Pride & Prejudice

Sirs:

It is indeed good to find that TIME does not feel obliged to bay with the rest of the editorial pack where Charles de Gaulle and the French Committee of National Liberation are concerned. Judging by what I have recently heard and read, most people cannot see anything of the essential justice of the Fighting French cause, but are completely obsessed with the intractable, choleric, and tactless soldier who heads the Provisional Government of the French Republic. . . .

Such persons, feeling that the French are being wickedly ungrateful for our aid and for the superior wisdom of Americans in French affairs, make no allowance for the four heartbreaking years of unwarranted rebuffs and slights endured by De Gaulle and his followers. They would make of France Resistant another quasi-Ally, like Italy, complete with AMG and ex-Fascist mayors converted from Fascism to Democracy since June 6. When the French punish such Vichyites as they can catch, the charge is made that the "Gaullists" are purging the "opposition" and intend to rivet a Gaullist dictatorship on France. If other Allied governments punished their traitors so, they would be praised for bringing "war criminals" to book. . . .

The worst effect of all this clashing of wills and systems is not, it seems to me, that the enemy may take brief comfort in the spectacle, but that future relations between America and Britain and restored France may be permanently injured, and that France will seek comfort from Russia for the unreasoning and insulting attitude taken by her Western Allies. However foolish it may seem to us, France can and will take offense at America's patronizingly superior attitude toward a proud and unhumbled people. . . .

WALTER CHARLES UTT Alameda, Calif.

Extra-Special

Sirs:

Thanks for the extra-special airmail service on the "Invasion" issue. I've heard quite a few fellows comment with something such as, "Damned nice of them, huh?" Certainly such extra services as these constitute one of the factors of TIME'S success formula.

WADE H. WIGINGTON JR. Captain, A.A.F. c/o Postmaster Seattle, Wash.

Proud "Kept Man" Sirs: I liked your story (TIME, June 26) dealing with the President's Great Blueprint for the brave new world. You were quite right in saying that my denunciation of Mr. Roosevelt's Magna Carta for permanent peace was loud, and it will be louder as time goes on.

But why do you invariably add "bridge expert" to "Ely Culbertson?" When will your editorships decide to give me a teeny-weeny diploma promoting me to even a half-expert on international affairs ? And what have world affairs to do with the well-known fact that I am a bridge expert? After all, the greatest peace plan on earth or in heaven came from a Carpenter. . . .

Mind you, I am proud and grateful to be a bridge expert. Spinoza used to grind lenses to earn a living, and I prefer to grind bids and plays. Bridge, as you know, is not only my hobby but my bread and butter, as well.

It is thanks to millions of bridge players who support me far beyond my deserts that I was able to create a new system for World Peace which, by the way, is neither mathematical nor rigid, as you seem to think. I am proud to be the kept man of ten million American women. But a game of bridge is one thing and a bridge into the future is quite another.

ELY CULBERTSON New York City

P: TIME will continue to give Bridge Expert Culbertson's avocation serious attention.--ED.

Gieseking

Sirs:

In TIME (June 19) you include Walter Gieseking among other artists who are allegedly friends of the Nazis and who now stand in fear of reprisal. The facts in his case, with which I am fully familiar by reason of my being manager of all his American tours for 15 years, completely negate the implication in your article.

Mr. Gieseking never has been active in politics or political events. Of my knowledge I can say that although a citizen of Germany, born in France, he has been singularly free of any Nazi taint. In fact, he has been living in Switzerland, having gone there shortly after the war started. He is completely without guile or prejudice. He is devoted to his family and his music and such things as a valuable collection of butterflies. It is unfair for any American publication to create any different impression and I am sure that you would not want a reputable publication like TIME Magazine to create an erroneous impression, based upon misinformation.

CHARLES L. WAGNER

New York City

P: TIME did not imply that great Pianist Gieseking is a Nazi sympathizer, simply suggested that he and other musicians mentioned may suffer because of their Nazi and Fascist associations.--ED.

Advance Agents?

Sirs:

The cheering effect of the invasion news at this East Coast Army Camp was dispelled for me by the news later in the day that we are losing the first battle of what has already materialized in the German mind as the next war.

We received a number of German prisoners of war during the day, the first group at this post. I heard the first reaction to them from a chaplain. . . . "Really," he said, "I don't believe they have been too deeply affected by Naziism; I found most of them to be deeply religious."

Then I spoke with an M.P. who had escorted them into camp. "They're a nice gang of fellows," he said. ". . . Seeing them face-to-face like this, they seem like any of us."

Finally a non-com had a look at them and came away with his heart brimming over with good will. "They were telling us," he said, "that you must learn to distinguish between National Socialism and Hitlerism. They say that National Socialism is a good thing, especially for Germany, but that to their regret as well as to anyone's, Hitlerism has perverted it."

Can it be that Germany has delivered over a crew of advance agents to us?

(SERVICEMAN'S NAME WITHHELD)

(Address withheld)

Pacific Club Sirs: I read with interest your mention of the Pacific Club in Noumea and of its handsome dividends [TIME, June 19]. ... As soon as the Club's "long bar" and "one-armed ban dits" showed sufficient return, members were informed that their original investments would be refunded with no handsome dividends. Who got those negotiable and liquid dividends? . . .

R. M. H. BERG Lieutenant, U.S.N.R. Norfolk, Va.

P: I The American Red Cross and Army-Navy Relief.--ED.

"Honorable Boneheads"

Sirs:

After enjoying Caryl Weinberg's letter (TIME, May 1) on "Tokyo Rose" we heard "Tokyo Ann" mention it in her broadcast. It's true, their recordings are good, and they do hit close to home. But to us in the Aleutians it's a morale booster! . . .

"Our Little Enemy Ann" (as she calls herself) gets off some humor at times. We all get a kick out of the way she refers to us as "Honorable Boneheads. . . ."

So it is a fact that "Tokyo Rose" and "Little Orphan Annie" play a good part in raising our morale here in the Aleutians. Here's hoping we can pay them a visit soon.

J. HOWES, U.S.N.R. c/o Postmaster San Francisco

"He Stayed with Us"

Sirs:

Your elevating effusion on Chaplain Hoffmann (TIME, June 19) strikes up paeans of praise within the hearts of all the doughboys of the 133rd Infantry, with whom he served.

Hoffmann was a ist lieutenant in our outfit. During the flaming fight for Fondouk Pass, the Division chaplain came down, offered Hoffmann the post of assistant Division chaplain. This would bring him a step-up in rank, and there wasn't so much ducking German 88s. Father Hoffmann's rejoinder was that he was interested not a whit in rank, that his place was with the boys of the ist Battalion. He stayed with us. Wherever the going was toughest on the front line, you'd see Hoffmann strolling along with a shovel. With this he'd scoop out a little depression and then get horizontal for a few minutes beside some G.I. Having spoken, he'd move on.

Were Hoffmann in this vicinity, here's one Methodist who'd join his parish.

HORACE F. WULF Lieut. Colonel, Infantry Fort Benning, Ga.

Poke Pincher

Sirs:

Fie on TIME (June 12) for libeling a lady, and making a killer out of her. Dangerous Dan McGrew was "pitched on his head, and pumped full of lead" by the man from the creeks. The lady that's known as Lou pinched several pokes, but pulled no triggers.

JAMES G. HAMILTON

Lieutenant Venice, Fla.

P: Right. No pistol packer, she.--ED.

TIME v. the Axis

Sirs:

Congratulations. Today an enemy propaganda broadcast, Jap or German, I don't know which, came on the air in a typical Axis tirade against, of all things, TIME Magazine. Here is a report, as accurately as I can remember it:

"TIME is a magazine run by Jewish influence, printing dirty, malicious stories. It uses the Winchell type of news reporting, printing lies about everything and anything."

They also attacked John Scott [TIME'S Stockholm correspondent], going into detail as to his antecedents, Scotch-Irish they said, but suddenly, before you know what's happened, his real name is revealed as "Isadore Kaplan," just as surely as President Roosevelt's name is "Rosenfelt." And of course, since he is a Jew, what else could be expected of him, but that he write typically Jewish lies to be printed by your Jewish-controlled magazine. . . .

Please keep on printing this "cheap, dirty, rotten, American propaganda." We American soldiers here in India like it.

(CPL.) SOL FRIEDMAN c/o Postmaster New York City

Flea Bark

Sirs:

In TIME (June 19) you quote me as saying, "The good darkies of the South should remember that, at the best, Eleanor [Roosevelt] will be boss of the U.S. a limited time, while the good white people of the South will be here forever. . . ." But you failed to finish the quotation from my editorial, "Good white people and good darkies have lived harmoniously together for hundreds of years, and will continue to do so if they are let alone by Northern people who know not the problems of the South."

Your omission of the last sentence seriously impairs the sense of what I said. I realize, of course, that my writing a protest to you is like a flea barking at an elephant. . . .

W. W. WHITAKER

Editor

The Grenada County Weekly Grenada, Miss.

Jefferson's Debt

Sirs:

In TIME (May 22) there appears an article mentioning a letter of Thomas Jefferson's in which he asks for a time extension on a loan. You state that this letter was "found last week in a Virginia mountain cabin." This could not possibly be true because the original of this letter has been in our possession for at least two generations.

We have heard of many people who have claimed that they have come across the original of this letter in their belongings. The explanation of this is that in 1936 a well known bank in Richmond had a printing firm reproduce this letter in such a form as to make it appear as if it were an original old manuscript. . . . These aged-looking copies were then sent by this bank to their customers in order to promote a loan plan. . . . The copies were so well done that they could fool an inexperienced observer. . . . This bank did not have permission from us to use this letter commercially. . . .

J. LYNN COCHRAN

Staunton, Va.

P: Reader Cochran should get in touch with Robert Livingston Bailey, of the Civil Service Commission, Washington, B.C., who swears that he, too, has the original letter in question. It is not, he says, one of the Morris Plan Bank of Virginia's reproductions.--ED.

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