[Photo: Volkmar Schmidt, 1995]
Our project of naming the members of the Dallas plot to assassinate JFK in Dallas was completed with our narrative on Harry Dean in late October 2020. Harry Dean wasn’t called to testify for the Warren Commission (WC) but he was personally close to Loran Hall and Larry Howard, two guys who were named in the context of the WC testimony of Silvia Odio.
Harry offers a convincing narrative that Hall and Howard were the two who accompanied Lee Harvey Oswald (LHO) at the home of Silvia Odio on (or around) September 25, 1963. It was around that same time that Harry personally met Ex-General Edwin Walker (hereafter General Walker) and at that meeting Harry Dean heard General Walker threaten both JFK and LHO. To us, that ties up matters with regard to the JFK plot.
What we discuss in the current thread is a small stream that feeds into the larger stream. We discuss the evidence that the Walker shooting of April 1963 was not the act of a “Lone Nut,” but was the result of a plot that began specifically on February 22, 1963.
On this website, throughout November 2020, we reviewed the WC testimony of George De Mohrenschildt (DM) a self-declared friend of LHO in Dallas. In December 2020 we named three non-Russian associates of George DM (1911-1977), namely: Volkmar Schmidt (1933-1998), Michael Paine (1928-2018), Everett Glover (1917-2010). The latter two testified for the WC. And although Volkmar didn’t testify for the WC, he offered informal evidence in filmed interviews and magazines afterwards.
We can accept that George, Michael, Everett, and Volkmar had nothing directly to do with the JFK Assassination plot in Dallas. However, since we propose that General Walker was the very center of the JFK plot, we’ll explore the importance of the Walker shooting to the JFK Assassination plot, in a greater depth than before.
By using WC testimony, HSCA Exhibits, and PBS Frontline reports, we’ll labor to demonstrate the existence of a coherent yet bumbling conspiracy to kill General Walker. We won’t proceed with a story format, i.e. building up drama for a surprise ending. We’ll use a reporter’s format, telling the reader our findings at the very start and then revealing material evidence to support our findings.
We’ll propose that the Walker shooting severely disturbed his already unstable hornet’s nest. We’ll propose that Walker found out in four days about LHO’s role in the shooting, and we’ll report Walker’s suspicion that George DM, Michael Paine, and several of their associates were also involved in this shooting.
In the coming weeks we’ll present evidence that George DM, Michael Paine, Everett Glover, and Volkmar Schmidt were indeed involved with LHO in the plot to kill Walker at his home in Dallas. We’ll show that George, Michael, and Everett withheld from the WC many facts about the Walker shooting.
The first clue appeared in late 1976, when the HSCA subpoenaed George DM to appear. George prepared by writing his memoirs in book form, and he reflected on them for several months. Suddenly, in late March 1977, he committed suicide. Jeanne, his wife, delivered these memoirs to the HSCA in early April 1977. In those memoirs George related two unexpected factoids:
George and LHO shared several hostile conversations about General Walker sometime during their close relationship from August 1962 through April 1963.
George used to make LHO laugh by calling Walker, “General Fokker”.
Even in 1964 George had testified to the WC that LHO had hinted to him that LHO “hated” General Walker. Let’s briefly review that snippet, where WC attorney Albert Jenner spoke about General Walker and LHO’s attempt on his life.
Mr. JENNER. You didn’t want him to shoot anybody?
Mr. De MOHRENSCHILDT. Anybody. I didn’t want him to shoot anybody. But if somebody has a gun with a telescopic lens you see, and knowing that he hates the man, it is a logical assumption you see.
They are talking about General Walker, and George testifies here that LHO hated Walker. We must read carefully, because George leaps over several weeks. George begins by speaking of the time before the Walker shooting, when George said he didn’t want LHO “to shoot anybody.” Then in the next sentence George leaps over several weeks, to the time after the Walker shooting, when George and Jeanne discovered LHO’s rifle with scope in a LHO’s closet (April 13, 1963).
Yet WC attorney Jenner didn’t focus on that time-sequence. Jenner didn’t focus on the rifle’s scope. Jenner focused on the crucial statement that LHO hated General Walker. Let’s review:
Mr. JENNER. You knew at that time that he had a definite bitterness for General Walker?
Mr. De MOHRENSCHILDT. I definitely knew that, either from some conversations we had on General Walker – you know – this was the period of General Walker’s – you know – big showoff – you know.
This time George leaped backwards in his time-sequence. He began with the “conversations” that he and LHO “had on General Walker” (which could not have been much before February 22, 1963, as we’ll soon see). From there George leaps backwards to “the period of General Walker’s…big showoff.”
What period was that? As newspapers of the day show clearly, it was the period starting with the deadly Ole Miss riots of September 30, 1962. Walker had orchestrated a racial riot over James Meredith, a Black American who wanted to go to college at Ole Miss University. On this date, thousands of protesters and thousands of US Federal troops clashed at Ole Miss as Feds fought to enforce the US Supreme Court’s Brown Decision of 1954. Two reporters were killed into riots, and hundreds of Feds and protesters were wounded.
Walker was arrested the next morning for allegedly leading those riots; and JFK had him thrown into an insane asylum in Springfield, Missouri. After three days, however, Walker was released from the insane asylum into the care of his friends in Dallas and placed under house arrest pending his Grand Jury hearings in Mississippi.
The Grand Jury convened in November 1962 and heard evidence until January 1963. Then, to the astonishment of US Liberals, the Grand Jury acquitted General Walker of all charges.
Once freed, Walker quickly planned a coast-to-coast speaking tour to spread right-wing segregationist politics, starting in early February, to finish in early April. City after city, speech after speech, day after day, US Liberals obsessively followed the daily news about Walker, talking back to their newspapers and gossiping endlessly with their friends about General Walker. So, here, from September 30, 1962 and into the early weeks of February 1963 – this was “the period of General Walker’s…big showoff” as referenced by George DM.
Many Liberals were still convinced that Walker was guilty of inciting those violent riots, of inviting and organizing “thousands” of armed protesters to come to Oxford, Mississippi in late September 1962. Many still demanded punishment for him. We’ll offer evidence to show that George DM, Michael Paine, Everett Glover, and Volkmar Schmidt were among that Liberal demographic.
We notice that George fails to date these conversations with LHO. One may get a false impression that these hostile conversations about General Walker might have begun as soon as LHO and George met in Fort Worth, in August 1962. George avoids clarifying the dates for us, but we have good evidence that these hostile conversations about General Walker could not have happened much before February 22, 1963.
Although he didn’t testify for the Warren Commission, Volkmar Schmidt told many media publications about his role in all this. Here’s what Volkmar told PBS Frontline in 1993:
Lee Harvey Oswald brought up in the conversation with me the fact that he really felt very angry about the support that the Kennedy Administration gave to the Bay of Pigs invasion. It turned out that Lee Harvey Oswald really idealized the socialism of Cuba, but he was critical of the socialism in the Soviet Union. And he was just obsessed with his anger towards Kennedy...
I mentioned General Walker who deserved criticism because he was a racist, a retired General, ultra-right-wing, and who had, just a little time before had talked to students at the University of Mississippi who then got so agitated that they shot and killed some reporters.
In hindsight, I probably, may have given Lee Harvey Oswald the idea to go after General Walker. I certainly didn’t tell him to take the Law into his own hands. Not at all. He may also have thought of General Walker independently.
The first thing we should notice is Volkmar’s claim here that LHO was “obsessed with his anger towards Kennedy” at the time-period of this party, February 22, 1963. It clashes head-on with George DM’s final words in his 1976 manuscript; that LHO was an “admirer of Kennedy.”
Here Volkmar says only that, “I mentioned Walker,” as though casually, only in passing. He does not admit in this interview for PBS Frontline that he brazenly told LHO that General Walker was as bad as Adolf Hitler. He backs away from any such suggestion, saying, “I certainly didn’t tell him to take the Law into his own hands.”
Yet Volkmar gently suggests that he “may have given Lee Harvey Oswald the idea to go after General Walker.” Really? How? Volkmar doesn’t offer more in that snippet.
Volkmar says that General Walker, “just a little time before had talked to students at the University of Mississippi who then got so agitated that they shot and killed some reporters.” This is clearly about the Ole Miss riots of September 30, 1963.
But Volkmar says it happened “just a little time before.” Yet the end of September 1962 and the end of February 1963 are really five months apart. So why does Volkmar say, “just a little time before”? Volkmar is obviously connecting Walker’s Ole Miss riots of September 1962 and his conversation with LHO in February 1963. In that sense, indeed, it was “just a little time before.”
Volkmar worked for perhaps 2 hours, according to some accounts, to convert LHO from his obsession of anger at the Kennedy Administration over the Bay of Pigs, towards anger at General Walker. This is important for our purposes, because without even trying, Volkmar Schmidt marked the first date that LHO became obsessed with anger towards General Walker, namely, the date of Everett’s party – February 22, 1962.
Let’s dig in a bit more here. William Kelley interviewed Volkmar Schmidt in January 1995, and among other things, asks Volkmar about this party. Here’s what Volkmar Schmidt told William Kelley:
K: Can you relate to me how you first came to meet DeMohrenschildt and Oswald?
S: I met the DeMohrenschilt through some of the people who worked with me at the research lab [Magnolia, or Mobil Oil]…I think the fellow who got us in touch was Everett, Doctor Glover…Soon after I met them they arranged this dinner party at their place at which they invited Lee Harvey Oswald. That was the only time I met the Oswalds.
There’s a discrepancy there. The De Morhenschildt’s didn’t actually, “arrange this dinner party at their place” – on the contrary, they arranged it at Everett Glover’s place. Further, as Glover testified to the WC, that one of his roommates at the time was Volkmar Schmidt himself. So really, Everett, George, and Jeanne arranged a party at Everett’s and Volkmar’s apartment for all these young, Dallas oil engineers.
How could Volkmar forget that he met the Oswald’s specifically at his own apartment? Well – perhaps it is an error of his speaking English as a second language. Let’s give Volkmar the benefit of the doubt. Also, we can be confident that this was the same party because Volkmar emphasized, “That was the only time I met the Oswalds.” So there weren’t two parties in question. Let’s return to the interview.
K: You talked with him at length that night?
S: Yes, I spent about two solid hours with him.
K: What was your impression of him?
S: …A very disturbed man. A man desperate, spiritually, totally desperate. That’s why I talked with him, to try to get him back to sanity. His determination to leave an imprint in history was just incredible. The warning flags went right off for me that this man was ready to explode and do harm to himself and others…So anyway, I had been around people who were even more disturbed during my youth because I grew up in the house of a psychiatrist.
Let’s pause here for a couple of notes. Speaking of LHO, Volkmar says that he “spent two hours with him.” Two hours doing what? The clue comes in his final sentence: “I grew up in the house of a psychiatrist.” Well, that's something, but it’s clearly not enough to play the psychiatrist.
Yet Volkmar says of LHO, “I talked with him, to try to get him back to sanity.” Sanity? Was Volkmar a licensed psychologist? No! So, Volkmar was arrogant enough to presume to give LHO some free fake psychiatry! Volkmar wasn’t spending two hours with LHO in a friendly chat between equals, but trying “to get him back to sanity.”
Volkmar had the best of intentions because he saw in LHO, “A very disturbed man. A man desperate, spiritually, totally desperate.” Yet that’s a clergyman’s diagnosis, not a psychiatric diagnosis. As if his psychological skills were superb, Volkmar seized upon a further diagnosis, that LHO’s “determination to leave an imprint in history was just incredible.”
So, this was the only time that Volkmar ever saw LHO – at a party. At this party Volkmar sized up LHO’s personality, identified LHO’s key psychological problems, and proceeded to allegedly heal LHO right there in front of the whole party – for two entire hours. LHO was “disturbed,” and “desperate” with an “incredible” and pronounced “determination to live an imprint in history.” Volkmar felt a duty to heal right then and there.
Was LHO really such a desperate character? Well, Volkmar told William Kelley in 1995, “The warning flags went right off for me that this man was ready to explode and do harm to him[self] and others.” Well, that's the official justification for every psychiatrist to intervene with any patient -- this tendency to “do harm to himself and others.”
So, as an altruistic act, for the good of society, Volkmar acted. From this viewpoint, Volkmar was tampering. Other interpreters, more suspicious than we are, would accuse Volkmar of trying to “reprogram” LHO. Two hours is a long time to “work” on somebody. Anyway, let’s proceed.
K: Can you give me some more of your impressions of Oswald?
S: Oswald found out that if you really want to do something you can succeed in a lot of things, it just takes determination. That’s how he learned Russian, yes? It took incredible determination. And he pulled himself out of really low-class upbringing in Fort Worth, which was hell, so he was a bitter young man because of social injustice, which quite frankly existed in Texas especially…
Let’s pause. Volkmar seems to be admiring LHO at this point. LHO had determination – “incredible determination.” Just look at how LHO taught himself Russian. Wasn’t this admiration? LHO “pulled himself out of really low-class upbringing in Fort Worth, which was hell,” said Volkmar. This sounds like admiration. But Volkmar quickly took it all back. Instead, LHO “was a bitter young man because of social injustice.” So, in sum, LHO was bitter. Let’s proceed with Volkmar’s personality evaluation of LHO:
K: Can you give me some more of your impressions of Oswald?
S: …So, he was a nothing, who tried to make something out of himself. And he was looking, like many Americans, for notoriety. It was subconsciously, the only avenue to succeed. He would kill himself if he could leave a mark, and he left a terrible mark…Professor Kuetemeyer told me…to deal with people like this who are disturbed, you have to use empathy, be slightly over-zealous yourself to link up with them and that total insanity, towards reality.
Pause again. Volkmar isn’t admiring LHO anymore. LHO “was a nothing, who tried to make something out of himself.” Notice how Volkmar is no longer speaking of his impressions of February 22, 1963, but of LHO after the JFK Assassination. Volkmar says that LHO, “was looking, like many Americans, for notoriety.” This was why LHO later chose to shoot JFK, suggests Volkmar.
Volkmar returned to his pseudo-psychiatry, and spoke of LHO’s subconscious mind, “It was subconsciously, the only avenue to succeed.” Subconsciously? Volkmar evidently thought of himself as an expert. Volkmar was now certain about what motivated LHO to be the “Lone Nut” with JFK, as he says, “He would kill himself if he could leave a mark, and he left a terrible mark.” Volkmar continuously bounces back and forth between February 1963 and November 1963.
Furthermore, Volkmar discloses his authority in this impromptu psychoanalysis, and the specific technique that he was to use: “Professor Kuetemeyer told me…to deal with people like this who are disturbed, you have to use empathy…” Use empathy, Volkmar? Exactly how does one do that? Volkmar told William Kelley, “Be slightly over-zealous yourself to link up with them and that total insanity, towards reality.” Ah yes, link up with that “total insanity” in order to lead the patient back “towards reality.”
Volkmar wanted to convey confidence in his qualifications to heal the sick man, LHO, and in his justification for trying – because look how LHO behaved towards JFK ten months later! Volkmar could not stick with the question about his impressions of LHO on February 22, 1963. Anyway, let’s return to William Kelley’s interview of Volkmar:
K: You mentioned General Walker when you talked with Oswald?
S: …Yes…When I heard how hateful he was towards Kennedy and Cuba, which was kind of irrational, I tried to say, “Hey, there’s something much more real to be concerned about.” Because, I don’t know about Castro, but I do know about this Walker, he’s kind of a Nazi, yes? Not so bad as those Nazis in Germany…
Again, Volkmar repeats that LHO was “hateful” towards JFK and the US fiasco in Cuba known as the Bay of Pigs. Volkmar objects that this was “kind of irrational” – rather than reactionary in politics, he regarded it as “irrational” in psychology. He was not speaking of a difference in political opinion but was speaking of a mental case – an irrational person who was divorced from reality. So Volkmar chose to convey, “Hey, there’s something much more real to be concerned about.”
Volkmar treated LHO's rage against the Kennedy Administration as a delusion and stooped to bring LHO closer to "reality."
Also, at this point, Volkmar confesses that he did regard General Walker as “kind of a Nazi.” Then he pulled his punch in this interview, and he qualified that saying, “Not so bad as those Nazis in Germany.” That’s an important qualification here, because other accounts of this meeting between LHO and Volkmar Schmidt on February 22, 1963, maintain that Volkmar said that General Walker was as bad as Hitler. We’ll explore that in the weeks to come. For now, let’s return to William Kelley’s interview of Volkmar:
K: You mentioned General Walker when you talked with Oswald?
S: …Yes…I had specifically mentioned to Lee Harvey Oswald, that Walker had given a speech to the students at the Mississippi campus and those guys went off and killed a couple of journalists.
K: Yes, reporters died during those racial riots.
S: Absolutely, and here’s something that we have to protest, and think about it. But I said it has to be all constructive, yes? There was a racial problem, and you have to bring justice to the minorities.
Here we see that Volkmar is clearly referring to the Ole Miss racial riots of September 30, 1962, where two reporters were killed. Several eye-witnesses including Anglican cleric Duncan Gray, testified that General Walker had used radio and TV to invite “thousands” of protesters to Ole Miss University, and he had led the protestors in their violent melee. Back to William Kelley’s interview:
K: So, do you think your conversation with Oswald about Walker may have instigated him to take a pot shot at him?
S: Yes, he did, and naturally it was a terrible responsibility, and for years when I drove past the underpass I literally had to cry because, you know. But I exonerate myself completely because I had the best intent; I embraced Kennedy, and I certainly didn’t tell him to take a pot shot at him.
William Kelley asked the proper question here, but Volkmar answered in a confused manner. Kelley asked Volkmar if his conversation with LHO might have motivated LHO to take a pot-shot at General Walker. At first, Volkmar answered the question directly, “Yes, he did, and naturally it was a terrible responsibility.” Probably Volkmar meant to say something like, “Yes, LHO did shoot at General Walker, and naturally I, Volkmar, felt that my conversation with LHO that night was “a terrible responsibility.”
Suddenly, Volkmar shifted gears and alluded to the JFK Assassination, where JFK was shot so near the triple underpass railroad bridge at Dealey Plaza. But William Kelly’s question had nothing to do with the JFK Assassination. So, Volkmar flitted from one topic to a totally different topic. Perhaps Volkmar considered (as we do) that the two shootings were somehow related – but Volkmar didn’t explain that. Volkmar then returned to Kelley’s question about the Walker shooting.
Volkmar admitted his role as a “terrible responsibility” which he bore for years. However, Volkmar said “I exonerate myself completely.” That might be history’s prerogative and not Volkmar’s, although it is probably true that with regard to LHO and General Walker, our dear Volkmar “certainly didn’t tell him to take a pot shot at him.”
Yes, let us accept for the sake of argument here that Volkmar in all innocence and sincerity encouraged LHO to transfer his rage now toward General Walker without any intent or expectation that LHO would dive into action and try to kill Walker. Nevertheless, here are the facts we will explore in the weeks to come:
LHO wrote about General Walker only once in all of his writings up until February 22, 1963.
In all those writings, LHO expressed no hostility towards General Walker in the slightest.
However, on February 22, Volkmar noticed LHO expressing rage at the Kennedy Administration over the Bay of Pigs (April 17, 1961).
Volkmar chose to process LHO.
By the end of this “two hours” of mental processing, LHO was reportedly a changed man.
With this important sequence in mind we can finally propose a logical scenario regarding George DM and the hostile conversations about Walker that he shared with LHO. Those conversations began on February 22, 1963 -- the date of the party that George DM himself had arranged at the home of Everett Glover. George and Jeanne DM personally drove the Oswalds to that party, so it is probable that George DM brought LHO to that party deliberately to encounter Volkmar Schmidt. Let’s return to William Kelley’s interview:
K: I didn’t think you told him to do it, just because you were talking to him about it...
S: I may have triggered it. Actually, a few days after I talked with him, he bought his weapons.
This is an important sequence of events to bear in mind. Only days after this party, LHO would purchase a Manlicher-Carcano rifle from Klein’s Sporting Goods in Chicago, over US Mail. Even Volkmar Schmidt noticed this in the wake of the JFK Assassination. We regard this sequence as crucial for our understanding of LHO and his motives regarding his pot-shot at Walker on April 10, 1963.
Regards,
--Paul
Copyright (c) 2021 by Paul Trejo. All Rights Reserved.
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