Official and Confidential

by Anthony Summers

  3. The content of this book was discussed with two eminent professors of psychiatry and psychology, a child psychologist and an Army psychologist who has worked with dysfunctional families. They are Dr Harold Lief, Professor Emeritus at the University of Pennsylvania and past President of the American Academy of Psychoanalysts, Dr John Money, Professor of Medical Psychology at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Dr Norris Haynes, Research Director at Yale University’s Child Study Center, and Gaye Humphreys, a family therapist then working with the Army in Ireland.

  SOURCE NOTES

  Everything reported in this book was documented by the author, and all sources – of both human and print origin – appeared in the 1993 hardback edition. While the main text remains unabridged in this edition, the Source Notes are summarized – in the interest of brevity and to ensure that the book is affordable to a wider public. Readers who wish to obtain the full Source Notes should consult the hardback edition or write to the author, who will be glad to provide them. Please address requests to: Anthony Summers, c/o Open Road Integrated Media, 180 Varick Street, Suite 816, New York, New York, 10014.

  J. Edgar Hoover left no diaries or intimate letters – with the single exception of his bizarre correspondence with Melvin Purvis, quoted in this book. His personal files, which probably contained private letters as well as highly sensitive office documents, were mostly destroyed on his orders following his death. A mass of personal material, photographs, childhood journals – even Hoover’s christening robe and baby bootees – survived as an exhibit at the Masons’ Supreme Council headquarters in Washington D.C. For real information, however, the researcher must forage among the millions of documents that passed across the Director’s desk during his tenure. The notes he scrawled on them in his rounded script, known as Blue Gems because they are written in blue ink, reveal a good deal about the man.

  Hoover’s obsession with all that concerned himself, coupled with the inexorable efficiency of his bureaucratic machine, created another historical treasure. Every single clipping that mentioned his name, from national newspapers to the most obscure local journal, was clipped, perused personally by Hoover, then filed away. Crammed into thirty-three cardboard boxes, they found their way to the National Archives.

  These paper sources, along with tens of thousands of FBI documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act – and more than 800 interviews conducted for this book – are the pieces of the jigsaw that lead to this portrait of Hoover.

  To interpret Abbreviations used below, see pages 575–7.

  Foreword

  FBI and other comments on the J. Edgar movie are cited from the Independent on Sunday (UK), Oct. 9, 2011. The Clinton speech is drawn from NYT, Mar. 29, 1993, and an interview with the secretary of the Gridiron Club, and Styron’s speech from The Complete Guide to Writing Fiction, by Barnaby Conrad, Cincinnati, Ohio, Writers Digest books, 1990, p. 26, and interviews with William Styron, 1993. The reference to the extortion racket draws on the New York Post, Feb. 11, 1993, and interviews with Murray Weiss, John Pyne, Sherman Kaminsky, George Hammock, and James McDonnell. John Weitz revealed Angleton’s identity to writer Peter Maas, in Esquire, May 1993. Fresh Rosenstiel sources include FBI files 139–2163 and 94–41753, and Mary Perot Nichols in Philadelphia Inquirer, Mar. 28, 1993. Kessler references draw on The Bureau: The Secret History of the FBI, by Ronald Kessler, St. Martin’s Press, 2002, p. 107. Elizabeth Brown was informative on stories about Hoover in the homosexual community. Ralph Salerno and Laurence Keenan were interviewed for the Frontline program. Lord Jenkins’ anecdote is in A Life at the Centre, Random House, NY, 1993, p. 189.

  Chapter 1

  Interviews included undertakers William Reburn and John van Hoesen, Watergate figures Frank Sturgis and Felipe DeDiego; Nixon aides H. R. Haldeman and John Ehrlichman, Justice Department officials Robert Mardian, Mitchell Rogovin and Harold Tyler; psychiatrists Dr Harold Lief and Dr John Money. Events at the Nixon White House were documented on WHT, 587–003, 601–033, Haldeman’s note, 9:15 A.M., May 2, 1972, WHSF, NP. Nixon’s reaction to H’s death draws on J. Edgar Hoover: The Man and the Secrets, by Curt Gentry, 4Y, Norton, 1991, p. 28, and a 1992 int. of Gentry (supplied to the author by Ingrid Young) re. passage in unpub. Watergate tape transcript.

  Chapter 2

  Interviews included Hoover relatives Dorothy Davy, Fred Robinette, Virginia Hoover, Anna Hoover Kienast, and Marjorie Stromme, childhood acquaintances Monica Dwyer and Francis Gray, and aide and intimate friend Guy Hottel. Medical information was supplied by Dr Lawrence McDonald. Documents on Hoover’s childhood include his parents’ letters, school reports and his own notes at HC, his 1949/50 correspondence with Harold Burton, Burton Papers, LC, publications of Central High School Alumni Association, and his father’s death certificate, D.C. no. 2645955.

  Chapter 3

  Interviews included former FBI Assistant Director Cartha DeLoach, and – on church attendance – former agent Leo McClairen. Schoolmates’ recollections came from Dave Stephens’ letter to H., May 25, 1955, in HSF, and C. W. Collier’s letter in Time, Jun. 1, 1936. Hoover’s degree was described in an interview with the George Washington University Registrar. Details of H.’s early career drew on William Dufty’s research for the NYP, 1958 (which included an interview with Bruce Bielaski), the John Lord O’Brian Papers at the University of Buffalo Law School, H.’s World War I memos in DJ files, RG60, NA, the Felix Frankfurter Papers, LC, and Hoover and Clyde Tolson’s staff files. Hoover’s wartime status drew on the exemption list in CR, vol. 56, p. 8138, and an interview with Barbie Richardson of the Selective Service Commission. H.’s relations with Alice were based on an interview with a serving FBI archival source who requested anonymity, and Cartha DeLoach.

  Chapter 4

  Interviews included H.’s godson, J. Edgar Ruch, Guy Hottel, Justice Frankfurter’s former law clerk Joseph Rauh, and James Thompson of Aspin Hill pet cemetery. Without Understanding: The FBI and Political Surveillance 1908–1941, a doctoral dissertation by David Williams (see Bibliography), was especially useful, as were the papers of Sen. Thomas Walsh, LC, the several 1920 congressional probes of illegal practices at the Justice Department under Attorney General Palmer, Hse. of Reps. 66th Cong., 2nd and 3rd Sessions, the Drew Pearson Diaries, 1949-S9, ed. Tyler Abell, NY, Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1974, the Felix Frankfurter Papers, LC, and the papers of Denis Dickason in the collection of Harriet Pickering. A list of H.’s library books was supplied by the FBI Library at Quantico. His Masonic record is in HSF. Frank Baughman’s inscribed photo is in HC, and his FBI file is no. 67–691–2.

  Chapter 5

  Interviews included a second godson of H., J. Edgar Nichols, author Ralph de Toledano, Roger Baldwin of the ACLU, former FBI Assistant Directors Charles Bates and Cartha DeLoach, former agents Edward Armbruster Jr., Robert Domalewsky, Aubrey Lewis, Neil Welch, Leo McClairen, Ed Duff, Erwin Piper, Kenneth Whittaker, Wm. South, and Mervin O’Melia. Lavonne Cowley, widow of agent Sam Cowley, and reporter Fletcher Knebel on letters written to an agent’s wife. The papers of President Herbert Hoover, at HHL, were especially useful, as were the Harlan Stone Papers, gen. corr. 1889–1946, at LC, the Melvin Purvis personnel file, FBI 67–7489, the Denis Dickason letters in Harriet Pickering’s collection, and the chapter on H. in Public Entrepreneurship: Toward a Theory of Bureaucratic Political Power, by Eugene Lewis (see Bibliography), and the lecture outline for agent recruits, by Bernard Suttler, at RG65NA.

  Chapter 6

  Interviews included neighbour Anthony Calomaris, TV journalist Eames Yates, former agents Duane Eskridge, Erwin Piper, Joseph Schott and Kenneth Whittaker and author Ralph de Toledano on H.’s habits, FBI historian Susan Falb on FBI women, Guy Hottel’s relative Chandler Brossard, Florida restaurateur Jo-Ann Weiss, and former Asst. AG Robert Mardian on H. and Jews, former Washington Post editor Ben Bradlee on H.’s xenophobia, former Asst. AG Harold Tyler and John Howe on his limousines, Kennedy era officials Wm. Hundley, Edwin Guthman, John Seigent
haler, and former Attorney General Ramsey Clark on H. and Robert Kennedy, Aubrey Lewis, James Barrow, Donald Stewart, Gerard Tracey and Cartha DeLoach on black agents, hotelier Mara Forbes on red ties, Michael Fooner, Arthur Murtagh and – in 1972 – journalist Guy Richards on FBI bugging of James Farley. Victor Navasky’s book Kennedy Justice, NY, Atheneum, 1971, provided H.’s ‘Baloney’ comment on the Mafia, and Jack Levine’s report to Asst. AG Miller, Jan. 23, 1962, illuminated H.’s handling of agents. Also used were the files of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, at LC, the Joseph Bayliss letter to Cong. Carl Mapes, Mar. 26, 1929, HH, HHL, and the Cummings Papers at the University of Virginia. Herbert Hoover’s talk with incoming President Roosevelt came from Scheidt’s note to H., Jun. 2, 1950, and Nichols’ note to Tolson, Feb. 24, 1956, in Crime Records Research, RG65NA. The Ku Klux Klan allegation is at Drew Pearson’s Diaries, op.cit., p. 285, and Garvan’s recommendation to FDR appears in a letter from Garvan to FDR, Jun. 16, 1933, Personal Files FDRL.

  Chapter 7

  For my reporting of H.’s relationship with Melvin Purvis I am grateful to Purvis’ son Alston, who gave me access to the remarkable Purvis/H. Letters in the Purvis Collection at the University of Boston. Interviews included Alston Purvis and Doris Lockerman, H.’s niece Marjorie Stromme on threats made by ‘Machine Gun’ Kelly, former agent William Turner on Kathryn Kelly, and Anita Colby on H.’s claim that Tolson shot Dillinger. ‘FBI Summaries of Interesting Cases,’ preserved in the private collection of a former Assistant Director’s family, were useful on the Thirties’ Bandits, as was the Scanlon’s May 1970 on Kathryn Kelly. H.’s comments on women and crime were drawn from an undated NYT clip of 1932, Hearst’s Progress of Jun. 1939, and Secret Intelligence Agent, by Montgomery Hyde, London, Constable, 1982, p. 242. The suggestion that agents mutinied at Little Bohemia is in a memo to DeLoach, May 11, 1966, FBI 948–350. The suggestion that the real Dillinger survived was elaborated in Dillinger Dossier, by Jay Robert Nash, Highland Park, IL, December Press, 1983.

  Chapter 8

  Interviews included Katherine Miller, Betty Kelly, Jo-Ann Weiss, former Assistant Directors Cartha DeLoach, Mark Felt, and Charles Bates, former agents Ken Clawson, Neil Welch, John O’Beirne, John Doyle, Harry Whidbee, Pete Pitchess, Joseph Schott, and Leo McClairen, and hotelier Arthur Forbes, on Clyde Tolson. Harvey’s employees Pooch Miller, Charles Harvinson, George Dunson, and Aaron Shainus and H.’s reporter friend Walter Trohan described H.’s use of the restaurant. Jokes about H. and Tolson were gleaned from H.’s nephew Fred Robinette, Julia Cameron, and Jan Wenner. The Corcoran episode was described by Joseph Shimon, and additional information supplied by Thomas Corcoran, Betty Corcoran, James G. C. Corcoran II, and James Dowd. H.’s relationship with Winchell was described by Herman Klurfeld and Curly Harris, and his patronage of the Stork Club by Guy Hottel, Chandler Brossard, Anita Colby, and Luisa Stuart. The H./Tolson ‘tiff’ was reported by William Turner. Documentary sources used included: the H./Tolson correspondence in TSF & HSF; WH, Aug. 28, 1933 and FBI file 62–68973 on Ray Tucker; an H. note and Nichols to H., Jan. 21, 1938, FBI 62–320–1, and Inquisition in Eden, by Alvah Bessie, NY, Macmillan, 1965, p. 194 on H.’s use of perfume. The Joe Pasternak interview was kindly supplied by Charles Higham, and Ethel Merman’s comment appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle, May 23, 1978.

  Chapter 9

  Interviews included Curtis Lynum, quoting Raymond Suran on Tolson being jilted, Edna Daulyton, former agents Joe Wickman and Jim Barrow, and acquaintance Alvin Malnik on H.’s guilt about his mother, nephew Fred Robinette, Ginger Rogers, Effie Cain, Leo McClairen, Walter Trohan, Richard Auerbach, and Guy Hottel on Lela Rogers. Joan, Richard, and Manee Thompson, and Katherine Porter were interviewed about Frances Marion. Charles Harvinson, John Howard, Joseph Schott, Joseph Griffin, and Arthur and Mara Forbes discussed Dorothy Lamour. Walter Trohan and Beatrice Berle recalled the Sumner Welles episode, and David Wise reported a conversation with Assistant AG James Rowe. Former agent Joe Wickman spoke of H.’s standing order about allegations of homosexuality. Frank Kameny, Harry Hay, and Dan Simenovsky discussed the Mattachine Society, and Dr Marshall Ruffin’s treatment of H. was described by his wife, Monteen – with additional information supplied by Dr Hill Carter, Jack Anderson, and Dr Robert Sjogren. William Stutz recalled delivering flowers for H. The depositions of Hillory Tolson and Dorothy Skillman, TWF, were useful on Tolson’s family life. Dorothy Lamour wrote to the author, who made use of Lamour’s book, My Side of the Road, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, Prentice-Hall, 1980. Harold Ickes’ unpub. diaries, LC, were a valuable source on the Welles affair, and the information on John Monroe was gleaned from FBI documents kindly supplied by Dan Simenovsky.

  Chapter 10

  Interviews included: former agent C. W. Toulme on the arrest of Alvin Karpis, J. Edgar Nichols on his father, former agent Joseph Purvis on H. and newspapers, Jeremiah O’Leary on his relations with the FBI, and Karl Hess, Fletcher Knebel and Nancy Wechsler on interference with the press. Roland Evans, Mrs Stewart Alsop, and Mrs E. Chubb discussed Joseph Alsop, and the Jack Nelson episode was described by Nelson himself, and David Kraslow. Former Assistant Directors Charles Bates and Cartha DeLoach spoke of the FBI relationship with Jimmy Stewart. The report that Karpis was tracked by a treasury agent is in Surreptitious Entry, by Willis George, NY, Appleton-Century, 1946, p. 45. Information on Louis Nichols came from a private family collection. The Raymond Henle letter, dated Feb. 19, 1958, is in the Henle Papers at the State Historical Society of Wisconsin. References to Jeremiah O’Leary come from H. to OC file, Feb. 25, 1966, OC92, Jones to Bishop, Jun. 11, 1968, FBI 1/11–38861–45, Shanklin to HQ, Nov. 22, 1963, FBI 89–4324, Jones to Bishop, Apr. 7, 1970, FBI 1/11–399961–45, and WP, Jan. 28, 1978. Vice President Henry Wallace referred to surveillance of Drew Pearson in The Price of Vision: The Diary of Henry A. Wallace, ed. John Morton, Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 1973, p. 406. H.’s claim that Alsop was a homosexual is in a Feb. 15, 1962, memo in the Lewis Strauss Papers, HHL. The Jack Alexander description of H.’s office is in FBI file 62–11607.

  Chapter 11

  Edward Turrou, son of former star agent Leon Turrou, provided information on the 1938 Nazi trial, and Thomas DeWald kindly shared his research on Ford executive Harry Bennett. Former Assistant AG Norman Littell expanded on his diary entries, and reporter William Dufty supplied his unpublished manuscript with its interview of Federal Communications Chairman James Fly. Former FBI surveillance specialist Wesley Swearingen granted extensive interviews. Secretary of State Cordell Hull’s ‘cocksucker’ exclamation comes from Ralph de Toledano’s book J. Edgar Hoover, The Man in his Time (see Bibliography), p. 152. The Supervisory Archivist at the Roosevelt Library advised the author in an Apr. 4, 1990 letter that there is no trace of an FDR memorandum about investigating Soviet and Fascist espionage, as claimed by H. The Francis Biddle Papers, FDRL, were used in connection with AG Frank Murphy. The writings of James Lawrence Fly are in the Fly Collection at the Butler Library, Columbia University. The reference to 1944 taps of Republicans came from the NY Star, Sept. 28, 1948, and the author’s conversations with the late Guy Richards. The most scholarly work on FBI surveillance was done by Prof. Athan Theoharis, of Marquette University, and I used his article in Political Science Quarterly, vol. 107, 1, Spring 1992.

  Chapter 12

  The description of H.’s house drew on interviews with Hilton Simmons, Robert Fink, Anthony Calomaris, and Anthony Cave Brown, reporting his interview with Sir William Stephenson. Stephenson’s ‘grip’ is noted in W. M. Stevenson’s Apr. 25, 1993 letter to the author. William Corson recalled an interview of H. on having received a written Presidential instruction to cooperate with Stephenson, but FDRL Archivist Raymond Teichman reported no trace of such a document in a Jun. 16, 1992 letter to the author. The official British history of Stephenson’s operation, An Account of Secret Activities in the Western Hemisphere, is unpublished, and was shown to the author by William Stevenson. The Van Deman Pape
rs are in the Military Reference Branch, NA. The Popov episode was discussed by Jill and Marco Popov, Celia Jackson, Rodney Dennys, Col. T. A. Robertson, author William Stevenson, Chloe MacMillan, and former FBI official Arthur Thurston. For a full reading of the sources used for this controversial episode, it is especially essential to see the hardback edition. Notable, however, are the Popov Papers preserved by his family, FBI file 65–36994, ‘The British Assault on J. Edgar Hoover: The Tricycle Case,’ by Thomas Troy, Intelligence and Counterintelligence, III, No. 3, 1989, British Intelligence in the Second World War, vol. 4, by F. H. Hinsley and C. A. G. Simkins, London, HMSO, 1990, and American Historical Review, article by John Bratzel and Leslie Rout, Dec. 1982.

  Chapter 13

  Interviews on Pearl Harbor included Duane Eskridge, George Allen, Tom Flynn, and Saburu Chiwa. Col. Carlton Ketchum’s son, David, discussed his father’s claims and provided correspondence. A. M. Ross-Smith and Deborah Payne provided information on H.’s allegations against British intelligence, and J. Edgar Nichols reported H.’s Hitler assassination scheme. Former agents John Holtzman, Duane Traynor, and Norval Wills, and attorney Lloyd Cutler, discussed the Nazi saboteurs. Key among Pearl Harbor sources were And I Was There, by Edwin Layton, Roger Pineau, and John Costello, NY, William Morrow, 1985, and Pearl Harbor: Final Judgement, by Henry Clausen and Bruce Lee, NY, Crown, 1992, Dec. 7–12 correspondence at FDRL, John A. Burns Oral History Project, Univ. of Hawaii, and H. phone and office logs showing that H. was on vacation when asked to testify. Eight Spies Against America, by George Dasch, NY, Robert McBride, 1959, and the Atlanta Constitution, Jul. 4–6, 1980 contain essential information on the Nazi saboteurs.