◆ SpookStack

"oy ; th A A HN He ee ee a a } -! . ty , 7 . _ , + cote , x : -~4&- - ee oF al es - : . "Josoph P, Kennedy, than American Ambassador to Great .-- ‘Britain, discharged Kent, and tho British Government immediately arrested him on charges of espionage. After Kent had been held . in jail for somo timo he was given 4 trial. ._ The espionage 1 | gharges foll flat, but he finally was convicted of larceny of , . . government documents and sentenced to seven years in prison, where he now is, — ; “Captain Ramsay, who had been shown or given copies of the correspondence » was placed under detention under the Defense of _the Roalm Act. . : In mid-summor of 1941, after. receipt of the informtion from the- j = British Embassy in Washington throtgh Mr. Wingo, Mrs. Kent sought OT ~ a passport from the United States Styte Department to go to Eng- land.. This was denied her, Mrs, Kent thon yailed upon a newspaper- “man with Baltimore connections, Mr. Ian R cFarlane, {since heard in the early menths of 1944 as a news analyst dn Station WITH, Baltimors, ot Maryland) to go to England for her. Mrs, Kent financed his trip on con- - dition that MacFarlano would interview the English Solilciter who defond- ' @d Kont, and would do his best to interviow Kent himself in prison on the Isle of Wight. MacFarlane reached England by the Atlantic Clipper in March, 1942, Upon his return from Engiand, MocFarlane reported to Mrs. Kent thot ho had been able to accomplish all of theso assignments. He saw Kent on the Isle of Wight. Kent told him that the assignment of . JF . handling the surreptitious cables proyed upon his mind and conscience. : '-Phe oath, taken by 21] Forcign Service Clerks, is: "I do solemnly swear i or affirm that I will support and defend the Constitution of tha United ee wa States agsinst all onomies, foroign and domestic, etc." | } \ Kent considered that the assignment forced him to violate his oath, since he was the accredited public servant of a State Department charged by Congress, at this timo, with preserving the noutrality of the United States. He asked for ao transfer from the Embassy in London. His request } was rofpsed. Ho than mido photostatic copies of the cables passing : through his hands and hid them in his room, Kent grow desperate over ths r direction the correspondence was taking, since obviously the Prosident | i was committing the United States to war without authorization of Congress i H or oven the knowledge of the actual government of Britain ot that time. | Yet at this vory time President Roosevelt was pledging the voters of the | i United States that their sons would not be sent into foreign war, Tyler | t ; Kent then tock the atep of divulging the cables to Churchill's most active: - political opponent in Parlinment, the lesder of the Right Club, Captain Archibald Ramsay. Tho conspiracy was secretly discussed among Rightists and anti-Churchill circles in Britain. On May 10, 1940, owing to the f4linoss of Neville Chamberlain, the ambitions of Winston Churchill were suddenly realized, Churchill received the government from Chamberlain H amd immodintely tharoafter the British Ramsay and the American Kent wore { soizgod ond jailed, , MacFarlano reported that Kent told him that the exchange of cables ~. . Js began in Octcher, 1939. Churchill was then First Lord of the Ad- “*# miralty., According to Kent, tho first message was from Churchill. Kent gave its content to MacFarlane as the following: (Goneral sense : rather than exact quote.) "I am half American and tho natural person ts work with you. We evidently see eye to eye. If I could become Prim | f. Minister of Britain wo could control the world." After this first cable, a fow weeks clapsed, then Prosident Rossevelt cabled back for more de- tails of Mr. Churchill's plan, Thereafter, messages passed at rapid in- tervals between Churchill and the President, sometimes several in one day, throughout the winter of 1939 and 1940, the period of the “phony war", Many were long letters, which Kont was required to code and decode. Mac- Farlano reported that Kent told him the substance of these messages con- cernod such subjects as the mtter of the transfer of 50 destroyers, the methods to be uscd to induco Congress to pass the Lend Lease Bill, and stratogy to ba used to bring about tho repeal of the American Neutrality and Johnson Acts, . ; ; \ oot At unexpected corroboration of some of the substance of cables * sof & was reported by Mr, Wingo after conversation with Mr. Jch les, rh TS ee cab of hb Te MATNES ORATSTER AND TRIBUNE,.who had/accom, ") 2 | py