John Armstrong's research and theory
Dreitzes
by Dave Reitzes
I discovered the work of John Armstrong in May 1998. Despite some
reservations, I quickly came to believe that Armstrong's investigation
into the biography of Lee Harvey Oswald had unearthed one of the most
stunning discoveries in the history of the ongoing JFK assassination
inquiry. With John's encouragement, I researched and wrote a detailed
adaptation of his work and was fortunate to be able to archive it on
Deanie Richards' JFK Place.
At one point, however, I got distracted.
It had taken little more than a 1992 reading of Edward Jay Epstein's
*Counterplot* (now anthologized in *The Assassination Chronicles*) to
convey to me the deficiencies of infamous New Orleans DA Jim Garrison's
investigative methodology. Now that I was on-line, several of Garrison's
defenders were apparently outraged to learn of my little regard for Big
Jim and demanded an explanation. I did my best to present one; it's called
"Who Speaks for Clay Shaw?" and is now archived at the Kennedy
Assassination Home Page (http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/shaw1.htm).
When my position earned me a multitude of personal attacks (accusations of
being everything from a liar and a CIA "disinformation specialist" to a
Nazi and/or a living mutation of Jim Garrison's own excrement -- these
being just some of the *printable* ones), I found myself researching
Garrison's career more and more intensively. (Whether this was due to
simple indignation or genuine curiosity about my accusers' pathology is a
matter open to speculation.)
When the dust started to clear several months later, my thinking about the
JFK assassination had undergone a change that can hardly be overstated.
Studying Garrison's methodology had opened my eyes to wide-ranging,
systematic errors of judgment in my own work: For practically every
witness or source I cited in support of one of my own convictions, it
seemed there was a questionable, misguided or outright fraudulent Garrison
witness that seemed uncomfortably familiar. It is no exaggeration to state
that my faith in even the most credible of my sources was severely shaken.
I remained convinced of the validity of John's Armstrong's theory,
however, until slightly later.
In March, W. Tracy Parnell posted an article critical of John's work
(http://www1.madbbs.com/~tracy/lho/h&l1.htm), focusing primarily on the
unreliability of eyewitness statements. I didn't have any problem with
this argument, which I found reasonable but uncompelling. I started to
formulate a response, emphasizing two key points: 1) the pattern of two
distinct individuals, two distinct "Oswalds," that emerges in John's work,
and 2) the scarce but crucial physical evidence and independent
corroboration for a number of the eyewitnesses.
I chose Henry Lee Timmer as a case study. Timmer is the eyewitness who
helps John Armstrong place an Oswald impostor in North Dakota almost ten
years before the assassination, when Oswald is supposed to have been in
New York City (John Armstrong, "Harvey and Lee: The Case for Two Oswalds,
Part 1," PROBE Magazine, Vol. 4, No. 6, September-October 1997, 21-2).
Armstrong cites five sources in support of Timmer's story -- a 1963
statement by Oswald indicating onetime residence in North Dakota, a
similar 1959 statement reported by Aline Mosby, an FBI report referencing
Mosby's quotation, a 1963 allegation from the Senate Internal Security
Subcommittee, and an eyewitness account from Timmer's mother, Alma Cole
(Ibid., 22). The FBI report can admittedly be dismissed, since it only
reports -- not verifies -- what Mosby said. One could also, for the sake
of argument, ignore the corroboration from Timmer's mother, and also
dismiss the Internal Security Subcommittee's information as hearsay.
But Armstrong cites Lt. Francis Martello of the New Orleans Police
Department as someone Oswald informed *personally* of his onetime
residence in North Dakota (Ibid., 22), a residence the official record
rules out. In preparing my response to Parnell, I now went to double-check
this in the report of Martello's interview with Oswald (10 H 53-6; 23 H
736-40), but found no mention of North Dakota there, nor in Martello's
Warren Commission testimony (10 H 51-62; 11 H 471). Had John simply made a
mistake?
Regardless of Martello, I had no doubt whatsoever that John's other
citation was unimpeachable. Aline Mosby's 1959 article on Oswald quotes
him in plain black and white as saying he lived in North Dakota. This
article ran in newspapers around the world in 1959 and was quoted
frequently following the assassination. A clear scan of one of these
articles is included in Jerry Robertson's document collection, *Denial
#2.*
For my response to Parnell, I decided to go straight to the source and
quote from Mosby's notes of her 1959 interview with Oswald, which are
reproduced in the Warren Commission *Hearings* volumes (CE 1385; 22 H
701-10). When I called these notes up on my *Hearings* CD-ROM for the
first time, however, I was again in for a surprise: Where the oft-cited,
oft-quoted Mosby newspaper article says, "Then we moved to North Dakota,"
Mosby's typewritten notes clearly say, "Then we moved to New Orleans" (CE
1385; 22 H 703). There is no mention of North Dakota whatsoever.
"North Dakota" was never anything but a transcription error. The dozens
and dozens of newspapers that picked up the reference simply repeated the
mistake, as did John Armstrong, as -- up until this time -- did I.
In light of the discovery that Henry Lee Timmer and his mother have
nothing to corroborate their story, I was forced to acknowledge problems
I'd always had with Timmer's story, and the true chronology of events
became evident:
In 1959, Mosby or an associate mistranscribes "New Orleans" as "North
Dakota"; newspapers around the world repeat the mistake; the FBI later
repeats the mistake; the Senate Internal Security Subcommittee later
repeats the mistake. After the assassination, perhaps Alma Cole reads that
the President's accused killer lived in North Dakota at one time and
wonders if this Lee Harvey Oswald wasn't an undesirable young man her son
Henry palled around with as a teenager. Perhaps Henry indeed remembers
this person; he recalls his name as "Harvey."
'Come to think of it,' Timmer might have thought upon hearing more about
JFK's "Marxist assassin," 'He once showed me a funny pamphlet of some
kind. I'll bet it was about Marxism. It *was,*' he decides, 'it *was*
about Marxism!"
But is it likely that a boy of twelve or so in North Dakota would
recognize a pamphlet on Marxism and would remember it a full decade later?
'And didn't Harvey once say something about killing the President?' Henry
might have asked himself. 'I think he did! I'm sure he did! Of course he
did!'
In 1953? Could any patsy have been set up that far in advance? Had
Oswald's eventual assignment been chosen for him even as Eisenhower was
being sworn in?
Only months ago, I accepted Henry Timmer's story: If Timmer remembered it,
Oswald must have said it, right? But how many Garrisonites have been
arguing the same thing about Perry Russo, for example, or Vernon Bundy,
both discredited by their own earlier words? Or Aloysius Habighorst and
Andrew Sciambra, two key Garrison witnesses discredited on the stand? I
myself had been adamantly defending such Garrison witnesses as Henry Earl
Palmer and Corrie Collins in their identifications of Oswald in Clinton,
Louisiana, until shown solid evidence they were not credible -- their own
1967 statements, discovered by Patricia Lambert (see *False Witness*).
Even award-winning Louisiana historian Dr. Michael L. Kurtz, who I've
expended a great deal of energy championing, cannot in and of himself be
taken as proof of sinister Oswald connections and activities in New
Orleans.
Much of John Armstrong's case is far less important than Henry Lee
Timmer's story and the anomalous Mosby "North Dakota" reference. Some of
it, I had to admit to myself, had always troubled me. A prime example is
Armstrong's citation of Marita Lorenz as a crucial eyewitness to an Oswald
in the US at the time Oswald was in Russia (Armstrong, "Harvey and Lee:
The Case for Two Oswalds, Part 2," *PROBE,* Vol. 5, No. 1,
November-December 1997, 21). (Gaeton Fonzi's first-hand portrayal of
Lorenz in *The Last Investigation* should be enough to demonstrate to even
most conspiracy theorists why I have problems with her credibility.) I'd
rationalize this by assuring myself that Lorenz' claim of knowing Oswald
in 1960 or so is entirely unrelated to her later dubious claims regarding
1963. I'm afraid that excuse is not going to suffice any longer.
Without Lorenz, though, who's left to corroborate a key point of John
Armstrong's case: the existence of an Oswald in Florida during 1959-61? An
alleged CIA operative or two, a few transients never heard from again, a
few others whose credibility was never tested . . . in other words,
"Garrison witnesses." I recalled -- for what seemed like the thousandth
time -- that former HSCA investigator Gaeton Fonzi never was able to
verify a single one of the eyewitness accounts he'd come across of Lee
Harvey Oswald in Florida. No one's ever accused Fonzi of being an
incompetent investigator; certainly I wouldn't.
Admittedly, these are just bits and pieces of John Armstrong's argument.
What about John's serious allegations of missing school and employment
records from Oswald's teen years? What about Palmer McBride, William Wulf,
the missing employment records from the Fifties and the controversial tax
records? McBride has compelling independent corroboration for his account
of Oswald in New Orleans in 1957-58; if this wasn't Oswald, who was it?
What about Oscar Deslatte and Fred Sewall's statements and evidence that a
"Lee Oswald" approached them as a representative of the Friends of
Democratic Cuba (a fund-raising arm of the CIA's anti-Castro operations
formed by alleged Oswald associate Guy Banister and former Oswald employer
Gerard Tujague) at a time when Oswald is known to have been in the USSR?
Were Deslatte and Sewall mistaken or lying? Could Oswald's name have been
chosen by the FDC for reasons unrelated to later doings in New Orleans
and/or Dallas? What about the dozen-plus eyewitnesses in and around Alice,
Texas? Could they all possibly be mistaken, possibly thinking of another
unusual family that passed through the area in October 1963? What about
the half-dozen or so witnesses at the Sports Drome Rifle Range? Were they
all thinking of someone else? What about the dozens of people who place
Oswald with Ruby or at Ruby's Carousel Club? Or the many, many others who
place Oswald at places he is never supposed to have been or with people he
is never supposed to have known? Are these all examples of mistaken
identify stirred up by the fervor surrounding the assassination?
What about Oswald's wallet, allegedly found at the Tippit crime scene?
What about the oddities in his medical records -- two tonsillectomies, for
example, and a reappearing front tooth? What about some of the genuinely
troublesome photographs brought to our attention by researchers like John
Armstrong, Jack White and Jerry Robertson? What about all the reports of
Oswald in Philadelphia, Ohio, West Virginia, Montreal, and all sorts of
other places he is supposed to never have been? What about John
Armstrong's intriguing research into Marguerite Oswald?
I can't debunk any of these things and, frankly, I have no desire to do
so. John Armstrong himself has always said that if his theory of two
Oswalds is incorrect, a new theory will have to be offered in its place to
explain the facts he's turned up. Some aspects of John's case are more
easily explained than others, but I believe that John's research, along
with related work by Jack White and Jerry Robertson, has indeed raised a
number of issues that merit further investigation.
It is no joy to express my newfound doubts about the work these men have
done. They are dedicated researchers and generous scholars, and if the
full truth about the Kennedy assassination is ever known, it will be due
to folks just like them. Those who support their work -- people like Jim
Hargrove and Deanie Richards -- deserve praise for their efforts in
demanding a fair hearing for some ideas all too easily dismissed.
We must, each one of us, follow our own path to the truth. Whose path is
ultimately the right one is not important; the truth itself is the only
thing that matters. With the aid of researchers like John Armstrong, Jerry
Robertson and Jack White, I do believe we're getting there.
SOURCES FOR JOHN ARMSTRONG'S PUBLISHED WORK:
John Armstrong, "Lee Harvey Oswalds: Dual Identity Cover-Up," *Fair Play*
#7, available on-line at:
gopher://freenet.akron.oh.us:70/h0/SIGS/JFK/FP/fp.back_issues/07th_Issue/c
opa_lho.html
John Armstrong, "Marguerite's Addresses," *PROBE,* Vol. 3, No. 5,
July-August 1996
John Armstrong, "Harvey and Lee: The Case for Two Oswalds, Part 1,"
*PROBE,* Vol. 4, No. 6, September-October 1997
John Armstrong, "Harvey and Lee: The Case for Two Oswalds, Part 2,"
*PROBE,* Vol. 5, No. 1, November-December 1997
As of January 1, 1999, these last two issues are available from Citizens
for Truth about the Kennedy Assassination (CTKA) for $6.00 each including
postage. *PROBE's* mailing address is CTKA, PO Box 3317, Culver City, CA
90231. (Vol. 3, No. 5 is out of print and I would urge CTKA to post John's
article at their Web site.) An order form can be printed out on-line at:
http://www.webcom.com/~ctka/orderform.html
John Armstrong, "Harvey, Lee, and Tippit," *PROBE,* Vol. 5, No. 2,
January-February 1998, available on-line at:
http://www.webcom.com/~ctka/pr198-jfk.html
John Armstrong, "The FBI and the Framing of Oswald," *PROBE,* Vol. 4, No.
3, March-April 1997; ordering information as above
John Armstrong, "Harvey and Lee: Just the Facts, Please," *Fair Play,* No.
25, November-December 1998, available at:
http://home.rmi.net/~jkelin/facts.html
John Kelin, "Harvey and Lee: A Capsule Version," *Fair Play,* No. 25,
November-December 1998, available at:
http://home.rmi.net/~jkelin/armstrong.html
SOURCES FOR JOHN ARMSTRONG'S CONFERENCE PRESENTATIONS:
John Armstrong, "Lee Harvey Oswalds: Dual Identity Cover-Up," abstract
from the 1995 COPA conference; *Fair Play* No. 7; available on-line at:
gopher://freenet.akron.oh.us/h0/SIGS/JFK/FP/fp.back_issues/.07th_Issue/cop
a_lho.html
John Armstrong, 1996 Fourth Decade presentation; reported by Joe Backes,
"The Fourth Decade Conference, Part 2," *Fair Play,* No. 12, available
on-line at:
gopher://freenet.akron.oh.us/h0/SIGS/JFK/FP/fp.back_issues/.12th_Issue/fre
donia2.html
(This researcher possesses a copy of this manuscript with numerous
corrections made personally by John Armstrong. I regret that this
corrected version cannot be posted on-line without the author's
permission.)
John Armstrong, 1997 Lancer presentation, available on video with printed
script from JFK/Lancer. For on-line ordering information, see:
http://www.flash.net/~jfklancr/Ordering97.html
Jerry Robertson's transcription of the 1997 presentation is available
on-line at: gopher://freenet.akron.oh.us/70/SIGS/JFK/Only/JA
See also: Tom DeVries, Review of John Armstrong's presentation, "Harvey
and Lee," *Assassination Chronicles,* Vol. 3, No. 4, Winter 1997,
available at: http://www.jfklancer.com/Winter97.html#Review
Jim's Hargrove transcription of John Armstrong's 1998 JFK/Lancer November
in Dallas presentation is available on-line at:
gopher://freenet.akron.oh.us/70/SIGS/JFK/Only/JA
OTHER SOURCES RELATED TO JOHN ARMSTRONG'S WORK:
Jerry Robertson's document scans related to John Armstrong's work:
gopher://freenet.akron.oh.us/70/SIGS/JFK/Only/JA
For information on Mr. Robertson's other available resources, e-mail him
at: jro...@nfe.com
Jim Hargrove's series on John Armstrong's research is available at:
gopher://freenet.akron.oh.us/70/SIGS/JFK/Only/JA
Jack White's "Evolution of Lee Harvey Oswald" poster was created at the
suggestion of John Armstrong. It contains 77 images of Lee Harvey Oswald
from the cradle to the grave, and is the single most valuable visual
resource to seeing for oneself evidence that more than one person was
using the name "Lee Harvey Oswald," as well as evidence that someone went
to a lot of trouble in a few cases to blur the distinction. It can be
ordered at Mr. White's Web site: www.flash.net/~jwjfk
A miniature version of the poster is reproduced in Robert Groden, *The
Search for Lee Harvey Oswald.*
Also available from Jack White: his videotape presentation, "The Many
Faces of Lee Harvey Oswald," which inspired John Armstrong's Oswald
research.
Several photographs relevant to John Armstrong's work can be found at:
http://www.mtexchange.com/photos.htm
Dreitzes
>Visit the "Harvey and Lee" Web page at:
> http://enteract.com/~hargrove/armstrong.html
>
>This site will be vastly expanded sometime next week.
>
>--Jim Hargrove
Oops! I neglected to update my old list of resources with this obvious new
entry. I believe John Armstrong also recently contributed a "Harvey and Lee"
article to *The Fourth Decade.*
BTW, as Mr. Armstrong is not on-line, I sent him a copy of the article I posted
here and offered to post any response he might have. In the meantime, check
out:
The "Harvey and Lee" Web page:
http://enteract.com/~hargrove/armstrong.html
Jerry Robertson's document scans related to John Armstrong's work:
gopher://freenet.akron.oh.us/70/SIGS/JFK/Only/JA
For information on Mr. Robertson's other available resources, e-mail him at:
jro...@nfe.com
Jim Hargrove's series on John Armstrong's research is available at:
gopher://freenet.akron.oh.us/70/SIGS/JFK/Only/JA
Jack White's "Evolution of Lee Harvey Oswald" poster was created at the
suggestion of John Armstrong. It contains 77 images of Lee Harvey Oswald from
the cradle to the grave, and is the single most valuable visual resource to
seeing for oneself evidence that more than one person was using the name "Lee
Harvey Oswald," as well as evidence that someone went to a lot of trouble in a
few cases to blur the distinction. It can be ordered at Mr. White's Web site:
www.flash.net/~jwjfk
A miniature version of the poster is reproduced in Robert Groden, *The Search
for Lee Harvey Oswald.*
Also available from Jack White: his videotape presentation, "The Many Faces of
Lee Harvey Oswald," which inspired John Armstrong's Oswald research.
Several photographs relevant to John Armstrong's work can be found at:
http://www.mtexchange.com/photos.htm
An article by W. Tracy Parnell critical of John Armstrong's theory is available
at:
http://www1.madbbs.com/~tracy/lho/h&l1.htm
DR
W. Tracy Parnell
Dreitzes wrote in message <19990408200633...@ng-fp1.aol.com>...
>Long Division: One Researcher, Ten Months and Two Oswalds
>by Dave Reitzes
>
>
>For my response to Parnell, I decided to go straight to the source and
>quote from Mosby's notes of her 1959 interview with Oswald, which are
>reproduced in the Warren Commission *Hearings* volumes (CE 1385; 22 H
>701-10). When I called these notes up on my *Hearings* CD-ROM for the
>first time, however, I was again in for a surprise: Where the oft-cited,
>oft-quoted Mosby newspaper article says, "Then we moved to North Dakota,"
>Mosby's typewritten notes clearly say, "Then we moved to New Orleans" (CE
>1385; 22 H 703). There is no mention of North Dakota whatsoever.
>
>"North Dakota" was never anything but a transcription error. The dozens
>and dozens of newspapers that picked up the reference simply repeated the
>mistake, as did John Armstrong, as -- up until this time -- did I.
>
I believe this is a very important discovery that Dave has made. Not only
does it debunk the North Dakota thing, but it demonstrates the mistake so
many researchers make (myself included) in accepting something at face value
and not doing your own research. It also speaks very eloquently on witnesses
being affected by post-event information. I think this is one of the most
important posts that I can remember and I hope everyone will give it the
consideration it deserves.
W. Tracy Parnell
Drei...@aol.com
Subject: Re: John Armstrong's research and theory
From: "W. Tracy Parnell" <Tr...@madbbs.com>
Date: 4/9/99 9:47 AM Eastern Daylight Time
Message-id: <%vnP2.384$O3.1...@news13.ispnews.com>
W. Tracy Parnell
**********************************************************
DR responds:
Thanks for the kind words. I've been urging researchers for five or six
months -- both LNs and CTs -- to take a serious, objective look at John
Armstrong's work. I have every confidence that if John's theory is correct,
his work will bear it out. Even if his theory is incorrect, I believe there
is much of value in his research.
BTW, one lurker has raised the question of when the Mosby notes published as
CE 1385 were typed up -- 1959 or 1963. I see no indication whatsoever in the
*Hearings* volumes themselves. I also don't know if Mosby's original
handwritten notes were preserved and, if so, if they are available at the
Archives. I might give the NARA site a check sooner or later, but if John
Armstrong has these or any other evidence that supports the Mosby North
Dakota ID, I'm sure he'll let us know. As John is not on-line, I offered to
post any response he might have.
Dave Reitzes
prwh...@yahoo.com
the 1996 Fredonia Conference, I was quite astounded by some of his
discoveries. The major shortcoming of the series, of course, was the lack
of footnotes (or "notes"), which really should have been included (I
understand this decision was made by PROBE's editors). However, I was
certainly pleased that John was quite willing to send copies of several
documents referred to in his series, which have been quite helpful.
However, as Dave Dreitzes points out in his posting, it is very likely
that the reference to "North Dakota" by Aline Mosby was a mistake. After
reading this reference, I looked up Aline's UPI report from Nov. 15, 1959
("Ft. Worth Defector Confirms Red Beliefs", which was published in the
Warren volumes), but she did not make any reference to Oswald having moved
to either North Dakota or New Orleans in it. He was simply described as a
"20-year-old Texan from Ft. Worth". On Nov. 26, 1959 Priscilla Johnson's
article on LHO was published in the Washington Star under the heading
"U.S. Defector to Reds Turned to Marx at 15", and reference was made to
Oswald having lived in Texas, New York and Louisiana, but not North Dakota
(by the way, Johnson referred to Oswald as a "nice-looking six-footer",
which was also published in the New Haven paper in early December, 1959;
the reference to Oswald's height was changed to a "nice-looking young man"
in her revised Nov. 24, 1963 version.)
Not only had Priscilla re-published her 1959 article after the assassin-
ation (the typewritten report sent to NANA from Moscow was included in the
Warren volumes), but I learned from John Armstrong that Aline also wrote
an article recalling her interview with Oswald, published by UPI on Nov.
23, 1963. Midway through the article (sent to me by John), LHO is quoted
as describing having moved to North Dakota, where he supposed- ly came
across "Das Kapital" for the first time. However, in a lengthy manuscript
written by Aline (CE 1385; no date is given, but it appears to have been
submitted in Sept. 1964), as Dave points out, LHO is quoted as stating
"Then we moved to New Orleans", followed by the reference to "Das
Kapital". In both her Nov. 23, 1963 report and the report for the Warren
Commission (which might have also been the basis for an article she wrote
that was published in the spring by PARIS MATCH), she quotes LHO having
found other Marxist books "..on dusty (back) shelves in the New Orleans
library".
When I first read the Nov. 23, 1963 report, I thought it was odd that
Oswald appeared to first find "Das Kapital" in a North Dakota library, but
then located more books on the subject of Marxism in a New Orleans
library. It looks to me like John Armstrong was so intent on finding
evidence to support the allegations of various residents of Stanley, North
Dakota, that he allowed himself to overlook the possibility that the
reference to North Dakota was a simple typing error. As Dave points out,
it is conceivable that one or more residents of Stanley, ND read Aline's
post-assassination report, and convinced themselves that the young boy
named Harvey they remembered was Oswald. However it is also possible that
the Oswald living in New York might have been sent to North Dakota to
treat his delinquent behaviour, while another Oswald was still in Ft.
Worth preparing to attend Stripling Jr. High. (Robert Oswald told the
author of "Two Oswalds" in the Nov. 1998 issue of TEXAS MONTHLY that it
was he would went to Stripling, not Lee, which would have been in the late
1940s. However, the former vice-principal told the author it was LHO's
school records the FBI came to get. As John pointed out in his series,
Robert Oswald had stated to the Warren Commission that Lee had attended
Stripling, but now seems to be changing his story.)
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