I’m a fan of obituaries. Obituaries often provide a lot of food for thought, or at least tell you something about people who, let’s face it, are sometimes decent if flawed, and sometimes scumbags for whom there is no possible excuse.
Ruth Greenglass died recently. Who? The wife of David Greenglass, brother of Ethel Rosenberg, who was executed with her husband Julius in the electric chair in 1953. That just shows how young they all were.
David G. dictated the notes on the US nuclear programme for Julius Rosenberg to pass them on to the Soviet Union. That much is unchallenged. But who had typed up the notes at Greenglass’s dictation for them to be handed on to Rosenberg? His sister, or his wife? The prosecution’s case against Ethel Rosenberg, who had been repeatedly interviewed, was a flimsy one. Far more likely that Greenglass, who had already confessed to spying and agreed to testify against the Rosenbergs, would have employed his wife for the task. Indeed, he had consistently asserted his sister’s innocence under questioning.
But before the trial the prosecutors interviewed Mrs Greenglass again, reminding her that her husband had yet to be sentenced. At that point she “remembered” that in the autumn of 1945 it had been Ethel Rosenberg who had typed up the notes. Greenglass agreed that his wife had a very good memory and that her version of events that had taken place almost six years before was almost certainly the right one. The admission was to send his sister to the electric chair along with her husband. Ruth Greenglass agreed with this testimony, and Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were both executed on June 19, 1953.
Ruth Greenglass died recently, and her husband David is still alive. A New York Times reporter, Sam Roberts, conducted numerous interviews with Greenglass for his book The Brother: The Untold Story of the Rosenberg Case, which appeared in 2003. Greenglass acknowledged to Roberts that he was no longer sure of the truth of what he had said on the witness stand: “I frankly think that my wife did the typing, but I don’t remember. You know, I seldom use the word ‘sister’ any more. I’ve just wiped it out of my mind.”
How jolly convenient. You murdered your sister, and then you “seldom use the word any more”. Well, your wife’s now burning in hell, and you’ll join her soon, you scabby bastard.
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Julius was about 35 and Ethel was a little bit older at about 37 or 38.
I remember when little Gimlet Kamm dedicated a long posting to proving the correctness of the verdict. The problem was that Verona only proves Julius' guilt and says nothing about Ethel. The fact that she didn't have a Soviet code name speaks volumes to me.
As far as Julius is concerned, his KGB controller went on the record recently and said that nothing that Julius passed on helped the USSR in any way to develop their bomb.
There is still a lot here that can be used to bash the USA over the head with, but what I would like to see is Moscow award Julius the medal and honours that he clearly deserves.
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