensive book formats, help us understand the great degree of influence Livingstone had in the Victorian period. We can show that this unprecedented public exposure made Livingstone an icon to the mid-Victorian readership, and that the adulation of Livingstone stemmed from his personification of the central trends and ideals of mid-Victorian thought, namely abolition, evangelism, colonization and natural science. His position as a scientist anchored the reception of his total persona, and we will detail his scientific achievements after we first look at the chronology of the period, a short biography and the existing body of Livingstone criticism.

Chronology

Livingstone’s literary and cultural impact can be better understood in reference to the events of the period. A short chronology of contextualizing events will make his centrality to the classic mid-Victorian period more evident.

In 1837 the reviled William IV died and Victoria ascended the throne of Great Britain, and in 1840 she married her consort, Albert Saxe-Gotha. In 1841 Livingstone sailed for Africa, via India. In 1847 chloroform was used for the first time in surgery (Livingstone’s medical qualifications and status are important in this paper). In 1851 Prince Albert sponsored the Crystal Palace world exhibition. In 1855 the Newspaper Tax was abolished and the first mass circulation daily, the Daily Telegraph, was established in Britain. These set the stage for Livingstone’s watershed publication of Missionary Travels in 1858, which established his fame. Darwin’s Origin of Species was published in 1859. The 1860s, the peak of Livingstone’s career, saw such classic Victorian events as Benjamin Disraeli’s (and Gladstone’s) ascendancy as Prime Minister, the passage of the Second Reform Bill, the abolition of compulsory church tithes, Lister’s antiseptic surgery and the publication of Huxley’s Man’s Place in Nature. Darwin published his Descent of Man in 1871. Livingstone died in Africa in 1873. The publication of Thomas Hardy’s first novel in 1874 may be seen as marking the end of this classic mid-Victorian period in literature and culture. Thus Livingstone occurs at the high tide mark of the classic mid-Victorian period, neither too early, before illustrated magazines, nor too late, when experimental modernism broke forth. Also important to periodization, the enthusiasm for Livingstone’s grand expedition to cross Africa (the traversa) is linked to British insecurities over the civil war in India, the Sepoy Insurrection of 1857.

To understand David Livingstone as an important Victorian figure, we need to briefly recap his own background. His Scottish ancestry and his working-class youth experiences helped to form his identity. His great grandfather died at Culloden, still loyal to the last reigning Stuart King, James II, and disloyal to William of Orange, William III, who ascended the throne in the ‘Glorious Revolution’ of 1688. His father, Neil Livingstone, worked in a “responsible position” at a cotton mill and his mother Mary Hunter Livingstone raised a large family on the River Clyde, north of Glasgow.

David Livingstone worked in the fabric mill from six a.m. to six p.m. six days a week with one-hour mid-day lunches. One of Livingstone’s biographers, Cecil Northcutt, believes young Livingstone read Mungo Park and other popular books on Africa. At 15 the mill spinner was reading “books on travel, geography, botany and chemistry” and he taught himself Latin and Greek during the winter semesters. As a young adult he was admitted into the practice of medicine. Before he left the British Isles for Africa he was ordained an orthodox Congregationalist minister, of the Knox Scot Kirk confession.

Livingstone commenced his missionary and exploration adventures in 1841, but his writings were not widely published until 1858. His death in April of 1873 in Africa was by no means the end of his literary fame, but this period from 1858 to 1873 marks the peak of Livingstone’s popularity and marks the classic mid-Victorian era as well.

The long period from 1841 to his discovery of Lake Ngami in August 1849 forms an opening era, before Livingstone was well known. During this period he remained south of the Kalahari Desert, close to his extremely remote mission in Kolobeng. He was in the ‘Contact Zone,’ living a few weeks march north of the next most remote mission at Karuman and a six-month hike from Cape Town, or “civilization.” Comparison of his exploration maps to post-colonial maps of Africa show Livingstone’s solo adventures predicting and telescoping much of African colonial history. For example he experienced Boer depredations in the Transvaal, he suffered from many Angolan mercenary raids and Livingstone confronted Zanzibar’s Arabic slave-trading oligarchy. These three historically important forces were the principle political forces confronting him to his south, west and east.

Livingstone’s period of greatest celebrity from 1850 to 1873 can be split into two phases. After the publication of the Travels in 1857 his career was ascendant, his public career peaked with the traversa (the east to west crossing of the African Continent) and his subsequent return to a hero’s welcome in Britain. Then, in 1858, he was named Consul to Africa (Consul to Quilimane, technically) and was fitted out by the British Government with 5000 pounds sterling and two ships to navigate the Zambesi River, the Ma-Robert and the Pioneer. This sailing, in uniform, on the heels of the traversa and his potent addresses to all major Scottish and English universities mark the highpoint, the dramatic center of the story.

The final and tragic phase began around the year 1864. Livingstone explores Africa for the sake of exploring Africa, ignoring his own health. He doesn’t quite ‘go native,’ but he gets drawn into the self-destructive activity of playing the role of the famous Dr. Livingstone.

The tragic behavior is the subtext and enduring theme of the Stanley and Livingstone story. David Livingstone was lost, rumored dead (again) and the American reporter Henry Stanley found him, near Lake Nyasa, on November 10, 1871. Cecil Northcutt quibbles at this, pointing out that Livingstone knew where he was at this time and wasn’t “lost.” But knowing one’s own rough bearings, in a jungle with no medicine, beset by mutinous camp followers and having no news flowing in or out for months all show us that Dr. Livingstone, if not lost, then was certainly running out of luck, time and resources. Stanley begs Livingstone to return to the East coast of Africa and to recuperate in Britain, but Livingstone refuses. Livingstone withdraws back into the interior of Africa and then dies in late April of 1873.

This self-destruction was foreshadowed in the earliest period. At Kolobeng and Kuruman (the frontier missions) in the 1840s he had acclimatized his body for the Kalahari trek to Lake Ngami with Oswell and Murray in 1849. He brought his wife and children on this extreme adventure, and they watched as the African tribal guides dug grave-sized mud wells in the traditional damp spots of the Kalahari Desert. Their pack animals often ran amok and went into convulsions due to the biting tsetse fly. Livingstone’s willingness to force his wife Mary Moffat Livingstone to endure this (and even childbirth under similar circumstances) is one enduring and memorable criticism of the explorer. After Ngami he dispatched his family back to Britain and emotionally abandoned them, in terms of immediacy, participation and “quality time.”

Revisionists of the Livingstone Story

Livingstone’s suicidal mania in the 1870s and his spousal and child abuse are favorite themes of the revisionists, and understandably so. The charge of his taking unfair credit for others’ explorations, a thesis put forth by Judith Listowel, is unfounded, though. Livingstone was scrupulously fair in the record regarding Mungo Murray and William Oswell’s rights to co-discovery of Lake Ngami. They were the first Europeans (or historically documented Africans) to find and announce to the world the exact location of the rumored lake north of the Kalahari Desert. Oswell and Murray made it possible for Livingstone to find the lake, they were with him when it was found and Livingstone gives proper credit to them. Judith Listowel, who claims that Livingstone suppressed Oswell and Murray’s contribution to the discovery of Lake Ngami, is refuted in this effort to revise.

Similarly, Listowel tries to make the case that Livingstone belittled and suppressed the achievements of Lazlo Magyar. Livingstone was certainly unconcerned with the Hungarian explorer and he didn’t help Magyar in his efforts to explore Africa. Lazlo Magyar did not get much credit for his extensive African explorations, but the Hungarian government and scientific community are to blame for this, not Livingstone. Once again Listowel, the over-reaching revisionist, has no real case against Livingstone.

David Livingstone’s notes also dispense with another explorer as a simple slave trader, while Listowel shows that explorer to be a Portuguese explorer of good reputation. Livingstone probably made a mistake in underestimating these contemporaries, even slurred them, in passing, in his journals. No, Livingstone did not cooperate with or encourage the Hungarian or the Portuguese explorers in their African adventures, and these two were much less well known than David Livingstone, but Judith Listowel’s indictment of Livingstone appears to be petty and overblown.

Cecil Northcutt, another biographer of Livingstone writing in the same period (the early 1970s) also attempted a revision of the Livingstone story, centering on his family problems, his self-destructive mania and his geographical miscalculations. Northcott’s attempt to reduce the stature of the “great man” is as unsuccessful, if somewhat less forced, than Listowel’s attempt at historical revision.

These ad hominem arguments, whether valid or not, are not really necessary to ‘de-bunk’ the myth of Livingstone, as Listowell and Northcott attempted to do in the 1970s. The entire fabric of British Victorian discourse is the content of the meta-narrative known as “Livingstone in Africa.” We need not dig so deeply into his personal foibles and faults. Although we may well find evidence of “spousal abuse” or “hostility to other explorers” this is a narrow, petty and ultimately unsatisfying critique.

Recent biographical authors fall flat in their attempts at revision by overstating minor quibbles and misjudging Livingstone’s obvious intent. Narrative lines linking him to events after his death are flawed by teleology. He is casually linked with Cecil Rhodes and the Rhodesia Corridor, and he is indicted in the carving up of Africa, neither of which he foresaw or participated in. True, Livingstone felt that the British had a responsibility to drive a wedge between Angola and the Mozambique slave ports, and he was a harsh critic of the Boer depredations, and both are political positions that can be called pro-British Empire. But more fundamentally these geopolitical extrapolations into later colonial events do not adhere to Livingstone. His great cruciform (X-shaped) expeditions into Africa were undertaken in solemn peace with just a thin lifeline back to an interior mission. Signaling ahead and sending gifts before coming into contact with African tribes, he enjoyed the love and support of many African chiefs and guides.

Certainly Livingstone had some prejudices inhering in his identity, but his ability and desire to embrace the Africans one to one in Christian charity softened his biases. In his descriptive prose he celebrates the Caffres (Zulu) and berates the timid Bakwains, but his overall view of the African is that of a fully human and historically potent people. He often saw “the true Egyptian” in the African visage and therefore credited them with a racial heritage equal to the Greeks, Jews and Gentiles.

Despite his humanitarian and inter-dependent relationship with Africans, Livingstone occasionally slips into a racist discourse typical of his time and background. If his categorizing of African tribes is often observant, subtle and harmless, when he describes less developed tribes he sometimes slides into descriptions like this, (one of the more blatant examples of Livingstone’s racism):

"The Basinje…seem to possess more of the low Negro character than either the Balonda or Basongo; their color is generally dirty black, foreheads low and compressed, noses flat and expanded laterally, though this is partly owing to the alae spreading the cheeks, by the custom of inserting…reeds in their septum; their teeth are deformed by being filed to points; their lips are large. They make a nearer approach to a general Negro appearance than any tribes I met . . ."

Livingstone should be viewed in his time and place contexts, a middle-class hero, exhibiting and exemplifying the values of his day; he was uniquely posited in time to benefit from large social, intellectual, political and technological currents. All this led, of course, to his virtual sanctification, with a corpus verging on hagiography, as David Livingstone lived out many of the dreams and fantasies of the middle and upper class mid-Victorian English speaking world. This adulation of Livingstone’s achievements and progressive attitudes stimulated this attempts at revision, many of which were unsuccessful. In this paper we will look at Livingstone from a new critical and culturally determined point of view. We will show that Livingstone’s immense popularity and continuing historical importance comes from his harmonizing with the major trends of Victorian thought, primarily Enlightenment scientific values, but also abolitionism, evangelism and commercial colonization.

David Livingstone’s Identity as an Enlightenment Scientist

As stated above, Livingstone’s status as combined physician, geographer, linguist and natural historian propelled his fame and celebrity, and these attributes still help define his larger meaning relative to the Empire of mid-Victorian Britain. Livingstone was an accredited medical doctor, trained in his native Scotland. This is important for two reasons. First, the medical degree gave him legitimacy and access to elites in Britain and helped propel his acceptance as a great man, (the historically ‘great man’ as defined by Carlyle). Physicians carry the highest status in the west and Livingstone’s professional credentials helped elevate him in the public mind above other explorers, naturalists, missionaries and authors of the period. Secondly, Livingstone’s actual life-saving skills built priceless good will with the native Africans that he encountered and these skills even saved his own life repeatedly, allowing him to thrive and surpass the life expectancy of other explorers in Africa. His famously hardy constitution was complemented by his self-treatments in the field. The combined self-medication and his medical treatment of others gave his career a durability and respect well above his contemporaries, both within his African milieu and his European clientele and audience.

Livingstone had other scientific competencies, and these also enhanced his reputation while sustaining his life. His greatest achievements were in the field of geography. He carefully recorded temperatures and was devoted to his locational devices, the sextant and chronometer. The primary documentary record that Livingstone amassed is full of latitude and longitude measurements--although his ability to accurately compute longitude was chronically limited by the inaccuracy of his oft-damaged chronometers. He also carefully documented temperatures, such as this entry: “(14 February, 1853) At Lotlakane. Thermometer in shade, 96 degrees, In sun on leather cushion 122 degrees, on green painted box in sun 126 degrees, Two inches below soil 128 degrees.” He could calculate longitude from lunar sightings, which only highly trained geographers dared to attempt.

Known primarily in his day as a geographer, was the first known European to traverse (traversa) the continent of Africa near the equator. Livingstone was not only familiar with the frontier west of the farthest outposts of Portuguese Mozambique; he was equally knowledgeable about the frontiers east of the farthest outposts of Portuguese Angola. His penetration of this interior region laid the basis for British claims on present-day Malawi, Botswana, Tanzania, etc. He kept careful logs of geographic locations and he was the first individual (known African or known European) to understand the inter-relationship of the Limpopo, Congo and Zambezi Rivers’ watersheds. With William Cotton Oswell and Mungo Murray he discovered Lake Ngami in 1849, and this was his first great geographic achievement. His understanding of the Congo/Zambezi relationship was equally important to science, as no western scientist had understood where the Congo drainage area ended and the Zambezi drainage area began. Livingstone’s reputation as a geographer suffered later in his career, however, when he misread the ancient question of the farthest source of the Nile. His conclusions in the 1870’s about the relationship of Lake Edward, Lake Tanganyika and the White Nile were in error, but overall he was the greatest South African geographer of his age and easily the equal of his contemporaries in African exploration, Richard Burton and John Speke.

Livingstone’s geographic career had geo-political and cultural consequences that must be considered. As Nancy Leys Stepan states, “If there is a lesson to be drawn from (the) history of science, race and liberalism, it is that science is always a social product and tends to reflect in general terms the political and social values of its times.” This is especially true in this case. Livingstone’s geographical efforts cannot be separated from their ultimate political results. Be exploring and, by extension, by claiming south central Africa for his native Britain, Livingstone’s legacy becomes entwined with that of Cecil Rhodes. Present day Malawi, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Namibia and Botswana (formerly Rhodesia) owe their current post-colonial British Commonwealth status largely to Livingstone’s mapping. This strip of former British colonies stood between the Portuguese coastal realms of Mozambique and Angola. Rhodes’s subsequent scheme of a British security corridor to include these countries plus Kenya, Uganda, Sudan and Egypt was premised on the ‘Britishness’ of the central frontier--as first described in detail by David Livingstone. It was only after 1919 that “the high expansionist imperialism of the late 19th century, when…Rhodes dreamed of a white central and south Africa, faded.” Rhodes’s aggressive, exploitive plans for central Africa should be kept separate from the activities of Livingstone one generation earlier. Livingstone’s friends Sechele and Sekelutu ruled over most of his immediate political contacts, the Bechuana Bakwains and the Makololo tribes were the primary political entities of that period. They, the Africans, were relatively benign agents who welcomed him, and later political developments cannot be used to criticize Livingstone’s peaceful educational activities in central Africa.

As an ethnographer and linguist (sociology had not been coined yet, but this discipline is what Livingstone practiced in documenting African societies), Livingstone appreciated the human qualities of the Africans he studied and worked with. Arriving in Africa on 15 March 1841 at Simons Bay “Livingstone took up the cause of the African and remained his friend to the end of his life…He got on appreciably better with Africans than with white men, who never took to his leadership.” While his relationship with missionary, geographic and governmental institutions remained strained; his survival from 1841-1873 shows us that his way with African Tribal leadership was relatively affable and winning. He was, essentially, an exile in Africa, with mixed feelings for both Britain and his Scottish labor class identity. He preferred the company of native Africans to elite Europeans.

Upon his first inland mission in Africa, Livingstone recognized the basic African social dynamic that would carry him through until the final tragic period. As he ranged north of Karuman into the land of the Bechuana (who were terrified of the Mzilikazi) he noticed that the Bechuana (Bakwains) were “glad to have a white man live amidst them, hoping he would give them security….Livingstone showed his talent for languages by learning Sechuana in three months …. (and he preached to) the Bakaa, a tribe that had recently murdered four white men.” So Livingstone was involved in the daily lives of the Africans and he engaged in transcultural exchanges, documenting and giving voices to the remote Africans, in contrast to other westerners in Africa who saw only primitive savages and potential slaves.

Livingstone’s major conflicts within Africa stemmed from his constantly crossing linguistic, tribal and quasi-political frontiers. His alliance with one tribal chief could be a serious handicap on a contested frontier. His abolitionism and eagerness to please the black African tribal leadership would often play against the Portuguese, Arab and Dutch Boer interests he encountered, while theft and petty mutiny were everyday irritants. These socio-political problems were added onto the chronic thirst, hunger and tsetse fly pestilences he would typically encounter in Africa. Livingstone was an ethnographer with sensitivity toward those whom he studied. He engaged in transactions with Africans and these were not one-sided. The openness of spirit with which he engaged to Africans in learning their languages is notable. Biographer Judith Listowel’s analysis of Livingstone’s relationship with Africans gets right to the heart of his success in the African continent:

From the time he first arrived in Africa Livingstone studied tribal customs and treated Africans with patience and tact; though tactless, even overbearing with Europeans, he seemed to have an instinctive understanding for the Africans. To this approach, coupled as it was with his calm courage practically all Africans responded (italics mine).

Countless examples exist of these trancultural exchanges as Livingstone learned and communicated in the native languages. His long sessions of question and answer with native speakers carry with it an implicit respect absent from much Euro-African contact. One amusing example he cites is the royal herald who accompanied him in the name of the Makololo chief Sekeletu “whose writ ran thin on the Barotse frontier.” As the Scottish missionary explorer would enter a village in train, the herald would shout, “Here comes the lord, the great lion!” This is interesting in itself, but Livingstone eventually asked the herald to stop, because they had crossed into another dialect group whose word for “sow” was the Makalolo word “lion.”

Early in his main narrative, the Missionary Travels, he tells the story of Oswell and Murray confusing the perfect form of “Kia Timela” with the phrase “Kia Itumela,” one of which means “thank you” and the other “I have wandered.” Livingstone takes a page or two to transcribe a dialogue between the British explorers and the lost African Guide, which is punctuated by Oswell hearing ‘Thank you very much’ in place of ‘I am lost.’ The humor and the linguistic mastery combine with a healthy awareness of the Britishers’ own dependence on the Africans and their language. Livingstone tells a funny story, based on African language subtleties and he makes it a warm and transcultural exchange, sensitively told. The story finishes with another translated punch line:

"We enjoyed a hearty laugh on the explanation of their midnight soliloquys. Frequent mistakes of this kind occur. A man may tell his interpreter to say he is a member of the family of the chief of the white men; “Yes, you speak like a chief,” is the reply, meaning, as they explain it, that a chief may talk nonsense without any one daring to contradict him. "

David Livingstone was a participant in and beneficiary of the popularity of natural history, which was a standard element in Victorian exploration literature. He was not a great participant in the debate over Darwin, but his journals, reports and summary narratives are filled with detailed descriptions of flora and fauna. The Travels, his best-known work, is actually structurally weakened by the constant digression into the animal life and unusual plants he describes, as this breaks up the narrative considerably. Obviously he values the genre and puts special emphasis on the habits of the lion, the elephant and the giraffe. His disparaging of the mythic qualities of the lion is amusing, considering the mauling he endured in 1841 (when he lost much of the mobility in his right arm). His characterization of the lion as a relatively harmless animal is ironic. Livingstone’s description of snakes, rhinos and other African wildlife sometime carry a simplistic tone, as if the lectures on lions, giraffes and other animals had been delivered to many youngsters. Often the natural history paragraphs, close to half of his total output, have a lighter and breezy tone compared to his descriptions of natural geography and human ethnography. His popularity among less educated and middle-class readers can be seen in these passages, and they are often illustrated by the inexpensive lithography of the period.

Livingstone’s writings on natural history and medicine are often related and fail to fall into either medical or natural history categories. He became quite adept at identifying animal diseases, and of course his arch-nemesis was the tsetse fly. Much of this medical, veterinary and biological material reflects a transcultural exchange of native and western information (italics mine):

“Inquiries among the Bushmen and Bakalahari, who are intimately acquainted with the habits of the game, lead to the belief that many diseases prevail among wild animals. I have seen the Kokong or gnu, the Kama or hartebeest, the tsessebe, kukama, and the giraffe, so mangy as to be uneatable even by the natives. Reference has already been made to the peripneumonia which cuts off horses, tolos or koodoos. Great number of zebras are found dead with masses of foam at the nostrils…I once found a buffalo blind from opthalmia standing by the fountain Otse … the rhinoceros often has worms in conjunction with his eyes . . . all the wild animals are subject to intestinal worms…the zebra, giraffe, eland, and kukama have been seen mere skeletons from decay of their teeth as well as from disease.”

Livingstone as a Commercial Colonist, Missionary and Abolitionist

Livingstone was deeply in harmony with the evangelical Christianity, which Antoinette Burton and others point to as a central motif of Victorian cultural tradition.

He had originally planned to enter China as a missionary but was forestalled by the 1838 Opium War. After over ten years of relatively stationary outpost mission work teaching hygiene, English and moral development in remote Africa, Livingstone decided that Christianity, (synonymous with civilization and progress, to him) must follow exploration.

His own preference of science and exploration over Christian ministry is indicated by the fact that Livingstone chose to dedicate his first major book, Missionary Travels, to the Royal Geographic Society rather than the London Missionary Society. After 1852 he can be more accurately described as an exploring geographer than an evangelical missionary. Nevertheless his approach to the natives he encountered remained evangelical and charitable, and he never lost the aura of the church. His restlessness and outright boredom within established mission camps drove him to go farther afield, and his pride and personal goals complicated his relationship with the Mission Society from the first. After this, much of his evangelism was addressed not to Africans but to his popular audience within the English-speaking world. He encouraged bright young Britons to follow him and take up his work in Africa. His writings are full of homilies and moral reinforcement. Ultimately his missionary identity became more of a state of mind than a true vocation, and by the time he was made Consul to Africa, he had become more of a public scientist than a gospel evangelist.

Livingstone was perpetually at odds with the African slave trade. He castigated the Portuguese and Arab slave traders and sought for British military support to put down the slave trade. The sight of young women chained together haunted him after the traversa, and his need to occasionally link up with the slave “oligarchy” to survive caused him anger.

Livingstone saw a need to bring additional commodities and mediums of exchange to Africa, to augment the existing currency in ivory, gold and captive humans. Anti-slavery efforts, missionary work, and commercial trade were linked together in all of Livingstone’s major announcements.

"Sending the Gospel to the heathen must…include much more than is implied in the usual picture of a missionary, namely a man going about with a bible under his arm. The promotion of commerce ought to be especially attended to, as this, more speedily than any thing else, demolishes that sense of isolation which heathenism engenders…. my observations on this subject make me extremely desirous to promote the preparation of the raw materials of European manufactures in Africa, for by that means we may not only put a stop to the slave-trade, but introduce the Negro family into the corporate body of nations. "

Livingstone saw himself as a geographer with missionary goals. “The end of the geographical feat is the beginning of the missionary enterprise,” was one of his mottoes.

In a similar fashion, Livingstone’s evangelistic and colonializing strands cannot be disentwined, as he believed “(as) missionaries…we can influence the commerce of the world in this great city (London) of merchant princes, in such a way to have Christianizing results.” Trade, emancipation and mission work were inextricable for Livingstone. His stated goal in 1855 shows this, “My object in returning to Africa is to try to get a permanent path to that central region from which most of the slaves have always been drawn…to propitiate the different chiefs along (the Zambesi)…endeavoring to induce them to cultivate cotton and to abolish the slave trade.”

Conclusions

David Livingstone was a model type among Victorian historical figures. He combined in his persona many of the characteristics most highly valued by his British and American nineteenth-century readers. Livingstone was foremost a scientist in the Scottish Enlightenment tradition. He was an accredited physician, an acclaimed geographer, a talented transcultural linguist, a careful naturalist and an early ethnological sociologist of African culture. Other aspects added to his celebrity because of their conformity to Victorian values. These aspects were his evangelical mission, his hatred of the slave trade and his support of mercantile colonization of Africa (in support of Christianity and Abolition). Illustrated magazines and illustrated books were emerging into a modern mass market during Livingstone’s career, and all this together brought David Livingstone unprecedented upper and middle class fame throughout the English-speaking world.

When we look into the assumptions of British mercantile colonialism, the biases inherent in Encyclopedic natural history, and the limits of even well-intentioned Euro-African transactions, then a critique emerges that doesn’t hinge on the personal, but in understanding the biases common to the language and cultural assumptions of the mid-Victorian period. Colonization via evangelical missions and an African Empire built upon abolitionist moral superiority were manifested by the direct sponsorship of Livingstone by the British government, and these had results which must be critiqued, but the political results of later times need to be carefully differentiated from the actions of the individual. Celebrated for his scientific achievements and opposition to slavery, David Livingstone remains a formidable historical figure, and his legacy as scientist and human philanthropist continues to resist hostile revisionism.

Appendix

Remaining Questions For Further Study

Was the popular dramatic saga of David Livingstone part of a deeper tradition of representing legitimacy? Were the Sextant, Chronometer and Bible important to Livingstone’s role, since he was always pictured holding them? Are kingly, priestly and sacrificial strands of narrative found in the Livingstone saga? Is the rapid innovation of mass illustrated magazines circa 1860 important to the Livingstone drama? Do dramaturgical approaches illuminate the Livingstone saga? Do transcultural and transactional analyses shed light on the explorer’s narratives? Are the complicated values, courtesies and mores of British Victorians important to understanding the unprecedented popularity of the Livingstone saga? Do traditions of the ‘law-giver’ relate to Livingstone’s totemic Bible? Are the chronometer and sextant symbolic of a royal orb and scepter? Does the compound status of physician, priest and surveyor inform the received image of Livingstone by his Victorian audiences? What assumptions underlay his relationship with Africans? With Europeans? Do Livingstone’s travels, suspenseful absences and re-appearances have overtones of earlier royal and priestly drama? How did Henry Stanley go about appropriating the Dr. Livingston mystique?

A cultural, dramaturgical and deep iconic analysis of the Victorian period is overdue. David Livingstone, a geographer, missionary and physician often cast himself as a law-giver and a kingly force, carrying a book of law, the Bible--and an orb and scepter of scientific legitimacy, his sextant and chronometer. His suspenseful “offstage” disappearances and death rumors go to a deeply archetypal trope of sacrifice and resurrection. Livingstone’s character, physical sturdiness and writing style need to be reviewed in analyzing the causes of his unprecedented popularity and status. The gap between Livingstone’s intentions and his perceived qualities should be aired. There are important issues concerning Livingstone’s popular representation and signification, including the courtly, kingly and iconic elements of the Livingstone saga. His disappearances and re-appearances, rumored murder, totemic icons and rarefied stature need investigation. The dramaturgical approaches of Geertz, Goffman and Stahlins can be applied to the drama of Livingstone. Bernard Cohn’s research into the language and the preferred deference policies used in British India also bring up angles of inquiry for the Livingstone corpus.

In the period from 1858-1873 innovative mass media techniques of low cost illustrated printing brought the Livingstone story to a broad audience. Women, youth and marginalized observers became part of the hagiographic and dramaturgical representation of Livingstone. Unprecedented mass publics saw staged elements reminiscent of royal grand tours, “law-giving,’ and a Phoenix-like re-emergence, all within the surface story of Dr. Livingstone’s African explorations and Christian missionary efforts. The political aspirations of colonizing Britons was given legitimacy by the exploits of Livingstone, but many of these themes lie below the surface. A cultural, iconic and dramaturgical look at the writings and images of David Livingstone could yield illuminating insights into the Afro-British colonial experience, and the broader Anglo-American Victorian experience.

Shanet Clark

Woodruff History Fellow

GSU Atlanta

Secrecy, Lying and Murder.

That is how the CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES is subverted by the executive power and the intelligence agencies.

Congressional oversight and public oversight are not only weak and ineffective, they are effectively impossible, due to the classification and destruction of documents.

The prerogatives of the President extend to political manipulation of the Agencies, the Press and the public mind.

BUSH jumped at the chance to falsely link the events of 9/11 to Saddam Hussein, and kept this drumbeat of false propaganda before the public in the build up to his war in the oilfields.

CIA analysts who agreed with the false findings were promoted and protected, government officials who disagreed were silenced, or in the case of one STATE DEPARTMENT intelligence analyst, apparently murdered by a "high fall"

The headlong race toward war made George Bush a WARTIME COMMANDER IN CHIEF, which has prerogatives and powers unavailable to PEACETIME civilian Presidents.

Faced with the fact that LUIS POSADA CARRILES is a terrorist, but one that worked for the US side, Bush will choose to be unresponsive and equivocate.

I am reminded of the CIA employee who quit after a training stint at Camp Perry, near Yorktown, Virginia.

He quit early in his career because he was being taught how to incinerate School Buses.........................

Excellent factual analysis.

Of course, this string of events became central to the impeachment.

Nixon was willing to go to almost any length to satisfy HUNT.

It is entirely within the realm of possibility that Nixon gave the carrot, and the intelligence agencies gave HUNT the stick.

With the hush money coming in, Hunt was unlikely to tell all he knew about the 1970s. With the death of his wife, he was unlikely to tell what he knew about the 1960s.

John,

The New York Times today (may 22) had an interesting item about the passing of the CLARK CLIFFORD/ LLOYD CUTLER / EDWARD BENNETT WILLIAMS generation.

"An earlier more relaxed era had allowed lawyers like Mr. Cutler and Clark M. Clifford, Sol M. Linowitz and Edward Bennett Williams to shuttle between public and private work in ways that current ethics strictures would probably not permit.

The ebullient Mr. Williams was once simultaneously general counsel to President Ronald Reagan's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, counsel to the Washington Post and a friend to both William J. Casey, the CIA Director and Bob Woodward, the Post reporter who was investigating the situation."

from "A Dying Breed: In Washington, Twilight of the Lawyer-Gods" by Todd S. Purdum, NYT Week in Review.................

Here's an item for sale on EBAY...bad taste, but funny....

This is an anonymous piece on the internet about PASH.

It is generally logical and informative:

FIRE FROM THE SKY

by "One Who Knows"

PART 27:

WHO CREATED THE ATOMIC BOMB?

Boris Pash, head of security for the Manhattan Project, and scientist

Samuel Goudsmit followed the lead tanks into Paris and into Germany,

looking for the German nuclear laboratory, which they found in Strasbourg.

This was called Operation Alsos (Greek for "Groves"). Peter Goodchild in

his book *J. Robert Oppenheimer, Shatterer of Worlds,* p. 110 said: "Very

soon a picture of the Germans' progress began to emerge. They revealed that

Hitler had been told of the possibilities of a nuclear weapon in 1942 and

that there had been a whole series of uranium pile experiments.

But the crucial facts were that even as late as August 1944 the experiments

were still at an early stage. The Germans had neither the certain

information that an explosive chain reaction was possible, nor did they

have the material or the mechanism to make their bomb. It was apparent that

the project had moved forward hardly at all since 1942. There were one or

two people in Washington who, when they read Goudsmit's final report,

suspected that the information had come too easily, but most people

believed it."

It is possible that Germany DID develop the bomb, and the Allies kept it

secret? In *Heisenberg's War,* p. 481, Vannevar Bush is quoted as saying in

June 1949: "The Nazis wanted an atomic bomb; we knew that. They had as good

a chance at it as we had. In the tense years up to 1945 we thought that

they were close competitors, even that they might be six months ahead of

us. Then after Stuttgart fell and the Alsos mission did its work, we found

out. The Nazis had not even reached first base." Surprise, surprise. Or was

it lie, lie?

My best guess, based on the evidence, is that there is a strong possibility

Germany DID develop the atomic bomb! The Americans managed to capture some

of them in early 1945, then on August 6, 1945, dropped one on Hiroshima.

This would account for J. Robert Oppenheimer's curious statement that the

bomb dropped on Hiroshima was made in Germany. Could the Germans have taken

some bombs with them when Hitler escaped? Was the submarine convoy

protected by nuclear weapons, and were they what stopped Operation

Highjump? Perhaps not, that is just conjecture, but I strongly suspect we

got the "bomb" from the Germans.

In *Blowback,* "the first full account of America's recruitment of Nazis,

and its disastrous effect on our domestic and foreign policy" by

Christopher Simpson, he states: "On July 6 [1945] the Joint Chiefs of Staff

(JCS) specifically authorized an effort to 'exploit... chosen, rare minds

whose continuing intellectual productivity we wish to use' under the top

secret project code-named Overcast... At first this was justified on the

grounds that German scientists might be useful in the continuing war

against Japan" (p.33).

When the Allies found the German atomic bomb laboratory, they were amazed

that it was just a small concrete reactor in a cave, too small to go

critical. Yet they went to considerable trouble in a top secret program to

grab these scientists because they might be useful in defeating Japan? What

were they going to do, throw radioactive concrete at the Japanese? Tom

Agoston in *Blunder!* says (p. 38) that "Unknown to Allied scientists, the

Germans had been able to build up a sizeable stockpile of U-235 and had

held up to two tons, as well as two tons of heavy water."

William Stevenson, in *A Man Called Intrepid,* says "The Germans had the

man [Heisenberg] whose theoretical work was the basis of the bomb" (p. 456)

and "In the military field, the view prevailed in 1939 that the country

with the greatest chance of bringing together the pieces was Germany."

Let's see now, the atomic bomb was a German idea, they had the best

scientists, they had a proven ability to develop advanced weapons, they had

plenty of raw material, and yet their "bomb" consisted of nothing more than

some radioactive concrete in a cave in a hill at the base of a church?

(*Heisenberg's War,* p. 421.) The German laboratory was captured on April

21, 1945, then three months later on July 16 a bomb was tested at

Alamogordo, New Mexico. Then on August 6, 1945, one was dropped on

Hiroshima, and August 9 on Nagasaki. This is not counting the nuclear

explosion in the Oakland, California, area, but we are not supposed to know

about that.

Pash and Goudsmit in Operation Alsos captured several tons of uranium and

"it was shipped to Britain and then the United States, transformed into

uranium hexaflouride gas for isotope separation at Oak Ridge, Tennessee,

and finally in the form of U-235 used to destroy Hiroshima." (*Heisenberg's

War,* p. 362.)

Most classified files from World War II have been routinely declassified

under the provisions of the U.S. Freedom of Information Act. Tom Agoston

(*Blunder!,* p. 124) said of the Alsos information, "The files continued to

be suppressed and remain under lock and key in Washington, well beyond the

thirty-year rule. The motive for this remains a four-decade mystery."

He also said that the testimony of Albert Speer, referring to General

Kammler, "The transcript continues to be classified beyond the normal

thirty-year rule, and is not expected to be made public before 2020."

Kammler disappeared at the end of the War and it was reported that he

committed suicide (four different versions). If he were dead, why the

secrecy? Kammler was regarded as "the most important man in Germany outside

the Cabinet." The chain of command was Hitler to Himmler to Himmler's

Deputy SS General Karl Wolff to SS General Oswald Pohl to Kammler, and

later the link was more direct.

Dr. Wilhelm Voss told Agoston what happened to Kammler was a "hot matter"

that could not be revealed. Agoston said one of Kammler's close associates

was Rudolph Hess, who flew to Britain on a secret mission in May 1941. "The

secret British file that might explain why he flew to Britain will remain

closed until the year 2020" (p.160).

What clinched the proof for me was when I read in Phoenix Journal #18

(*Blood And Ashes*), speaking of the Manhattan Project, "Of course, they

utilized the German production urn and, actually, the bomb used on Japan

was constructed in Germany" (p. 159). The author of those Journals is "One

Who Knows."

GERMAN SUBMARINES IN SOUTH ATLANTIC

The newspaper *France Soir* had the following account: "Almost 1-1/2 years

after cessation of hostilities in Europe, the Islandic Whaler, "Juliana"

was stopped by a large German U-boat. The Juliana was in the Antarctic

region around Malvinas [now Falkland] Islands when a German submarine

surfaced and raised the German official naval Flag of Mourning - red with a

black edge.

The submarine commander sent out a boarding party, which approached the

Juliana in a rubber dinghy, and having boarded the whaler demanded of Capt.

Hekla part of his fresh food stocks. The request was made in the definite

tone of an order to which resistance would have been unwise. The German

officer spoke a correct English and paid for his provisions in U.S.

dollars, giving the Captain a bonus of $10 for each member of the Juliana

crew. Whilst the food stuffs were being transferred to the submarine, the

submarine commander informed Capt. Hekla of the exact location of a large

school of whales. Later the Juliana found the school of whales where

designated."

The French *Agence France Press* on 25 September 1946, said: "The

continuous rumours about German U-boat activity in the region of Tierra del

Fuego (Feuerland, in German), between the southernmost tip of Latin America

and the continent of Antarctica are based on true happenings."

There have been stories and books written about Germans counterfeiting U.S.

currency and otherwise obtaining American money printing plates, which may

account for the German use of American money.

The Guinness Book of World Records says that the "greatest unsolved

robbery" was the disappearance of the entire German treasury at the end of

the war.

RAND CORPORATION

In January 1946 industrialist Donald Douglas approached the Army Air Force

with a plan for government and industry to work together on long range

strategic planning. This was called Project RAND, a name coined by Arthur

Raymond from Research ANd Development. Much of their first government money

went to the von Braun team. (McDougall, Walter al. ...*the Heavens and the

Earth, A Political History of the Space Age,* Basic Books, New York, 1985,

p. 89.)

LESLIE R. GROVES

Groves is known as the General in charge of the Manhattan Project which

built the Atomic Bomb. He was chosen because he is the one who supervised

the building of the Pentagon, and by 1942 was in charge of all U.S.

military construction everywhere. After the war he went to work for

Remington Rand Corporation.

BORIS PASH

"The stakes in the search for the scientific expertise of Germany were

high. The single most important American strike force, for example, was the

Alsos raiding team, which targeted Axis atomic research, uranium

stockpiles, and nuclear scientists, as well as Nazi chemical and biological

warfare research. The commander of this assignment was U.S. Army Colonel

Boris Pash, who had previously been security chief of the Manhattan Project

- the United States' atomic bomb development program - and who later played

an important role in highly secret U.S. covert action programs.

Pash succeeded brilliantly in his mission, seizing top German scientists

and more than 70,000 tons of Axis uranium ore and radium products. The

uranium taken during these raids was eventually shipped to the United

States and incorporated in U.S. atomic weapons." (Simpson, Christopher,

*Blowback,* Collier Books, New York, 1988, p. 26.)

"Another notable Bloodstone veteran is Boris Pash, a career intelligence

officer identified in the Final Report of the U.S. Senate's 1975-1976

investigation into U.S. intelligence activities as the retired director of

the CIA unit responsible for planning assassinations" (*Blowback,* p. 108).

*Blowback,* p. 152-153 says: "The records of Operation Bloodstone add an

important new piece of information to one of the most explosive public

issues of today: the role of the U.S. government - specifically the CIA -

in assassinations and attempted assassinations of foreign officials.

According to a 1976 Senate investigation, a key official of Operation

Bloodstone is the OPC officer who was specifically delegated responsibility

for planning the agency's assassinations, kidnappings, and similar 'wet

work.'

"Colonel Boris Pash, one of the most extraordinary and least known

characters in American intelligence history... his work for U.S.

intelligence agencies places him in the critical office given the

responsibility for planning postwar assassination operations... Colonel

Pash is one of the few remaining originals of U.S. intelligence, and his

experience in 'fighting the communists' goes back to the 1917 Russian

Revolution.

He was in Moscow and Eastern Europe in those days with his father, a

missionary of Russian extraction, and the young Pash spent much of the

Soviet civil war working on the side of the White armies, then with Czarist

refugees who had fled their country. In the 1920s Pash signed on as a

reserve officer with the U.S. military intelligence service... he... played

a role in the internment of Japanese civilians in California, and was soon

assigned as chief counterintelligence officer on the Manhattan Project, the

supersecret U.S. effort to develop the atomic bomb. (More than a decade

later it was Colonel Pash's testimony that helped seal the fate of

scientist Robert Oppenheimer in the well-known 1954 security case.)

Before the war was out, it will be recalled, Colonel Pash led the series of

celebrated special operations known as the Alsos Mission that were designed

to capture the best atomic and chemical warfare experts that the Nazis had

to offer.

"After the war Colonel Pash served as the army's representative on

Bloodstone in the spring of 1948, when the tasks of that project, including

recruiting defectors, smuggling refugees out from behind the Iron Curtain,

and assassinations, were established. Bloodstone's 'special operations,' as

defined by the Pentagon, could 'include clandestine warfare, subversion,

sabotage and... assassination,' according to the 1948 Joint Chiefs of Staff

records. In March 1949, Pash was assigned by the army to the OPC division

of the CIA... His five-man CIA unit, known as PB/7, was given a written

charter that read in part that 'PB/7 will be responsible for

assassinations, kidnapping, and such other functions as from time to time

may be given it... by higher authority.'"

From *Dulles* by Leonard Mosley (A Biography of Eleanor, Allen and John

Foster. London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1978.), we find, p. 459: "But now he

[Allen Dulles] was interested in the more sinister Agency experiments in

mind-bending drugs, portable phials of lethal viruses, and esoteric poisons

that killed without trace. Allen's sense of humor was touched when he

learned that the unit working on these noxious enterprises was called the

*Health Alteration Committee* (directed by Dr. Sidney Gottlieb and Boris

Pash)... Richard Bissell... had now succeeded Frank Wisner as deputy

director of Plans..."

To learn more about the mind-control and torture experiments of Pash and

Gottlieb, read *Journey Into Madness: The True Story of Secret CIA Mind

Control and Medical Abuse* by Gordon Thomas (Bantam Books, New York, 1989).

One of the people they killed was Frank Olson (a CIA germ warfare doctor

whose specialty was anthrax), while they were working on Subproject-68,

also known as MK-ULTRA. MK-ULTRA started as *Project Bluebird,* set up on

April 20, 1950, by CIA Director Admiral Roscoe Hillenkoetter (who later was

a member of NICAP), and on July 20, 1950, they began using sodium amytal,

Benzedrine and other drugs to "brainwash" prisoners.

In September 1950, the *Miami News* published an article under the headline

BRAIN WASHING TACTICS which was considered the first formal use of the

term. One of Gottlieb's partners was Dr. Harold Wolff, who appears to be a

Paperclip doctor. He worked with Parke-Davis and "...remained closely

connected with the M-K Ultra brainwashing project" (p. 191). He helped set

up an apartment and introduce LSD to the hippies in San Francisco, and

worked on Project Mindbender (a Manchurian-Candidate type operation) with

William Buckley.

Isn't it interesting that so many of the participants in the most secret of

secrets of World War II are still very involved in the Kennedy

assassination and other more current affairs. Many books and articles have

been written about the CIA being involved in the JFK assassination, and now

you know that the man in charge of CIA assassinations was Boris Pash,

formerly chief of security for the Manhattan Project. He was also head of

the group trying to capture Hitler's advanced technology, including "flying

saucers" and other secrets.

The book *ZR Rifle - The Plot To Kill Kennedy And Castro* by Claudia

Furiati, p. 36, says that a man named William Harvey had been in charge of

the CIA post in West Berlin until 1960, then was placed in charge of CIA

assassinations by Richard Bissell in 1961. The plans to assassinate

political leaders was code-named *ZR-RIFLE,* headed by Harvey. Bo Gritz

said on p. 525 of his book: "The Kennedy assassination was code-named

'ZR-RIFLE'." It seems apparent to me that Harvey and Pash were wearing the

same pair of pants.

In 1941, Ian Fleming, the future creator of the "James Bond" stories, and

at that time a high ranking officer of British Intelligence, suggested to

William Donovan that he set up a specially trained and selected

assassination unit. PB/7 (Pash Boris Seven) was the original of the "Agent

007" concept. If my memory is correct, I believe Nixon stated that William

Harvey was the real 007.

I assume Pash was Agent 001, or perhaps he had seven agents working for him

(originally five). If you want to understand more of how these various

factions such as CIA, KGB, Nazis, Communists, FBI, etc., can be fighting

each other and working together at the same time, you need to understand

who was above them, controlling them. To understand that, look to British

Intelligence! You will find British Intelligence to be an operation of

British and European Royalty and "Aristocracy"!

E. Howard Hunt, while in prison in December, 1975, in an interview with the

*New York Times,* said that the head of the CIA assassination unit was

Boris Pash. Pash was assigned to Angleton at this time (see *Final

Judgment,* p. 207). Angleton was head of the Israel desk of the CIA and was

very pro-Israel. He was also closely involved with Meyer Lansky.

In *Cold Warrior,* the biography of James Jesus Angleton by Tom Mangold, he

says on page 362: "I would like to place on the record, however, that

Angleton's closest professional friends overseas, then and subsequently,

came from the Mossad (the Israeli intelligence-gathering service) and that

he was held in immense esteem by his Israeli colleagues and by the state of

Israel, which was to award him profound honors after his death." His place

was taken after his death by William Colby. When Kissinger wanted to "get

LaRouche," he turned to Angleton for help. Angleton's tombstone is in

Hebrew.

On page 97 of *Final Judgment,* Piper says that "The ZR/Rifle Team, in

fact, was one of Angleton's pet in-house CIA projects, which he ran in

conjunction with his CIA colleague, William Harvey."

According to Claudia Furiati, Joseph Schreider was in charge of the CIA

laboratories and of developing poisons for assassinations, and says that

Harvey was in charge of political assassinations, working out of the Miami

office run by [Paperclip] Shackley, and was working with Schreider to try

to poison Castro. Above we have Boris Pash and Sidney Gottlieb working

together in the same manner. We have Pash and Harvey in the same locations,

doing the same jobs, in charge of the same projects - talk about

featherbedding. I believe that Harvey was actually at headquarters in

Langley, over Shackley in Miami.

*Blowback,* p. 153, says that Pash "...served as the Army's representative

on Bloodstone in the spring of 1948, when the tasks of that project,

including recruiting defectors, smuggling refugees out from behind the Iron

Curtain, and assassinations, were established. In March 1949, Pash was

assigned by the Army to the OPC division of the CIA."

Harvey died June 6, 1976, according to Dick Russell, and Pash was in his

80s in 1988 according to Simpson.

END OF QUOTE / ONLINE MATERIAL .

This is generally supportive of Judyth's account in TMWKK.

Oswald was involved with these "mad scientists".........

Mary Pinchot Meyer holds the key.

It was her behavior which caused JFK to lose his security clearance and risk sanction. Her connections to CIA and MOCKINGBIRD and Timothy Leary make her a victim of Orwellian truth squads and historical erasure by authorities.

I have heard that LBJ was down on the floorboards WITH A RADIO PRESSED TO HIS EAR as the shots filled Dealey Plaza.

One of the reasons I joined the FORUM and put forward my theory is to respond to the BARR MCCLELLAN school of thought that Lyndon was the originator of the ambush. I seek to clarify the situation and present evidence that a small group of executives were the originators and JOHNSON was handed a fait accompli by these executives, CD DILLON, Kennedy's Republican Secretary of the Treasury and Secret Service, MAXWELL TAYLOR of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and other cabinet level Presidential advisors.

The Vice President, while a cynical and ruthless man, did not have the authority to do what was done in Dallas and Bethesda, but was part of a small group of EXECUTIVES invoking EXECUTIVE SANCTION of the President.

The 25th Amendment (written in 1963 and ratified in 1967) makes it clear that a small group of cabinet level executives can remove the President, and given Kennedy's private life, his security clearance was reviewed and he was removed by a small clique of powerful militant Cold War enemies.

This is basically a more articulated and shaded version of the old saw:

"the government did it"

( )

I eagerly await the next volume of Robert Cairo's LBJ biography, which I suspect may not be published until after his passing. The man's research is truly amazing. There are stories attributed to the Secret Service man in Johnson's car that Johnson was on the floor of his limo before the 1st shot rang out. I doubt he was a principle, but I am confident that he was in the loop.  

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Welcome to the Forum. It is always good to have knowledgeable new members.

This is a book I am also looking forward to reading. I have heard that he is waiting for the death of Lady Bird before he delivers the manuscript.

Like you I don’t believe LBJ organized the assassination but he was the most important figure in the cover-up. LBJ definitely was a main beneficially of the assassination. So were his friends in the oil industry and the arms industry that were part of the Suite 8F Group.

http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/JFKgroup8F.htm

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

So what is the word on Pash? (Shanet Clark)

Hi Shanet,

In case you haven't read it, here is some background on Pash.

http://www.haigerloch.de/stadt/keller_englisch/allison.htm

James

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Intriguing.

Here is the NAMEBASE file on Boris Pash:

The name, in capital letters, is associated with Pash in the pages of (lower case) books:

ADAMS ARTHUR ALEXANDROVICH

Sayer,I. Botting,D. America's Secret Army. 1989 (76)

ANGLETON JAMES JESUS

DiEugenio,J. Pease,L. The Assassinations. 2003 (164)

Lane,M. Plausible Denial. 1991 (155)

Piper,M.C. Final Judgment. 1993 (207)

BANDERA STEFAN

Simpson,C. Blowback. 1988 (152)

BISSELL RICHARD MERVIN JR

Galiullin,R. The CIA in Asia. 1988 (52)

Trento,J. The Secret History of the CIA. 2001 (193)

BOYD JOHN P

Simpson,C. Blowback. 1988 (108)

BURNHAM JAMES

Hersh,B. The Old Boys. 1992 (243)

CALOGERO JAMES

Peake,H. Reader's Guide to Intelligence Periodicals. 1992 (50)

CALVERT ALLEN

Copeland,M. The Game Player. 1989 (35 38)

CALVERT HORACE K

Sayer,I. Botting,D. America's Secret Army. 1989 (71)

CASEY WILLIAM JOSEPH

Hersh,B. The Old Boys. 1992 (165)

CLARK RONALD W

Intelligence/Parapolitics (Paris) 1986-11 (2)

CLINE RAY STEINER

Hersh,B. The Old Boys. 1992 (165)

COPELAND MILES

Trento,J. The Secret History of the CIA. 2001 (194)

CORSON WILLIAM R

Galiullin,R. The CIA in Asia. 1988 (50)

COUNTER INTELLIGENCE CORPS

Peake,H. Reader's Guide to Intelligence Periodicals. 1992 (50)

DAENZER HERMANN

Assn. National Security Alumni. Unclassified 1996-SP (22)

DEACON RICHARD

Intelligence/Parapolitics (Paris) 1986-11 (2)

DEAN GORDON E

Assn. National Security Alumni. Unclassified 1995-W (15)

DEDEYAN SAHAG K

Minnick,W. Spies and Provocateurs. 1992 (172)

DEMNITZ ARTHUR

Assn. National Security Alumni. Unclassified 1996-SP (22)

DENESELYA DONALD E

Trento,J. The Secret History of the CIA. 2001 (194)

DOSTI HASAN

Simpson,C. Blowback. 1988 (154)

DOYLE ROBERT

Copeland,M. The Game Player. 1989 (36)

DULLES ALLEN WELSH

Lane,M. Plausible Denial. 1991 (155)

EARMAN JOHN S JR

Assn. National Security Alumni. Unclassified 1995-W (14)

Hersh,B. The Old Boys. 1992 (226)

EDWARDS DUVAL A

Peake,H. Reader's Guide to Intelligence Periodicals. 1992 (50)

EISENHOWER DWIGHT DAVID

Trento,J. The Secret History of the CIA. 2001 (194)

EVANS ROBLEY D

Assn. National Security Alumni. Unclassified 1996-SP (22)

FLEISHMAN RUDOLPH

Hunt,L. Secret Agenda. 1991 (11)

FOSTER JANE

Intelligence/Parapolitics (Paris) 1986-11 (2)

FRANK JOSEPH (CIA)

Assn. National Security Alumni. Unclassified 1995-W (15)

FREER CHRISTIAN M

Assn. National Security Alumni. Unclassified 1995-W (15)

GAGEN NORBERT I

Sayer,I. Botting,D. America's Secret Army. 1989 (76)

GEHLEN REINHARD

Hersh,B. The Old Boys. 1992 (165)

GESCHICKTER CHARLES F

Assn. National Security Alumni. Unclassified 1995-W (14)

GOTTLIEB SIDNEY

Hinckle,W. Turner,W. The Fish is Red. 1981 (29)

Trento,J. The Secret History of the CIA. 2001 (194)

GOUDSMIT SAMUEL

Hunt,L. Secret Agenda. 1991 (11)

GREENWAY GILBERT

Hersh,B. The Old Boys. 1992 (243)

GREEN ED (CIA)

Hersh,B. The Old Boys. 1992 (243)

HARBISON EARLE HARRISON JR

Constantine,A. Psychic Dictatorship in the U.S.A. 1995 (192)

HARLEY DON

Sayer,I. Botting,D. America's Secret Army. 1989 (76)

HARVEY WILLIAM KING

DiEugenio,J. Pease,L. The Assassinations. 2003 (164)

HAYMAKER WEBB

Assn. National Security Alumni. Unclassified 1995-W (14)

HISKEY CLARENCE F

Sayer,I. Botting,D. America's Secret Army. 1989 (76)

HUGHES JOHN C

Hersh,B. The Old Boys. 1992 (165)

HUGHES VINCE

Peake,H. Reader's Guide to Intelligence Periodicals. 1992 (50)

HULICK CHARLES VINAL

Hersh,B. The Old Boys. 1992 (243)

HUNT E HOWARD

DiEugenio,J. Pease,L. The Assassinations. 2003 (164)

Piper,M.C. Final Judgment. 1993 (207)

Thomas,E. The Very Best Men. 1996 (85)

Trento,J. The Secret History of the CIA. 2001 (193)

JACOBS ARTHUR L

Hersh,B. The Old Boys. 1992 (243)

JAMISON LEN

Sayer,I. Botting,D. America's Secret Army. 1989 (76)

KHRENOV VLADIMIR M

Minnick,W. Spies and Provocateurs. 1992 (172)

KNIGHTLEY PHILLIP

Intelligence/Parapolitics (Paris) 1986-11 (2)

LEAGUE YOUNG GERMANS

Sayer,I. Botting,D. America's Secret Army. 1989 (346)

LINDSAY FRANKLIN ANTHONY

Simpson,C. Blowback. 1988 (152)

LUTHER WOLFGANG

Assn. National Security Alumni. Unclassified 1996-SP (22)

LYSENKO NIKOLAI Y

Minnick,W. Spies and Provocateurs. 1992 (172)

MADDOX WILLIAM PERCY

Hersh,B. The Old Boys. 1992 (165)

MAHEU ROBERT AIME

Hinckle,W. Turner,W. The Fish is Red. 1981 (29)

MANDELSTAM ROBERT STANLEY

Hersh,B. The Old Boys. 1992 (243)

MCDOWELL ROBERT

Hersh,B. The Old Boys. 1992 (226)

MERRILL LYNCH COMPANY

Constantine,A. Psychic Dictatorship in the U.S.A. 1995 (192)

MILLER FRANCIS PICKENS

Hersh,B. The Old Boys. 1992 (165)

MITCHELL HARVEY

Intelligence/Parapolitics (Paris) 1986-11 (2)

MONSANTO COMPANY

Constantine,A. Psychic Dictatorship in the U.S.A. 1995 (192)

MURPHY ROBERT DANIEL

Hersh,B. The Old Boys. 1992 (226)

NASSER GAMAL ABDEL

Trento,J. The Secret History of the CIA. 2001 (194)

OCONNELL JAMES P

Hinckle,W. Turner,W. The Fish is Red. 1981 (29)

OFFICE POLICY COORDINATION

Trento,J. The Secret History of the CIA. 2001 (193)

OGARA JOHN F

Hersh,B. The Old Boys. 1992 (165)

OPERATION BLOODSTONE

Assn. National Security Alumni. Unclassified 1995-W (14)

Sayer,I. Botting,D. America's Secret Army. 1989 (346)

Simpson,C. Blowback. 1988 (108)

OPPENHEIMER JONATHAN ROBERT

Sayer,I. Botting,D. America's Secret Army. 1989 (76)

PAQUES GEORGES

Minnick,W. Spies and Provocateurs. 1992 (172)

PARSONS W B

Sayer,I. Botting,D. America's Secret Army. 1989 (71)

PASKALIAN SARKIS O

Minnick,W. Spies and Provocateurs. 1992 (172)

RAJEWSKI BORIS

Assn. National Security Alumni. Unclassified 1996-SP (22)

REBET LEV

Simpson,C. Blowback. 1988 (152)

RHODES RICHARD

Assn. National Security Alumni. Unclassified 1995-W (15)

ROCCA RAYMOND G

Lane,M. Plausible Denial. 1991 (155)

ROOSEVELT ARCHIBALD B

Trento,J. The Secret History of the CIA. 2001 (194)

ROSSELLI JOHN

Hinckle,W. Turner,W. The Fish is Red. 1981 (29)

RUCKELSHAUS WILLIAM DOYLE

Constantine,A. Psychic Dictatorship in the U.S.A. 1995 (192)

SAMUELS NATHANIEL

Copeland,M. The Game Player. 1989 (36)

SCHUBERT GERHARD (RADIATION RESEARCHER)

Assn. National Security Alumni. Unclassified 1996-SP (22)

SHACKLEY THEODORE GEORGE

Trento,J. The Secret History of the CIA. 2001 (193)

SIBERT EDWIN LUTHER

Hersh,B. The Old Boys. 1992 (165)

SMITH WALTER BEDELL

Hersh,B. The Old Boys. 1992 (165)

STASHYNSKY BOGDAN

Simpson,C. Blowback. 1988 (152)

STONE ROBERT S

Assn. National Security Alumni. Unclassified 1996-SP (22)

STRANG DIETER

Assn. National Security Alumni. Unclassified 1996-SP (22)

STRICKLAND LEE S

Intelligence/Parapolitics (Paris) 1986-11 (2)

STRUGHOLD HUBERTUS

Assn. National Security Alumni. Unclassified 1995-W (14)

STUDIES INTELLIGENCE JOURNAL

Intelligence/Parapolitics (Paris) 1986-11 (2 2)

TAYLOR MICHAEL (FDA/MONSANTO)

Constantine,A. Psychic Dictatorship in the U.S.A. 1995 (192)

THOMPSON LLEWELLYN E JR

Hersh,B. The Old Boys. 1992 (226)

TRENTO JOSEPH JOHN

Lane,M. Plausible Denial. 1991 (155)

Piper,M.C. Final Judgment. 1993 (207)

TRUSCOTT LUCIAN K (GEN)

Trento,J. The Secret History of the CIA. 2001 (194)

TURNER STANSFIELD

Constantine,A. Psychic Dictatorship in the U.S.A. 1995 (192)

VLASOV VASILI P

Minnick,W. Spies and Provocateurs. 1992 (172)

VON HAAGEN EUGEN

Hunt,L. Secret Agenda. 1991 (11)

PASH BORIS T

pages searched: 38

These names share the indicated number of pages with the above name. Click on a name below for a standard name search:

HUNT E HOWARD 4

ANGLETON JAMES JESUS 3

OPERATION BLOODSTONE 3

BISSELL RICHARD MERVIN JR 2

CALVERT ALLEN 2

EARMAN JOHN S JR 2

GOTTLIEB SIDNEY 2

STUDIES INTELLIGENCE JOURNAL 2

TRENTO JOSEPH JOHN 2

ADAMS ARTHUR ALEXANDROVICH 1

BANDERA STEFAN 1

BOYD JOHN P 1

BURNHAM JAMES 1

CALOGERO JAMES 1

CALVERT HORACE K 1

CASEY WILLIAM JOSEPH 1

CLARK RONALD W 1

CLINE RAY STEINER 1

COPELAND MILES 1

CORSON WILLIAM R 1

COUNTER INTELLIGENCE CORPS 1

DAENZER HERMANN 1

DEACON RICHARD 1

DEAN GORDON E 1

DEDEYAN SAHAG K 1

DEMNITZ ARTHUR 1

DENESELYA DONALD E 1

DOSTI HASAN 1

DOYLE ROBERT 1

DULLES ALLEN WELSH 1

EDWARDS DUVAL A 1

EISENHOWER DWIGHT DAVID 1

EVANS ROBLEY D 1

FLEISHMAN RUDOLPH 1

FOSTER JANE 1

FRANK JOSEPH (CIA) 1

FREER CHRISTIAN M 1

GAGEN NORBERT I 1

GEHLEN REINHARD 1

GESCHICKTER CHARLES F 1

GOUDSMIT SAMUEL 1

GREEN ED (CIA) 1

GREENWAY GILBERT 1

HARBISON EARLE HARRISON JR 1

HARLEY DON 1

HARVEY WILLIAM KING 1

HAYMAKER WEBB 1

HISKEY CLARENCE F 1

HUGHES JOHN C 1

HUGHES VINCE 1

HULICK CHARLES VINAL 1

JACOBS ARTHUR L 1

JAMISON LEN 1

KHRENOV VLADIMIR M 1

KNIGHTLEY PHILLIP 1

LEAGUE YOUNG GERMANS 1

LINDSAY FRANKLIN ANTHONY 1

LUTHER WOLFGANG 1

LYSENKO NIKOLAI Y 1

MADDOX WILLIAM PERCY 1

MAHEU ROBERT AIME 1

MANDELSTAM ROBERT STANLEY 1

MCDOWELL ROBERT 1

MERRILL LYNCH COMPANY 1

MILLER FRANCIS PICKENS 1

MITCHELL HARVEY 1

MONSANTO COMPANY 1

MURPHY ROBERT DANIEL 1

NASSER GAMAL ABDEL 1

OCONNELL JAMES P 1

OFFICE POLICY COORDINATION 1

OGARA JOHN F 1

OPPENHEIMER JONATHAN ROBERT 1

PAQUES GEORGES 1

PARSONS W B 1

PASKALIAN SARKIS O 1

RAJEWSKI BORIS 1

REBET LEV 1

RHODES RICHARD 1

ROCCA RAYMOND G 1

ROOSEVELT ARCHIBALD B 1

ROSSELLI JOHN 1

RUCKELSHAUS WILLIAM DOYLE 1

SAMUELS NATHANIEL 1

SCHUBERT GERHARD (RADIATION RESEARCHER) 1

SHACKLEY THEODORE GEORGE 1

SIBERT EDWIN LUTHER 1

SMITH WALTER BEDELL 1

STASHYNSKY BOGDAN 1

STONE ROBERT S 1

STRANG DIETER 1

STRICKLAND LEE S 1

STRUGHOLD HUBERTUS 1

TAYLOR MICHAEL (FDA/MONSANTO) 1

THOMPSON LLEWELLYN E JR 1

TRUSCOTT LUCIAN K (GEN) 1

TURNER STANSFIELD 1

VLASOV VASILI P 1

VON HAAGEN EUGEN 1

VON WEIZSAECKER CARL 1

WARREN SHIELDS 1

WHALEY BARTON 1

WHITTEN JOHN M 1

WHITWELL JOHN 1

WILSON HOWARD 1

WISNER FRANK GARDNER 1

WRIGHT PETER MAURICE 1

ZENITH TECHNICAL ENTERPRISES 1

ZHOU ENLAI 1

BORIS PASH is someone at the nexus of German/US intelligence and chemical industry.

He has been recieving information from this source:

(sorry about the quality of the photo)

Can anyone identify this person?

I believe he is a member of the Forum:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewI...3975176129&rd=1

This one stands a better chance of being 'never seen before.'  I went back and forth with the seller months ago.  This seller has a few slides of the motorcade, but no shots within the plaza.

These are interesting also.  I pasted two of them together.  These were the ones I found most significant.  Some views of Parkland I have never seen before are also available.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewI...3976018853&rd=1

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewI...bayphotohosting

- lee

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Good stuff, Lee.

Two comments. The group in the first shot seem to be the "nucleus" of the larger gathering a few minutes later (the hammerman photo)

The bottom photo is in black and white except for one officers face.

Anyone recognize any suspects in these two photos?

I read the NYTIMES review of the Anthony Summers SINATRA book.

The reviewer has a very fond and romantic view of FRANK and doesn't "get" a book that looks past the recording sessions and singing style.

Of course, a musical history was not Anthony Summers's purpose here.

I am reminded of Chuck Giancana's refrain he learned from Sam :

"The right hand (fbi) doesn't know what the left hand (cia) is doing."

A story from the old days:

Frankie, Sammy, and Joey got in a fight.

Sammy said "Frank, I am really going to kill Joey" and Sammy said "No Frank, lets just twist his arm"

Sammy Davis Jr., Frank Sinatra and Joey Bishop?

No, this story is about Frank Costello, Sam Giancana and Joe Kennedy.......