Mr. DE MOHRENSCHILDT. Very aggressive fellow.
Mr. JENNER. Is he aggressive politically?
Mr. DE MOHRENSCHILDT. Likes to discuss it, but I don't know whether
he has any actual political--I mean whether he actually works to have
Goldwater elected. But he likes him and freely expresses his admiration
for him.
I don't think he is too much of a boy to go around and try to collect
votes for Goldwater. He is too much concentrated on himself.
Mr. JENNER. Does it refresh your recollection that you and your wife,
Wynne Sharples, were married on the 7th of April 1951?
Mr. DE MOHRENSCHILDT. That is probably it, yes.
Mr. JENNER. And you were divorced almost exactly 5 years later, in
April 1956?
Mr. DE MOHRENSCHILDT. Yes, that is correct--5 years. I have the date
clearly in my mind.
Mr. JENNER. By the way, let me ask you this at the moment: Are you a
drinker?
Mr. DE MOHRENSCHILDT. Occasionally, but not too much.
Mr. JENNER. This will be all right to state to you on the record. Of
all the people interviewed, everybody said that you were, if anything,
a purely social drinker, they had never seen you intoxicated or close
to it.
Mr. DE MOHRENSCHILDT. It is not true, because I have been drunk many
times--not every day, but many, many times. Not under the table, but I
have drunk more than I should.
Mr. JENNER. You said your son, Sergei, had died in 1960.
Mr. DE MOHRENSCHILDT. Yes, in August 1960.
Mr. JENNER. You are sure of that--rather than 1961?
Mr. DE MOHRENSCHILDT. 1960--I am pretty sure.
Mr. JENNER. Well, what I have might be a misprint.
Mr. DE MOHRENSCHILDT. My wife will tell you. I am not very good at
dates.
But I think it is 1960.
Mr. JENNER. You are very good on names, though.
Mr. DE MOHRENSCHILDT. Yes, I remember names. Dates I am very poor at.
That death, you know, put me in such a terrible condition of despair,
that I decided, and I asked my wife to go with me on a trip throughout
all of Mexico and Central America, to get away from everything, and
to do some hard physical exercise. At the same time I thought I would
review the geology of Mexico and Guatemala. And it was an old dream of
mine to make a trip like that, but not in such rough conditions as we
did it.
Mr. JENNER. I am going to get into that.
Mr. DE MOHRENSCHILDT. If you are interested, go ahead.
Mr. JENNER. I am just trying to recall where we were when I interrupted
myself.
At this point, tell me your political philosophies.
Mr. DE MOHRENSCHILDT. My political philosophy is live and let live. I
voted Republican, but--I am just not interested in politics.
Mr. JENNER. I am not thinking of politics in that sense, Mr. De
Mohrenschildt, I am thinking in politics with a capital P.
Mr. DE MOHRENSCHILDT. Well, I think I am a 100 percent democrat,
because I believe in freedom.
Mr. JENNER. Are you talking about individual freedom now?
Mr. DE MOHRENSCHILDT. Individual freedom. And I believe in freedom
of expressing myself when I feel like it. I believe in freedom of
criticizing something which I think is not democratic.
Mr. JENNER. What is your attitude towards communism?
Mr. DE MOHRENSCHILDT. Towards communism, I wouldn't like to live in a
Communist regime, I am not a Communist, never have been one. But if
somebody likes it, let them have it. And I get along very well with
fellow workers who are Communists. For instance, in Yugoslavia, I
got along very well with them. Of course, we didn't discuss politics
very much out there. On the contrary, you have to stay away from that
subject. But I consider the other person's point of view.
If somebody is a Communist, let them be a Communist. That is his
business.