Times are estimates
from this work-in-progress timeline
of Nov 18.
0:00 Jim Jones (47): How very much
I've loved you. How very much I’ve tried my best to give you the
good life. (Applause) But in spite of all of I've tried a handful
of our people, with their lies, have made our life impossible.
(Baby cries) There’s no way to detach ourselves from what’s
happened today. Crowd: That's right!
Jones: And
that’s not so unfamiliar to us either – if we, even if we were
Judeo-Christian – if we weren’t Communists. [JJ knows that
many of his followers have lingering belief in the God of
Christianity, so cites a Bible verse to justify his violence.]
The world -- "the kingdom suffers violence, and the violent
shall take it by force." [Mat
11:12] If we can’t live in peace, then let’s die
in peace. (Applause) We’ve been so betrayed. We have been
so terribly betrayed. But we tried and as Jack
Beam [54y, joined PT in 1954] often said, I don't
know where he's at right this moment, where's Jack? He
said "if this only worked one day it was worthwhile." (Applause)
(Recording pause)
Jones: Thank
you.
(Recording pause)
Jones: --
what’s going to happen here in a matter of a few minutes is that
one of those people on that plane is going to shoot the pilot. [Assassin
Larry Layton joined the defectors when it wasn't realized
there was going to be an additional plane.] I know that. I
didn’t plan it, but I know it’s going to happen. They’re gonna
shoot that pilot and down comes that plane into the jungle. And
we had better not have any of our children left when it’s over
because they’ll parachute in here on us. (Baby babbles) I’m
telling you just as plain as I know how to tell you. I’ve never
lied to you. (Acclamation) I never have lied to you. I know
that’s what’s gonna happen. That’s what he intends to do, and he
will do it. He’ll do it. (Baby babbles) Unfortunately(?) being
so bewildered with many, many pressures on my brain, seeing all
these people behave so treasonous – it was just too much for me
to put together, but I now know what he was telling me. And
it’ll happen. If the plane gets in the air even. (Baby screams)
So my opinion is that we be kind to children and be kind to
seniors and take the potion like they used to take in ancient
Greece and step over quietly because we are not committing
suicide; it’s a revolutionary act.
Crowd: That's right!
Jones: We can’t
go back; they won’t leave us alone. They’re now going back to
tell more lies, which means more congressmen. And there’s no
way, no way we can survive. Anybody wish to (Recording pause)
4:00 Jones: Anyone that has any
dissenting opinion, please speak. Yes. (Recording pause) [During
the recording pause, someone apparently suggests deferring
suicide so that PT members can strike at PT enemies in
Georgetown like Tim Stoen.]
You can have an opportunity, but if our children are left, we’re
going to have them butchered. We can make a strike, but we’ll be
striking against people [Guyanese army] that we don’t want to
strike against. We want, we’d like to get the people who caused
this stuff, and some, if some people here are prepared to know
how to do that, to go in town and get Timothy
Stoen, but there’s no plane. (Baby cries) There’s no
plane. You can’t catch a plane in time. [JJ believes the GDF
will reach JT before JT could strike PT enemies in Georgetown.]
He’s responsible for it. He brought these people to us. He and Deanna
Myrtle. But people [PT members with revenge orders]
in San Francisco will not – not be idle over this. They’ll not
take our death in vain you know. Yes, Christine.
5:00 Christine Miller [60y]: Is it too late for Russia?
Jones: Here’s
why it’s too late for Russia. They killed. They started to kill.
That’s why it makes it too late for Russia. Otherwise I’d said,
Russia, you bet your life. But it’s too late. I can’t control
these people. They’re out there. They’ve gone with their guns.
And it’s too late. And once we kill anybody – at least that’s
the way I’ve always – I’ve always put my lot with you. If one of
my people do something, it’s me.
Man: That's
right.
Jones: And they
say I don’t have to take the blame for this, but I don’t live
that way. They said deliver up Ujara, who tried to get the man
back here. Ujara, whose wi-- mother’s been lying on him and
lying on him and trying to break up this family. And they’ve all
agreed to kill us by any means necessary. Do you think I’m going
to deliver them Ujara? Not on your life.
[Don Sly's wife Neva defected from PT in 1975 and was trying to get Don and their two kids to leave JT.]
Crowd: No!
Jones: No.
[Don
Sly, aka Ujara, 42y. Attacked Rep. Ryan with a knife that
afternoon. JJ had promised Ryan that Sly would be turned
over to the Guyana police.]
Don Sly:
Is there any way if I
go, that it’ll help?
Jones: No.
You’re not going. You’re not going.
Crowd: No!
Jones: You’re
not going. I can’t live that way. I cannot live that way. I’ve
lived with– for all, and I’ll die for all. (Applause) (Recording
pause)
Jones: I’ve been living on hope for a long time, Christine, and I appreciate you’ve always been a very good agitator. I like agitation because you got to see two sides of one issue, two sides of a question. But what those people are gonna get done once they get through will make our lives worse than hell. Will make us– will make the Russians not accept us. When they get through lying. They told so many lies between there and that truck that we are– we are done-in as far as any other alternative.
Miller: Well, I say let’s make an airlift to Russia. That’s what I say. I don’t think nothing is impossible if you believe it.
Jones: How are we going to do that? How are you going to airlift to Russia?
Miller: Well, I thought they said if we got in an emergency, they gave you a code to let them know.
Jones: No they
didn’t. They gave us a code that they’d let us
know of an issue; not us create an issue for them.
They said if we– if they saw the country coming down they'd
create -- they'd give us a code. (Baby cries) They'd give us a
code. You can check on there and see if it’s on the code. Check
with Russia to see if they’ll take us in immediately, otherwise
we die. I don’t know what else you say to these people. But to
me death is not– death is not a fearful thing. It’s living
that’s treacherous. (Applause) (Recording pause)
Jones: I have
never, never, never, never seen anything like this before in my
life. I’ve never seen people take the law and do– in their own
hands and provoke us and try to purposely agitate murder of
children. [JJ seems to admit here that poisoning the children
will be murder.] There is no use, Christine; it’s just
not– it’s not worth living like this. Not worth living like
this.
Crowd: That's
right! (Recording pause)
Miller: I think that there were too few who left for twelve hundred people to give them their lives for those people that left.
Jones: Do you know how many left?
Miller: Oh,
twenty-odd. That’s a small …
[Ryan left with 15 sincere defectors and one fake one, Larry Layton. Eleven other JT residents escaped unnoticed into the jungle that morning.]
Jones: Twenty-odd, twenty-odd.
Miller: ... compared to what’s here.
Jones: Twenty-odd. But what’s gonna happen when they don’t leave? I hope that they could leave. But what’s gonna happen when they don’t leave?
Miller: You mean the people here?
Jones: Yeah. What’s going to happen to us when they don’t leave, when they get on the plane and the plane goes down?
Miller: I don’t think it’ll go down.
Jones: You
don’t think it’ll go down?
Crowd: Yes it
will... he said it will. Yes it will!
Jones: I, I wish I would tell you you’re right, but I’m right. There’s one man there who blames, and rightfully so, Debbie Blakey for the murder– for the murder of his mother. And he’ll– he’ll stop that pilot by any means necessary. He’ll do it. That plane’ll come out of the air. There’s no way you fly a plane without a pilot.
[JJ refers to Larry Layton and his defector sister Debbie Layton Blakey. Their mother Lisa Layton died of cancer in JT 3 weeks earlier, on Oct 30. JJ said that Debbie's defection interfered with his miraculous ability to hold off Lisa's cancer. Larry Layton watched her die in agony, not knowing that painkillers were hoarded for JJ and for the mass suicide.]
Miller: I wasn’t speaking about that plane. I was speaking about the plane for us to go to Russia.
Jones: How... (JJ sighs in frustration. Angry voices.) To Russia? You think Russia’s gonna want– no, not gonna, it’s, it’s, it’s, it's, it's– we're not, you think Russia’s gonna want us with all this stigma? We had some value, but now we don’t have any value.
Miller: Well, I don’t see it like that. I mean, I feel like that– as long as there’s life, (Baby screeches) there’s hope. That’s my faith.
Jones: Well–
some– everybody dies. Some place that hope runs out because
everybody dies. (Acclamation) I haven’t seen anybody yet didn’t
die. (Acclamation) And I’d like to choose my own kind of death
for a change. (Acclamation) I’m tired of being tormented to
hell, that’s what I’m tired of. (Acclamation) Tired of it.
(Applause) (Recording pause)
Jones: --twelve hundred people’s lives in my hands, and I certainly don’t want your life in my hands. I’m going to tell you, Christine, without me, life has no meaning. (Applause)
Jones: I’m the
best friend you’ll ever have. I want, want, I have to
pay– I’m standing with Ujara. I’m standing with those people.
They are part of me. I can detach myself. My attorney [Charles
Garry] says detach myself. No, no, no, no, no, no. I never
detach myself from any of your troubles. I’ve always taken your
troubles right on my shoulders. (Acclamation) And I’m not going
to change that now. It’s too late. I’ve been running too long.
Not going to change now. (Applause) (Recording pause)
[PT ideology included reincarnation.]
Jones: Maybe
the next time you’ll get to go to Russia. The next time round.
This is– what I’m talking about now is the dispensation of
judgment. This is a revolutionary– a revolutionary
suicide council. I’m not talking about self–
self-destruction. I’m talking about what -- we have no other
road. I will take your call. We will put it to the Russians. And
I can tell you the answer now because I am a prophet. Call the
Russians and tell them, and see if they’ll take us. (Recording
pause)
[There is no evidence that any such call "to Russia" was attempted.]
Miller: --not
that I'm afraid to die, by no means.
[In the U.S., JJ
once pointed his pistol at Miller's head for standing up to
him, and she challenged him to shoot her. Per Hue Fortson on JT
Paradise Lost Deleted Scenes]
Jones: I don’t
think you are. I don't think you are.
Miller: But, ah, I look at our babies and I think they deserve to live, you know?
Jones: I agree. But also they deserve what's more; they deserve peace. (Acclamation)
Miller: We all came here for peace.
Jones: And
we’ve– have we had it? (Crowd: "No!")
Miller: No.
Jones: I tried
to give it to you. I’ve laid down my life, practically. I’ve
practically died every day to give you peace. And you still not
have any peace. You look better than I’ve seen you in a long
while, but it’s still not the kind of peace that I want to give
you. A person’s a fool who continues to say that you’re winning
when you’re losing. (Baby cries)
Crowd: That's
right! (Baby cries)
Mary Ruby Johnson:
(Unintelligible) gonna die(?)
Jones: Win one,
lose two. What?
Johnson: (Unintelligible)
Jones: I didn’t
hear you, ma’am. You’ll have to speak up.
Johnson:
(Unintelligible) ...in time, we die anyway! (Baby laughs)
Jones: That’s a
sweet thought. Who said that?
[Mary
Ruby Johnson (52) was the mother of Garry Poncho
Johnson, the security guard who reportedly gave Larry Layton
his pistol, and who released the lawyers Mark Lane and Charles
Garry into the jungle. But this might be Mary Darden aka Mary
Allie Johnson.]
12:00 Crowd: Mary Johnson!
Jones: Come on
up and speak it again, honey. Say, come up and say about talk
about (Recording pause)
Jones: --is
taking off. No plane is taking off. Suicide. They have done it.
Stoen has done it. Somebody ought to li-- Somebody, can they
talk, can they not talk to San Francisco– see that Stoen does
not get by with this infamy? [JJ is asking that the SF Temple be
sent coded orders for revenge killings and mass suicide. JJ may
not have realized that Tim Stoen has traveled to Georgetown with
the Ryan delegation.]
Crowd: That's
right!
Jones: This is
infamy. He has done the thing he wanted to do. To have us
destroyed.
Woman: That's
right!
Miller: When
you– when you– when we destroy ourselves, we’re defeated. (Baby
cries)
Jones: We're
not defeated.
Miller: We let them, the enemy, defeat us.
Jones: Did you
see– did you see “I
live to fight no more forever”?
Miller: Yes, I saw that.
Jones: Did you
not have some sense of pride and victory in that man? He would
not subject himself to the will or whim of people who tell that
they're going to come in whenever they please and push into our
house. Come when they please, take who they want to, talk to who
they want to– does this, is that living? That’s not living to
me.
Crowd: No!
Jones: That’s not freedom. That’s not the kind of freedom I sought.
Miller: But I
think where they made their mistake is when they stopped to
rest. If they had gone on they would’ve made it. But they
stopped to rest. (Recording pause)
13:25 Jim McElvane [46y. Chief of PT security in SF. Arrived in JT only 2 days earlier.]: It's over, sister, it's over. We've made that day. [cf. Jack Beam quote above] We made a beautiful day, and let’s make it a beautiful day. That's what I.. (Applause)
Jones: We win,
we win when we go down. Tim Stoen
has nobody else to hate. He has nobody else to hate. Then he’ll
destroy himself. I’m speaking here not as the
administrator, I’m speaking as a prophet today. I wouldn’t step
in this seat and talk so serious if I didn’t know what I was
talking about. (Acclamation) Is there any way to call back the
immense amount of damage that’s going to be done? But I cannot
separate myself from the pain of my people. You can’t either,
Christine, if you stop to think about it. You can’t separate
yourself. We’ve walked too long together. (Acclamation)
Miller: I know that. But I still think, as an individual, I have a right to–
Jones: You do, and I’m listening.
Miller: – what I think, what I feel. And think we all have a right to our own destiny as individuals.
Jones: Right.
Miller: And I think I have a right to choose mine, and everybody else has a right to choose theirs.
Jones: Mm-hmm.
Miller: ("You
know?" "In hopes"?)
Jones: Mm-hmm.
(Recording pause) I’m not criticizing, I'm not trying to...
[Lue
Ester Lewis (48y) identified by eyewitness survivors Rhodes
& Clayton.]
14:35 Lue Ester Lewis:
Why don't you leave then?
Jones: What’s
that?
Lewis: She's
talkin' like she wanna to leave, why don't she just go ahead!
(Child shrieks) "Your own individual lives." That's what you
sayin!
Miller: That's
what-- (Recording pause)
Jones: --said
today, that's what twenty people said today, with their lives.
Miller: Well, I
think I still have a right to my own opinion. (Crowd shouts
angrily)
Jones: I’m not taking it from you. I’m not taking it from you.
McElvane:
Christine.
Lewis: Do you wanna leave?
McElvane:
You’re only standing here because he was here in the
first place. So I don’t know what you talking about, having an
individual life. Your life has been extended to the day that
you’re standing there because of him. (Acclamation) (Recording
pause)
Jones: --voice
back there, she has as much right to speak as anybody else, too.
Woman: That's
right!
[In addition to the
Jones-supporting Mary Ruby Johnson at 12:00 above, there were
three other Rubys in JT. Ruby Lee Johnson was there with her
daughter Ruby Jewell Caroll and 8 of their
children/grandchildren. Ruby Jean Bright was
there with 2 children, 3 sisters, and 5
nieces/nephews. If one of these three spoke up to
support Miller, JJ chose not to record her.]
15:15 Jones: What did you say,
Ruby? (Recording pause.) Well, you’ll regret that this very day
if you don’t die. You’ll regret it if you do, though you don’t
die. You’ll regret it. (Acclamation)
Miller: Dad, you’ve saved too many people.
Jones: I’ve saved them. I saved them, but I made my example. I made my expression. I made my manifestation, and the world was ready -- not ready for me. Paul said, “I was a man born out of due season.” [1 Cor 15:8] I’ve been born out of due season, just like all we are, and the best testimony we can make is to leave this goddamn world.
(Applause) (Recording
pause)
Voice: Peace,
peace. (Baby cries)
Lewis: You must
be scared to die.
Miller: I’m not
talking to her.
Lewis: Well I'm
talkin to you! (Continues angry shouting)
Miller: Will you let– would you let her or let me talk?
Jones: Keep talking.
Miller: Would
you make her sit down and let me talk while I’m on the floor or
let her talk? (Lewis shouts back angrily.) (Recording pause)
Jones: --proper
to tell the leader what to do, it really isn't. (Angry
acclamation) I’ve listened to you. You asked me about Russia.
I’m right now making a call to Russia. What more do you
suggest? (Angry shouting) I’m listening to you. If Russia
gives me one slight bit of encouragement. I just now instructed
them to go there and do that.
[There is no evidence that any such call "to Russia" was attempted.]
Lewis: And you
would be no fucking good in Russia, goddammit!
Voice: Y'all
should go--
Woman: Why
didn't you get on that truck?
Marceline?:
This is not ("arrested"?)
(Shouting) (Recording
pause)
14:30 Johnny Brown Jones: All
right now, everybody hold it. We didn’t come– hold it. Hold it.
Hold it. Hold it.
(Recording pause)
Jones: -- much longer to maintain? (Acclamation) (Recording pause) --to lay down your burdens. I’m gonna lay down my burdens. Down by the riverside. Shall we lay them down here inside of Guyana? What’s the difference? (Acclamation) No man didn’t take our lives, right now. They haven’t taken them. But when they start parachuting out of the air, they’ll shoot some of our innocent babies. I’m not lying– I don’t wanna see this, Christine. But they gotta shoot me to get through to some of these people. I’m not letting them take Ujara. Can you let them take Ujara?
Voices: No,
no, no, no!
[John Victor
Stoen, 6y. Son of defectors Grace and
Tim Stoen,
but probably sired by JJ.]
Miller: You wanna see John die?
Jones: What’s that?
17:18 Miller: You mean you
wanna see John, the little one with Kimo
die?
[Jim
Jon "Kimo" Prokes (3) was JJ's son by his mistress and
powerful lieutenant Carolyn
Moore Layton, who helped plan
the mass poisoning.]
Jones: I want
to see (angry voices shouting) peace, peace, peace, peace,
peace, peace, peace, peace, peace, peace.
17:30 Marceline Jones: Christine, are you saying that you think he thinks more of them than other children here? That's what you’re saying!
[Marceline
Jones, 51. Wife of JJ.]
Jones: John -- John -- you're acting -- do you think I’d put John’s life above others? If I put John’s life above others, I wouldn’t be standing with Ujara. I’d send John out, and he could go out on the driveway tonight.
Miller: No, I
called his name because he’s young, they're young.
Jones: I know,
but he’s no different to me than any of these children here.
He’s just one of my children. I don’t prefer one above another.
I don’t prefer him above Ujara. I can’t do that. I can’t
separate myself from your actions or his actions.
Lewis: Never ends!
Jones: If you’d
done something wrong, I’d stand with you. If they wanted to come
and get you, they’d have to take me. (Acclamation)
18:10 Emotional elderly black voice:
We’re all ready to go. If you tell us we have to give our lives
now, we’re ready– I'm pretty sure all the rest of the sisters
and brothers are with me. (Acclamation) (Recording pause)
Jones: --months
I’ve tried to keep this thing from happening. But I now see it’s
the will– it’s the will of Sovereign Being that this happen to
us. That we lay down our lives in protest against what’s being
done. That we lay down our lives to protest in what’s being
done. The criminality of people. The cruelty of people. Who
walked out of here today? Did you notice who walked out? Mostly
white people. (Acclamation) Mostly white people walked.
[All but one of the
defectors who left with Ryan were white. However, the eleven
people who slipped out of camp that morning were all black --
including the wife and child of security chief Joe Wilson.]
[Tommy Bogue had noticed Edith Parks breaking the
rules and talking to Rep. Ryan to defect, and he ran to alert
his father Jim. Tommy had been brutally punished for an earlier
escape attempt. Jim Bogue had early to JT in 1974, hoping to win
back his estranged wife Edith through his tireless efforts on JT
agriculture. Their adopted daughter Marilee refused to leave
with them, as did the ex-wife and five children of Edith's
partner Harold Cordell. On the NBC tape, Cordell says to his
14-yr-old son James "I love you no matter what decision you
make." The tragic story of the Bogue family is recounted in A
Thousand Lives by Julia Scheeres.]
18:50 Woman: James, Tom.
Jones: I’m so
grateful for the ones that didn’t– those who knew who they are.
There's no, there's, there’s no point– there’s no point to this.
We have -- we are born before our time. [1
Cor 15:8] (Acclamation) They won’t accept us. And I don’t
think we should sit here and take any more time for our children
to be endangered. Because if they come after our children, and
we give them our children, then our children will suffer
forever. (Clapping)
Miller:
...anybody with a different idea...
Jones: I have no quarrel with you coming up. I like you. I personally like you very much.
Miller: These people get hostile when you try to…
Jones: Oh, some
people do– but– yes, some people do. Put it that way– I’m not
hostile.
Woman [possibly
Maria Katsaris?]: (.. explain? ...)
Lewis: (Quit?)
starting shit!
Jones: You had to be honest and you stayed, and if you'da wanted to run, you’da run with them, because anybody coulda run today, they woulda wanted to. I know you’re not a runner. And I– your life is precious to me. It’s as precious as John’s. (Baby cries) And I don’t– what I do I do with weight and justice and judgement. (Baby cries) I’ve weighed it against all evidence.
20:05 Miller: OK, that’s all I’ve
got to say.
[End of Miller's
debate with Jones, which consumes 15 minutes of tape
and includes at least 17 recording pauses.]
Jones: What
comes now folks? What comes now?
[Odell
Rhodes says JJ's adopted son and security chief Johnny
Brown Jones approached JJ with news of the airstrip
shooting. The next minute of the tape records pandemonium
apparently caused by 1) the shooting news and 2) the beginning
of the poisonings.]
Johnny Brown Jones:
Everybody hold it!
McElvane: Sit
down and stay seated. Stay seated!
[Richard Dwyer
was Deputy Chief of Mission and accompanied Rep. Ryan to
JT. Dwyer is not considered a PT enemy, presumably because
jurisdiction rules and U.S. privacy laws sharply limited how
much he could help the Concerned Relatives. He was spared from
execution at the airstrip even though he was laying right next
to Ryan, who received a point blank coup de grace. Dwyer had
planned to return to JT from the airstrip, to ensure the arrest
of Don Sly and to protect further defectors like Al Simon's
family. After the airstrip shooting he of course did not return
to JT, and instead called in the Guyana army.]
Jones: Say it. Say it. Say peace, peace. Say peace. Say peace. Say peace. Say peace. What’s come? Don’t let– Take Dwyer on down to the mi- the East house. Take Dwyer.
Woman [not Maria
Katsaris?] on PA: Everybody be quiet, please.
(Recording pause)
Jones:
(Unintelligible) -- show you've got some respect for our lives!
Woman: Shut up!
McElvane: That
means sit down, sit down. Sit down.
Jones: I know.
[A ghost recording
of female operating HAM radio is heard in the background
beginning at 20:38, continues for some time]
Jones: (Groan.)
I tried so very, very hard. We’re trying over here to see what
can be, what can happen in Los Angeles. Who is it?
[JJ might be ordering via coded radio messages that the LA Temple proceed with revenge killings and suicide.]
20:48 Woman [Marceline?]: Bob,
Carl[?], Wesley (driving? brought?) truck, they must be security
people.
[Shooters included
security team members Bob Kice and Wesley Carl Breidenbach]
McElvane: ...
Stan ... about ten of our folks on it.
[Stanley Gieg (19y)
drove the tractor pulling the trailer with the airstrip
shooters. JJ thinks that Dwyer has returned with them
or perhaps forgot that Dwyer left, and worries that the hit
squad might attack Dwyer.]
Jones: Get
Dwyer out of here before something happens to him. (Recording
pause)
21:00 Voice: --goin' to get
Ujara.
[Don Sly aka Ujara was guarding visiting PT lawyers Mark Lane and Charles Garry, while waiting to be ordered back to the pavilion for the revolutionary suicide, which is now starting.]
Jones: Dwyer?
Voices: Ujara.
Jones: I’m not
talking about Ujara. I said Dwyer. Ain’t nobody gonna take
Ujara. I’m not lettin’ em take Ujara.
[This
is the first evidence of poisoning on the tape. Ruletta
Brown Paul (24) went first, poisoning her 18-month-old son
Robert Paul Jr (no photo) and then herself. Ruletta's
husband Robert Paul was one of the eleven who had quietly
escaped into the jungle that morning. The second woman
to poison herself and her 1-yr-old son Deron was "Michelle
Wilson" i.e. Michelle Wagner Fitch (24), sister of
Leslie Wagner-Wilson who had also escaped that morning with
her own young son. Ruletta and Michelle may have volunteered
early out of despair or shame over these family defections.]
21:20 Jones: (Baby cries) Gather in, folks. It’s easy, it’s easy. Yes, my love.
Elderly Black Woman: At one time, I felt just like Christine felt. But after today I don’t feel anything because the biggest majority of the people that left here were white, and I know it really hurt my heart because–
Jones: Broke
your heart, didn’t it?
Elderly Black Woman:
It broke my heart to think that all of these years these white
people have been with us, and they’re not a part of us. So we
might as well end it now because I don’t see …
[Rep. Leo Ryan
(53) was executed at the airstrip almost an hour earlier.]
22:00 Jones: It's too late. You
must quit talking. The congressman has been murdered. (Recording
pause)
White Woman:
(whispers) We're ready.
Black Man: --be quiet, that's all. (Baby cries) (Recording pause)
Black Woman:
It's all over.
Man: It's all
over.
Jones: It’s all
over, all over. What a legacy, what a legacy. But the Red
Brigade's the only ones ever made any sense anyway. They invaded
our privacy. They came into our home. They followed us six
thousand miles away. Red Brigade showed them justice. The
congressman’s dead.
[JJ admired the Red Brigades, a communist terrorist group that murdered Italian Prime Minister Moro six months earlier. JJ had contingency plans to kidnap U.S. politicians if JJ were jailed. JT security was known as the Red Brigade.]
(A clap?) ("You stop
it.") (A slap?)
22:50 Jones: Please get us some
medication. It’s simple. (Baby screams) It’s simple. There’s no
convulsions with it. It’s just simple. Just, please get it.
Before it’s too late. The GDF [Guyana Defense Force] will be
here, I tell you. Get movin’, get movin’, get movin’.
Woman [Katsaris?]:
("huddle"?)
23:00 Voices: Shh! Shut
up! Shut up now! Who are you--
Jones: Don’t be
afraid to die. If you -- if these people land out here, they'll
-- they’ll torture some of our children here. They’ll torture
our people. They’ll torture our seniors. We cannot have this.
Voices: That's
right! That's right!
Jones: Are you going to separate yourself from whoever shot the congressman? I don’t know who shot him.
Voices: No. No. No. Hell, no! Hell, no! (Recording pause)
Jones: -- speak
her peace, and those had a right to go, and they had a right to–
How many are dead? Aw, God Almighty, God.
[Patty
Chaffin Parks (44) was ironically the most
reluctant Nov 18 defector. Her mother-in-law Edith Parks had
joined PT 20yrs earlier in Indiana. Edith's grandson Dale and
Dale's wife Joyce worked in the JT clinic. Joyce was away in
Caracas but the rest of the Parks family escaped as defectors
on Nov 18. It's unclear how JJ's informant knows Patty was
dead. Her body was still on the locked Twin Otter when the
shooters left the airstrip. It's possible her assassin saw his
through-the-window head shot find its mark. Or, the shooters
could be making a random unsubstantiated claim, as they did
for Jim Cobb.]
23:30 Voice: Patty Parks is dead.
Jones: Hmm?
Voice: Patty Parks.
Jones: Patty
Parks is dead?
Child: Hey,
look!
Voice: Shhh!
Voice: (Get in
line by me?)
(Recording
pause)
23:50 White woman: -- and
the others to endure long enough in a safe place to write about
the goodness of Jim Jones?
Jones: I don’t
know how in the world they’re ever going to write about us. It’s
just too late. It’s too late. The congressman’s dead. The
congressman's aide's dead. Many of our traitors are dead.
They’re all layin’ out there dead.
[Ryan's
aide Jackie
Speier was critically wounded at the airstrip. Only one
defector died: Patty Parks. Her body was not removed from the
plane until after the hit squad left.]
Black woman:
Right on! OK.
Jones: Hmm?
Black woman:
Good! Good!
Jones: I
didn’t, but my people did. My people did. They’re my people.
Voices: That's
right!
Jones:
And they’ve been provoked too much. (Acclamation) They’ve been
provoked too much. What’s happened here’s been too-- it's been
an act of provocation.
Angry Woman:
They did it themselves! (Voice: "That's right!") They
did it! If they'd given us our right to theirselves(?)
freedom!
24:30 Mary Ruby Johnson: If there’s any ways possible to, uh, have them to give Ted something to take him, I’m satisfied, okay?
Jones: What's
that?
Johnson:
I said, if there’s anyway you can do, to have them give Ted
something, so he won’t have to-- let him go too okay, and I’m
satisfied.
Jones: That’s
fine.
Voice: Ted
Holliday [Ted Holliday was not in Jonestown but was the son
of Mary “Ruby” Johnson Rodgers and brother of Poncho Johnson
and Irra Jean Johnson. Thus Ruby is asking that Ted back in
California be poisoned too. She does not mention her oldest
son Bennett, perhaps because he was not in PT.]
Jones: Ted, yes. Yes. Yes.
Johnson:
Because I said I never wanted to live if you die, so this is--
And I appreciate you for everything.
Jones: You're a
(unintelligible)
Johnson: You
are the only. You are the only. And I appreciate you.
Jones: OK.
(Applause) (Recording pause)
25:00 Jones: Please, please, can
we hasten? Can we hasten with that medication? You don’t know
what you’ve done.
Woman: Dad, I
want you to know, you've given me the happiest days of my life!
Jones: I've
tried. (Applause) (Recording pause)
Jones: -- move,
lease move.
Young man: Hey
Dad?
Jones: Huh?
[Wesley Breidenbach was one of the airstrip shooters. At the end of the airstrip were four Guyanese Defense Forces soldiers guarding a disabled GDF plane. They stood by during the shooting, explaining later that Americans shooting Americans was not their problem.]
Young man:
Wesley told me there were two GDF guys-- (Recording pause)
(Baby crying, voice
says "Shhhh") (Recording pause)
Jones: --they
saw it happen and ran in the bush and dropped their machine
guns. I never in my life. But there'll be more. (Recording
pause)
Katsaris?: What
is this? Stop it right there. (Recording pause)
Jones: You’ve
got to move. Are you gonna get that medication here? You’ve got
to move.
Katsaris?: Hurry up!
26:00 Jones: Marceline, they've
got forty minutes. (Recording pause)
[Is this about
finishing all poisoning before the GDF arrives from Matthews
Ridge? Or perhaps a deadline for Marceline's sons in
Georgetown to begin their revenge and suicide assignments?]
[Maria
Katsaris (25y) was in the end second in power only to
Carolyn Layton. She was surrogate mother to JJ's son John Victor
Stoen. On Nov 18 she was very busy: finalizing poison
plans, issuing revenge/suicide orders to Georgetown via radio,
and arranging financial documents and cash to be carried to
the Soviet embassy. On Nov 18 she had repeated to her visiting
brother her accusations that their father had sexually abused
her. But in a surviving JT recording, she had confided
to JT comrades that the abuse charges were false.]
Maria Katsaris:
You have to move, and the people that are standing there in the
aisle, go stand in the radio room yard, but everybody get behind
the table and back this way, okay?
Distant woman:
Please everybody hurry. (Recording pause)
Jones: There's
nothing to it.
Katsaris:
There’s nothing to worry about. Everybody keep calm and try and
keep your children calm.
[Judy
Ijames (28) was a nurse at JT. Or this might be Joyce
Touchette (45), who is named by
Stanley Clayton as helping mix the poison and helping administer
it.]
Judy Ijames?:
Have the older children give love to the little ones that act
scared.
Katsaris: And
the older children can help love the little children and, and
reassure them. (Recording pause) --children aren't crying from
pain. It’s just a little bitter tasting. They’re not crying out
of any pain. (Recording pause)
[Annie
McGowan (70) was an elderly woman to whom PT bank accounts
were transferred after the 1978 defections of PT financial
secretaries Debbie Layton and Terri Buford. Katsaris and
McGowan signed letters
leaving PT funds to the Soviet embassy, and Katsaris gave cash
and the letters in 3 suitcases to Michael Prokes and Tim and
Mike Carter to carry out of JT.]
26:30 Katsaris: Annie McGowan,
can I please see you back-- (Recording pause)
McElvane:
--things I used to do before I came here. So let me tell you
about it. It might make a lot of you feel a little more
comfortable. Sit down and be quiet, please. One of the things I
used to do– I used to be a therapist. And the kind of therapy
that I did had to do with reincarnation in past life situations.
Jones: Yes, yes, yes.
McElvane: And every time anybody had the experience of going into a past life (baby cries), I was fortunate enough through Father to be able to let them experience it all the way through their death, so to speak. And everybody was so happy when they made that step to the other side.
Jones: When you
step through the door there's no other thing you can do but step
that way. It’s the only way to step. (Baby cries, shrieks)
That choice is not ours now. It’s out of our hands. (Child
shrieks)
McElvane: If you have a body that’s been crippled, suddenly you have the kind of body that you want to have.
Jones: Try to
calm. Tell 'em it's something to give 'em a little rest, a
little rest. Calm the children.
McElvane: It
feels good. It never felt so good, family, I tell you. You’ve
never felt so good as how that feels. (Child cries No!)
Jones: Thank
you. (Baby shrieks) (Recording pause)
(Children crying)
[Attorneys Mark
Lane and
Charles
Garry had already been released a few minutes
earlier, soon after Don Sly was fetched from guarding them
around at 21m00s on the tape.]
Jones: And I do
hope that those attorneys will stay where they belong and don’t
come up here. (Babies cry.) What is it?
28:00 Man: What happened?
Jones: What is it?
Man:
What did you say Johnny? [Probably JJ's adopted son and
security chief
Johnny
Brown Jones.]
Jones:
Did what? (Recording pause)
Jones:
(Woman groans.) It's hard, it's hard, it’s hard but only at
first– only at first is it hard. It's hard only at first.
Living– you’re looking at death and it only looks– living is
much, much more difficult. (Affirmations) Raising up every
morning and not knowing what’s going to be the night’s bringing.
It’s much more difficult. It’s much more difficult. (Recording
pause)
28:40 Voice: Let's get it o(ver
with?)
[Irene
Edwards (57) and her husband James were devoted PT members
originally from the Gulf Coast.]
Irene Edwards: I just want to say something to everyone that I see that is standing around and, or crying. This is nothing to cry about. This is something we should all rejoice about. We should be happy about this. (Applause) They always told us that we should cry when you’re coming into this world. But when we’re leaving it, and we’re leaving it peaceful, I think we should be happy about this. I was just thinking about Jim Jones. He just has suffered and suffered and suffered. (Applause) We -- he is the only God, and he don’t even have a chance to enjoy hisself here. (Applause) I wanted to say one more thing, This is one thing I want to say. That’s few that’s gone. There’s many more here. He's still-- We-- That’s not all of us. That’s not all yet. That’s just a few that has got a chance to get to the one that they should tell their story to -- their lives[?] to. I’m looking at so many people crying. I wish you would not cry. And just thank Father. Just thank him. I've been here about...
(sustained applause)
30:00 Edwards: I’ve been here uh one year and nine months. And I never felt better in my life. Not in San Francisco. But until I came to Jonestown. I've enjoyed this life. I've had a beautiful life. And I don’t see nothing for us to be crying about. We should be happy. At least I am. (Unintelligible)
(Sustained applause) (Recording pause)
30:45 Black Woman: … wouldn't be
alive today. I just like to thank Dad cause he was the only one
that stood up for me when I needed him. And thank you,
Dad. (Applause) (Recording pause)
30:55 White Woman: I’m glad
you’re my brothers and sisters, and I’m glad to be here.
31:00 Jones: [Impatiently cuts
her off] We don't have a lot of testimonies.
White Woman: Okay.
Jones: Let's
get on with it, please.
Woman: --quiet,
you're right.
Jones: Please.
For God’s sake, let’s get on with it. We’ve lived– we’ve lived
as no other people have lived and loved. We’ve had as much of
this world as you’re gonna get. Let’s just be done with it.
Let’s be done with the agony of it. (Applause) (Recording pause)
Jones: It’s
far, far harder to have to watch you every day, die slowly– and
from the time you’re a child until the time you get gray, you’re
dying. (Acclamation) (Recording pause)
Jones:
--dishonest, and I’m sure that they’ll– they’ll pay for it.
They’ll pay for it. This is a revolutionary
suicide. This is not a self-destructive suicide. So
they’ll pay for this. They brought this upon us. And they’ll pay
for that. I leave that destiny to them.
Voices: (Child
screams, cries) You're all right, you're all right, you're all
right. (Recording pause)
Jones: --who
wants to go with their child has a right to go with their child.
(Baby cries) I think it’s humane. I want to go– I want to see
you go, though. They can take me and do as they– whatever they
want to do. I want to see you go. I don’t want to see you go
through this hell no more. No more. No more. No more. (Child
screams)
32:05 Black women's voices:
--make it a quick death, especially if--
Jones: We’re trying. If everybody will relax. The best thing you do to relax, and you will have no problem. You’ll have no problem with this thing if you just relax. (Recording pause)
Black Man with lisp:
…of the children here a great deal because of Jim Jones. And the
way the children are laying there now. I’d rather see them lay
like that than to see them have to die like the Jews did, which
was pitiful anyhow. And I just like to thank Dad for giving us
life and also death. And I appreciate the fact, the way our
children are going. (Child yells) Because, like Dad said, when
they come in, what they’re gonna do to our children– they’re
gonna massacre our children. (Affirmations) And also the ones
that they take, capture, they’re gonna just let them grow up and
be dummies like they want them to be. And not grow up to be a
socialist like the one and only Jim Jones. So I’d like to thank
Dad for the opportunity for letting Jonestown be not what it
could be, but what Jonestown is. Thank you, Dad. (Applause)
(Recording pause)
33:35 Jones: --it’s not to be
afeared. It is not to be feared. It is a friend. It’s a friend
(Child cries) (Recording pause)
Jones: --sitting there, show your love for one another. (Recording pause)
Jones: They
just heard they’re coming, don’t let them take him. (Recording
pause)
Jones: -- calm. Let’s get calm. Let’s get calm. (Children screaming) (Recording pause)
Jones: We had
nothing we could do. We can’t– we can’t separate ourselves from
our own people.
(Children screaming)
34:05 Man: C'mon, mom!
(Overlapping voices and screams) (Recording pause)
Jones: --for twenty years laying in some old rotten nursing home.
(Voices) (Recording pause)
Jones: --taking us through all these anguish years. They took us and put us in chains and that’s nothing. This, this is, that's, that, there’s no comparison to that, to this. They’ve robbed us of our land, and they’ve taken us and driven us until we tried to find ourselves. We tried to find a new beginning. But it’s too late. You can’t separate yourself from your brother and your sister. (Affirmations) No way I’m going to do it. I refuse. I don’t know who fired the shot. I don’t know who killed the congressman. But as far as I am concerned, I killed him. You understand what I’m saying? I killed him. He had no business coming. I told him not to come.
Woman [maybe
Marceline]: That's right. That's right. (Recording pause)
35:00 (42 continuous seconds of children crying, overlapping voices) (Recording pause)
Jones: --die
with respect, die with a degree of dignity. Lay down your life
with dignity. Don’t lay down with tears and agony. There’s
nothing to death. It’s like Mac said, it’s just stepping over to
another plane. Don’t be this way. Stop this hysterics. This is
not the way for people who are Socialists or Communists to die.
No way for us to die. We must die with some dignity.
Voices: That's right.
Jones: (Groan) Soon we will have no choice. Now we have some choice. Do you think they’re gonna allow this to be done– allow us to get by with this? You must be insane. (Children crying) (Recording pause) Look children, it’s just something to put you to rest. (Recording pause) Oh, God.
(Children crying. Child vocalizes.)
36:45 Jones: Mother, Mother,
Mother, Mother, Mother, please.
Woman shrieks:
Don't take my (children?)--
[This woman sounds
very much like Bonnie Simon, who that afternoon yelled "Don't
you take my kids!" when her husband tried to take their kids
with Ryan. The entire Simon family stayed and died.]
Jones: Mother, please, please, please. Don’t– don’t do this. Don’t do this. (Recording pause) Lay down your life with your child. But don’t do this. (Recording pause)
37:00 Woman [maybe Marceline]:
--want the children out of S.C.U.(Recording pause)
[In the Special
Care Unit up to a half dozen dissident or
troublesome residents were kept under sedation. Four bodies
were found there, one of which surely was Gene Chaiken, a PT
attorney who had dissented too much.]
Jones: Free at
last. (Applause) (Recording pause)
Jones: Peace– keep your emotions down. Keep your emotions down. (Child shrieks) (Recording pause) Children, it will not hurt. If you’ll be– if you’ll be quiet. If you’ll be quiet.
Child: No! No!
(Recording pause)
(15 seconds of children screaming) (Recording pause)
Jones: It’s
never been done before, you say. (Child cries) It’s been done by
every tribe in history. Every tribe facing annihilation.
(Affirmation) All the Indians of the Amazon are doing it right
now. They refuse to bring any babies into the world. They kill
every child that comes into the world. (Child cries) Because
they don’t want to live in this kind of a world. (Child cries)
(Recording pause)
Jones: So be
patient. Be patient. (Children screaming.) Death is– I tell you,
I don’t care how many screams you hear. I don’t care how many
anguished cries. (Children screaming) Death is a million times
preferable to ten more days of this life. (Child shrieks) If you
knew what was ahead of you– if you knew what was ahead of you,
you’d be glad to be stepping over tonight.
Woman: (Unintelligible) is right. (Recording pause)
Jones: Death, death, death is common to people. (Children scream) And the Eskimos, they take death in their stride. Let’s be dignit– let’s be dignified. (Child screams) If you'll quit tell them they’re dying– if you adults would stop some of this nonsense. Adults, (woman yells) adults, adults. I call on you to stop this nonsense. (That's right!) I call on you to quit exciting your children when all they’re doing is going to a quiet rest. (That's right!) I call on you to stop this now if you have any respect at all. Are we black, proud, and Socialist, or what are we? (Affirmations) Now stop this nonsense. Don’t carry this on anymore. You’re exciting your children. (Affirmations) (Recording pause)
Jones:
--all over, and it's good.
(Recording pause) No,
no sorrow– that it’s all over. I’m glad it’s over.
Voices: That's right! (Recording pause)
Jones: --hurry,
hurry my children. Hurry. All I say, let's not fall into the
hands of the enemy. Hurry, my children. (Child crying) Hurry.
There are seniors out here that I’m concerned about. Hurry. I
don’t want to leave my seniors to this mess. (Child crying)
(Recording pause) Quickly, quickly, quickly, quickly, quickly.
(Recording pause)
39:30 Jones: Sisters, good
knowing you. No more pain, Al. No more pain, I said, Al. No more
pain.
[Unclear who "Al"
is.]
Katsaris:
Adults (unintelligible)...
Jones: Jim Cobb
is laying on the airfield dead at this moment.
[Concerned
relative Jim Cobb, one of the "8 revolutionaries" from 1973,
was uninjured in the airstrip attack. Cobb's family
joined PT in Indiana in the 1950s. Cobb lost his mother,
brother, and three sisters on Nov 18. None of the four
visiting concerned relatives were able to persuade any
relatives to leave.]
(Vigorous cheers and applause)
Jones: Remember the [concerned relative Beverly] Oliver woman said she– she’d come over and kill me if her sons wouldn’t stop her? These, these are the people– the peddlers of hate. (Child cries) All we’re doing is laying down our life. We’re not letting them take our life. We’re laying down our life. (Affirmations) (Recording pause)40:10 
Billy
Oliver: All I would like to say is that my, uhm– my
so-called parents was filled with so much hate–
Jones: (clapping in admonition) Stop this, stop this, stop this, parents. Stop this crying, hollering. (Recording pause)
Oliver: – hate and treachery. I think you people out here should think about how your relatives was and be glad about that the childrens are being laid to rest. And all I’d like to say is that I thank Dad for making me strong to stand with it all and make me ready for it. (Child cries) Thank you. (Affirmation) (Recording pause)
Jones: --all they do is taking a drink. They take it to go to sleep. That’s what death is, sleep. (Children screaming) (Recording pause) --of it, I’m tired of it all. (Recording pause)
40:45 Woman: --loving thing we could have ever done, most loving thing all of us could have done (Child cries), and it’s been a pleasure walking with all of you in this revolutionary struggle. (Child crying) No other way I would rather go than to give my life for socialism, communism, (Child cries) and I thank Dad very, very much. (Affirmation) (Recording pause)
41:00 Elderly Woman:
--that uh, Dad’s love and mercy, goodness and kindness and bring
us to this land of freedom. His love– his mother was the
advance– the advance guard to socialism. And his love, his mercy
shall go on forever unto the fields of time--
Jones: Where’s
the vat, the vat, the vat? Where’s the vat with the Green C? CN.
Elderly Woman:
--go onto the-- fine, and thank you, Dad.
Man: Who has
the vat?
Woman: Quiet!
41:20 Jones: The vat with the green CN, please. (Child cries) Bring it here so the adults can begin. (Recording pause)
Jones: --beg you, don’t, don’t fail to follow my advice. You’ll be sorry. (Child cries) You’ll be sorry. (Recording pause)
Jones: --that
we do it, than that they do it.
Voices: That's right! That's right! (Recording pause)
Jones: --have trust. You have to step across. (Child crying)
Jones: We used
to sing this world, this
world's not our home – well, it sure isn’t – (Child cries)
(Recording pause) we were saying– it sure wasn’t.
Woman: That's right, Dad.
Child: I don't
want-- (Recording pause)
Jones:
He doesn’t want to. Tell him. All he’s doing– if they will tell
him– assure these children. Can’t some people assure these
children of the relaxation of stepping over to the next plane?
(Recording pause) We've set an example for others. We've set–
one thousand people who said, we don’t like the way the world
is. (Affirmations)
Jones: (Please stop?) [Probably not "Take some"] (Recording pause)
Jones: --take
our life from us. (Baby cries) (Affirmations) We laid it down. [John
10:18] We got tired. (Affirmations)
Woman: Greatest
day ever.
Woman: --happy
times.
Jones: We
didn’t commit suicide, we committed an act of
revolutionary suicide protesting (Baby cries) the
conditions of an inhumane world.
Voices: Right.
Jones: (Groans)
(42:42
No more Nov 18 recording on the remaining 100secs of tape
available with half-speed ghost recording of music.)