George de Mohrenschildt

George Sergius de Mohrenschildt ( ru , Георгий Сергеевич де Мореншильд; April 17, 1911 – March 29, 1977) was an American petroleum geologist, professor, and known CIA informant. De Mohrenschildt is best known for having befriended Lee Harvey Oswald in the summer of 1962. De Mohrenschildt later alleged that their friendship continued until Oswald's death two days after the assassination of U.S. president John F. Kennedy. In actuality, De Mohrenschildt never saw Oswald, or wrote to him, after April 13, 1963—three days after Oswald's alleged attempt on the life of General Edwin Walker.

De Mohrenschildt's testimony before the Warren Commission investigating the assassination was one of the longest of any witness.

Life

Early life

De Mohrenschildt was born as Jerzy Sergius von Mohrenschildt in Mozyr, in the Russian Empire, now in Belarus, on April 4 in the old-style Russian Julian calendar.Warren Commission Hearings, volume 9, p. 168
Testimony of George S. de Mohrenschildt
He had an older brother, Dimitri. His aristocratic father, Sergey Alexandrovich von Mohrenschildt, was of Baltic German, Swedish, and Russian descent. De Mohrenschildt's mother, Alexandra, was of aristocratic Polish, Russian, and Hungarian descent.

Sergey von Mohrenschildt was described by his son as the Marshal of Nobility of the Minsk Governorate from 1913-1917, and a civil rank of Actual Civil Councilor corresponding to Major General. In 1920, during the Russian Civil War, Sergey von Mohrenschildt was arrested by the Bolsheviks for anti-Soviet agitation. He was sentenced to exile for life in Veliky Ustyug, a town in the north of Russia. De Mohrenschildt later testified to the Warren Commission that, while awaiting transport to Veliky Ustyug, his father became ill. Two Belarusian Jewish doctors who treated him in jail advised him to stop eating so he would appear more sickly. The doctors then told the Soviet government that Sergey was too ill to survive the trip to Veliky Ustyug and he should be allowed to recover at home. The Soviet Government agreed, under the condition that Sergey check in weekly until he was well enough to be sent to Veliky Ustyug. After his release, Sergey, his wife and the young de Mohrenschildt then fled to the Second Polish Republic in a hay wagon (de Mohrenschildt's older brother Dimitri, who was awaiting execution, was later repatriated to Poland as part of a prisoner exchange). During their journey, de Mohrenschildt, his father and mother Alexandra contracted typhoid fever. Alexandra died of the disease shortly after the family crossed into Poland.

After the death of his mother, de Mohrenschildt and his father made their way to Wilno, where the family owned a six-acre estate. De Mohrenschildt graduated from the Wilno gymnasium in 1929 and later graduated from the Polish Cavalry Academy in 1931. He went on to earn a master's degree at the Institute of Higher Commercial Studies. Having completed a dissertation on the economic influence of the U.S. on Latin America, he received a doctor of science degree in international commerce from the University of Liège in Belgium in 1938.

George von Mohrenschildt emigrated to the United States in May 1938, after which he legally changed the nobiliary particle in his name from the Germanic "von" to the French "de". According to de Mohrenschildt, he gathered information about people involved in pro-Nazi activities, such as those bidding for US oil leases on behalf of Nazi Germany before the US became involved in World War II. De Mohrenschildt testified that a further purpose of his data collection was to help the French outbid the Germans.

De Mohrenschildt spent the summer of 1938 with his older brother Dimitri von Mohrenschildt on Long Island, New York. Like George, Dimitri was a staunch anti-communist, but was also an agent of General William J. Donovan's OSS and, during the Cold War, one of the founders of Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty.

While in New York, de Mohrenschildt became acquainted with the Bouvier family, including the young Jacqueline Bouvier, the future First Lady of the United States. Jacqueline grew up calling de Mohrenschildt "Uncle George" and would sit on his knee. He became a close friend of Jacqueline's aunt Edith Bouvier Beale.

De Mohrenschildt dabbled in the insurance business from 1939 to 1941, but failed his broker's examination. In 1941, he became associated with Film Facts in New York, a production company owned by his cousin, Berend Maydell, also known as Baron Maydell (or Count Maydell) who allegedly had pro-Nazi sympathies. (De Mohrenschildt denied any Nazi sympathies of his own and claimed to have helped raise money in America for the Polish resistance.) For this reason, De Mohrenschildt made a documentary film about resistance fighters in Poland. According to a memo by former CIA director Richard Helms, de Mohrenschildt "was alleged to be a Nazi espionage agent."

In 1942, de Mohrenschildt married an American teenager named Dorothy Pierson. They had a daughter, Alexandra (known as Alexis) and divorced in early 1944. In 1945, de Mohrenschildt received a master's degree in petroleum geology from the University of Texas.

Dallas, Oswald and Haiti

After the end of World War II, de Mohrenschildt moved to Venezuela, where he worked for Pantepec Oil, a company owned by the family of William F. Buckley Sr.Baker 2009 p. 75 In 1947, he married Phyllis Washington, the daughter of a diplomat with the State Department. They divorced in 1949. That same year, de Mohrenschildt became a naturalized U.S. citizen. In 1950, he launched an oil investment firm with his step-nephew Edward Hooker, with offices in New York City, Denver, and Abilene. In 1951, de Mohrenschildt's third marriage was to the physician Wynne "Didi" Sharples. The following year, the couple settled in Dallas, Texas, where de Mohrenschildt took a job with oilman Clint Murchison as a petroleum geologist. De Mohrenschildt and his third wife had two children, a son and a daughter, both of whom were born with cystic fibrosis (the couple's son died of the disease in 1960, as did their daughter in 1973).Bugliosi 2007 pp. 657-658 De Mohrenschildt and Sharples were divorced in 1957.

De Mohrenschildt joined the Dallas Petroleum Club, was a member of the Dallas Council on World Affairs, and taught at a local college. One of his longtime friends, offshore oil engineer George Kitchel, told the FBI that de Mohrenschildt counted among his good friends oil barons Clint Murchison, H.L. Hunt, John W. Mecom Sr., and Sid Richardson. De Mohrenschildt also joined the right-wing Texas Crusade for Freedom, whose members included Earle Cabell, Everette DeGolyer, David Harold Byrd and Ted Dealey.

In 1957, de Mohrenschildt went to Communist Yugoslavia to conduct a geological field survey for the U.S. State Department-sponsored International Cooperation Administration. While in Yugoslavia, he was accused by the authorities there of making drawings of military fortifications. After returning to the United States, de Mohrenschildt was debriefed by the CIA, both in Washington and in Dallas.

Following his divorce in 1957, de Mohrenschildt married his fourth wife, former dancer, model, and fellow Russian-American Jeanne LeGon, in June 1959. LeGon (née Eugenia Fomenko) was the daughter of a director of the Chinese Far East Railway who was later killed by communists. From late 1960 and into 1961, he and his wife toured Central America and the Caribbean. His "walking trip" through Central America was made to recover from the grief of losing his only son in 1960 to cystic fibrosis. However, de Mohrenschildt also submitted a written report of his trip to the U.S. State Department, and a photograph taken during the trip shows him meeting the American ambassador to Costa Rica.

Lee Harvey Oswald and his Russian-born wife Marina Oswald were introduced to de Mohrenschildt in the summer of 1962 in Fort Worth, Texas. De Mohrenschildt testified before the Warren Commission in 1964 that he met the Oswalds through a prominent member of Fort Worth's Russian-American community, oil accountant George Bouhe. When de Mohrenschildt asked whether it was safe to help Oswald, Bouhe said that he had checked with the FBI. De Mohrenschildt also believed that he had discussed Oswald with Max Clark, whom he believed worked for the FBI, and with J. Walton Moore, whom de Mohrenschildt described as "a Government man — either FBI or Central Intelligence",George de Mohrenschildt
House Select Committee on Assassinations - Appendix to Hearings, Volume 12, 4, p. 54. and who had debriefed de Mohrenschildt several times following his travels abroad, starting in 1957. (According to a declassified CIA document, obtained by the House Select Committee on Assassinations, de Mohrenschildt was in fact correct and J. Walton Moore was an agent of the CIA's Domestic Contacts Division in Dallas.) De Mohrenschildt asserted that, shortly after meeting Oswald, he had asked Moore and Fort Worth attorney Max E. Clark about Oswald to reassure himself that it was "safe" to assist Oswald. De Mohrenschildt testified that one of the persons with whom he had discussed Oswald told him that Oswald "seems to be OK," and that "he is a harmless lunatic." However, he was no longer sure who had told him that. (When interviewed in 1978 by the House Select Committee on Assassinations, J. Walton Moore said that while he "had 'periodic' contact with de Mohrenschildt", he had no recollection of any conversation with him concerning Oswald. During this period, tens of thousands of American citizens were routinely debriefed by the CIA after traveling to communist countries such as Yugoslavia, as de Mohrenschildt was.) After returning home from a weekend trip to Houston, de Mohrenschildt became aware that someone had broken into his home and copied his personal papers and other documents. At the time, he also had a manuscript that Oswald had given him to read, and realized that the document might also have been photocopied in the search. His primary concern was that the CIA was behind the break-in. According to de Mohrenschildt, Moore flatly denied when confronted that the CIA was involved in any way. Epstein, Edward Jay. ''The Assassination Chronicles: Inquest, Counterplot, and Legend'' (New York: Carroll & Graf, 1992), p. 559.

In October 1962, Oswald informed de Mohrenschildt that he had lost his job in nearby Fort Worth. In response, de Mohrenschildt advised Oswald that he would have a better chance of finding work in Dallas. Oswald was soon hired by the Dallas photographic firm of Jaggars-Chiles-Stovall. De Mohrenschildt's wife and daughter would later say that it had been he who had secured the job at Jaggars-Chiles-Stovall for Oswald.

On April 14, 1963, de Mohrenschildt and his wife Jeanne visited the Oswalds' Dallas apartment. As Marina was showing Jeanne around the apartment, they discovered Oswald's rifle leaning against the wall inside a closet. Jeanne told George that Oswald had a rifle, and George joked to Oswald, "Were you the one who took a pot-shot at General Walker?" (General Edwin Walker was an ultra-conservative politician whom de Mohrenschildt "knew that Oswald disliked.") When later asked by the Warren Commission about Oswald's reaction to his joke, de Mohrenschildt said that Oswald "smiled at that". In an interview with Edward Jay Epstein, de Mohrenschildt claimed to have told the CIA that he believed Oswald had attempted to murder General Walker. "I spoke to the CIA both before and afterwards. It was what ruined me." The Warren Commission concluded that on April 10, 1963, Oswald had attempted to kill General Walker.

In June 1963, de Mohrenschildt moved to Haiti. He never saw Oswald again.

After Kennedy was assassinated on November 22, 1963, de Mohrenschildt testified before the Warren Commission in April 1964. According to Colonel L. Fletcher Prouty, then chief Pentagon-to-CIA liaison officer, de Mohrenschildt also had several private lunches with former CIA director and Warren Commission member Allen Dulles while testifying. In November 1966, de Mohrenschildt left Haiti and returned to Dallas. During 1967, Orleans Parish