Regular Army Private First Class Dinkin was serving in Metz, France in the 599th Ordinance Group. He held a secret security clearance for his job in the crypto-section of his unit. Prior to enlisting he had attended the University of Chicago. He and his family had lived in Chicago. His studies at the university included psychology. His duties at Metz would have included deciphering cable traffic from the European Commands, NATO and so forth.In September, 1963, Dinkin noticed material in the Army newspaper, Stars and Stripes, and other print publications, that was negative toward the president and his policies and implied that he was a weak president in dealing with the Russians. The examples that he found became more negative, the suggestion being that if he were removed as president it would be a good thing. By mid-October Dinkin had found enough information—some of it subliminal—that he was convinced that a plot was in the works. One driven by some high ranking members of the military, some right-wing economic groups, and with support by some national media outlets.He did not tell his superior officers about this information—given that he believed that the military was involved. He did tell quite a few Army friends and some others that I will note shortly. This information probably got back to Army authorities because Dinkin was transferred to the Army Depot in Metz, France, where his duties did not require a secret clearance.Dinkin’s studies forced him to conclude that the plot would happen around November 28, 1963, and that the assassination would be blamed on “a Communist or a Negro”. He then sent a registered letter to Attorney General Robert Kennedy. When he got no reply, he decided on other options.
Agency cables of November 12 and 18 to CIA Director McCone should have made him interested in getting more knowledge about Dinkin or, at the minimum, alerting the Secret Service about Dinkin’s information. Neither Director McCone nor anyone from the CIA passed this knowledge on to the President or the Secret Service in time to foil the plot. The CIA and the FBI had at least 2 weeks, from November 8 to 22, to warn the Secret Service and the President. They did not do so. On November 13, 1963, after he had returned to base in Metz, Dinkin was confined to the “Psych Ward” where, on the evening of November 22nd, he was questioned by a Secret Service agent and asked if the plot was from the left or right. Dinkin said that it was “from the right”.On December 5, 1963, Dinkin was sent to Walter Reed Hospital. There he underwent numerous psychiatric tests. He told the FBI that he was aware that the Army psychiatrist had declared him to be “psychotic” and “paranoiac”. Dinkin was at Walter Reed for 4 months. There he was given extensive therapy, including being asked to record lists of words. Dinkin had been recently discharged from the Army prior to an interview by the FBI on April 1, 1964.The FBI interviewed Dinkin in Chicago on April 1, 1964. He told them that he had been discharged from the Army. He then related the details about his pre-knowledge of the assassination. He told the agents that he first became aware of the plot to assassinate President Kennedy in September, 1963. At that point Dinkin felt that he did not have enough facts to support his view, but by October he believed he had enough information to substantiate his theory.So, on October 16, 1963, he wrote a letter to Attorney General Robert Kennedy setting forth his information, and signed the letter with his own name. He got a friend to send the registered letter because Eugene thought the letter might be intercepted if he showed his own name and address on the envelope. In the letter he requested that he be interviewed by a representative from the Justice Department. (He got no response, but since we know that Asst. Attorney General Herbert Miller answered Mrs. J. Dinkin’s letter to Attorney General Bobby Kennedy, it is likely that Miller intercepted this letter as well.) Dinkin informed the agents who interviewed him that he had told a number of people about his research. He listed the following individuals as having heard the plot details prior to November 22, 1963: PFC Dennis DeWitt, PFC Larry Pullen, Sergeant Walter Reynolds , a Dr. Afar, an Army psychology teacher at Metz, and R. Thomas, a student attending Friebourg University in Switzerland.After Dinkin returned from his leave to Switzerland and Germany on November 8, he was placed in detention until November 13. While there, Dinkin was contacted by a white male who identified himself verbally as a representative of the Defense Department. This individual asked Dinkin for the location of the material that he had compiled as proof of his prediction of the assassination of President Kennedy. He added that he desired to obtain these proofs and furnish Dinkin a receipt for the papers. Eugene told the FBI agents that he instructed the man where the papers were located at the base, at which time the man left. This was prior to the assassination.Dinkin stated that upon his release from custody, he discovered that all of his notes were missing. He presumed that the individual mentioned previously had taken them. Dinkin never received a receipt for his papers. Dinkin reasserted to the FBI agents that he believed that there had been a plot perpetrated by a “military group,” and abetted by newspaper personnel working with the group that plotted to assassinate President Kennedy.After November 13, 1963, Dinkin was taken to Landstuhl Hospital in Germany for a psychological evaluation, and was subsequently transferred to Walter Reed Naval Hospital, where he remained for four months until he was discharged. At this point in April, 1964, Dinkin had given the FBI agents enough information for them to verify his story. They could have interviewed the individuals with whom Eugene had consulted about his assassination information. Additionally, the FBI could have interviewed the white male from the Defense Department. The FBI could have easily identified him because the CID detention center at Metz would have kept a visitor log and no one would have been able to visit a prisoner without signing in and showing identification.So far in my ongoing research, I have found no indication that the FBI did anything that was called for to either corroborate Dinkin’s story or refute it. Hopefully when more materials are released in a few days to the National Archives at College Park, Maryland, we will get a complete picture of the Dinkin saga.Dinkin filed a civil suit in New York against the Army and others. Writer Dick Russell references that action in his book as Civil Action No. 75C 1015 U.S. District Court for Eastern District of New York. There is no information in the record of which I am aware that has indicated that Dinkin was contacted by the Warren Commission, despite their having been made aware of him by the FBI. Also, there is no record that the Secret Service or the Justice Department contacted him for detailed interviews, even though these agencies knew of Dinkin while the investigation of the assassination was ongoing.
Let's start with the story of Eugene B. Dinkin...https://www.kennedysandking.com/john-f-kennedy-articles/eugene-dinkin-the-saga-of-an-unsung-hero
Dinkin’s story…
Nice try but declassified docs corroborate parts of the Dinkin story. Some details remain sketchy but broadly, the story is true.
What parts of the story are supposedly corroborated?
Great Post, Jon,Some "ordinary" men have extra ordinary perception.... Eugene Dinkin was apparently one of those gifted individuals. The high ranking officers in the military apparently were passing messages in Stars & Stripes and Dinkin honed in on the plot. Unfortunately they had the power to shut him up by making him appear to be a "psycho "
Dinkin was a military cryptographer and there's speculation that he learned of the plot from intercepting the communications of French Intelligence:Private First Class Eugene Dinkin was a cryptographic code operator stationed in Metz, France. On November 4, 1963 he went AWOL from his unit, and entered Switzerland using forged travel orders and a false Army identification card. On November 6, he appeared in the Press Room of the United Nations in Geneva and told reporters he was being persecuted. He also told reporters that "they" were plotting against President Kennedy and that "something" would happen in Dallas. After Kennedy was murdered, a friend of Dinkin's named Dennis De Witt told military authorities that Dinkin had predicted Kennedy's assassination for November 28, and later changed the date to November 22.Dinkin was arrested on November 13 and placed in a psychiatric hospital, and latered transferred to Walter Reed, where he underwent various psychological tests before eventually being released. His allegation reached the White House on November 29, and went to the Warren Commission in April of 1964.Retellings of the Dinkin story typically note his status as a crypto operator, and speculate that he may have learned of an assassination plot decrypting military communications, perhaps between military plotters and Marseilles assassins. But the FBI reports on Dinkin, including interviews with him conducted in April 1964, state that the allegations came about from Dinkin's study of military publications such as Stars and Stripes. Dinkin told the FBI that it was his study of "psychological sets" which revealed to him both an anti-Kennedy bias as well as a military plot in the works. How we could divine the latter, and in particular attach dates and places for the upcoming murder, is hard to imagine.One explanation would be that Dinkin indeed learned about a plot through his crypto assignment, and that something about his confinement at Walter Reed led him to suppress this in favor of the story the FBI reported. An opposing view would of course be that he was a paranoid individual who happened to make a lucky guess.One method of determining the truth would have been to interview his military associates to see what he told them about where his ideas came from, including those named by Dinkinin his FBI interviews: PFC Dennis De Witt, PFC Larry Pulles, Sgt. Walter Reynolds, and R. Thomas. The FBI, after taking these names, does not appear to have followed up on them. The Warren Commission took no interest in the matter, and indeed omitted any mention of Dinkin from its purportedly encyclopedic 26 volumes of evidence.https://www.maryferrell.org/pages/Allegations_of_PFC_Eugene_Dinkin.html
