Memorandum for the Record, "Suicide of Frank Olson [deleted], Army Civilian Employee, Camp Dietrich", 30 November 1953

1953-11-30 · 3 source pages

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Publisher annotations

Commentary by The Declassified Collection, separate from the original source.

Source PDF page 1 · 2 notes

Camp Dietrich

The file's own spelling of Camp Detrick, the Army's biological warfare establishment at Frederick, Maryland. Both spellings appear across these records; the Army's is Detrick.

Dr. Gibbons

Gibbons appears again alongside Drum and Gottlieb in the February 1954 routing slip. It tells Helms to have them read the Director's letters and return them for an Eyes Only file (Memorandum, "Unwitting Application of LSD", with letters to Col. James H. Drum, 10 February 1954 — source PDF page 1), connecting this first report to the later internal response.

Source PDF page 2 · 2 notes

pay station

A public telephone. Lashbrook telephoned Gottlieb from one in the Statler after the fall, before returning to a room.

identifying data

This first memorandum records the police taking identifying details. In the later Security report, Lashbrook says he identified himself to them as a Defense Department employee, while naming the Agency contacts to its own investigator (Frank R. Olson — CIA compilation — source PDF page 19). The two audiences received different levels of information.

Source PDF page 3 · 1 notes

the drug

LSD, named in paragraph 11 of the preceding leaf. Edwards records Gottlieb's account of the drug being placed in Cointreau; the Church Committee later sets out the unwitting dosing in Part III.