Clever Girl

by Lauren Kessler

  CHAPTER 11: CLOSING IN

  “The FBI now knew who had been and was still working for the company”: FBI report, Oct. 18, 1944, Bentley file No. 61-6328-19.

  “this would tip the FBI’s hand”: FBI memo, special agent in charge, New York, to director, Jan. 4, 1945, Bentley file No. 61-6328-22.

  “No one else had lived in this apartment for years”: Bentley, Out of Bondage, p. 271.

  “she should take a ‘vacation’ immediately”: Bentley’s signed FBI statement, p. 85.

  “two Amerasia editors were found guilty of theft of government property”: On the Amerasia case, see Klehr and Haynes, American Communist Movement, p. 107; Haynes and Klehr, Venona, pp. 176–77.

  “she would be ‘blown to hell’”: FBI memo, H. B. Fletcher to D. M. Ladd, July 27, 1948. Bentley file No. 65-56402-3494.

  “‘The effect of Mr. Golos was wearing off’”: Bentley’s testimony before a Senate subcommittee, Export Policy and Loyalty, July 30, 1948, p. 44.

  “They were no better than gangsters”: That’s what Bentley told a Senate subcommittee, Export Policy and Loyalty, July 30, 1948, pp. 21, 44; Bentley, Out of Bondage, p. 258.

  “‘…as bad as the Nazis were, the Red Army was worse’”: Bentley, Out of Bondage, p. 276.

  “He hoped the money might help her”: Bentley’s signed FBI statement, pp. 71, 87.

  “She hardly recognized herself in the mirror”: On Bentley’s mental and physical condition, see Out of Bondage, pp. 272, 282.

  “what he recognized as severe hangovers”: May, Un-American Activities, p. 138.

  “big-shot government spy”: Silvermaster file No. 65-56402-3414.

  “not to arouse Heller’s suspicion”: On Bentley’s relationship with Heller, see Special Agent Danahy interview in Peake’s afterword to Out of Bondage (1988), p. 276; Bentley’s signed FBI statement, p. 85; May, Un-American Activities, p. 84; Roeker, “Communist Agent,” pp. 42–43.

  “taken part in investigations of communists and knew the Russian language”: Weinstein and Vassiliev, Haunted Wood, pp. 100–01.

  “Heller would be an ideal husband”: From material in KGB archives summarized in Weinstein and Vassiliev, Haunted Wood, p. 100.

  “little more than a sloppy drunk”: This according to a civil intelligence report on Heller found in the papers of William Remington’s lawyers. See May, Un-American Activities, p. 84.

  “She must go to the FBI”: Bentley tells this tale in Out of Bondage, pp. 284–85.

  “Elizabeth Bentley might have had a revelation”: Whittaker Chambers writes convincingly about an “ah-ha” moment that turned a lifelong communist into an anticommunist in Witness, pp. 13–14.

  “who degraded the principles for which Golos had died”: Robert Lamphere, an FBI agent who took over the Bentley case in the early 1950s, considered revenge a primary motive. Interview with author, June 23, 2000.

  CHAPTER 12: IN FROM THE COLD

  “She took the elevator to the third floor”: Bentley recounts this in Out of Bondage, pp. 286–88.

  “But Bentley had to trust someone”: Bentley later told FBI agents that she had come to New Haven to check them out, according to former agent Don Shannon. Author’s interview, July 7, 2000.

  “‘told the highlights’ of her story”: Bentley, Out of Bondage, p. 289.

  “Or was he impersonating an agent?”: FBI letter, New Haven field office to New York field office, Aug. 29, 1945, Bentley file No. 65-56402; FBI memo, D. M. Ladd to Director Hoover, Aug. 24, 1948, Hiss papers.

  “affair with an unstable woman”: The FBI considered Heller a windbag and something of a nut case. FBI memo, Boardman to director, Jan. 25, 1955, Silvermaster file No. 65-56402-4189.

  “neither Bentley nor Coady was satisfied with the catch”: Details of this first interview are recapped in FBI memo, New Haven field office to director, July 30, 1955, Bentley file No. 134-4353-177.

  “North American spy network centered on atomic espionage”: On Gouzenko, see Chambers, Witness, p. 205; Weinstein and Vassiliev, Haunted Wood, p. 104.

  “Aldrich was outwardly courteous and noncommittal”: So Bentley remembered when she was interviewed on Meet the Press in 1953.

  “sitting across the desk from a certified nut case”: A recap of this meeting is found in FBI memo, Los Angeles to director, July 28, 1955, Bentley file No. 134-435-174. It is also mentioned in FBI memo, William O. Simon to New York, July 28, 1955, Bentley file No. 134-182-103.

  “She agreed to come in the next day”: Memos summarizing Buckley’s initial involvement include: Buckley to director, Nov. 13, 1946, Bentley file No. 65-14603-40; New York to director, July 28, 1955, Bentley files No. 134-182-102 and No. 134-182-103.

  “maybe they would see the light, as she had seen the light”: Bentley, Out of Bondage, p. 281. 128 “Her own immunity from prosecution was not discussed”: Several agents interviewed by Peake say immunity was never discussed during the interviews but rather was taken for granted. See Peake’s afterword to Out of Bondage (1988), p. 220.

  “a comment the agents noted with particular pride”: This account of the Nov. 7 interview is based in part on author’s interview with Don Jardine, May 25, 2000. Details of what Bentley talked about are found in FBI memo, special agent in charge, New York, to Washington field office and director, Nov. 8, 1945, Bentley file No. 65-56402-1 as well as, of course, her signed FBI statement.

  “they sent it by teletype to their boss”: FBI teletype, special agent in charge, New York, to Washington field office and director, Nov. 8, 1945, Bentley file No. 65-56402-1.

  “hand-delivered by an agent who flew down from New York”: May, Un-American Activities, p. 85.

  “she was interviewed six days in a row”: FBI report by Thomas G. Spencer, Dec. 5, 1945, Bentley file No. 65-56402-220.

  “sometimes the agents met her elsewhere for her convenience”: FBI memo, special agent in charge, New York, to director, Jan. 4, 1951, Bentley file No. 134-435.

  “her contact ‘Al’ was really Anatoly Gorsky”: FBI memo, from D. Milton Ladd, Nov. 21, 1945, Bentley file No. 65-56402-52.

  “Bentley’s stock went up”: The agents had a “great deal of respect for her” and considered the case “one of the great breakthroughs of the time,” according to former FBI agent Robert Lamphere, who took over the file in 1952. Author’s interview with Lamphere, June 23, 2000.

  “They found nothing out of the ordinary”: FBI memo, D. M. Ladd to E. A. Tamm, Nov. 19, 1945, Bentley file No. 65-56402-37.

  “that she had indeed done it”: Later, the decrypted Venona cables would confirm her involvement in espionage activities. Bentley is mentioned, by code name, in numerous cables, including Venona 2011 (Dec. 11, 1943), 2013 (Dec. 11, 1943), 278 (Feb. 23, 1944), 588 (April 29, 1944), 687 (May 13, 1944), 973 (July 11, 1944), 1065 (July 28, 1944), 1353 (Sept. 23, 1944), 1464 (Oct. 14, 1944), 1673 (Nov. 30, 1944), 1802 (Dec. 21, 1944), 954 (Sept. 20, 1944), 275 (March 25, 1945).

  “to be used against her comrades sometime later”: Whittaker Chambers, a courier in Washington, D.C., in the 1930s, hid incriminating evidence in a hollowed-out pumpkin stashed on the family farm. Years later, the “pumpkin papers” were used to corroborate his story. See Chambers’s heartfelt, if overly long, memoir Witness.

  “in a safe deposit box at a Manhattan bank”: Bentley, Out of Bondage, p. 294; FBI memo, special agent in charge, New York, to director, Jan. 4, 1951; Bentley file No. 134-435.

  “the only money we’ve ever gotten back, or ever will get back, from the Lend-Lease program”: Author’s interview with Don Shannon, July 7, 2000.

  “Bentley said she met with top Russian functionaries, and she did”: Details of the meeting and FBI involvement are found in: FBI memo, New York field office to Washington field office and director(date illegible), Bentley file No. 65-56402-56; FBI memo, D. M. Ladd to E. A. Tamm, Nov. 21, 1945, Bentley file No. 65-56402-54; Bentley’s testimony before HUAC, Communist Espionage, Aug. 11, 1948, p. 813; Bentley, Out of Bondage, p. 297; Weinst
ein and Vassiliev, Haunted Wood, p. 103; May, Un-American Activities, p. 87.

  “These people still had access to sensitive information”: The twenty-seven named in Bentley’s signed FBI statement were: Solomon Adler, Norman Bursler, Frank Coe, Edward Fitzgerald, Harold Glasser, Bela Gold, Sonia Gold, Michael Greenberg, Joseph Gregg, Maurice Halperin, Alger Hiss, Irving Kaplan, Duncan Lee, Harry Magdoff, Robert Talbott Miller III, Victor Perlo, Bernard Redmont, William Remington, John H. Reynolds, Peter Rhodes, Allan Rosenberg, Nathan Gregory Silvermaster, William Henry Taylor, Helen Tenney, William Ludwig Ullmann, Donald Wheeler, Harry Dexter White.

  CHAPTER 13: HOOVER’S TURN

  “having the preliminary data immediately”: FBI memo, Hoover to Gen. Vaughn, Nov. 9, 1945, Bentley file No. 65-14603-15; FBI memo, D. M. Ladd to director, Aug. 24, 1948, Hiss papers. See also Cook, FBI, p. 284, and Lamphere, FBI-KGB, p. 36.

  “asking for a detailed report on the Bentley situation”: FBI letter, Hoover to Ass’t Directors Tolson, Tamm, and Ladd, Nov. 15, 1945, No. 65-56402-403X8 in Hiss papers.

  “Copies went not only to the secretary of state and General Vaughn”: FBI memo, D. M. Ladd to director, Aug. 24, 1948, Hiss papers.

  “the Bentley case was the Bureau’s single most important priority”: FBI memo, Hendon to Tolson, Nov. 11, 1945, Bentley file No. 65-56402-38.

  “one of the longest, most expensive investigations in its history”: May, Un-American Activities, p. 77.

  “Bureau’s elite Major Case Squad”: It was a move that “disgusted” some of those within the FBI. See Lamphere, FBI-KGB, p. 36.

  “with special attention to the twenty-seven still employed by the federal government”: “Special Assistant Donegan,” The American Mercury, v. 77, no. 31 (August 1953); May, Un-American Activities, p. 87.

  “That same day, agents were assigned to tail Silvermaster”: Romerstein and Breindel, Venona Secrets, p. 156.

  “William Remington’s phone was tapped”: May, Un-American Activities, p. 87.

  “locate and follow Mary Price”: FBI memo, Tamm to Ladd, Nov. 19, 1945, Bentley file No. 65-56402-37. 137 “installed microphones next door”: National Security Electronic Surveillance File, Bentley file No. 65-56402-39; Craig, “Treasonable Doubt,” p. 130.

  “agents in Washington were assigned to tail him night and day”: FBI memo, D. M. Ladd to director, Aug. 24, 1948, Hiss papers.

  “Donegan put thirteen additional people under surveillance”: FBI memo, D. M. Ladd to E. A. Tamm, Nov. 21, 1945, Bentley file No. 65-56402-54.

  “to join the twenty-five agents already there on the job”: FBI memo, Hendon to Tolsen, Nov. 19, 1945, Bentley file No. 65-56402-38.

  “more than two hundred agents would work the case”: Craig, “Treasonable Doubt,” p. 112.

  “it had rained in New York on Sunday, March 5”: Haynes and Klehr, Venona, p. 409, fn. 2.

  “a man known to Bentley only as ‘Charlie’”: FBI report, Oct. 3, 1950, Bentley file No. 65-14778.

  “the breakthrough that would halt Soviet espionage in the United States”: Author’s interview with Herman Bly, July 15, 2000.

  “a photo lab in the basement, just as Bentley had said”: Lamphere, FBI-KGB, p. 40.

  “maintain contact with Communist Party leader Earl Browder”: Bentley, Out of Bondage, p. 296.

  “schedule another meeting with Gorsky”: Haynes and Klehr, Venona, p. 157.

  “It would be their last meeting”: Details of the meeting in FBI teletype report, Nov. 30, 1945, Bentley file No. 65-56402-56 and Bentley’s signed FBI statement, p. 88. For Gorsky’s suspicions, see Weinstein and Vassiliev, Haunted Wood, p. 103.

  “ripe for turning”: Haynes and Klehr, Venona, p. 112; Bentley, Out of Bondage, pp. 304–05.

  “a dandy system for everyone but the FBI”: Weinstein and Vassiliev, Haunted Wood, pp. 104–05, 108; Haynes and Klehr, Venona, p. 51.

  “Silvermaster was told the news by Akhmerov”: Weinstein and Vassiliev, Haunted Wood, p. 170.

  “Akhmerov assured his Moscow superiors”: Weinstein and Vassiliev, Haunted Wood, p. 170.

  “a ‘hysterical, highly emotional nuisance’”: FBI memo, director to special agent in charge, Charlotte field office, June 3, 1947, no number, Bentley file.

  “He gave her only press releases and published articles”: May, Un-American Activities, pp. 90–91.

  “with an intent to do injury to the United States”: According to Chapter 4, paragraph 32, U.S. Code, 1946 edition, v. 4, Title 50(U.S. Government Printing Office, 1948), pp. 5595–96.

  “order a freeze of virtually all intelligence activities”: Weinstein and Vassiliev, Haunted Wood, p. 218.

  “Bentley was the cause of the new orders”: Weinstein and Vassiliev, Haunted Wood, p. 106.

  “Bentley’s defection meant they would have to ‘stop our work totally’”: Weinstein and Vassiliev, Haunted Wood, p. 170.

  “Vassily Zarubin, Akhmerov’s colleague in New York, also had to leave”: Romerstein and Breindel, Venona Secrets, pp. 9, 189.

  “ordered home at the same time”: Weinstein and Vassiliev, Haunted Wood, p. 286.

  “‘the most tangible blow to our work’”: Sergei Sarchenko in a mid-March 1950 memo quoted in Weinstein and Vassiliev, Haunted Wood, pp. 297–98.

  “discharged from the Naval Reserves”: May, Un-American Activities, pp. 87–88.

  “twenty-four of the twenty-seven, most of whom were career civil servants”: Haynes and Klehr, Venona, p. 128.

  “more than twenty-five thousand people were referred to loyalty boards for investigation”: Fariello, Red Scare, p. 17; Haynes and Klehr, Venona, pp. 13–14.

  “was, like Bentley, an informer”: Packer, Ex-Communist Witnesses, pp. 104–05; Weinstein and Vassiliev, Haunted Wood, pp. 35–48.

  “had covert relationships with Soviet intelligence agencies”: The best sources on Venona are the FBI’s Venona file, available at the FBI’s FOIA reading room; the complete cables themselves with introductions, commentaries, and explanations online at www.nsa.gov; and Haynes and Klehr’s excellent book, Venona.

  “Bentley herself was the subject of more than a dozen Venona cables”: These are listed in Notes for Chapter 12 and are available in their original form online at www.nsa.gov.

  “Venona wiped them away”: Much later, additional confirmation of Bentley’s story would come from secret documents and memos in the KGB archives that were briefly opened to western researchers in the 1990s. See Klehr and Haynes, Secret World, pp. 295, 312–17.

  “there was no proof of any other kind of relationship”: May, Un-American Activities, p. 89.

  “‘…an acquittal under very embarrassing circumstances’”: Letter, E. P. Morgan to H. H. Clegg, Jan. 14, 1947, quoted in Haynes and Klehr, Venona, p. 161.

  CHAPTER 14: RED SPY QUEEN

  “But once again, Moscow demurred”: This exchange was found in documents in the KGB archives, summarized in Weinstein and Vassiliev, Haunted Wood, p. 108.

  “she was earning $800 a month”: Bentley’s testimony, Export Policy and Loyalty, July 30, 1948, p. 10. This salary put her in the top 3.5 percent of American wage earners, according to Current Population Reports: Consumer Income (series P-60), issue No. 1 (Jan. 28,1948), Washington, DC: U.S. Bureau of the Census, Table 11, p. 17.

  “she received a $2,000 bonus”: FBI report “Re: Confidential Informant Gregory,” Bentley file No. 65-14603.

  “Hoover was once again pushing for action”: FBI report, New York field office to director, Oct. 3, 1948, Bentley file No. 61-6328-81.

  “the corporation stopped doing business at the end of February 1947”: FBI report “Re: Confidential Informant Gregory,” pp. 6–7, Bentley file No. 65-14603; also Peake’s afterword in Out of Bondage (1988), p. 303, fn. 279.

  “she found a similar position at Pacific Molasses, Ltd., in New York City”: See Peake’s afterword, Out of Bondage, p. 303, fn. 280, for relevant FBI documents.

  “just what she said had been promised, her $9,600 yearly sa
lary”: FBI memo “Re: Gregory, Espionage-R,” Nov. 1, 1950, p. 6.

  “But Bentley had never been a good money manager”: As former Special Agent Jack Dahany commented in an interview with Peake, whatever her skills, managing money was not one of them. See Peake’s afterword in Out of Bondage (1988), p. 303, fn. 285.

  “she treated herself to a two-week vacation in Bermuda”: Peake’s afterword in Out of Bondage (1988), p. 268.

  “for possible prosecution”: FBI memo, D. M. Ladd to director, Aug. 24, 1948, Hiss papers.

  “Did she have any drawbacks…alcohol, narcotics, a criminal record, mental instability?”: FBI memo, Theron Caudle to director, Dec. 13, 1946, Hiss papers.

  “see how Bentley comported herself”: My understanding of the grand jury system comes from University of Oregon law professor Margaret Paris.

  “Donegan seemed the natural choice”: Nelson Frank, “Special Assistant Donegan,” American Mercury, August 1953 (v. 77), pp. 30–33.

  “a man named T. Vincent Quinn, was also involved”: FBI letter, D. M. Ladd to director, Aug. 24, 1948, Hiss papers.

  “retold most of the story she had told to the FBI”: Because grand jury testimony is secret and closed to the public unless an indictment results, much of the information about what happened during those thirteen months comes from other sources, such as later testimony before congressional committees or an occasional news magazine story based on leaked information. See, especially, Newsweek, Aug. 2, 1948, pp. 23–24, and The Nation, Jan. 30, 1954. Also Bentley’s account in Out of Bondage, p. 308.

  Lauchlin Currie repeated his grand jury testimony in his appearance before HUAC, Communist Espionage, Aug. 13, 1948, p. 853. For Remington’s grand jury testimony, see May, Un-American Activities, p. 93. Coe repeated his grand jury testimony before HUAC, Communist Espionage, Aug. 13, p. 919. For William Taylor’s testimony, see The Nation, Jan. 5, 1957, p. 5. For the testimony of Duncan Lee, Sonya and Bela Gold, Bernard Redmont see Packer, Ex-Communist Witnesses, p. 114, and Belfrage, American Inquisition, p. 185n.

  “Brothman and his secretary, Miriam Moscowitz”: Lamphere, FBI KGB, pp. 142–43, 169–70; 172; New York Times, July 30, 1951, p. 1.