Greg Parker Posted July 26, 2015 Share Posted July 26, 2015 On site for the Bainbridge epidemic, along with Oswald's half-brother, were bacteriologists from the U.S. Army's biological warfare center, Fort Detrick, as well as physicians from the Armed Forces Epidemiological branch. Dr. Charles H. Rammelkamp, Jr., a member of the Armed Forces Epidemiological Board (AFEB), was also there for the outbreak. Readers knowledgeable about the findings of the President's Advisory Committee on Human Radiation Experiments, appointed by President Bill Clinton in 1995, may recall that the committee took a cursory look at experiments reviewed, approved, and sponsored by the New York School of Medicine and AFEB, at the time of Rammelkamp's tenure, on physically healthy mentally retarded children at the Willowbrook State School in Staten Island, New York. The experiments centered on subject children being fed infected stool extracts obtained from individuals with hepatitis, thus infecting the subject children with the virus. Additionally, Dr. Rammelkamp was at the center of another controversial experiment conducted in the early 1950s. This experiment, conducted concurrently with the Bainbridge outbreak, involved American servicemen stricken with streptococcal which can cause rheumatic fever and heart disease. The servicemen, hospitalized at Francis E. Warren Air Force Base in Wyoming, were intentionally not treated with penicillin, which at the time was still being questioned as an effective treatment for rheumatic fever. In a 1966 TIME magazine article, Harvard University's Dr. Henry K. Beecher, who was asked by the magazine to consider Dr. Rammelkamp's experiments, stated he was "concerned about experiments that are designed for the ultimate good of society in general but may well do harm to the subject involved." Earlier Dr. Beecher had stated in the New England Journal of Medicine, that since World War II, the numbers of patients used as unwitting experimental subjects was increasing at alarming rates. Beecher told TIME editors that the increase was causing "grave consequences" but he declined to name any physicians, hospitals, or universities involved in such experiments. Beecher also did not reveal to TIME magazine, or anyone else, that he too, like other Harvard officials of his day and today, was also involved in such experiments and that for the past thirteen years, or longer, he had served the CIA as a covert informer and consultant on interrogation and mind control techniques, including the use of LSD, as well as his specialty anesthesia. [see my book for details about Dr. Henry Beecher's work for the CIA overseas, which included several surreptitious meetings with Sandoz Chemical company officials.] Yeah, thanks Gaal... more of my work lifted from ythis forum and used without acknowledgement. This was posted in 2005 Lee Oswald was a couple of months short of his thirteenth birthday when he and his mother trekked to New York City and moved in with Lee’s half-brother, John Pic, Jr. It was August, 1952. Pic, at the time, was in the Port Security Unit of the Coast Guard. Immediately prior to that, he had a four month stint (January to April, 1952), at the US Naval Training Station, Bainbridge, Maryland. His testimony before the Warren Commission does not reveal what he did there. However, The Commission on Streptococcal and Staphylococcal Diseases which ran from 1941 to 1973 may hold the key. The Commission was set up as part of the Armed Forces Epidemiological Board (AFEB). In 1952, the Director of the Commission was Charles A Rammelkamp, a specialist in streptococcal and other autoimmune diseases. Rammelkamp’s contributions to WWII in fact, came about because of outbreaks of autoimmune diseases in various military bases. He was thus recruited to work for the Commission on Acute Respiratory Diseases at Fort Bragg, NC. Such outbreaks continued after the war, but acute poststreptococcal received little attention from the Commission until an epidemic occurred at Bainbridge Naval Training Center, Maryland, in 1951 and 1952. Rammelkamp investigated this epidemic, which confirmed in his mind that certain types of group A streptococci were nephritogenic - that is— they caused kidney inflammation. If the US was interested in producing agents it could use in biological warfare, it was equally interested in protecting itself from the very same agents. Indeed, from a very early stage of the Cold War, the lines between defensive and offensive actions were already becoming blurred. The research conducted by Rammelkamp and the commissions he was involved with, certainly had military use one way or the other, as autoimmune diseases are common results of biological weapons. Which brings us back to John Pic Jr, who, as shown, was stationed at the Bainbridge Naval Training Center during the epidemic. It comes as no surprise then to learn that from September, 1953 until April, 1954, Pic was stationed at the Naval Hospital in Portsmouth, Va. The Department of Defense Report on it's Search for Human Radiation Experiment Records tells us that the Naval Hospital in Portsmouth was involved from an undetermined date until 1960 in evaluating the effect of parabromdylamine maleate on the thyroidal uptake of radiation in untreated hyperthyroid euthyroid patients; from an undetermined date until 1959 it was involved in comparing precordial isotope-dilution cardiac output values with those obtained by the Fick method and; from an undetermined date until 1960 it was involved in the study of tendon reflexes as a diagnostic aid in myxedematous patients. In the first two areas of experimentation, various doses of radiation were administered orally or intravenously so that the effects on various organs could be studied. In the latter experiments, a fifteen microcurie source of 1-131, shielded with lead, was attached to the foot of the patient, and a sodium iodide thallium activated crystal was connected to a ratemeter so that readings could be taken. It should be stressed here that myxedematous patients are those who, through iodine deficiencies relating to the thyroid, have stunted growth and cretinism. There can be no doubt that this group of patients could not have given informed consent. John Pic Jr, it seems, was being trained in particular areas of medicine dealing with chemical, biological and radiological warfare. On the 1st of February, 1956, Pic joined the USAF. In October 1958, he received orders to join APO 323, Tachikawa, Japan where he was a lab technician. The USAF hospital in Tachikawa took casualties from all the Asian skirmishes of the era, including Korea. In August 1962 he was transferred to Wilford Hall Air Force Hospital, Lackland Air Force Base as Non-Commissioned Officer in Charge of the Special Procedures Branch, Department of Pathology. Willford Hall, like Portsmouth Naval Hospital, also came up in the DoD Report on Human Radiation Experiments. Although the records of what went on at Wilford Hall are unclear in precise details, it seems to have revolved around cancer and thyroid experiments. The Pathology Department of any hospital conducting such experiments would necessarily have a major involvement. http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=859 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Josephs Posted July 26, 2015 Share Posted July 26, 2015 David Josephs wrote, The man in the grave was the man who Ruby killed... so what? The man in the grave is supposed to be "Harvey" but "Lee" had a mastoid operation as did the man in the grave. // Parnell ================= Gee Harvey could have had Mastoid operation.....,gaal Yes, he could have. But the point I am making is Armstrong did not say this-he just ignored it. And my early work was from 1998-2003 so he was aware of the problem. And if he comes out now and says Harvey had the operation it will not look good so he continues to ignore it. Everybody once in a while ignores something.... So no answer to the fact that there are discrepancies in the Marine Military record indicating the existence of two Oswalds ?? ,gaal No, I certainly do not have all the answers to the discrepancies. I would say that your interpretation of the records indicates two Oswalds to you. Others understand that these disparities exist in the real world and will because of the nature of the human beings who create the records. Offer another realistic and documented explanation then Tracy. Donovan, Gorsky, Felde, Marines with Lee, Marines with Harvey never knowing each other or the other Oswald, the DoD lying to the HSCA, Anna Lewis' Feb in NOLA ID, Lee at McKeown's, the Sports Drome while Harvey is in Irving or at Beckley, Sylvia Odio, Mexico City, Kudlaty, DaRouse, Palmer, Pfisterer's, 2220 Thomas, 120 Telemechas... Tip of the iceberg Tracy... I greatly appreciate your calm approach... JA will not be 100% correct with every fact and every source... no one can be... but until a better explanation is offered to address EVERY conflict, some of the key ones are obviously related to covering SOMETHING up... the H&L thread of evidence stretches a long way.. I look forward to a well presented rebuttal to this evidence... Start with who was at Youth House and howhe then became "class president" - that would be interesting... DJ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
W. Tracy Parnell Posted July 26, 2015 Share Posted July 26, 2015 (edited) David Josephs wrote: I look forward to a well presented rebuttal to this evidence... Not all of the "evidence" can be rebutted and I won't waste my time with some things. I cannot debunk Judyth Baker either-I can only show her inconsistent statements through the years and so on. I disagree however, that H&L is the best explanation until someone can debunk everything. You don't need an alternate universe to explain it. And you are already aware of the scientific facts H&L itself doesn't explain such as the exhumation and the handwriting evidence. Edited July 26, 2015 by W. Tracy Parnell Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul Trejo Posted July 27, 2015 Share Posted July 27, 2015 (edited) David Josephs wrote: I look forward to a well presented rebuttal to this evidence... Not all of the "evidence" can be rebutted and I won't waste my time with some things. I cannot debunk Judyth Baker either-I can only show her inconsistent statements through the years and so on. I disagree however, that H&L is the best explanation until someone can debunk everything. You don't need an alternate universe to explain it. And you are already aware of the scientific facts H&L itself doesn't explain such as the exhumation and the handwriting evidence. As for Judyth Baker, her story builds upon some facts, and elaborates them to re-tell the Jim Garrison theory using her own May-June love affair with Lee Harvey Oswald. Her elaboration is "justified" on the basis that it was her "interpretation" of her short relationship with Lee Harvey Oswald that revealed to her all the secrets of Jim Garrison's investigation (although she didn't know it at the time). After Oliver Stone produced JFK in 1991, this evidently jogged Judyth Baker's memory. She began re-writing her life story with a special slant as provided by the most notorious suspect in the 20th century. Also, the elements in her story are real -- though organized only in retrospect. There is little doubt that David Ferrie was obsessed with murdering Fidel Castro, and would do anything in his power to make this happen. His work on poisons with an academic expert on poisons is not a far-fetched idea. Judyth Baker's work on these same poisons isn't far-fetched. What is far-fetched, IMHO, is her effort to bring the realizations of her post-Oliver Stone period into the summer of 1963 -- when all of this would have been vague to her teenage sensibilities. What we see in her work is a curious mixture of fact and fiction -- and she is in a unique position to re-tell her own story. The question of Judyth Baker is therefore a question of results -- what is the result, just in case she is reporting accurately? IMHO, Baker's result is nothing at all different than the results of Jim Garrison in 1968. So, really, when it comes to Judyth Baker, nothing is lost and nothing is gained if we take her story at face value. That doesn't make it true. As for Harvey & Lee, we have a unique theory among CT's. The H&L theory belongs to the CIA-did-it catalog of theories. This catalog is by far the largest of the JFK CT literature -- but that doesn't make it true. How many JFK researchers have claimed CIA leadership of the JFK murder? Mark Lane or Vincent Salandria may have been the first. Harold Weisberg was not far behind. Jim Garrison did not begin with a CIA-did-it theory, but he surely ended with one. Anthony Summers, Jim Marrs, Robert Groden, Ed Epstein, Peter Dale Scott, Fletcher Prouty, Gaeton Fonzi, Lamar Waldron, James Fetzer -- the list goes on and on. But the CIA-did-it theory isn't the only one out there. There still remain the followers of Mae Brussell and the followers of Harry Dean, for example. Robert Blakey no longer stands by his Mafia-did-it theory of 1979, but many others still do. IMHO, the H&L theory is the final stage of the CIA-did-it blight on the JFK literature. By portraying the CIA as prophets who could foresee every aspect of a future Coverup, John Armstrong really ends up making the CIA into little gods (instead of attacking them as he claims). His endless fiction reminds me of a false prophet who prophesies about things that already occurred. The H&L theory is (one hopes) the final reaction against Hoover-LBJ-Warren-Dulles and their "Lone Nut" theory of Oswald, which they forced down the throats of the Warren Commission members and the American public in 1964. Thank heaven for the JFK literature that frees the mind from the ridiculous SBT which itself is absolute proof of Cover-up. Woe to us because that same literature has run amok and cannot stop itself. Well, it will never stop without the Full Truth. And that Full Truth will at best become available on Thursday 26 October 2017 -- the deadline for the ARRB. Regards, --Paul Trejo Edited August 1, 2015 by Paul Trejo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Josephs Posted July 27, 2015 Share Posted July 27, 2015 David Josephs wrote: I look forward to a well presented rebuttal to this evidence... Not all of the "evidence" can be rebutted and I won't waste my time with some things. I cannot debunk Judyth Baker either-I can only show her inconsistent statements through the years and so on. I disagree however, that H&L is the best explanation until someone can debunk everything. You don't need an alternate universe to explain it. And you are already aware of the scientific facts H&L itself doesn't explain such as the exhumation and the handwriting evidence. I was able to dubunk JVB easily,using her own supplied evidence... http://www.ctka.net/2015/JudythBaker-DJ.pdf That's what we do Tracy... we take the EVIDENCE and debunk IT, we do not attack the person unless attacked first. When I asked JVB to address some of the points in that essay, she shut me down and banned me from all her groups.. I can appreciate you disagree that H&L is the "best" explanation... but so far a few isolated attempts to discredit the work has not exactly been overwhelming. As to the exhumation... is was the man who Ruby killed... they were not digging him up to see if he was LEE but if he was a Russian spy... it's the same closed loop evidence trick the FBI used with the rifle. Compare the HARVEY records to the HARVEY records and all checks out. How he went from 5'11" to 5'9" is never addressed since you seem to agree that the USMC does not know how to measure a person's height or weight, know where their Marines are at any point in time and contradict themselves repeatedly as to where and when Oswald was here or there.... When you can address the DoD conflict and Oswald in Taiwan, maybe we'll get somewhere. As for handwriting.. if you're going to pull out the HSCA I can shoot holes in that charade of a report all day long. So instead of concentrating on the little things... address the BIG ones... Felde, Gorsky, Donovan, Palmer all put him places he could not have been if he was only one person... And still no one adequately addresses how Anna Lewis has Oswald in New Orleans in Feb 1962... when he does not get there until Apr 1963. If you are willing to chalk up every one of these conflicts during his life since 1952 as "adminstrative mistakes" or "FBI ineptness" more power to ya Tracy. At some point Coincidence becomes suspicious... no? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
W. Tracy Parnell Posted July 27, 2015 Share Posted July 27, 2015 David, I think you are correct that Judyth Baker is a fraud and your article goes a long way toward establishing that fact. What I meant was I can't prove beyond all doubt that she knew LHO. I can demonstrate (as you and others have) that it is very unlikely she knew him and even more unlikely that she had an affair with him. Oswald was exhumed to disprove another two Oswald theory-this one by Eddowes. But it doesn't matter why they exhumed Oswald. The fact is they did and the man in the grave is supposed to be "Harvey". But "Lee" had the mastoid operation according to Armstrong and the body in the grave did as well. As I have said many times, I'll never understand why Armstrong didn't just say that "Harvey" was given the operation so the two men would match. But he chose to ignore it and now he is stuck with it. As for the height thing, a man cannot change height. And the USMC certainly know how to measure, so it would seems logical that to save time they simply asked his height and he responded with an exaggerated figure as many men do. Yes, I am willing to chalk up all the unexplained thing to mistakes, lying and inaccurate witnesses etc. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steven Gaal Posted July 27, 2015 Share Posted July 27, 2015 (edited) David, I think you are correct that Judyth Baker is a fraud and your article goes a long way toward establishing that fact. What I meant was I can't prove beyond all doubt that she knew LHO. I can demonstrate (as you and others have) that it is very unlikely she knew him and even more unlikely that she had an affair with him. Oswald was exhumed to disprove another two Oswald theory-this one by Eddowes. (YES HARVEY WAS IN THE GRAVE AND EDDOWES,ONI,CIA know it and this helps disprove the DOUBLE OSWALD THEORY (IN SOME WAY I GUESS BY SAYING, IN A FABRICATION INTELL TALE, THAT DOUBLE OSWALD PROVED BY ANOTHER FELLOW IN THE GRAVE > THIS EXHUMATION WAS A INTELL PSY-OPS operation. ,gaal) But it doesn't matter why they exhumed Oswald. The fact is they did and the man in the grave is supposed to be "Harvey". But "Lee" had the mastoid operation according to Armstrong and the body in the grave did as well. As I have said many times, I'll never understand why Armstrong didn't just say that "Harvey" was given the operation so the two men would match. But he chose to ignore it and now he is stuck with it. As for the height thing, a man cannot change height. And the USMC certainly know how to measure, so it would seems logical that to save time they simply asked his height and he responded with an exaggerated figure as many men do. Yes, I am willing to chalk up all the unexplained thing to mistakes, lying and inaccurate witnesses etc. THIS FELLOW EDDOWES WAS VERY DEEP INTO THE ULTRA DEEP BLACK INTELLIGENCE OPERATIONS. , gaal Eddowes. (JACK WHITE posted Eddowes told him he was retired MI 6 . , gaal) ==== Posted by John Simkin on 18 December 2013 - 04:13 PM in JFK Assassination Debate ----------------------------------------------- I decided to produce some material on the Profumo case. This took the form of biographies on the key figures. During my research I discovered that Keeler and Rice-Davies met Earl Felton at a 1963 New Year party. According to Rice-Davies, Fenton was a screen-writer who introduced her to Robert Mitchum. The following month Felton contacted Keeler. According to her account: "Stephen had been telling him lies, feeding him false information and indicating that I was spying for the Russians because of my love for Eugene. The message was to leave the country, say nothing about anything I might have seen or heard." I know from other sources that Fenton was a CIA agent. A FBI document dated on 29th January, 1963, reveals that Thomas Corbally, an American businessman who was a close friend of Stephen Ward, told Alfred Wells, the secretary to David Bruce, the ambassador, that Christine Keeler was having a sexual relationship with John Profumo and Eugene Ivanov. The document also stated that Harold Macmillan had been informed about this scandal. In March, 2009, I was contacted by Mandy Rice-Davies, who was upset by my biography of her. She was particularly angry about a quote I had used by Christine Keeler, that she considered libelous. I was invited to telephone her, which I did, and she was very generous with the amount of information she gave me on the case. The problem was that she was just a pawn in these events and was unable to see the larger picture. For example, she refused to accept that Earl Fenton was a CIA agent and that he genuinely wanted to make her a Hollywood star. Rice-Davies did give me some really interesting information about the court-case. It was her intention to provide evidence to the court that Stephen Ward was not living on her immoral earnings. However, when she was cross-examined by Ward's defence counsel, James Burge, he never gave her the opportunity to explain this. Whereas when she was cross-examined by the prosecuting council, Mervyn Griffith-Jones, he was allowed by the judge to give the false impression that Lord Astor paid her £200 to have sex with her. Rice-Davies speculated that someone was so determined to get Ward they were even controlling his defence team. I am convinced she is right but it was not the government but the intelligence agencies who had decided on who were going to be the victims of the cover-up. The story begins in 1952 when Stephen Ward, who worked for the Osteopathic Association Clinic in Dorset Square, became friendly with model, Joy Lewis. She was the wife of the successful businessman and former Labour Party MP, John Lewis. Ward introduced Joy to Frederic Mullally. It was claimed that Mullally had once said that his greatest ambition was to sleep with all the beautiful women in London. Mullally began an affair with Joy Lewis. Mullally later commented: "She (Joy) and Lewis had lots of fights, rows and walkouts. And on one occasion she went out in great distress, and didn't know what to do, and called Stephen Ward. And he put her up for the night at his place. It was a totally friendly gesture on his part." However, when Lewis heard about what happened, he became convinced that Ward was also having an affair with his wife. Lewis also became angry with Ward over another relationship his wife had. Ward's friend, Warwick Charlton, has argued: "He (Lewis) went potty when he found Stephen had fixed her up with a Swedish beauty queen, a lesbian, with whom she had an affair. This he thought, was an assault on his manhood... He had a heart attack over it." Charlton was with Lewis when he heard the news of the affair. Lewis told Charlton "I will get Ward whatever happens". Lewis took out a revolver and said "I'll shoot myself, but not before I get Ward." Charlton claimed that "from then on, the most important thing in John's life was his burning hatred for Ward, which went on year after year." The journalist, Logan Gourlay, remembers that in 1953 Lewis attempted to get his newspaper, The Daily Express, to publish an article discrediting Ward. Frederic Mullally explained: "Lewis got hold of an Express reporter, a young untrained boy, and gave him what purported to be an exclusive story that Stephen Ward and I were running a call-girl business in Mayfair." The editor, Arthur Christiansen, who was friendly with both Ward and Mullally, and refused to publish the story. Lewis now began to telephone the Marylebone Police Station anonymously, saying that Dr Ward was procuring girls for his wealthy patients. The police treated the calls as coming from a crank and ignored them. MI6, who provided prostitutes for foreign visitors, became aware of the activities of Stephan Ward. One officer admitted: "We learned that Ward wasn't that interested in participating in sex. He liked to watch girls being screwed, especially adult women dressed up as underage girls. Ward would obtain girls, and a boost for us came when he met Lord Astor - and capitalised on Astor's perversion... For us, here was a thriving little London setup with all sorts of big names and diplomats and others swimming in and out... MI6 has tentacles everywhere, and someone spotted Ward and felt the setup might become useful, that some interesting people might walk into it. We could get to know them, do little deals, so that they'd be friends of ours." According to the authors of Honeytrap (1987), MI6 became aware of the attempts by Lewis to bring an end to Ward's activities. An MI6 officer recalled: "The problem was how do we negate Lewis, and stop him spoiling this promising setup? My case officer assigned me to get in with Lewis, and I did, by pretending I wanted an interview for the paper or something. Soon I was going nightclubbing with him - we went to a place called Eve's quite a lot. He was quite open about his hatred for Ward. And I got in with him to the extent that I was helping him to plan his anti-Ward campaign, but in such a way as to make sure it didn't come off.... Ward was never actually recruited, so far as I knew, just observed and kept on ice as an available asset." In 1954 John Lewis decided to divorce his wife. Lewis told Warwick Charlton that he was going to use the case to ruin Stephen Ward: "He's a bastard. Not only did he introduce Joy to Freddy Mullally but to some Swedish beauty queen as well. I'm going to cite seven men and one woman in my divorce case." The judge in the case noted it had "been fought with a consistent and virulent bitterness which could rarely have been excelled". The judge also questioned some of the evidence he heard. It was later claimed that "Lewis asked several witnesses to perjure themselves, and bribed some to do so." Lewis had not obtained the revenge he required but he was unwilling to forget the damage that Ward had done him. Ward continued to prosper as an osteopath and his patients included people such as Winston Churchill, Duncan Sandys, Feliks Topolski, Ava Gardner, Mary Martin and Mel Ferrer became his patients. This enabled him to set up his own clinic in Cavendish Square, on the fringe of Harley Street. Over patients included Lord Astor, who allowed him the use of a cottage on his Cliveden Estate. Other friends included Colin Coote, the editor of the Daily Telegraph, Roger Hollis, the head of MI5, Anthony Blunt, Surveyor of the Queen's Pictures, Geoffrey Nicholson, the Conservative MP, Peter Rachman, the famous slum landlord and the actor, Douglas Fairbanks Jr. Ward was also an artist and he had a reputation for producing fine portraits of his friends. This included the Duke of Edinburgh and Madame Furtseva, the Soviet Minister of Culture. In 1959 met Christine Keeler, when she worked as a showgirl at Murrays Cabaret Club. It was not long before she decided to go and live with him at his flat in Orme Court in Bayswater. "His flat was tiny and on the top floor but there was a lift. There was a bed-sitting room with two single beds pushed close together, and an adjoining bathroom. we would share the bed but only as brother and sister; there were never to be any sexual goings-on between us." During this period Ward also got to know Maria Novotny, Mandy Rice-Davies and Suzy Chang. Novotny ran sex parties in London. So many senior politicians attended that she began referring to herself as the "government's Chief Whip". As well as British politicians such as John Profumo and Ernest Marples, foreign leaders such as Willy Brandt and Ayub Khan, attended these parties. In 1960 Novotny travelled to the United States with Chang. It is believed that both girls worked at the Quorum Club in Washington, run by Bobby Baker, and became involved in relationships with leading politicians. This included both John F. Kennedy and Robert Kennedy. Recently released FBI files claim that Stephen Ward was involved in supplying these girls. The FBI investigation also suggested that a "Hungarian madam in New York" was also involved in what was called the "Bowtie" case. Colin Coote, the editor of the Daily Telegraph commissioned Stephen Ward to sketch pictures of participants in the trial of Adolf Eichmann. Coote " got many complimentary letters about the drawings and decided that when there was another opportunity to use Ward he would do so." Coote suggested Ward should go to the Soviet Union to sketch the leading politicians of the country. However, Ward had difficulty getting a visa from the Soviet Embassy in London. Ward told Coote about his problems and on 21st January 1961, Coote invited Ward to have lunch at the Garrick Club with Eugene Ivanov, an naval attaché at the embassy. Coote later recalled: "I remembered Stephen Ward's difficulty about a visa and thought that this link might be useful." David Floyd, the Daily Telegraph's correspondent on Soviet affairs, also attended the lunch. Ward was impressed with Ivanov's ability to discuss foreign affairs: "I listened with fascination as they argued backward and forward on issues which I had never heard discussed before in an intelligent and informal manner." Ward and Ivanov became close friends. As Philip Knightley pointed out: "As Ward's friendship with Ivanov blossomed, the original purpose for meeting him - to get a visa to go and sketch Soviet leaders - appears to have been forgotten. The two men met often and went everywhere together. Ivanov would call at Ward's flat unannounced and the two of them would go out - either to visit a club, to play bridge, or to dine with one of Ward's friends." Anthony Summers argues that: "MI5's D branch, responsible for counter-espionage, quickly identified Ivanov as a Soviet Intelligence officer using diplomatic cover, a common practice worldwide. According to one source, part of Ivanov's mission may have been to supervise Soviet penetration of the Portland naval base in Dorset." In February, 1961, Ward and Christine Keeler moved to 17 Wimpole Mews in Marylebone. According to Keeler's autobiography, The Truth at Last (2001), Roger Hollis and Anthony Blunt were regular visitors to the flat. "He (Lord Denning) knew that Stephen was a spy and that I knew too much. During my two sessions with him I told him all about Hollis and Blunt: how Stephen had politely introduced me and how I had said 'hello' and nodded when they visited. I told him all about Sir Godfrey's visit and how I had seen Sir Godfrey with Eugene. He asked me very precisely who had met Eugene and about the visitors to Wimpole Mews. He showed me a photograph of Hollis - it wasn't a sharp shot of him - and asked me to identify him. I told Denning this was the man who had visited Stephen. He showed me a photograph of Sir Godfrey and I also identified him. He did not show me a picture of Blunt for, I suspect, they already knew more than they wanted to know about Blunt. Denning was very gentle about it and I told him everything. This was the nice gentleman who was going to look after me. But I was ignored, side-lined - disparaged as a xxxx so that he could claim that there had been no security risk. It was the ultimate whitewash." Ward also got to know Keith Wagstaffe of MI5. On 8th June 1961, the two men went out to dinner before going back to the Wimpole Mews flat. Christine Keeler made the two men coffee: "Stephen was on the couch and Wagstaffe sat on the sofa chair. He wanted to know about Stephen's friendship with Eugene. We knew that MI5 were monitoring embassy personnel so this was quite a normal interview in the circumstances." Wagstaffe asked Ward: "He's never asked you to put him in touch with anyone you know? Or for information of any kind." Ward replied: "No, he hasn't. But if he did, naturally I would get in touch with you straight away. If there's anything I can do I'd be only too pleased to." Keith Wagstaffe reported back to MI5: "Ward asked me if it was all right for him to continue to see Ivanov. I replied that there was no reason why he should not. He then said if there was any way in which he could help he would be very ready to do so. I thanked him for his offer and asked him to get in touch with me should Ivanov at any time in the future make any propositions to him... Ward was completely open about his association with Ivanov... I do not think that he (Ward) is of security interest." On 8th July 1961 Christine Keeler met John Profumo, the Minister of War, at a party at Cliveden. Profumo kept in contact with Keeler and they eventually began an affair. According to Keeler: "Their (Ward and Hollis) plan was simple. I was to find out, through pillow talk, from Jack Profumo when nuclear warheads were being moved to Germany." Profumo and other cabinet ministers were also attending sex parties being held by Mariella Novotny. In December 1961 Novotny held a party that became known as the "Feast of Peacocks". According to Keeler, there was "a lavish dinner in which this man wearing only... a black mask with slits for eyes and laces up the back... and a tiny apron - one like the waitresses wore in 1950s tearooms - asked to be whipped if people were not happy with his services." Although MI5 and MI6 were aware of these sex parties taking place, there is no evidence that these politicians were warned about the danger they were in. After the Cuban Missile Crisis in October 1962, Ward told Keeler that he believed John F. Kennedy would be assassinated. He told her and Eugene Ivanov: "A man like John Kennedy will not be allowed to stay in such an important position of power in the world, I assure you of that." I will return to this issue later because evidence would emerge in 1963 that Ward was working for MI6 during this political crisis. On 28th October, 1962, Ward introduced Christine Keeler to Michael Eddowes, a lawyer who had become a rich businessman. This included owning Bistro Vino, a chain of restaurants. (Later this lawyer was to become very involved in the cover-up of the assassination of John F. Kennedy). As Keeler later revealed: "I kept my date with Michael Eddowes but he was far too old for me. He was nearly sixty but her certainly was interested and wanted to set me up in a flat in Regent's Park." During this period Keeler became involved with two black men, Lucky Gordon and John Edgecombe. The two men became jealous of each other and this resulted in Edgecombe slashing Gordon's face with a knife. On 14th December 1962, Edgecombe, fired a gun at Stephen Ward's Wimpole Mews flat, where Keeler had been visiting with Mandy Rice-Davies. Two days after the shooting Keeler contacted Michael Eddowes for legal advice about the Edgecombe case. During this meeting she told Eddowes: "Stephen (Ward) asked me to ask Jack Profumo what date the Germans were to get the bomb." However, she later claimed that she knew Ward was joking when he said this. Eddowes then asked Ward about this matter. Keeler later recalled: "Stephen fed him the line he had prepared with Roger Hollis for such an eventuality: it was Eugene (Ivanov) who had asked me to find out about the bomb." On 24th December 1962, Ward's old enemy, John Lewis, met Christine Keeler at a Christmas Party. She told him about the problems she was having with two of her former lovers, Lucky Gordon and John Edgecombe. "On the surface, the man I met at Jenny's party on Christmas Eve 1962, could not have been more helpful. I didn't know he was using me as a conduit to get to Stephen Ward. He bragged about getting hundreds of thousands of pounds in legal actions against newspapers. My legal troubles involving Johnnie and Lucky were nothing. I was so grateful when he said he would get his lawyers to help and even more pleased that he actually rang, as promised, the next day." Keeler later admitted that he was "one of the most evil men of the whole affair, the vindictive John Lewis... Stephen had played a part in his bitter divorce from his wife, Joy, and Lewis was, even years later, after him." Lewis decided he would pass this information to George Wigg, the MP for Dudley. The first meeting took place on 2nd January 1963. Wigg was interested in the story but asked Lewis to provide him with more information. Lewis now told Keeler he was willing to pay her £30,000 if her information brought the government down. Keeler responded by telling him that "Stephen (Ward) asked me to ask Jack Profumo what date the Germans were to get the bomb." Wigg's secretary remembers, "Mr Lewis constantly rang up during the day when Mr Wigg was about his parliamentary business. I frequently got the impression he wasn't completely sober. But he was insistent." On 7th January, Lewis told Wigg the story about Ward asking her to discover classified information from Profumo. Wigg pointed out in his autobiography: "Lewis had attended a pre-Christmas party where a Miss Christine Keeler talked excitedly about a recent shooting incident, the first of several events destined to endow her with what she appeared to crave the reputation of being the most notorious woman in London. Miss Keeler, who said she had heard a Mr Stephen Ward refer to Lewis, asked if she could telephone him and, a few days later, sought his help. She then spoke about her friendship with John Profumo, Secretary of State for War, and with the Russian Naval Attaché, Captain Eugene Ivanov. Miss Keeler alleged that Ward had asked her to obtain from Profumo information about the supply of atomic weapons to the Germans... I rejected at once the idea that Profumo personally was a security risk. I had found him politically untrustworthy but I never regarded him as a fool, and I could not be persuaded that an obviously ignorant girl would be used as a go-between. It seemed to me the man to keep an eye on was Ivanov. Lewis agreed that the matter must be handled exclusively on the issue of security. I urged him to talk to the police and, at a later stage, advised him to talk to Commander Townsend at Scotland Yard. Lewis did talk to the police but, being dissatisfied with the results, returned to me again and again." Warwick Charlton later explained. "John Lewis was an able politician. He had held pretty high office, but because of the way he was living he had lost his seat. He was desperate to get back in. He had two motives delivered to him by Christine: one, the Russian security thing, and, two, evidence that Stephen was a ponce. He'd have his revenge, and he had little presents to give Wigg to beat the Tory Party with, and he might get back and re-establish his reputation with Labour." On 10th March, 1963, Wigg attended a party with Harold Wilson, the leader of the Labour Party, Richard Crossman and Barbara Castle. Crossman later recalled: "When we arrived at the party George outlined the story to us and we emphatically and unanimously repudiated it. We all felt that even if it was true and Profumo was having an affair with a call girl and that some Russian diplomat had been mixed up in it, the Labour Party simply should not touch it. I remember that we all advised Harold very strongly against it and in a way rather squashed George." George Wigg got up in the House of Commons on 21st March and asked Home Secretary Henry Brooke, during a debate on the John Vassall affair: "I rightly use the Privilege of the House of Commons - that is what it is given me for - to ask the Home Secretary who is the senior member of the Government on the Treasury Bench now, to go to the Dispatch Box - he knows that the rumour to which I refer relates to Miss Christine Keeler and Miss Davies and a shooting by a West Indian - and, on behalf of the Government, categorically deny the truth of these rumours.... It is not good for a democratic State that rumours of this kind should spread and be inflated, and go on. Everyone knows what I am referring to, but up to now nobody has brought the matter into the open. I believe that the Vassall Tribunal need never have been set up had the nettle been firmly grasped much earlier on. We have lost some time and I plead with the Home Secretary to use that Dispatch Box to clear up all the mystery and speculation over this particular case." Richard Crossman then commented that Paris Match magazine intended to publish a full account of Keeler's relationship with John Profumo, the Minister of War, in the government. Barbara Castle also asked questions if Keeler's disappearance had anything to do with Profumo. The following day John Profumo issued a statement: "I understand that in the debate on the Consolidated Fund Bill last night, under the protection of parliamentary privilege, the Hon. Gentlemen the Members for Dudley (George Wigg) ... spoke of rumours connecting a Minister with a Miss Keeler and a recent trial at the Central Criminal Court. It was alleged that people in high places might have been responsible for concealing information concerning the disappearance of a witness and the perversion of justice. I understand that my name has been connected with the rumours about the disappearance of Miss Keeler. I would like to take this opportunity of making a personal statement about these matters. I last saw Miss Keeler in December 1961, and I have not seen her since. I have no idea where she is now. Any suggestion that I was in any way connected with or responsible for her absence from the trial at the Old Bailey is wholly and completely untrue. My wife and I first met Miss Keeler at a house party in July 1961, at Cliveden. Among a number of people there was Doctor Stephen Ward whom we already knew slightly, and a Mr Ivanov, who was an attaché at the Russian Embassy.... Between July and December, 1961, I met Miss Keeler on about half a dozen occasions at Doctor Ward's flat, when I called to see him and his friends. Miss Keeler and, I were on friendly terms. There was no impropriety whatsoever in my acquaintanceship with Miss Keeler." Ward now decided to contact George Wigg. On the afternoon of 26th March Wigg received a phone call from Ward and a meeting was arranged for that evening. At the meeting Ward told Wigg about his relationship with Eugene Ivanov: "Ward said he first met Ivanov some time in 1961 at a Garrick Club lunch where, with a journalist specializing in Soviet affairs, they were guests of a Fleet Street editor. Ward found Ivanov a charming man. He taught him to play bridge and, soon, was seeing him two or three times a fortnight. They had fun with girls, although nothing improper ever took place, and they played bridge. They had visited only one night club, The Satyr, together, and then only for ten minutes. Ward said Ivanov never spoke critically about the British people. His one desire, which Ward shared, was to foster Anglo-Soviet friendship.... The Security Service, Ward asserted, knew all about his association with Ivanov. Representatives of the Security Service had enquired about his various meetings and Ward had promised to keep them informed and had kept that promise. He cited two occasions on which he thought friendship with Ivanov had been of value to Britain. At the time of the Berlin crisis in 1962 he, acting for Ivanov, had informed Sir Harold Caccia and other Foreign Office officials that the Soviet Union would adopt a conciliatory policy in return for Western guarantees about the integrity of the Oder-Neisse Line." The second occasion he had provided information to the intelligence services was during the Cuban Missile Crisis in October 1962. "His second venture in Ivanov - directed diplomacy - again as a go between - occurred during the Cuban crisis. This time, according to Ward, he was the link between Ivanov as peacemaker and the British Government, represented by the Foreign Secretary, Lord Home, and the Prime Minister. Ivanov told Ward the Russians would respond to a British initiative calling a conference in London by halting the delivery of arms and stopping all shipments of war equipment to Cuba. I pressed even harder on this subject for the obvious reason that I did not believe that Ward, personally, had been in touch with the Foreign Secretary and the Prime Minister Ward became cagey again. He was not prepared to say because too many important people were involved." However, Ward did say that he had written to Harold Wilson at the time to explain what he had been doing. "I told Harold Wilson that my visitor claimed to have written both to him and to the Prime Minister towards the end of the Cuban crisis. The letter was immediately extracted from the files and Wilson at once recalled a phrase about an approach made by Ward on behalf of Ivanov to the Foreign Office: 'I was the intermediary', Ward had written. Next day, Wilson handed Ward's letter to the Prime Minister and expressed his now acute anxiety about the implication that Ward was a contact between Ivanov and people of influence in this country." On 27th March, 1963, Henry Brooke summoned Roger Hollis, the head of MI5, and Joseph Simpson, the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, to a meeting in his office. Philip Knightley pointed out in An Affair of State (1987): "All these people are now dead and the only account of what took place is a semi-official one leaked in 1982 by MI5. According to this account, when Brooke tackled Hollis on the rumour that MI5 had been sending anonymous letters to Mrs Profumo, Hollis vigorously denied it." Hollis then told Brooke that Christine Keeler had been having a sexual relationship with John Profumo. At the same time Keeler was believed to be having an affair with Eugene Ivanov, a Soviet spy. According to Keeler, Stephen Ward had asked her "to find out, through pillow talk, from Jack Profumo when nuclear warheads were being moved to Germany." Hollis added that "in any court case that might be brought against Ward over the accusation all the witnesses would be completely unreliable" and therefore he rejected the idea of using the Official Secrets Act against Ward. Brooke then asked the Police Commissioner's view on this. Joseph Simpson agreed with Hollis about the unreliable witnesses but added that it might be possible to get a conviction against Ward with a charge of living off immoral earnings. However, he added, that given the evidence available, a conviction was unlikely. Despite this response, Brooke urged Simpson to carry out a full investigation into Ward's activities. Commander Fred C. Pennington was ordered to assemble a team to investigate Ward. The team was headed by Chief Inspector Samuel Herbert and included John Burrows, Arthur Eustace and Mike Glasse. Pennington told Herbert and his colleagues: "we've received this tip-off, but there'll be nothing in it." Glasse later told Philip Knightley that he thought that this was "a hint not to try too hard." It emerged later that Herbert installed a spy in Ward's home during the investigation. They recruited Wendy Davies, a twenty-year old barmaid at the Duke of Marlborough pub, near Ward's flat. Davies knew Ward who had sketched her several times in the past. Davies later recalled: "I went to Stephen's flat practically every night up to his arrest. Each time I tried to listen in to telephone conversations, and to what Stephen was saying to friends who called. When I got back to my flat I wrote everything down in an exercise book, and rang the police the next day. I gave them a lot of information." Chief Inspector Samuel Herbert interviewed Christine Keeler at her home on 1st April 1963. Four days later she was taken to Marylebone Police Station. Herbert told her that the police would need a complete list of men with whom she had sex or who had given her money during the time she knew Ward. This list included the names of John Profumo, Charles Clore and Jim Eynan. On 23rd April Mandy Rice-Davies was arrested at Heathrow Airport on the way to Spain for a holiday, and formerly charged her with "possessing a document so closely resembling a driving licence as to be calculated to deceive." The magistrate fixed bail at £2,000. She later commented that "not only did I not have that much money, but the policeman in charge made it very clear to me that I would be wasting my energy trying to rustle it up." Rice-Davies spent the next nine days in Holloway Prison. While she was in custody Rice-Davies was visited by Chief Inspector Samuel Herbert. His first words were: "Mandy, you don't like it in here very much, do you? Then you help us, and we'll help you." Herbert made it clear that Christine Keeler was helping them into their investigation into Stephen Ward. When she provided the information required she would be released from prison. At first Rice-Davies refused to cooperate but as she later pointed out: "I was ready to kick the system any way I could. But ten days of being locked up alters the perspective. Anger was replaced by fear. I was ready to do anything to get out." Rice-Davies added: "Although I was certain nothing I could say about Stephen could damage him any way... I felt I was being coerced into something, being pointed in a predetermined direction." Herbert asked Rice-Davies for a list of men with whom she had sex or who had given her money during the time she knew Ward. This list included the names of Peter Rachman and Emil Savundra. On 19th May, 1963, Stephan Ward wrote a letter to the Home Secretary Henry Brooke, the leader of the Labour Party, Harold Wilson, and his local M.P., William Wavell Wakefield. "I have placed before the Home Secretary certain facts of the relationship between Miss Keeler and Mr Profumo since it is obvious now that my efforts to conceal these facts in the interests of Mr Profumo and the Government have made it appear that I myself have something to hide - which I have not. The result has been that I have been persecuted in a variety of ways, causing damage not only to myself but to my friends and patients-a state of affairs which I propose to tolerate no longer." As a result of his earlier statement the newspapers decided not to print anything about John Profumo and Christine Keeler for fear of being sued for libel. However, George Wigg refused to let the matter drop and on 25th May, 1963, once again raised the issue of Keeler, saying this was not an attack on Profumo's private life but a matter of national security. On 5th June, John Profumo resigned as War Minister. His statement said that he had lied to the House of Commons about his relationship with Christine Keeler. The next day the Daily Mirror said: "What the hell is going on in this country? All power corrupts and the Tories have been in power for nearly twelve years." Some newspapers called for Harold Macmillan to resign as prime minister. This he refused to do but he did ask Lord Denning to investigate the security aspects of the Profumo affair. Some of the prostitutes who worked for Stephen Ward began to sell their stories to the national press. Mandy Rice-Davies told the Daily Sketch that Christine Keeler had sexual relationships with John Profumo and Eugene Ivanov, an naval attaché at the Soviet embassy. On 7th June, Christine Keeler told the Daily Express of her secret "dates" with Profumo. She also admitted that she had been seeing Eugene Ivanov at the same time, sometimes on the same day, as Profumo. In a television interview Ward told Desmond Wilcox that he had warned the security services about Keeler's relationship with Profumo. The following day Ward was arrested and charged with living off immoral earnings between 1961 and 1963. He was initially refused bail because it was feared that he might try to influence witnesses. Another concern was that he might provide information on the case to the media. On 14th June, the London solicitor, Michael Eddowes, claimed that Christine Keeler told him that Eugene Ivanov had asked her to get information about nuclear weapons from Profumo. Eddowes added that he had written to Harold Macmillan to ask why no action had been taken on information he had given to Special Branch about this on 29th March. Soon afterwards Keeler told the News of the World that "I'm no spy, I just couldn't ask Jack for secrets." In a FBI classified memo dated 20th June, 1963, from Alan Belmont to Clyde Tolson referred to the concerns of Defence Secretary Robert McNamara about the John Profumo case. It stated "Mr. McNamara referred to a memorandum from the FBI dated June 14, 1963, advising that Air Force personnel may have had relationships with Christine Keeler." The next section is blacked out but it goes onto say: "McNamara said he felt like he was sitting on a bomb in this matter as he could not tell what would come out of it and he wanted to be sure that every effort was being made to get information from the British particularly as it affected U.S. personnel." Chief Inspector Samuel Herbert also interviewed Vasco Lazzolo, who was one of Ward's friends who agreed to testify for the defence. Herbert told Lazzolo that if he was determined to give evidence on Ward's behalf, then he might have to be discredited. Herbert warned that the police might have to "find" some pornographic material in his studio and prosecute him. Ward asked James Burge, one of his patients, to represent him when he appeared at the the Magistrate's Court. Although he was not a Q.C., Ward decided to retain him for the trial. The trial of Ward began at the Old Bailey on 22nd July 1963. Christine Keeler admitted in court that she had sex with John Profumo, Charles Clore and Jim Eynan. In all three cases the men gave her money and gifts. During cross-examination she confessed that some of this money was paid to Ward as she owed him money for rent, electricity and food while she was living at his flat. Mandy Rice-Davies also admitted receiving money and gifts from Peter Rachman and Emil Savundra. As she was living with Ward at the time she gave him some of this money for unpaid rent. As Rice-Davies pointed out: "Much was made of the fact that I was paying him a few pounds a week whilst I was living in Wimpole Mews. But I said before and say it again - Stephen never did anything for nothing and we agreed on the rent the day I arrived. He most certainly never influenced me to sleep with anyone, nor ever asked me to do so." She added: "Stephen was never a blue-and-white diamond, but a pimp? Ridiculous.... As for Christine, she was always borrowing money (from Stephen Ward)." Ronna Ricardo had said that she had sex for money and then gave it to Ward at a preliminary hearing. However, she retracted this information at the trial and claimed that Chief Inspector Samuel Herbert had forced the statement from her by threats against the Ricardo family. According to Philip Knightley: "Ricardo said that Herbert told her that if she did not agree to help them then the police would take action against her family. Her younger sister, on probation and living with her, would be taken into care. They might even make application to take her baby away from her because she had been an unfit mother." At the trial Vickie Barrett claimed that Ward had picked her up in Oxford Street and had taken her home to have sex with his friends. Barrett was unable to name any of these men. She added that Ward was paid by these friends and he kept some of the money for her in a little drawer. Ward admitted knowing Barrett and having sex with her. However, he denied arranging for her to have sex with other men or taking money from her. Sylvia Parker, who had been staying at Ward's flat at the time Barrett claimed she was brought there to have sex with other men. She called Barrett's statements "untrue, a complete load of rubbish". Christine Keeler claims that she had never seen Barrett before: "She (Barrett) described Stephen handing out horsewhips, canes, contraceptives and coffee and how, having collected her weapons, she had treated the waiting clients. It sounded, and was, nonsense. I had lived with Stephen and never seen any evidence of anything like that." Mandy Rice-Davies agreed with Keeler: "Much of what she (Barrett) said was discredited. It was obvious to anyone that Stephen, with the police breathing down his neck and the press on his doorstep, would hardly have the opportunity or the inclination for this sort of thing." Ludovic Kennedy, the author of The Trial of Stephen Ward (1964) has argued that James Burge was unable to compete with the prosecuting counsel Mervyn Griffith-Jones: "In short, Mr. Burge was a very nice man; indeed, as the trial went on, I began to think that alongside Mr. Griffith-Jones, he was almost too nice a man. He was a civilised being, a person of wit and humour. I had been told by one of his colleagues that he was one of the few men at the Bar who could laugh a case out of court. The atmosphere here, as I think he realised, was not conducive to this sort of approach, but I was told he had tried it once or twice at the Magistrate's Court with some success. In addition to his quip about Mr. Griffith-Jones making a honeymoon sound obscene, he had also said that he had no objection to some of Mr Griffith-Jones's leading questions, as they were not leading very far. Mr. Griffith-Jones himself would have been incapable of either of these two remarks. But equally Mr. Burge could not match Mr. Griffith-Jones's cold relentless plodding, his battering away at the walls until, by sheer persistence, they began to crack. It was this, in the last analysis, that made one admire Mr. Griffith-Jones as much as one deplored him. Because his own attitude to the case was committed, one became committed in one's attitude towards him. It was this outward lack of commitment, not in matter but in manner, that at times led one to feel that Mr. Burge was doing himself literally less than justice. They say that the days of the committed lawyer are over: yet one would have liked to see Ward's defence accompanied by some passion, with his counsel as contemptuous of the charges laid against him as the prosecution were contemptuous of Ward himself. As it was, while I had no doubts which of the two counsel was the more intelligent, urbane and congenial, equally I had no doubts, where the jury was concerned, which was the more effective advocate." In his cross-examination of Stephan Ward, Burge asked him about his annual income. Ward replied that he was earning about £4,000 from his practice and another £1,500 or so from his drawings - a total of between £5,000 and £6,000 a year. Burge then asked: "If the prosecution's picture of a man procuring, and the picture of people in high places and very wealthy men was true, would you have needed to carry on your practice and work as an osteopath?" Ward replied: "If that were true, evidently not." Philip Knightley, the author of An Affair of State (1987) pointed out: "That ended the prosecution case. How strong was it? Griffith-Jones had succeeded in establishing that Christine Keeler and Mandy Rice-Davies took money for sex. He had shown that both girls gave money to Ward. Even though, given that in law the dividing line between living with a prostitute and living on a prostitute is very thin, the prosecution's weak point was that both girls owed Ward - one way or another - far more money than they ever paid him." Ward told his defence counsel, James Burge: "One of my great perils is that at least half a dozen of the (witnesses) are lying and their motives vary from malice to cupidity and fear... In the case of both Christine Keeler and Mandy Rice-Davies there is absolutely no doubt that they are committed to stories which are already sold or could be sold to newspapers and that my conviction would free these newspapers to print stories which they would otherwise be quite unable to print (for libel reasons)." Stephen Ward was very upset by the judge's summing-up that included the following: "If Stephen Ward was telling the truth in the witness box, there are in this city many witnesses of high estate and low who could have come and testified in support of his evidence." Several people present in the court claimed that Judge Archie Pellow Marshall was clearly biased against Ward. France Soir reported: "However impartial he tried to appear, Judge Marshall was betrayed by his voice." After the day's court proceedings, Ward contacted Tom Critchley, a Home Office official working with Lord Denning on the official investigation. Later, Critchley refused to comment what was said in that telephone conversation. That night Ward met the journalist Tom Mangold: "Stephen was very relaxed... He wasn't walking around in a froth. He was very calm and collected, just writing his letters and putting them in envelopes. I wanted to pretend that I hadn't seen what I'd seen. My excuse, which was not a good excuse, was that I was on a yellow card from my wife. I reckoned I could risk being home two hours late. But I knew the marriage wouldn't survive if I showed up any later. So all I did was to bleat at Stephen not to do anything foolish." After Mangold left Ward wrote to his friend, Noel Howard-Jones: "It is really more than I can stand - the horror, day after day at the court and in the streets. It is not only fear, it is a wish not to let them get me. I would rather get myself. I do hope I have not let people down too much. I tried to do my stuff but after Marshall's summing-up, I've given up all hope." Ward then took an overdose of sleeping tablets. He was in a coma when the jury reached their verdict of guilty of the charge of living on the immoral earnings of Christine Keeler and Mandy Rice-Davies on Wednesday 31st July. Three days later, Ward died in St Stephen's Hospital. According to Warwick Charlton, Ward's old enemy, John Lewis, was delighted at the news of his death: "He was celebrating. He made no bones about it." Ward's defence team found a letter that he had written to Vickie Barrett: "I don't know what it was or who it was that made you do what you did. But if you have any decency left, you should tell the truth like Ronna Riccardo. You owe this not to me, but to everyone who may be treated like you or like me in the future." The letter was passed to Barry O'Brien, a journalist who worked for the Daily Telegraph. He gave the letter to Barrett. He later reported she read the note and began to cry. "It was all lies but I never thought he would die." Barrett said she had been coerced into giving her evidence by the police and agreed to go to see Ward's solicitor, then went to another room to get her coat. According to O'Brien, an older women came out, and said: "Miss Barrett was not going anywhere." Barrett later retracted her retraction. In his book, The Trial of Stephen Ward (1964), Ludovic Kennedy considers the guilty verdict of Ward to be a miscarriage of justice. In An Affair of State (1987), the journalist, Philip Knightley argues: "Witnesses were pressured by the police into giving false evidence. Those who had anything favourable to say were silenced. And when it looked as though Ward might still survive, the Lord Chief Justice shocked the legal profession with an unprecedented intervention to ensure Ward would be found guilty." The entertainer Michael Bentine, who worked as an intelligence officer for MI9 under Airey Neave during the Second World War and had known Ward for sometime, kept up his contacts after the war, later commented: "A Special Branch friend of mine told me Ward was assisted in his dying. I think he was murdered." Paul Mann, a close friend of Stephen Ward, says he was told shortly after his death, that "Ward was injected with an air bubble, by hypodermic, with the intention of causing a fatal embolism. The needle broke, and the assassins left in a hurry. It was enough, though, to send the drugged Ward on his way. It was a botched affair." Chief Inspector Samuel Herbert died of a heart attack on 16th April 1966 at the age of 48. In his will he left only £300, which was commensurate with the police salaries at that time. However, after his death his bank account was discovered to contain no less than £30,000 (660,000 by today's values). According to Philip Knightley: "By coincidence, in the tape recordings which Christine Keeler made with her manager, Robin Drury, Keeler says that John Lewis, Ward's bitter enemy, had offered her £30,000 for information leading to Ward's conviction and the bringing down of the Conservative Government." In 1987 Anthony Summers and Stephen Dorril published their book on the Stephen Ward case, Honeytrap. During their research they managed to speak to several members of MI5, including Keith Wagstaffe, Wards case-officer. The book confirms that Ward had been involved in an operation that was attempting to persuade Eugene Ivanov to become a double-agent. As a result of the book being published the authors were contacted by a former MI6 officer who claimed that Ward was murdered by a contract agent called Stanley Rytter, whose cover was as a freelance journalist and photographer. Rytter had died in 1984 but Summers and Dorril investigate the allegation and got the story confirmed by one of his associates, Serge Paplinski. The intelligence officer then went on to say: "It was decided that Ward had to die.... He admitted (Rytter) that Ward was killed on the instructions of his department. He convinced Ward that he ought to have a good night's sleep and take some sleeping pills. The agent said he let Ward doze off and then woke him again and told him to take his tablets. Another half an hour later or two, he woke Ward again, and told him he'd forgotten to take his sleeping pills. So it went on - till Ward had overdosed. It might sound far-fetched, but it's the easiest thing in the world to do. Once the victim is drowsy he will agree to almost anything." ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by Robert Howard on 23 January 2014 - 10:12 PM in JFK Assassination Debate --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- It was entirely by chance, but I discovered that in Peter Dale Scott's - Deep Politics & The Death of JFK, pps. 367-68 footnote to section from page 230 HOOVER, BOBBY BAKERAND THE ELLEN ROMETSCH STORY, he elaborated on the similarity between the former and the Profumo Scandal. Below is the footnote in its entirety. Some miscellaneous speculations: Owen, it will be recalled, was with Ruby's stripper friend Candy Barr in 1957, just before she was arrested. Both Lester May, her attorney in that case and his brother-in-law Gordon McLendon (whom Ruby listed as one of his six closest friends 20 WH 39) were busy in 1971 in the mob effort to secure the release of Jimmy Hoffa (Sheridan, Hoffa 503-04; Moldea, Hoffa Wars, 280). So was Carlos Marcello associate D'Alton Smith, brother-in-law of Nofio Pecora, the head of Marcello's call-girl operations whom Ruby phoned in October 1963. In 1970 Smith would be indicted as part of a securities-fraud network, along with Charles Tourine, Ruby's friend Maurice "Frenchy" Medelvine, Mike McLaney and Sam Benton of the McLaney arms cache on Lake Ponchartrain (Scott, Crime & Cover-up, 46). Bobby Baker was approached about the million-dollar bail-out of Hoffa as well (Baker Wheeling and Dealing, 17). Bedford Wynne entertained his girls, and his friend George Owen, at his home in the Maple Terrace Apartments. This was also the womanizing friend George DeMohrenschildt (WCD 7:135), and at one time of Ruby's friend Lewis McWillie (WCD 84.86). Could Ruby and McWillie have moved in such "higher" circles by their ability to supply women, drugs and gambling? McWillie told the House Committee that he ran "stag parties" at the Cipango Club for Dallas gamblers Ivy Miller, and Earl Dalton, although he explained that the stag parties featured dice games at which "they let their wives come too" (5 AH 66). Jim Marrs writes that the Four Deuces in Fort Worth, which McWillie managed for the "gentleman gambler" W. C. Kirkwood was "in an area noted for its taverns and its prostitution. It was here, under the protective eye of off-duty policemen, that men like H. L. Hunt, Clint Murchison (sic) and others joined [speaker] Sam Rayburn and his protege [Lyndon] Johnson for hours of Kirkwood-provided hospitality." (Marrs, 292) One last detail to support the Washington policeman's theory that the mob, and more specifically, Nesline, has been behind sexual corruption in high places for a long time. Mandy Rice-Davies, the number-two woman in the Ward-Keeler sex ring that compromised both Profumo and Kennedy, established mob contacts when she moved to Israel. There she met Herbert Itkin, the mob-FBI-CIA double agent who had testified in the Teamster kickback trial, where his CIA control Mario Brod had testified successfully for the defense. Had she known the mob before the Profumo story broke? At least one of Ward's women, Mariella Novotny, (who had slept with Kennedy), had worked in London strip joints like the Club Pigalle and the Black Sheep (Summers and Dorrill, Honeytrap, 96). Meyer Lansky and Dino Cellini also had interests in London clubs, which may explain why Lansky and Nesline were spotted there in 1962. It is safe to say that the mob was involved in the post-assassination cover-up, beginning with Ruby's murder of Oswald in the Dallas police basement. But it is clear that many of those involved in the pre-assassination sexual intrigues, including Rosselli, Guy Richards, Michael Eddowes and, above all, Bedford Wynne, were involved in the post assassination story as well. ==================================================== Lobster number 2, 1983 by Stephen Dorril. __________________________________________________ __ Stephen Dorril In February this year, unnoticed by the press, a funeral took place in a quiet Sussex village. In attendance were some famous names from London society of the fifties and sixties, and two men in regulation dark suits from an undisclosed department of the Security Services. They had been contacts for the deceased, Maria Novotny, who made headlines in the sixties through her 'relationship' with President John Kennedy, and her involvement in the Profumo affair. Novotny's own accounts of the two episodes have tended to be dismissed, and reasonably so, as they appeared in the sensationalist press. (1) But one man, Michael Eddowes, took her very seriously indeed, claiming to have spent over $100,000 of his own money following up leads generated by her story. To Eddowes, Novotny was the link to a Soviet plot to discredit Western leaders: "I had discovered that the group in London who had destroyed Profumo had sent a young woman, Maria Novotny, to destroy the character of President Kennedy. She was the cousin of President Novotny of Czechoslovakia. This is fact." (2) When Eddowes expanded his theory to include the assassination of Kennedy, it took on a distinctly bizarre look. Eddowes' book, November 22nd: How They Killed Kennedy (3) suggested that Lee Harvey Oswald had been replaced by a look-a-like KGB agent when he went to the Soviet Union. (4) Following this to its logical conclusion, Eddowes reportedly spent over $10,000 in October 1981 on legal fees and exhumation costs involved in reopening Oswald's grave. (5) He arranged for a new autopsy with the consent of Marina Porter (Oswald) to see if the grave contained Oswald or a double. (6) Inevitably such ideas have meant that Eddowes has been portrayed as an 'assassination loony'. But he had at one time been a respected solicitor; obtained a Royal Pardon for Timothy Evans who was mistakenly hanged for the Christie murders; and wrote a best-selling book on the case, A Man On Your Conscience. Was Eddowes just muddying the water with disinformation on the assassination, or had he really uncovered evidence to confirm his theories? Strangely, although central to his theory on the assassination, Novotny is only briefly mentioned in the introduction to his book. One would have thought that everything that could be said on the Prufumo affair had been told, but new evidence, primarily from Nigel West (7) and Novotny herself, undermines the conclusions of the Denning Report. It also provides background to, and some justification for Eddowes' line of enquiry; even though in the end we can dismiss the Eddowes' claims because he misunderstood the role of Stephen Ward. This article is also an account of Maria Novotny's own life, which confirms at least a part of the articles in the sensationalist press. (8) There are no tidy ends to this account and if it is largely speculative - so be it; for the true story of the Profumo affair has yet to be revealed. I take it that readers have a basic knowledge of the Profumo affair and can read between the lines for themselves. Maria Novotny knew little of her own background: it wasn't until this year that her husband learned her real name. Maria Stella Novotny was born on the 9th of May 1941 in Prague. Her father was brother to the President of Czechoslovakia, and they lived in the Royal palace until she was 6 years old, when the Soviet Union moved in. Because the President supported the Communists, this family tie would explain why Eddowes thought she had been chosen to destroy Kennedy. But what Eddowes didn't know was that Maria's father was actively anti-Communist. Although opposed to each other politically, the brothers remained friends, the President warning Maria's father that the Soviets were liable to arrest him, and advising him to leave the country. Instead, he joined the underground, making arrangements for Maria to leave the country with the family agent, called Rutter. They escaped in a railway truck hiding under some corn, crossing the border into Austria. Unfortunately they ended up in the Soviet sector where they were put in a displaced persons camp. In 1948 Maria was released, apparently through the efforts of a Mrs Capes, who had known her father when he was in England, studying at university. How this was achieved is not known, but Maria was brought to England where she lived as the daughter of Mrs Capes. When she became a teenager she went into modelling and was determined to make it into a successful career. When only 18 she met Horace 'Hod' Dibden (9), then aged 57, at the Black Sheep Club (10) in Piccadilly, which he helped run. An expert on English antiques and furniture, he had many friends on the London scene, including Stephen Ward, who he had known since the war; and, interestingly, Michael Eddowes, who had given up his solicitor's practice and become the owner of a chain of restaurants. Hod and Eddowes had known each other for twenty years. Hod and Maria were married in January 1960. The marriage was conditional on her being allowed to carry on her own life. She appears to have been a highly intelligent, very beautiful young girl, determined to get on in the world, hoping to use Hod's contacts and money to climb the social ladder. In her personal account she claims to have been a virgin at the time, and, in reality, rather turned off by sexual relations. To her, sex was a 'game' designed to shock other people: she took her pleasure watching the reactions of people to situations she had organised. After the honeymoon they were regulars on the night club scene. One particular party in February 1960, given by an American millionaire, Huntingdon Hartford, was a turning point. Among the guests were Stephen Ward and a more 'sinister' man, Harry Alan Towers, who claimed to be a film producer and owner of a modelling agency. Maria and Towers didn't meet at the party, but Towers must have recognised her: four days later a letter arrived suggesting a meeting at Claridges to discuss some possible modelling work. The letter was actually signed by Tower's mother, Margaret, who Novotny claims had an extraordinary influence over him, and from whom he took his instructions. At the meeting Towers was brisk to the point of rudeness. He told her that he could make her a top television model doing commercials in America. Although she didn't like Towers, she found it difficult to turn down the contract, which offered upwards of $50,000 a year. Over the next days the contract was sorted out and Maria was introduced to some of Towers' friends, one of whom tried to have sex with her in Paris. Towers, over the next year, made no sexual advances towards Maria but didn't mind pushing his friends on her. She signed to Towers' modelling agency and he gave her a large deposit. The day she left for New York Stephen Ward went to a dinner party with her at which he made some sketches of her. Maria claimed that Ward and Towers knew each other. To Eddowes this provided a link between the Kennedy and Profumo episodes. Hod also thought that Ward and Towers knew each other at this time. Towers flew ahead a few days earlier and met Maria at what became Kennedy Airport. Almost immediately they were arguing with each other, and Maria became doubly suspicious of him when he told her to sign a hotel register as Maria Novotny. Up til then she had been known as Maria Chapman, Hod's family name. Towers insisted that while she was in America she should use Novotny. What else, she thought, did Towers know of her background? At first her modelling career went well and they went to the usual round of parties. But it seems that modelling offers were the result of her sleeping with television producers. After two weeks Towers arranged a lunch for her with Peter Lawford, the brother-inlaw of President John Kennedy. Towers claimed that it would do her modelling career good if she got to know Kennedy. Maria didn't see the connection at the time; it was only later that she realised that Towers had engineered the meeting for other purposes. On reflection, it spelt blackmail to Maria and Eddowes. Unknown to her at the time she was scheduled to be the replacement for Simone McQueen, a TV weather forecaster, who had just finished with Kennedy. Lawford took her to parties and she briefly met Kennedy at one and arranged to meet him again. They were more intimate at a party where the singer, Vic Damone, was the host. She was introduced to Kennedy and almost immediately shown into a bedroom where she went to bed with him. They weren't gone very long before there was a commotion in the main room. Damone's Asian girlfriend had made an unsuccessful suicide attempt and had been found in the bathroom with her wrists slashed. The apartment quickly emptied, Kennedy disappearing with a bodyguard and his associates. The incident was hushed up. The quick departure may have had something to do with the fact that, according to Maria, one of J. Edgar Hoover' s men was known to attend these parties. Word would have quickly reached Hoover who would have no doubt added it to his files on the Kennedy brothers. Maria continued to see Kennedy and his brother, Robert, though I doubt that there is much truth in the published accounts of her relationship with Robert. Her own account rarely mentions him - or, for that matter, the sensational claims of her involvement with UN officials. The latter appears to have involved Towers' other girls. At the end of the year Hod arrived in New York to buy antiques. At this time Maria had had enough of Towers. Her modelling career was nowhere in sight. She decided to leave Towers and move into Hod's apartment near the UN building. Towers was extremely angry and determined to make her stay in his flat. But as he was commuting between London and New York at this time, he had little real control over her. She moved in with Hod. During this period when Towers would later be accused of running a vice-ring at the UN building, he was in constant touch with his mother - and one other person, Leslie Chateris. This was presumably an innocent relationship since Towers said he wanted to buy the TV rights to The Saint. But Towers did get Maria to take a package to Chateris in Los Angeles. To Maria, Tower's business seemed to have little to do with television or films. Shortly after the disagreement Maria returned to his luxurious Manhattan apartment to pick up the rest of her clothes. Towers was surprisingly good-natured, apologising for his previous loss of temper, saying he would make it up to her. That night he said she could use his apartment for a night with a boyfriend. When he arrived they went into a bedroom, at which point he tried to persuade her to accept $100 for sexual relations. Eventually, after some persuasion, she accepted. He then showed her his badge and told her she was under arrest. He left the room fetching in other officers who were lining the corridor. Searching the apartment they found Towers hiding, shaking under some suitcases in a lobby. Maria was taken to a police station and interrogated for four hours, going through three different agencies. Finally she was released on bail. At her apartment the next day plain clothed policemen interviewed her and at FBI headquarters she was shown pictures of many girls and asked if she knew them. It was clear that the FBI wanted Towers. Several charges were to be made against him and they wanted her to testify against him. But before they could, Towers escaped from America after bail, reputedly a very large sum, had been put up. Towers was accused of running a vice-ring involving UN officials. Hod and Maria were shown immigration files on Towers which, according to Hod, showed Towers' links with Eastern Europe. When Eddowes went to New York he met John Malone, head of the New York FBI, and they apparently had three two hour interviews. Eddowes was shown FBI, Immigration, and, possibly, CIA files on Towers and Novotny. These proved to Eddowes satisfaction that Towers was working for the Soviets; that Novotny had been used to get close to Kennedy for possible blackmail - probably because of her Czech background. (For some reason Novotny believed that photos existed of her love making sessions taken from hidden cameras in the UN building.) It was reported that on leaving America Towers went to Prague, Moscow, and Peking, stopping for a time in southern Ireland before residing in Canada. (11) Novotny was held as a material witness and charged with being a wayward minor. According to Hod, it was rumoured at the time that Kennedy himself had intervened to stop the charges. By now Novotny was determined to leave America: Towers was hardly likely to return. She had in her own words, become a political pawn, with the State police, FBI and Immigration officials claiming jurisdiction over her. She escaped by buying a boarding ticket for the Queen Mary and staying on board when it sailed. Rather implausibly an officer let her stay on board without saying anything when she told him she had lost her passport. A rumour reached the papers that the CIA had helped her escape. Hod met her off the boat in England having flown ahead. One of the first people she met in London, around April 1961, was Stephen Ward, who invited her to a reception at the Soviet Embassy. Ward pestered her daily to meet the Soviet diplomat Eugene Ivanov, but she refused. She had had enough problems in New York, and a solicitor friend (possibly Eddowes) warned her not to get involved with political figures. Hod went in her place to the Embassy reception (with Gilbert Harding) where he met Ivanov. Ward didn't give up though. After Ivanov he switched to Profumo, introducing Maria as 'the girl who made an impact on the Kennedy clan'. Unknown to her, he was also playing up her relationship with the Czech President. These attempts to link Novotny to Profumo and Ivanov (which she later saw as deliberate) took place before the famous Keeler meeting, suggesting at the very least, that the Denning report (12) was less than adequate. She was eventually tricked into seeing Ivanov at a party at Cliveden. Ward introduced her to a surprise guest and quickly left the room. The guest was Ivanov. What came next was a shock because Ivanov knew details of her background and told her he could arrange for her to visit Czechoslovakia to see relatives. He painted a rosy picture of life in the country and of the Communist Party. She declined his offers and after some further efforts at persuasion she left the room to join the others. She learned later that he was particularly interested in her experiences in America. Behind the sexual affairs and personal intrigues of Ward, Profumo and Ivanov were the British Security Services; and further back, and probably not apparent to the participants, was the wider intelligence battle between East and West. It is worth going into some detail on this area as it provides clues to Novotny's true position.(13) In April 1961 the West's most important Soviet spy, Oleg Penkovsky, arrived in London on a Trade Mission, staying until May 6th. The material he gave to MI6 and CIA representatives was to prove vital to resolving the Cuban missile crisis: Kennedy would base his final decisions on the Penkovsky material. (14) During this particular visit he was debriefed at an all-night session during which he provided details on the KGB and GRU men at the Soviet Embassy in London. Amongst them was Ivanov whom he had known as a student. It is also worth noting that he had told MI6 that there was a traitor in the top ranks of MI5. Although no MI5 men took part in the debriefings of Penkovsky, they did play a leading role in the Profumo/Ivanov episode based on details he provided. Ivanov's cover for his intelligence role was that of Naval Attache. But he was no runof- the-mill intelligence officer. His father-in-law was Alexander Gorkin, Chairman of the Soviet Supreme Court. It is also believed that Ivanov played a prominent role in Nasser's coup in Egypt. According to Nigel West (15) he had been identified by 'D' branch as an intelligence officer when he first arrived in London on the 27th March 1960. Penkovsky described him as a man who liked women and a good party, suggesting that he might be a profitable target. So the watchers began trailing him. Here West's revisionist account starts to break down. It seems incredible that Ivanov was able to meet so many celebrities without MI5 keeping some tabs on him if they knew he was a spy. It is claimed that in June 1961 Ivanov led them to a house at 17 Wimpole Mews. By checking the electoral roll they found it was the home of Stephen Ward, who they contacted on June 8th. But that is virtually impossible because Ward didn't move into the flat until June 1st (16), which would have given him no time to be put on the register. Also according to MI5, on West's account, Ward was unknown to Registry. But Lee Tracey (17) an MI6 contract employee working at the Daily Mirror on organised vice, has revealed that he was assigned by MI6 to compile a profile on Stephen Ward six years before the scandal broke. Nothing ever appeared in the paper but a full report went to MI6 who hoped that some juicy target might be sexually compromised inside the Ward circle. (Which suggests either MI5 and MI6 didn't exchange material or someone is lying - or both.) MI5 made some discreet enquiries of Ward which revealed that he had many important people as friends, including the third Viscount Astor, who was known to MI5. Novotny has said that she saw reports which showed that Bill Astor was controlling Ward, and that her meeting at Cliveden with Ivanov had been arranged by Astor. In one of those intriguing coincidences, Astor played a role in Ivanov's attempts to intervene in the Cuban Missile Crisis. On the Thursday evening of the Cuba week, Astor suggested Ivanov should meet 'Boofy' Gore, the Earl of Arran. At the time it seemed to be an eccentric choice for behind - the - scenes diplomacy. But in reality it was spot on. For besides having easy access to Lord Home, then the Foreign Secretary, he was the first cousin of Sir David Ormsby-Gore the British Ambassador to America. Gore was a close friend of Kennedy - so intimately tied up in the decision making around the missile crisis (assuring Kennedy of the value of the Penkovsky material) that he was invited to the President's nuclear shelter if things went bad. (18) It was the Missile Crisis that persuaded Eddowes that Khrushchev was behind the assassination of JFK. It is possible that MI5 have said they used the electoral register to trace Ward to protect the real source. It is said that Ward was introduced to Ivanov by (Sir) Colin Coote, editor of the Daily Telegraph, in January 1961. There are conflicting stories about the origins of this meeting, but it has something to do with Ward doing sketches of Soviet diplomats. He did sketches of many famous people though he was only an average artist. (19) Coote had contacts in the Soviet Embassy and, interestingly, he was a golfing friend of the Director of MI5, Sir Roger Hollis. (20) Coote arranged a meeting at the Garrick Club. Accompanying Ward to this lunch was David Floyd, the Telegraph's correspondent on Soviet Affairs. Floyd was on the books of the IRD. (2I) IRD, run by the Foreign Office, was a Cold War propaganda outfit which had a close relationship with MI6; and, especially with section IX which dealt with the Soviet Union. Was the meeting set up by the intelligence services or did Floyd supply a report to section IX? Officially Ward was employed by MI5 on June 8th 1961 to help in the entrapment of Ivanov, hopefully to compromise him with the help of his girls. Ward's friends didn't know this. On the contrary many, including Hod and Maria, believed that he could be working for the Soviets. Hod was astonished when told of Ward's real role. He still believes Ward was murdered to keep him quiet. "It wasn't in his character to commit suicide." In London Hod and Maria set up dinner parties (22) at which many famous people attended. About half of these parties appear to have included sexual games afterwards. Ward was a frequent guest but as far as is known he never actually had sexual relations with the girls. It was at one of these dinner parties that the famous Ministerin- the-mask incident occurred; though in reality it was very different to the accounts of Keeler and Rice-Davies. (They, incidentally, never met Novotny.) Hod had met Keeler one night when Profumo picked her up at Ward's flat. According to Hod, Mandy Rice- Davies learned of the mask incident from Ward when he returned to their flat that night. Maria says: "I lied to Lord Denning, but not about a politician. My lies were to protect someone from ruin and a criminal charge. A Member of Parliament was present, William Rees-Davies, MP for Thanet, but he was not in the disguise." On December 14th 1962 Christine Keeler ran into an old friend - Michael Eddowes - and, according to him, the whole story of her involvement with Profumo and Ivanov came out. This included Ivanov's request that Keeler ask Profumo when the allies were going to let West Germany have nuclear warheads. Eddowes says he made out a 6- page report which eventually reached the Security Services. Nothing came of it because MI5 believed that Profumo had told the Prime Minister of this twin relationship, while Profumo assumed MI5 had told him. It wasn't until Eddowes wrote to Macmillan on June 13th that the affair was finally exposed. On Friday June 14th he released the full text of the letter to the Evening Standard and the media scramble began. Ward had been trying to get Novotny to meet Ivanov up until his departure. He left shortly after the Edgecombe shooting incident at Wimpole Mews. But what happened to Ivanov I haven't discovered. Officially he was recalled to Moscow, although Mandy Rice-Davies (who is not reliable) recounts a different tale. In 1977 two men interviewed her about the Profumo Affair in Israel, where she lived for a time. At first they claimed to be journalists from Time magazine; then private investigators. Eventually one of them said " I was with the CIA for 25 years. I spent a lot of time in London - I was involved in the George Raft affair at the Colony Club." When she mentioned Ivanov he said "We took him...we... the CIA. We couldn't let him go. We didn't know what he had and what he didn't have and we didn't want to take any chances. Let's say he was an involuntary defector." (23) It would be around this time that Eddowes started to put together the Novotny connection, eventually going to New York at the invitation of the Journal - American, to follow up leads. The one piece of information which he said he was after, could be details of the background of Harry Towers, which were given to him by 'contacts'. Eddowes did attempt to write a book with Maria Novotny on this whole affair and in the late sixties they were three quarters of the way through it when strange things started to happen. Eddowes rang Hod one day from his house telling him that two men had broken into his flat, beating him badly, leaving him bleeding on his bed. They warned him to stay away from the subject. The day before Maria had narrowly escaped a serious accident in her car when the steering failed. Bolts in the steering column had been cut. Eddowes, by this time an old man, was scared and burned the manuscript, and would pursue the matter no further. This would explain the brevity of the Novotny sections in his books on the Kennedy assassination. Maria doesn't appear to have changed her lifestyle very much in the later sixties. She did try to become a novelist, writing many books. But only one, a Harold Robbins type version of her own life, got published. She also had a regular column in the magazine Club International for a time, exploiting incidents from her own life. It was whilst researching a book, apparently on brothels, around 1970, that she came into contact with British Intelligence. At a brothel she found that it was a set-up, with two-way mirrors and hidden microphones, used by the Security Services to compromise clients. She was invited to help them with similar work and seems to have been employed as a high-class companion/whore to people of interest to the services. Particular cases involved compromising the head of a Caribbean island which the Foreign Office hoped to stop going independent. It did little good: it went independent the following year. Cameras had been hidden in a bedroom at Brown's Hotel when he came across for a diplomatic meeting. In 1978 (24) she was involved in the break-up of a massive fraud. She had been put onto the activities of Taylor and Ash by Billy Hill, the former London underworld boss, who thought there was the making of another Kray-type gang, whose brutality went against the old-time ideals. She was asked to become involved with Taylor, and was friendly with him for two years. In court Taylor claimed: "I have been set up by Henrietta Chapman, also known as Maria Novotny, who is working for British intelligence." The judge told him to sit down and stop being silly. Novotny was outside, waiting to give evidence against him, but following this outburst was advised not to, since she might be used again. A few days later on his way home from court, Taylor collapsed at Waterloo Station. He died later in hospital. Officially a heart attack, it has been suggested by some that he was killed with a poisoned umbrella. Following this case she was asked by the Chief Constable of Kent to help with enquiries into corruption in Scotland Yard. She became very friendly with top detectives and reported direct to the Chief Constable. It is known that she made visits to Southern Ireland and Ulster, apparently involved in intelligence operations. She also arranged parties in Europe for Common Market MPs and diplomats. Whether this or many of the other episodes were actually done on behalf of British Intelligence is not known. (25) Maria Stella Novotny died on the 20th February 1983. She had had a heavy cold during the day and ate little. Taking some food later she died choking on a milk pudding. Shortly after her death her house was burgled and all her files and large dayto- day diaries from the early sixties to the seventies were stolen. Recently Hod claims to have given her address books to the members of an undisclosed Secret Service department. Unfortunately I have been unable to track down Eddowes - if he is still alive. One can see now from where he received his basic ideas. A Czech girl with supposed Communist background, used by a group of men also with alleged Communist links (Towers and Ward), controlled by a Soviet intelligence agent (Ivanov), who claimed to have direct access to Khrushchev. All this was linked in his mind through the Cuban Missile Crisis, to the assassination of JFK. Where the evidence for that link is no one knows. Obviously, though, it falls down with the recent revelation that Ward worked for British Intelligence. But that raises a whole load of other questions..... Notes 1. News of The World (1961), Saturday Titbits (1972), The Globe (US) 1980. She has written a book - Kings Road (1977) - which deals with this period but it is a highly fictionalised account. 2. Radio Interview: Chicago WGN 1977 3. Known in the USA as The Oswald File (NY 1978). He has also personally published Khrushchev Killed Kennedy (1975). Does anyone have a copy? 4. Although it would be stretching the evidence to suggest Oswald had been replaced by a double, there are some strange aspects to his trip to the Soviet Union. His height, recorded on various official documents, varies quite considerably, and there are marked differences between photos of Oswald in the USSR and in the USA. (See The Many Faces of Lee Harvey Oswald - Jack White US 1979) 5. A large section of articles dealing with the exhumation are in The Continuing Enquiry Vol. V1 No 3 October 1981. 6. The new autopsy appeared to answer all the doubts that it was Oswald in the grave. But, incredibly, this has now come into question. The skull shows no signs of the original 1963 autopsy. Switched heads? It's all getting too crazy! 7. MI5 1945-72: A Matter of Trust Chapter 6. West's books are badly written. New material comes in small doses - basically to tease whilst the real 'game' is a continuing battle of sources, occasionally played over the dead body of Roger Hollis. It's a battle of the right wings. Chapman Pincher (Their Trade is Treachery NEL 1982), against aspiring Tory, Rupert Allason. ('West'). There are political and ideological motives to 'West's' books contrary to what some journalists believe. Notice how his books are so well received by the media whilst better and more important books - Verrier/Bloch and Fitzgerald/Faligot - suffer something like an unofficial D Notice. Is there any truth to the rumour that the recently arrested 'mole' in MI5 is one of 'West's' sources? 8. This account is taken from interviews with her husband and access to her own hand-written journal, letters etc. 9. There was nothing unusual in this relationship for Hod. In the late 1940s he had taken the 16 year old Patsy Morgan, daughter of a Coventry grocer, and given her the Pygmalion treatment. Rather the same approach as Stephen Ward. (See The Evil Firm: The Rise and Fall of the Brothers Kray - Brian McConnell, London 1969, p34) 10.Hod had helped to run Esmeralda's Barn, a night-club in Knightsbridge. Originally he designed it for society girl Esmeralda. In another bizarre incident on the night of its opening, she was found dead, accidentally gassed, on her bed with her lesbian lover. Patsy Morgan-Dibden was the main attraction of the club, so when she ran away from Hod to Europe, he gave it up. Protection for the club was provided by Billy Hill who ran the London underworld with his rival, Jack Spot. Hod returned to the business in the late 1950s with the Black Sheep Club. Esmeralda's Barn was eventually owned by the Kray twins who purchased it on the advice of Peter Rachman. (The Profession of Violence, John Pearson, London 1973). A good introduction to this whole Ward/Rachman/Criminal underworld nexus is Rachman, Shirley Green, London 1981. The media created 'Rachmanism' - a device designed to ease attention away from the real crooks, and a godsend to Labour's election hopes at the time. 11.Towers decided to return to the States in 1980 to face charges of bail jumping and contempt of court. As part of the deal, an address book which reportedly contains the names of every politician for whom he allegedly procured call girls will forever remain sealed away. Mary De Bourgon, Assistant D.A.: "It will never be opened in a court of law." (The Globe (US) December 9th 1980). Novotny was friendly with other politicians and lawyers. "Their names didn't mean all that much then but now many of them are big shots, in very high places." Obviously association with one of Towers' girls would have people worried, especially so when she adds: "I kept a diary of all my appointments in the UN building ...I understand the diary is now in the hands of the CIA." 12.Lord Denning's Report (HMSO 1963). Novotny was interviewed by Denning but she says the report was already written. He refused to accept her allegations, seemingly turned off by the details of the sexual games. 13.Kennedy's other 'relationships' certainly weren't ordinary and could explain why Novotny's could be important. In 1964, a year after the assassination, Mary Meyer [Pinchot], an intimate friend of JFK'S was mysteriously shot to death. Shortly after, her personal diaries were taken from her home by James Angleton (at the time head of CIA's Counter Intelligence Branch), a friend of the Meyer family. Angleton destroyed the diary, and though involved in the CIA's investigation of the assassination, has refused to comment: on the Meyer episode. (See Washington Post February 23rd 1976. Coincidence or Conspiracy Bernard Fensterwald (US 1977) Judith Exner had been introduced to JFK by friend Frank Sinatra, and had an affair with him through 1961 and '62. She also knew Sam Giancana and John Roselli intimately, both of whom were involved in the CIA/Mafia plots against Castro. (And both of whom were murdered just before going to testify before the House Select Committee on Assassinations.) It has been suggested that Giancana used his close friend Sinatra to place a girl near the President, perhaps to blackmail him. In another strange twist, Robert Maheu, Howard Hughes' man, who had also been involved in the CIA/Mafia plots, had been involved in a highly questionable CIA operation. "Taxpayers monies were spent to provide Heads of State with female companions and to pay people with questionable reputations to make pornographic movies for blackmail (against Heads of State)." See final Report of the House Select Committee on Intelligence: Village Voice Feb l6th 1976 page 72. On Exner see My Story Judith Exner (NY 1977). And, of course, there was Marilyn Monroe, who Novotny claimed to have met a few times when MM was having an affair with both Kennedy brothers. It has been claimed that she died in mysterious circumstances and had knowledge of Mafia and Teamster affairs, contained (again) in diaries. See: Who Killed Marilyn, and Did The Kennedy's Know, Tony Sciacca (NY 1976): Marilyn Monroe S. Periglio (Seville, 1982): and, for this whole Maheu/Mafia/ CIA/Kennedy's/Monroe mess, best of all is Jim Hougan's Spooks (London 1979). 14.Through The Looking Glass Anthony Verrier (London 1983) Chapter 6. 15.West, ibid page 17: also How MI5 Sacrificed Stephen Ward (Sunday Times 28/11/82) 16.Scandal '63: A Study of The Profumo Affair Clive Irving et al (London 1963) p 13 17.Secrets That Won't Be Told, Duncan Campbell (New Statesman 20th February 1981) 18.Verrier ibid. 19.Ward told Hod that he picked up girls in coffee bars, doing quick sketches of them to introduce himself. Ward said this was how he met Keeler in a cafe in Staines, Middlesex, and that he (Ward) was instrumental in obtaining a job for her at Murray's Club, contrary to published stories. 20.West ibid p145 21.See The Ministry of Truth, in Leveller No 64 (1981) and British Intelligence and Covert Action Bloch/Fitzgerald (London 1983) p 91. 22.Among those attending the Novotny parties were Walter Flack, Charles Clore's partner; Bill Astor; Sir William Emirs Williams, the Secretary General of the Arts Council; Sheila Scott; Nicholas Egon; Lord Asquith; Bobby Moore; Eustace Chesser; Douglas Fairbanks Jnr; Felix Topolski; Simon Harcourt- Smith; Lord Belper and many others. 23.Mandy Mandy Rice-Davies with Sheila Flack (London, 1980) p123. She reveals that she knew next to nothing - though perhaps others thought she did. She claims that she was refused a visa to the USA, and when in 1974 she tried to see her (she claims CIA) files they had disappeared (pl21). She claims she was interviewed by MI6 at Century House - unusually, since it is usually left to Special Branch to sort out security cases. 24.Times 1978: April 4/5/25; May 6/12/26; June 10/14/17/23 25.Times May 6th 1978 Edited July 27, 2015 by Steven Gaal Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Josephs Posted July 27, 2015 Share Posted July 27, 2015 Fair enough Tracy... again, appreciate the manner in which you go about this... One man's freedom fighter is another's terrorist... all depends on the POV. Funny thing is I started this project on H&L and ultimately got with John to disprove the theory... I even entertained Greg's arguments and felt he had made some good points - until I kept reading and looking at the source docs... and found that like me, he only had a cursory understanding of the evidence yet did not go any further.. I went alot further. I don't have to agree (and don't) with every detail and every day in the timeline... some speculation was necessary since the sources were either gone or never there to begin with... Speculation is also needed when we become aware that the evidence is not as it originally was - or there is no chain of evidence established AND the FBI or SS has their hands on it every step of the way. I hope you don't equate JVB with John's attempt at bringin evidence he either found or tracked down to light in the context he does. Much like Lifton not necessarily being correct about every detail and occurance does not change the core idea he presents... Bethesda injuries are not the same as Parkland injuries. There were most definitely a variety of Oswalds leaving evidence around There are most definitely conflicts in the 1952 thru 1963 records of this man... I subscribe to the H&L explanation... others do not and I can respect them for not if they so choose and do so without being offensive about it. Others attack the messenger and have no care at all what the subject is - I've moved on to the Rifle and am finding the same level of evidence manipulation as I did in Mexico... Jim and Steve can carry the H&L torch and present counterpoint... My next focus is 0184 and how the Zfilm Evidence IS the Conspiracy.... but I need to finish the Rifle and Pistol work first... Take care Tracy... as you find more to contest H&L I'd be happy to see where it goes DJ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Greg Parker Posted July 27, 2015 Share Posted July 27, 2015 (edited) "I even entertained Greg's arguments and felt he had made some good points - until I kept reading and looking at the source docs..." Like the Beauregard School records where you had no clue about how to read them... till finally after weeks of going around and around, you finally "got it" and vowed to take it to Armstrong. It's no surprise that you emerged from that discussion with your head firmly back in the sand on the issue. Armstrong, as with all cult leaders, can be very persuasive - as shown by his witness list who obediently parrot what he wants. Strange though, that you have never raised the issue of the Beauregard records again - which tells me you actually do agree with me, but are not game to say so. "I went alot further." then the evidence allows. Edited July 27, 2015 by Greg Parker Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
W. Tracy Parnell Posted July 27, 2015 Share Posted July 27, 2015 Steve, One major error in that article: 6. The new autopsy appeared to answer all the doubts that it was Oswald in thegrave. But, incredibly, this has now come into question. The skull shows nosigns of the original 1963 autopsy. Switched heads? It's all getting too crazy! This probably comes from Jack White/Groody, but it is easy to see the craniotomy incision just to the left of the ID tag. Unless you are postulating something bogus with the 1981 examination: http://wtracyparnell.com/jack-white-and-the-lho-exhumation-photos/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Josephs Posted July 27, 2015 Share Posted July 27, 2015 (edited) "I even entertained Greg's arguments and felt he had made some good points - until I kept reading and looking at the source docs..." Like the Beauregard School records where you had no clue about how to read them... till finally after weeks of going around and around, you finally "got it" and vowed to take it to Armstrong. It's no surprise that you emerged from that discussion with your head firmly back in the sand on the issue. Armstrong, as with all cult leaders, can be very persuasive - as shown by his witness list who obediently parrot what he wants. Strange though, that you have never raised the issue of the Beauregard records again - which tells me you actually do agree with me, but are not game to say so. "I went alot further." then the evidence allows. Ultimately you were wrong about those records Greg, as you are wrong about most all things you've ever posted related to H&L... Believe what you wish and insult whoever you want... you're a legend in your own mind. Edited July 27, 2015 by David Josephs Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Greg Parker Posted July 27, 2015 Share Posted July 27, 2015 "I even entertained Greg's arguments and felt he had made some good points - until I kept reading and looking at the source docs..." Like the Beauregard School records where you had no clue about how to read them... till finally after weeks of going around and around, you finally "got it" and vowed to take it to Armstrong. It's no surprise that you emerged from that discussion with your head firmly back in the sand on the issue. Armstrong, as with all cult leaders, can be very persuasive - as shown by his witness list who obediently parrot what he wants. Strange though, that you have never raised the issue of the Beauregard records again - which tells me you actually do agree with me, but are not game to say so. "I went alot further." then the evidence allows. Ultimately you were wrong about those records Greg, as you are wrong about most all things you've ever posted related to H&L... Believe what you wish and insult whoever you want... you're a legend in your own mind. Nope. A sneak preview from volume 2: Creating Mayhem with Historical Records Proponents of the “Two Oswalds” theory (Harvey & Lee: how the CIA framed Oswald by John Armstrong, Quasar Books, 2003) have completely misunderstood the Beauregard school records of Oswald. In fairness, they have been aided and abetted in this misunderstanding by the contradictory advice given to the FBI by the Assistant Principal of Warren Easton High, Wilfred Head, whose help they had sought in interpreting the records. In regard to attendance, Head stated that the abbreviation “Re Ad” usually represented “Re Admitted” and that the numbers listed opposite represented the total number of school days for a given school year. The advice given above by Head is not entirely correct, but then he compounds the error by stating contradictorily that 180 days was the usual number of days in a school year and in any event, state law mandated that the total number of school days must not fall below 170. Given that the figure shown as “Re Ad” for 1954-55 was 168, Head surmised that the figure must represent the total number of days Oswald actually attended. It is a little surprising that neither an educator, nor the author of Harvey & Lee (let alone any of his many acolytes and proselytizers) could not do the simple math involved. The number 168 does indeed fall below the mandated 170 days. That tells us it cannot be the total number of days in the school year. What we need to do is add the number of days listed as “absent”. In the case of the 1954-55 school year, we see 168 + 12 = 180 days – the exact number of days Head claimed to be the “regular”! If we do the same for the previous school year, we get 184 – more than the “regular”, but the term does imply occasional variation. The important point is that nowhere in the record does it show Oswald’s total number of attendance days. To work that out, we need to also know the dates Oswald commenced and finished at the school, along with the start and end dates of the school years involved. The Two Oswald theorists in short, need the “Re Ad” figures to indicate total number of days attended because this would mean overlap with New York school records and since Oswald cannot be in two places at once, it must denote a second boy using the same name. At its core, this theory deploys the same unscrupulous manipulation of the evidence to achieve a desired outcome as demonstrated by the Warren Commission. The actual text in the manuscript does include copies of documents as well as citations. You'll love volume 2, David. I promise. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Josephs Posted July 28, 2015 Share Posted July 28, 2015 You'll love volume 2, David. I promise. I'll love ripping it a new one Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Greg Parker Posted July 28, 2015 Share Posted July 28, 2015 You'll love volume 2, David. I promise. I'll love ripping it a new one Great rebuttal. Tells me you got nada. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Graves Posted July 28, 2015 Share Posted July 28, 2015 (edited) g You'll love volume 2, David. I promise. I'll love ripping it a new one Great rebuttal. Tells me you got nada. Yours is a truly great rebuttal, Greg. I'm sure he enjoys your ripping his "a new one." --Tommy Edited July 29, 2015 by Thomas Graves Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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