Читать книгу The Day John Fitzgerald Kennedy Past - Welby Thomas Cox Jr. - Страница 6

I do not recall dreaming, or moving... I slept as though as I had been gassed and when I woke I thought that I was in Hilarity Hall at the circus...there sat this elderly man...who looked 100, had a huge white beard...and no clothes as he stared at me from the next bed.

"Thought you had died pilgrim." He said.

"I had a rough twelve hours." I said

"Try twenty-four hours," he said "You have lost track of time."

“Too bad my times not up,"

“‘Guess the diesel therapy you spoke of in your sleep was like riding a bucking bronco without a saddle?" He laughed.

“That is a mild understatement...I came out of a life threatening situation at Manchester where a Cambodian nurse tried to poison me, because, you know, I was responsible for the war and ate up all their dogs and rats...so I lost 55 pounds in about 45 days, high fever, vomiting yellow poison and bleeding pure blood for three weeks."

“Dammit.” He said.

" Yeh...would have died if it had not been for an inmate named Joe Bicket from Marion County, who was in for growing weed...told me I had to file a habeas action to get in front of a federal judge."

“So you became the next Perry Mason?

“Not quite, but I may be the only guy in America who dropped his pants for a woman judge." I laughed at myself.

"The hell you did pilgrim."

"Sure did, and when she saw all that blood she came unglued...started screaming and pointing at the warden...who was also a woman...demanding that she take the stand.

"What is this...no don't answer that, I can see what it is and it needs your prompt attention...take this man to the Hazard Hospital today!"

"So two weeks after this surgery, they place you on diesel therapy to the Gulag?"

"Pure hatred from those sworn to protect the rights of inmates to medical care from a Country reaching out to protect the oppresses throughout the world who are downtrodden and whose civil rights have been taken from them...makes you want to barf."

"You sound like a man with experience."

"Oh, I know a thing or two." He said.

"I have nothing but time, and don't know when the next coach leaves, " I said, "Maybe a couple of days or a couple of years...but after seven months in prison, have come to three definitive conclusions which are essential for getting through this nightmare."

#1 would be" He said.

"I promise not to say another religious thing to you, since religion is quite the sensitive issue in prison...but you did ask for it...and # 1 has to do with the Lord's prayer that Christ taught us over two thousand years ago which says, Give us this day our daily bread; and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who have trespassed against us."

"So you must forgive everyone who has kicked you in the nuts."

"You know...you are half smart."

"I'm anxious for #2." He laughed.

"I'm going to need this time to come to grips with the heavy depression I'm suffering as a result of the death of my beloved son."

“We will come back to that...after #3."

" You have to take a huge stretch to understand # 3...In 1959 I was a high school student working a part-time job as the mail boy at Louisville Credit Men’s Association. Around the corner the Democratic Party had its headquarters...Danville Davis; the janitor introduced me to the place as a spot for good eats to draw a crowd. There was a great deal of excitement over a visit by Senator Kennedy, a candidate for the presidency. It was my first vote since I was turning 18. So Danville and I went to the headquarters."

“Did you see him?"

“Not only saw him, I shook his hand!"

“And you haven't washed your hand since... and that is #3?"

“I take my Kennedy politics very seriously... you see Kennedy is not only my hero, my mentor...but he is my saint as well and I promised myself that one day I would write a book as a legacy to his memory and my part in it...that hand shake, so that my children and grandchildren will know in 50 years, how important Kennedy was to this Country...and I will not let them forget him."

“Well, alright pilgrim," The old man using his best John Wayne..."where are you with this mind altering transformation?"

"I'm not even close...I've only been down less than a year."

"Well little partner, you got the talkin’ part done."

"I know that one...its Clint Eastwood." “So say the magic word, and win $ 100!" "That would be Groucho...Groucho Marx."

"Son, we're going to get along just fine, if you'll accept the advice I want to give you...coming from a man who is seventy-five and has been down for 42 years...most of it in this cell."

I could not believe what I had heard but chose to say nothing...just listened.

"While it is magnanimous of you to forgive those who were responsible for taking your freedom, it’s an exercise in futility... when your Christ said at first...'Forgive them Father, they know not what they do!'

Just remember that was followed by his final words...'Eli, Eli, Lama Sabacthani'The translation please...the old man said pointing to me as through he was the master of ceremonies"

“My God, My God. Why hath thou forsaken me?" I said.

"So you see, even in the most tragic death in the history of mankind, the God made Son chocked on his misery...you can have one way or the other...and it is my belief that at the end of the day you will be just like Christ...cursing those who took their own form of justice...a lynch mob...took you down to the hanging tree to dispense justice...those who conspired against you, destroyed your family, burnt your ranch to the ground, stole all you cattle, killed your son...and took vengeance on you because you refused to wear the blue pin-striped suit and red tie."

"42 years." I said (lost on the question)

"Yes, for sedition...because I know something about the truth behind the Kennedy murder and the government’s role in it."

“But sedition?" I asked.

“I think Black's Law Dictionary says that sedition is perhaps the very vaguest of all offenses known in the criminal code and is defined as the speaking or writing of words calculated to excite disaffection against the Constitution." He said.

“Look, I never ask an inmate about the amount of time they got or about their case,"

"Well I haven't spoken much to many folks, but you are a different breed of cat...you understand and speak the English language." You know what I mean, Joe?"

"No the name is Welby..."

"They call me Ham, names Merwin Sylvester Hamilton"

They shook hands with the inmate fist...just to acknowledge the issue of contamination.

Anyone checking in on these two old geezers would have been struck by how much fun they seemed to be having. Ham Hamilton for his part had spent so much time in this antiquated prison and raised so much hell over the celli assignments that those on high had simply decided to let him have a "one" man room. In the process Ham had lost many social skills, including personal hygiene.

When the Atlanta prison was originally built it must have been an awesome facility for any student of architecture. The facade is truly inspiring and the design of the atrium, now copied by the most elegant hotel chains, (Hyatt Hotels) comes to mind, set the precedent for the future, 100 years hence.

The prison policy provided one (1) hour for inmates to leave the cell and to perform one of the following: Get fed, get ice and water, use the phone, get reading material, socialize...and last but not least...take a shower.

The design of the showers was an afterthought and had to have been designed by a homosexual staff member because they were designed to face the atrium...like a closet, providing no privacy to undress or dress, additionally there was an ever present film and the odor from a series of long standing farts which had taken residence within the small space to be shared with other unspeakable matter which coated the walls and the floor.

Little wonder that the vast majority of the inmates utilized the sponge bath and avoided the spectacle and dehumanizing emphasis placed on and designed into the shower.

But Ham Hamilton had carried this issue to an extreme, following in the footsteps of the "latter day genius and bazaar nature exhibited by Howard Hughes." In fact, Ham Hamilton had become Howard Hughes, and since he lived in darkness and there were no mirrors, Ham felt safe and comfortable within his skin, and regardless of the weekly comments of the inmate population, Hamilton was going to spend his, under his own conditions and to hell with what anyone else thought.

Unlike most incoming cellies, most especially the black population who carried all hygiene to an extreme and had perfected their own sense of standards because they were the majority...I chose not to cause a stir over Ham's appearance and his odor. He had secured disinfectant in a spray bottle and both of us used it on the toilet and sink. I took it upon myself to wash the floor on hands and knees so that the space was close as we could get to clean and the air was reasonably fresh because the glass was broken.

It was in this atmosphere of mutual respect and generational comradely that I was not only able to confirm what I knew about the Kennedy assassination, what was out there in the public domain but through providence I was on a 24/7 co-habitation with the "keeper of the clandestine operational methodology" employed by the government, principally the CIA to murder the President.

There was only one path for me to take...and when you come to the end of the road which only goes right...take it. I chose to wait Ham out, when he wanted to talk, I was all ears...and note pad.

More importantly, I had begun to develop a respect and warmth for a man who through no fault of his own, was caught in the performance of his duty in the library at the CIA at Langley and his very participation as an American patriot dedicated to his country formed the basis for that very government to indict him for sedition and conspiracy to commit murder.

Like Lee Harvey Oswald, because Ham Hamilton knew the shadow network and the players employed in the scheme initially to bring down the government of Fidel Castro and to salvage the failed effects of the Bay of Pigs, Hamilton refused under his right to testify against himself and the right to remain silent under the Constitutional rights of the Fifth Amendment, when the Warren Commission came calling, those responsible for the operation, found Oswald to be a convenient patsy.

So far Hamilton had told me little, except that there was a conspiracy to overthrow Castro and this accomplished by an attempt on the life of President Kennedy, designed to inflame the government of the United States and the citizens demanding retaliation against the obvious source of this failed assassination attempt by a disaffected and mentally ill Oswald who had been selected and trained to take the fall.

Deep within the shadow of this dark conspiracy, by government operatives rested the flaming question and the chilling answer ostensibly sought by the Warren Commission, "Why was it done and who was responsible?"

Hamilton had the answer to both questions, even-though every sophisticated spy methodology had been put in place to cover the true identities of the layers of the principles.

Never again in his long life, in this world or the next, would he know the inner power, rising to a clarion call, this secret force of the soul, waiting in the wings to bring down the curtain. Ham Hamilton was to be the Narrator, the Captain of the ship and only upon his command would the ship of state… sail on.