Twelve of the accused had their say before the House Un-American Activities Committee in the Communist espionage investigation last week. When the week was over, the contradiction of stories was greater than ever.
Only two of the witnesses admitted that they knew dark-haired Elizabeth Bentley, the self-confessed Communist spy. (But none admitted knowing that she was a spy.) Many of the people named by Miss Bentley—either as co-spies or as purveyors of confidential Government information—admitted that they knew each other. Three also said that they had been visitors at a small, red brick house in suburban Chevy Chase.
That was the home of Russian-born Nathan Gregory Silvermaster, described by Miss Bentley as the kingpin of one Communist spy ring. There, Miss Bentley had testified, Mrs. Silvermaster and William Ludwig Ullman, an Air Forces major who lived with the Silvermasters, had photographed documents and other data which Miss Bentley carried to her Russian employers. Silvermaster had denied that he was a spy, but he refused to answer other pertinent questions on the ground that he might incriminate himself.
Powered Tools. Lauchlin Currie, onetime White House assistant, readily admitted that he had been entertained "several times" at Silvermaster's house. Once he had gone to the basement with Ullman, who showed his powered tools to Mr. Currie's son. He had seen no photographic equipment, he said.
When he took the witness stand, neat, small-shouldered Lauchlin Currie, a straightforward, earnest witness, was accompanied by his friend Dean Acheson, former Under Secretary of State. He made a categorical denial of ever having been a Communist or ever having given inside Government information to anybody not authorized to receive it.
He thought there was nothing odd about the fact that he knew several of the people accused by Elizabeth Bentley: George Silverman (a friend of his Harvard days), Victor Perlo, Harry White, Robert Talbot Miller III. Some were economists and he knew "literally hundreds of economists throughout the Government." One friend of Currie's who was no economist was Anatoli Gromov, onetime secretary of the Russian embassy. Miss Bentley testified last week that on one occasion Gromov had given her $2,000 for her information. Currie readily admitted knowing Gromov. "I met him at social occasions and was entertained at his house on one occasion. He made no effort to draw me out. The conversation was on cultural matters."
"A Charming Fellow." When round-faced Harry Dexter White, onetime Assistant Treasury Secretary, took the stand, more flat contradictions went into the record. He said that he did not know Elizabeth Bentley or Whittaker Chambers (TIME, Aug. 16). As to Chambers' story that he had pleaded with White to break away from the Communist party line: "Something I would remember very definitely would be if a gentleman met me and tried to convince me not to go into or not to leave a Communist ring. That I would have remembered. That I did not do."