Raymond Murphy

Raymond Murphy (1896-1963) was a US State Department officer.
Murphy was born in 1896, in Lewiston Maine, where his father was a mill worker. He went to the local Bates College, and became a clerk at the State Department. In the evenings he studied at the Georgetown University Law School, succesfully taking the bar exam.Ted Morgan, A Covert Life - Jay Lovestone: Communist, Anti-Communist and Spymaster, Random House, 1999, p.146. 
In 1925 he joined the State Departments Eastern European Division, under Robert Kelley. He began to study communism from sources such as the Comintern journal Inprecor, and the records of party congresses.Ted Morgan, A Covert Life - Jay Lovestone: Communist, Anti-Communist and Spymaster, Random House, 1999, p.146.
His allies within the State Department would come to be those diplomats who reported on the Soviet Union from Latvia during the interwar period, the "Riga Group" including George Kennan, Charles E. Bohlen, Loy Henderson and Elbridge Durbrow.Ted Morgan, A Covert Life - Jay Lovestone: Communist, Anti-Communist and Spymaster, Random House, 1999, p.146.
In 1937, Murphy's office became part of the European Affairs Division under Assistant Secretary of State James Clement Dunn.Ted Morgan, A Covert Life - Jay Lovestone: Communist, Anti-Communist and Spymaster, Random House, 1999, p.146. 
From 1938, Murphy regularly debriefed Walter Krivitsky, the former head of Soviet military intelligence in Western Europe, until his mysterious death in February 1941. 
In 1945, He arranged a US visa for Margaret Buber Neumann, the widow of Comintern agent Heinz Neumann.Ted Morgan, A Covert Life - Jay Lovestone: Communist, Anti-Communist and Spymaster, Random House, 1999, p.147.
In March 1945, Murphy questioned Whittaker Chambers for two hours at his home in Maryland.Ted Morgan, A Covert Life - Jay Lovestone: Communist, Anti-Communist and Spymaster, Random House, 1999, p.148.
After leading French Communist Jacques Duclos wrote an article in Cahiers du Communism criticising the dissolution of the American Commmunist Party, and wrote an analysis with the title: "Possible Resurrection of the Communist International, Resumption of Extreme Leftist Activities, Possible Effect on the United States".Ted Morgan, A Covert Life - Jay Lovestone: Communist, Anti-Communist and Spymaster, Random House, 1999, p.148. According to Roy Godson, the Duclos article was brought to Murphy's attention by Ben Mandel, and Murphy highlighted it in turn to the American Federation of Labor.Roy Godson, Dirty Tricks or Trump Cards: US Covert Action & Counterintelligence, Transaction Publishers, 2001, pp.204-205.
Murphy created an ad hoc intelligence services using diplomats such as Elbridge Durbrow in Italy, Norris Chipman in France and and Brewster Morris in Germany. he shared some of the reports from this group with Jay Lovestone, who in return shared information from his Canadian contacts with Nathan Mendelssohn.Ted Morgan, A Covert Life - Jay Lovestone: Communist, Anti-Communist and Spymaster, Random House, 1999, p.149. Pagie Morris also worked for Murphy in the period after the war.Ted Morgan, A Covert Life - Jay Lovestone: Communist, Anti-Communist and Spymaster, Random House, 1999, p.260. She was introduced to Murphy by William Donovan in 1946.Ted Morgan, A Covert Life - Jay Lovestone: Communist, Anti-Communist and Spymaster, Random House, 1999, p.264.
Murphy questioned Chambers again in August 1946. Among those Murphy suspected of spying for the Soviet Union was Alger Hiss, who had recommended Noel Field for a key diplomatic post.Ted Morgan, A Covert Life - Jay Lovestone: Communist, Anti-Communist and Spymaster, Random House, 1999, p.148.
Murphy compiled a report on Hiss which led to a security investigation which concluded in November 1946 that Hiss had taken home top-secret reports he was not cleared for.Ted Morgan, A Covert Life - Jay Lovestone: Communist, Anti-Communist and Spymaster, Random House, 1999, p.149.
In February 1947, Murphy brought the Chambers material to the attention of Richard M. Nixon, then a congressman on the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC).Ted Morgan, A Covert Life - Jay Lovestone: Communist, Anti-Communist and Spymaster, Random House, 1999, p.149.
In the spring of 1948, Murphy asked Pagie Morris to infiltrate the Congress of American Women, a suspected communist front.Ted Morgan, A Covert Life - Jay Lovestone: Communist, Anti-Communist and Spymaster, Random House, 1999, p.264.
After a warning from Lovestone about the situation in Italy on 9 March 1948, Murphy wired $50,000 in private donations to Ambassador James Dunn.Ted Morgan, A Covert Life - Jay Lovestone: Communist, Anti-Communist and Spymaster, Random House, 1999, p.191.
In August 1948, Murphy coached Chambers before his appearance at a HUAC hearing.Ted Morgan, A Covert Life - Jay Lovestone: Communist, Anti-Communist and Spymaster, Random House, 1999, p.149.
Murphy was responsible for introducing Lovestone to William Donovan, which led to Donovan recommending Lovestone in turn to Defence Secretary James Forrestal in 1948.Ted Morgan, A Covert Life - Jay Lovestone: Communist, Anti-Communist and Spymaster, Random House, 1999, p.187.
In September 1951, Lovestone secured US visas for a delegation of Tunisian nationalists though Murphy over French objections.Ted Morgan, A Covert Life - Jay Lovestone: Communist, Anti-Communist and Spymaster, Random House, 1999, p.289 .
Murphy retired from the State Department in 1959, having failed to get Nixon to use his influence to secure him an ambassadorship.Ted Morgan, A Covert Life - Jay Lovestone: Communist, Anti-Communist and Spymaster, Random House, 1999, p.149.
In the early 1950s, Dean Acheson wanted to fire Murphy for collecting information on Hiss, but the American Federation of Labor lobbies in his favour.Ted Morgan, A Covert Life - Jay Lovestone: Communist, Anti-Communist and Spymaster, Random House, 1999, p.150.
Murphy died of cancer in 1963.Ted Morgan, A Covert Life - Jay Lovestone: Communist, Anti-Communist and Spymaster, Random House, 1999, p.150.
==External Resources==
*NameBase MURPHY RAYMOND E
==Notes==
Murphy, Ray