Reclaiming History

by Vincent Bugliosi

  A few minutes later two squad cars full of police arrived and arrested all four of them, Oswald as well as the three Cubans, for “disturbing the peace by creating a scene.” They were taken to the station house of the First District, New Orleans Police Department, on North Rampart Street.1300*

  Each of them was questioned by police officers in the same room and Bringuier was impressed by Oswald’s cool self-possession. He was not nervous, not out of control, confident of himself, even when he was asked if he was a Communist. He obliged the police by showing them his literature and explaining that the Fair Play for Cuba Committee was not some weird fringe group but a national organization with offices in New York. About the extent and membership of the organization in New Orleans, Lee was understandably more cagey. He did not want to discuss that in the presence of Bringuier and the other Cubans. The police took Oswald out of the room and Bringuier did not see him again that day. The Cubans put up twenty-five dollars each for bail and were released until a court appearance on Monday morning. Oswald, who did not have the money for bail, spent the night in jail.1301

  About ten the next morning, New Orleans police lieutenant Francis L. Martello interviewed Oswald. Martello was currently a platoon commander at the First District station. As such, he routinely checked the preceding day’s arrest records, and today he was struck by Oswald’s police report. The police like to know what fringe groups are in the city and what their politics are, but the Fair Play for Cuba Committee was a new one to Martello. Martello had Oswald brought into an interview room, where he sorted through the contents of Oswald’s wallet, making note of his Social Security number, Selective Service draft card, and two membership cards of the FPCC—one from New York and another from New Orleans signed A. J. Hidell.1302

  Martello was friendly. His purpose was to establish a rapport with Oswald, and he found Lee easy to talk to, nonchalant, and obviously well read if not well educated, with a sort of “academic approach” to the Cuban problem. Oswald told him he had been born and raised in New Orleans, served in the U.S. Marines, lived for several years in Fort Worth, and moved from there to New Orleans only about four months ago. Martello had no reason to notice that Russia and Dallas had been entirely edited out of Oswald’s biography, and his general impression was that Oswald was telling the truth, even though Oswald became evasive when the conversation turned to the New Orleans chapter of the FPCC. Oswald claimed about thirty-five members, whose names he declined to give, and said that about five of them might attend each regular meeting, whose location he likewise declined to give. Martello found this information surprising, since it seemed unlikely that a group with thirty-five members would have escaped the notice of the police department, but he did not make an issue of it. Curiously, Lee also asked to see an agent of the FBI,* and Martello obliged him by calling the local office of the bureau.1303

  Lee turned to the Murrets for help to get out of jail. Unfortunately, only his cousin Joyce, home from Beaumont, Texas, for a visit, was at the house when Lee called from a jail phone. His Aunt Lillian was in the hospital, having undergone a minor ear operation, and his Uncle Dutz was away on a weekend Catholic religious retreat in Manresa, Louisiana, a place where people only go to pray and whose strict rules require that you can’t talk to anyone for twenty-four hours. Joyce not only was encumbered by her two small children, but also had to go to the hospital to bring Lillian home and could ill afford the time to come down to Rampart Street to bail him out. But she promised to do so if she could manage.1304

  For the time being, Oswald had better luck with his request to see a representative of the FBI. It was Saturday and the local office of the FBI was manned only by a skeleton crew. John Lester Quigley was the agent assigned the task. Neither the name nor the person of Lee Harvey Oswald rang any bells when Lee was shown into the police commander’s office, where Quigley was looking over the FPCC materials Lieutenant Martello had given him. Quigley knew of the committee as a national organization but had not yet encountered any signs of it in New Orleans. He did know that the bureau had an open file on Oswald and somehow had completely forgotten that about a year and a half before he had gone over to the naval station at Algiers, a suburb across the river from the city, to check Oswald’s naval intelligence records in response to a request from the bureau’s office in Dallas.1305

  Quigley took down some basic information about Oswald’s background, which he seemed to be fairly forthcoming about. Again, Lee was less forthcoming when the conversation turned to details of the local chapter of the FPCC, although he was willing enough to lecture the agent on patriotism. He had been distributing these throwaways for the FPCC as “a patriotic duty, as a patriotic American citizen.” The United States should not, Oswald said, attack Cuba or interfere with Cuban political affairs. The philosophy of the FPCC was that the American people should better understand internal conditions in Cuba and be given opportunities to go there to make up their own minds about it. As to the identity of A. J. Hidell,† whose signature appeared on the FPCC membership card, Oswald said he had never met Hidell personally but had spoken with him on the telephone on several occasions. He could not recall Hidell’s telephone number but remembered it was now disconnected anyway. He said he had received a note in the mail from Hidell on August 7 asking him to distribute some FPCC literature in the downtown area of New Orleans. FPCC meetings were held, he said, in various members’ residences, but he had attended only two of them and everyone there had been introduced by their first name only. He couldn’t recall any of the first names. One meeting had been held at his own home, but he declined to say how he had managed to get in touch with these other FPCC members whose names and addresses he did not know. In short, it was obvious that Oswald was not going to provide Quigley with information of any real interest to him or the bureau.1306

  Late that Saturday, Joyce Murret finally showed up at the police station, ready to put up the twenty-five-dollar bail for Oswald’s release. When she saw the “Viva Fidel” sign Oswald had been carrying and the leaflet with its bold heading “HANDS OFF CUBA!” she flinched. “Oh, my God,” she said, realizing she did not want to be a part of his being released from jail. Martello told her that Lee’s offense wasn’t particularly grave, and if she didn’t want to put up the twenty-five-dollar bail, she could contact one of the city or state officials who had the “power of parole,” and on his instruction Oswald would be released until his case was heard. Not sure what to do, she left and went to bring her mother home from the hospital, but not before she filled in some of the gaps Lee had left in his interview with Martello, telling the lieutenant about Lee’s trip to Russia and his poor Russian wife whom Lee did not even allow to speak English.1307

  Martello, intrigued, had Lee brought out of his cell to talk with him again. He asked Lee whether he was a Communist and Lee said he was not, relying on his increasingly familiar mantra that he was a Marxist but not a Soviet-style Marxist-Leninist. Lee, given the opportunity to talk about his favorite subject, political philosophy, grew expansive. He said he was in full accord with Karl Marx’s book Das Kapital, but true Communism did not exist in Russia. Marx, he said, was never a true Communist anyway; he was a socialist, as, Lee said, he himself was. Soviet Communism “stunk.” Russia had, he said, “fat, stinking politicians over there just like we have over here,” and that while the leaders have everything, the people are still poor and depressed. When Martello asked why he did not allow members of his family to learn English, Lee said that he hated America and didn’t want them to become “Americanized” and that he planned to return to Russia. As for his views of Khrushchev and Kennedy, he said he thought they got along very well together. There was no other mention of the president, but they did talk about Castro again. Martello asked whether he knew that Castro had recently admitted he was a Marxist-Leninist. Lee did, but he was not going to discuss the merits and demerits of the Cuban premier; he was mainly concerned with the people of Cuba and said the situation in Cuba would be a lot better “if
this country would have better relations with the poor people of Cuba and quit worrying about Castro.”1308

  After, Martello had Lee returned to his cell, he stuck his notes and several copies of the evidence—Oswald’s leaflets—in a file folder, put them away, and forgot about them. He did not consider Lee Oswald anyone who would be likely to resort to violence. In fact, he found him rather the opposite, rather passive. He hadn’t even tried to defend himself when Bringuier had threatened him. When Martello thought about the events of the day before, it seemed to him that Oswald may have set the Cubans up.1309

  Lee languished in jail—no sign of cousin Joyce and the bail money. Irritated, and not knowing that Joyce had already been to the jail, he called again and found that Joyce had just returned from the hospital with his Aunt Lillian. He was quite rude to Joyce on the phone, wanting to know why she hadn’t come to bail him out. When she told him she didn’t have any money, he told her to go to Magazine Street and get it from Marina, who should have about seventy dollars in cash. But Joyce absolutely did not want to make yet another trip to Rampart Street or get involved in any way. She told Lillian what Martello had told her about getting an official to “parole” Lee, and Lillian came up with the solution. She had Joyce get in touch with someone the Murrets knew, a local liquor store owner and state boxing commissioner, Emile Bruneau, who called her back later to say he had contacted a local official (A. Heckman, a New Orleans jury commissioner) and that Oswald had been released.1310

  When Lee finally got home on Saturday evening, he was tired and dirty but quietly jubilant as he informed Marina where and why he had been detained. She had lain awake until three that morning worrying about him and had even gone to check to be sure he did not have the Mannlicher-Carcano rifle with him. He told her that he enjoyed a philosophical conversation with a sympathetic police officer who had been like “a kindly uncle”—no doubt Martello. “He listened to my ideas,” Lee told her, “and let me out.”1311

  When Dutz came home from his retreat on Sunday evening and Lillian told him what had happened, he was horrified by the whole story. He drove over to the Oswalds’ place on Magazine Street, where he took note of the photograph of Fidel Castro on the mantle. He gave Lee a good talking to, suggesting that he get a job and start taking his family responsibilities seriously.

  “You be sure you show up at that courthouse for the trial,” he warned Lee.

  Lee said, “Don’t worry, I’ll show up.”1312

  Come Monday morning, August 12, Bringuier, Hernandez, and Cruz arrived early, joining some other Cubans who had taken seats in the half of the small Rampart Street courthouse reserved for white folks. Moments later Oswald arrived and ostentatiously took a seat on the other side, the one reserved for colored people. Bringuier seethed. The Cuban immediately understood what Oswald was up to. He meant to win the blacks over when he made a stirring defense of the villainous Fidel Castro. This would be “a tremendous work of propaganda for his side,” Bringuier realized, one of the things that caused him to think “that he was really a smart guy and not a nut.”1313

  But Oswald pled guilty to a charge of disturbing the peace and was sentenced to pay a fine of ten dollars or serve ten days in jail. Oswald paid the fine.1314 Bringuier, himself an attorney when he was in Cuba, pled not guilty and undertook a defense of himself and his two companions. He showed the judge the Guidebook for Marines and pointed to Oswald’s name on the first page, clear proof that Oswald was an agent provocateur trying to infiltrate the Cuban Student Directorate. The judge, no doubt eager to see the last of all four of them, dismissed the case against the Cubans.1315

  Johann Rush, a young cameraman for New Orleans television station WDSU, started filming Oswald walking down the stairs from the second-floor courtroom after the court session. Oswald seemed startled by the TV cameras.

  “So you’re interested in this, huh?”

  “Yes, we are,” Rush said.

  When Oswald learned he would be seen on WDSU-TV that evening, his interest was piqued. Rush spotted the gleam in his eye, handed him his business card, and suggested that Oswald give him a ring at the station whenever he planned further demonstrations. Rush was eager to film a good, old-fashioned street brawl. Oswald was noncommital but clearly interested, and Rush was pretty sure he would go for it. The Cubans watched the conversation from a distance, and raged. As soon as Oswald left, they assailed Rush. He ought not be talking at all with a Communist like that, much less giving him publicity. Rush shot footage of them too, and they were temporarily appeased.1316

  Lee, who had been waiting two months for a reply from Vincent Lee of the national Fair Play for Cuba Committee, felt that the recent events would finally evoke a response from the New York headquarters, and later in the day he wrote to Vincent Lee:

  Dear Mr. Lee

  Continuing my efforts on behalf of F.P.C.C. in New Orleans I find that I have incured the displeasure of the Cuban exile “worms” here. I was attacked by three of them as the copy of the enclosed summons indicates I was fined ten dollars and the three Cubans were not fined because of “lack of evidence,” as the judge said. I am very glad I am stirring things up and shall continue to do so. The incident was given considerable coverage in the press and local T.V. news broadcast. I’m sure it will all be to the good of the Fair Play for Cuba committee.

  Sincerley yours

  Lee H. Oswald1317

  Vincent Lee, already disturbed by Oswald’s undisciplined efforts on the committee’s behalf, was not inspired to reply.1318

  That day, August 12, or the next, Rush’s friend Bill Stuckey, who had a weekly program on the radio side of WDSU, phoned Bringuier and asked him if he had Oswald’s address. Stuckey had hitchhiked around Latin America for awhile after he mustered out of the Marine Corps, and he spoke Spanish pretty well. His program on WDSU dealt with Latin American affairs, and he knew many of the anti-Castro leaders in the city. Within the week Bringuier got the address for Stuckey from the court papers and asked Stuckey why he wanted it. Stuckey, who had heard about the national Fair Play for Cuba Committee but nothing about any local chapter, wanted to interview Oswald. Bringuier protested vehemently—Stuckey shouldn’t give a Communist like Oswald airtime when there were plenty of people in town who really knew what was going on in Cuba. Stuckey offered to do a radio interview of Bringuier too, but Bringuier didn’t like that idea either. Bringuier suggested a debate.1319

  When Stuckey didn’t take him up on the idea, Bringuier acted on his own. Rush found himself dispatched to Casa Roca to film Bringuier’s hastily organized press conference. Bringuier presented two Cuban exiles who had just returned from a raid on their homeland, and he served as their interpreter since neither of them spoke English. The two freedom fighters agreed that conditions in Cuba were now worse than ever. They were angry that the U.S. government, since the missile crisis, no longer supported Cuban exile raids on the island.1320

  Meanwhile, the August 13 edition of the Times-Picayune published an account of the street incident under the caption “Pamphlet Case Sentence Given.” It read, in its entirely, “Lee Oswald, 4907 Magazine, Monday was sentenced to pay a fine of ten dollars or serve ten days in jail on the charge of disturbing the peace by creating a scene. Oswald was arrested by First District police at 4:15 p.m. Friday in the 700 block of Canal while he was reportedly distributing pamphlets asking for a ‘Fair Play for Cuba.’ Police were called to the scene when three Cubans reportedly sought to stop Oswald. Municipal Court charges against the Cubans for disturbing the peace were dropped by the court.”1321

  It wasn’t much, but New Orleans’s main newspaper had taken notice and Oswald, delighted, made the most of it. He wrote to Arnold Johnson, information director of the U.S. Communist Party, that same day, August 13:

  Dear Mr. Johnson:

  I wish to thank you for the literature which you sent me for our local branch of the “Fair Play For Cuba Committee,” of which I am the secretary-President. As you can see from the enclosed [newspaper]
clipping I am doing my best to help the cause of [a] new Cuba…Please accept an honourary New Orleans branch membership card as a token of esteem.

  Thank You

  Lee H. Oswald1322

  Johann Rush did not have long to wait on his invitation to Oswald. Oswald left a message for Rush at the TV station to alert him that the Fair Play for Cuba Committee would again distribute literature, this time in front of the International Trade Mart at noon on Friday, August 16. Other newspaper and television stations were also informed, although the papers ignored the event, and only one other cameraman, WWL’s Mike O’Connor, showed up.* It was Oswald’s best-organized effort. He provided some substance for his phantom FPCC chapter by getting two other young men to help distribute the literature. One of them, a short, young Cuban, only passed out a few of the handful of leaflets Rush saw Oswald give him on the street after talking to him and his taller companion. The short man, who has never been identified, seemed embarrassed by the entire affair, grinning a lot, and soon left with his companion, who seemed to purposefully keep his back to Rush’s camera throughout the entire incident. The other leaflet distributor was a kid named Charles Hall Steele Jr., whom Oswald had recruited at the unemployment office, where Steele was waiting for a friend who was taking a test. Oswald offered two dollars for fifteen or twenty minutes of work. It sounded good to Steele, who asked no questions. He didn’t even bother to read the literature he passed out. Carlos Bringuier was tipped off, but he got the news too late and failed to get to the scene on time. This time there were no Cuban exiles and no fracas, but the footage of Oswald passing out leaflets in front of the New Orleans Trade Mart shot by Rush and O’Connor was broadcast on television that evening anyway.1323

  Someone brought one of the leaflets Oswald was passing out to Bringuier’s store, and Bringuier noticed that although it was the same leaflet, on yellow paper, from the week before, this time it bore a different address. The original leaflet from August 9 was stamped with the name A. J. Hidell and a post office box number; today’s was stamped with Oswald’s name and the Magazine Street address. A friend, Carlos Quiroga, came up with an idea to run a counterspy operation on Oswald. That evening, posing as a Castro sympathizer, Quiroga called on Oswald and spent an hour on Oswald’s screen porch discussing Cuban affairs with him. Oswald suspected that the Cuban was an agent of Bringuier’s or possibly even the FBI and told him nothing in particular,1324 but while Quiroga was there, little June came out on the porch and—to Quiroga’s astonishment—Lee spoke Russian to her. He tried to cover the blunder by telling Quiroga that he was studying Russian at Tulane University and was teaching it to his daughter, but the cat was out of the bag. Quiroga went straight back to Bringuier with the news that Lee Oswald might well have some connection to Soviet Russia.1325