The Human Side

When Trickfox, a Canadian scientist and fellow forum member requested some beta testers for an invention of his,  Mr. Twigsnapper asked Linda to bring me a test unit.  The Astrologer and I rendezvoused with her and Tractorman George at our local Chevron station. It was a brief but intense get acquainted meeting and I remember being struck by something she said as we nattered away in the back seat of the Prius: “You ought to see some of the pictures!”

I assumed she was talking about surveillance photos, but the significance of that statement didn't really click until I read  JD's reference to pictures “taken through the Keyhole,”  made  in one of his e-mails to the author of "Defying Gravity," (Once Linda decided to write her memoirs, someone, presumably JD, arranged for her to be handed a packet of printouts of their (JD and the author's) correspondence on the anniversary of her Dad's birthday in 2009, and I have read through most of it. ) Anyway, wonderful though reconnaissance satellites are, the need for boots on  the ground will always remain.

JD  and Mr. Twigsnapper represent the human side of the espionage world or HUMINT, as it is known.   Although I have seen photos of each of them, I imagine that I might be sitting in the same room with either one of them and not know who they were, unless they wanted to be known.


I have come to think that Mr. Twigsnapper, in particular, delights in making stealthy appearances.  Linda recently discovered him in the background of a photo taken at a Southern California horse show a few years before he introduced himself to her as Garrity.

My favorite photo of him was taken in Paris, very possibly by Jaques Bergier,  former member of the French Undergound and co-author of The Morning of the Magicians..  Linda's copy of the photo, given to her by Mr. Twigsnapper, has “99/020/562 3/18/56" hand-written in the top left corner. The first sequence was Bergier's underground code number, the second is the date the photo was taken. The snapshot may have been made on Townsend's fifty-first birthday, but it is clearly Mr. Twigsnapper's photo.   Yes, indeed he was a “dapper zing” as a dark-eyed French gypsy had called him but it is his air that captivates me.  He is a man at the top of his game and I fancy that he looks very proud of the young sailors surrounding him.  Something has just gone off very well for him and his gang.

Mr. Twigsnapper has said that this photo is somehow connected to “Buster Crabb's” mysterious disappearance the following month. (Thank you, Geoff and Kestrel for the above link.)  My interpretation of that event tells me that the headless, handless body in the wetsuit that washed ashore fourteen month's later was not Crabb's.  I believe the good Commander Crabb, by his own free will and voluntary actions, was taken aboard the Russian Ship, Ordzhonikidze, and back to Russia.  But as to why and how, and for what purpose or for how long, I have no idea.  Maybe someone will see fit to tell us one day.

This is one of those places where we as a research group throw a metaphorical flag down to mark the spot. It's a mystery that we have revisited often and will comb through many more times until we feel that we've either come to a dead end or a reasonable conclusion.  These oh-so-human aspects of the Townsend Brown story are what keep many of us digging away at it.