Hitler, Stalin and Mr Jones

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0:00:15 > 0:00:19MEN SPEAK MANDARIN

0:00:20 > 0:00:23I'm searching for the site of a murder which took place

0:00:23 > 0:00:25out here nearly 80 years ago.

0:00:31 > 0:00:34This is the only film of the man who died.

0:00:34 > 0:00:37A few seconds, taken at a meeting with Adolf Hitler.

0:00:37 > 0:00:42News, journalism, intelligence - it's all about knowledge.

0:00:42 > 0:00:43And a little bit of power.

0:00:45 > 0:00:46The murdered man was

0:00:46 > 0:00:49a brilliant Welsh journalist called Gareth Jones.

0:00:49 > 0:00:54He was trying to find out what the Japanese army was plotting in China.

0:00:54 > 0:00:57Gareth must have been really excited because he would have

0:00:57 > 0:01:00felt he was on the verge of another great scoop.

0:01:04 > 0:01:06His greatest scoop had been

0:01:06 > 0:01:09to expose the story few dared put their name to.

0:01:09 > 0:01:14It made him enemies among those who wanted to hide the truth.

0:01:14 > 0:01:17Gareth wasn't afraid of saying what people didn't want to hear

0:01:17 > 0:01:19and also, regardless of personal safety.

0:01:19 > 0:01:22He was shot twice in the back and then once in the head.

0:01:25 > 0:01:27So was he the victim of a Soviet vendetta?

0:01:29 > 0:01:32Or the chance casualty of a life lived dangerously?

0:01:55 > 0:02:00"I should consider myself a flabby little coward if ever I gave up

0:02:00 > 0:02:03"the chance of a good, interesting career

0:02:03 > 0:02:05"for the mere thought of safety.

0:02:05 > 0:02:09"I have no respect for any man whose acceptance

0:02:09 > 0:02:13"or judgement of a post depends on the answer to the question,

0:02:13 > 0:02:16"'will it give me a pension?'

0:02:16 > 0:02:17"'Is it safe?'"

0:02:26 > 0:02:32Five years later, the writer of that letter was somewhere in this intimidating landscape,

0:02:32 > 0:02:35prisoner of bandits whose language he couldn't speak.

0:02:42 > 0:02:44For most of his adult life,

0:02:44 > 0:02:47his gift for languages had opened every door.

0:02:51 > 0:02:54But among these Chinese bandits,

0:02:54 > 0:02:56singing in Welsh was his last resort.

0:03:01 > 0:03:04THEY SPEAK MANDARIN

0:03:04 > 0:03:07He says the bandits would work for whoever had money,

0:03:07 > 0:03:10whether it was the Japanese or the local government,

0:03:10 > 0:03:13or even the Communist Party in those days.

0:03:13 > 0:03:16Whoever paid the highest price, they'd work for them.

0:03:16 > 0:03:19Philip Colley is Gareth's great-nephew.

0:03:19 > 0:03:22By strange chance, he does speak Chinese.

0:03:22 > 0:03:23In the old days of England,

0:03:23 > 0:03:29the government would have considered Robin Hood to be a bandit as well.

0:03:31 > 0:03:35He said Robin Hood was a good bandit and he said in those days

0:03:35 > 0:03:37there were also good bandits in China.

0:03:39 > 0:03:42But these were not good bandits.

0:03:42 > 0:03:44Gareth Jones had trespassed

0:03:44 > 0:03:47into a snake pit of international intrigue.

0:03:51 > 0:03:55What happens here has global implications.

0:03:55 > 0:03:57It's serious journalism.

0:03:57 > 0:04:01I mean, this is not something one would do casually.

0:04:36 > 0:04:39A fortune-teller had said to Gareth

0:04:39 > 0:04:43at one time that he would never see his 30th birthday.

0:04:44 > 0:04:46And he didn't.

0:04:50 > 0:04:54So what came back from China was his ashes,

0:04:54 > 0:04:58these fading photographs of him in strange company,

0:04:58 > 0:05:01and an echo of his final days,

0:05:01 > 0:05:03through a letter he never posted.

0:05:03 > 0:05:08"Inner Mongolia. This has been the most exciting week I've ever had

0:05:08 > 0:05:13"in my life, packed with adventures and strange encounters"

0:05:18 > 0:05:20And, before long, he was forgotten.

0:05:23 > 0:05:24CHURCH BELLS CHIME

0:05:27 > 0:05:30In a small house in a small street

0:05:30 > 0:05:34lives another of Gareth's descendants, Philip's brother Nigel.

0:05:35 > 0:05:38Even in the family, Gareth was a shadowy figure.

0:05:38 > 0:05:41The only time he would ever be mentioned would be at Christmas

0:05:41 > 0:05:45when my grandmother and great aunt Gwyneth came for Christmas lunch.

0:05:45 > 0:05:49Apart from that, he was very rarely mentioned.

0:05:49 > 0:05:53I didn't realise that I'd had an uncle who had been murdered.

0:05:58 > 0:06:02My aunt wanted to stay in Barry until she died but,

0:06:02 > 0:06:04of course, she had this robbery.

0:06:04 > 0:06:07People rang us up and said there'd been a robbery

0:06:07 > 0:06:10and, fortunately, people next door had heard the dog bark.

0:06:13 > 0:06:16It was decided that she'd have to live with her younger sister,

0:06:16 > 0:06:18who was about 90 herself,

0:06:18 > 0:06:23and the whole family rallied together and we went and cleared the house.

0:06:23 > 0:06:25Underneath my grandmother's bed,

0:06:25 > 0:06:27which was thick with dust, was a big trunk.

0:06:27 > 0:06:29There were all sorts of papers there.

0:06:29 > 0:06:31There were some letters in the dining room

0:06:31 > 0:06:34but at the bottom of the second flight of stairs was

0:06:34 > 0:06:37this particular suitcase.

0:06:38 > 0:06:41With the letters G R V J - Gareth Richard Vaughan Jones -

0:06:41 > 0:06:43monogrammed on the outside.

0:06:43 > 0:06:47And inside were his letters which he must have sent

0:06:47 > 0:06:50to his mother and his father on a weekly basis,

0:06:50 > 0:06:51and also these diaries.

0:06:55 > 0:06:57"And that is why, one summer's day,

0:06:57 > 0:07:01"I found myself heading down to the Welsh seaside town of Aberystwyth."

0:07:10 > 0:07:13There are several people in this story called Jones.

0:07:15 > 0:07:19One of them is the chief archivist here, Graham Jones.

0:07:19 > 0:07:25In the week of this burglary, this relatively small archive of

0:07:25 > 0:07:31Gareth's papers transferred to our custody basically for safekeeping.

0:07:31 > 0:07:34I have to be honest and confess that, at that point,

0:07:34 > 0:07:38I'd never even heard of Gareth Jones. He was totally unknown to me.

0:07:38 > 0:07:41I'm not quite sure how many letters there were.

0:07:41 > 0:07:44But now, from these humdrum files,

0:07:44 > 0:07:48the story of an extraordinary life has emerged.

0:07:48 > 0:07:50At its centre is not Wales, where he lived,

0:07:50 > 0:07:53nor China, where he died,

0:07:53 > 0:07:55but Russia.

0:08:10 > 0:08:11It's 1889.

0:08:11 > 0:08:14In this corner of the Tsar's empire,

0:08:14 > 0:08:18a Welshman called John Hughes is king.

0:08:18 > 0:08:23And that's Hughes' house, high on the hill, overlooking everything.

0:08:23 > 0:08:28The monster house was his reward for building a steelworks for the Tsar.

0:08:29 > 0:08:32The settlement became like a corner of Wales.

0:08:34 > 0:08:37Scores of workers were brought over from the valleys

0:08:37 > 0:08:41and the town that grew up was named Hughesovka, in his honour.

0:08:46 > 0:08:50When his son Arthur was looking for someone to tutor the children,

0:08:50 > 0:08:54the woman who volunteered was a miner's daughter

0:08:54 > 0:08:57who'd never left Wales before, Annie Gwen Jones.

0:08:57 > 0:09:02This is a picture of Nain, as I call her, Mrs Annie Gwen Jones,

0:09:02 > 0:09:07taken in Hughesovka when she was there with her writing on the back.

0:09:07 > 0:09:10She must have had it taken when she was in Russia, yes.

0:09:12 > 0:09:16That young woman, of course, was Gareth Jones' mother.

0:09:16 > 0:09:19He was born in 1905, the youngest of three children.

0:09:19 > 0:09:22He went to the local school in Barry,

0:09:22 > 0:09:24that's his father who was the headmaster,

0:09:24 > 0:09:27and then on to Aberystwyth University

0:09:27 > 0:09:29where he was a totally brilliant student.

0:09:29 > 0:09:33He got a first in German and French and then a scholarship to Cambridge.

0:09:33 > 0:09:34There he is.

0:09:34 > 0:09:36To study Russian, of course.

0:09:44 > 0:09:46By the time he made his first trip to Russia,

0:09:46 > 0:09:50there had been revolution against the Tsar and a bloody civil war.

0:09:53 > 0:09:55Gareth by then was 25.

0:09:55 > 0:09:58He'd just left Cambridge with another first

0:09:58 > 0:10:00and now spoke Russian well.

0:10:07 > 0:10:08At one level,

0:10:08 > 0:10:13he was making a sentimental journey into his mother's past.

0:10:13 > 0:10:15But it was also a journey into a present

0:10:15 > 0:10:18that Gareth found fascinating.

0:10:18 > 0:10:20To some, Stalin was a frightening figure.

0:10:20 > 0:10:24To others, including many friends of Cambridge,

0:10:24 > 0:10:27the plan to transform Russia into a workers' state

0:10:27 > 0:10:30was an inspiring alternative

0:10:30 > 0:10:33to the war-weary, class-ridden, stagnant West.

0:10:40 > 0:10:43On August 15th, Gareth sent this postcard to his parents,

0:10:43 > 0:10:46saying he was off to see a collective farm,

0:10:46 > 0:10:50then bought himself a hard-class ticket on a slow train south.

0:10:54 > 0:10:59His letters from Russia are carefully worded for the censors' eyes.

0:10:59 > 0:11:04"The train left Moscow at four o'clock yesterday afternoon

0:11:04 > 0:11:08"and in Tula station, I had a real treat,

0:11:08 > 0:11:11"cheese sandwiches, cakes and lemonade."

0:11:12 > 0:11:16"A Cossack communist with the order of the red flag told me

0:11:16 > 0:11:20"a lot of things about present-day Russia."

0:11:28 > 0:11:31Almost precisely 81 years ago,

0:11:31 > 0:11:33Gareth Jones was sitting on this station,

0:11:33 > 0:11:35he'd been travelling for three or four days,

0:11:35 > 0:11:37he was tired, he was exhausted,

0:11:37 > 0:11:39he was "bearded", he says, in his letter home,

0:11:39 > 0:11:42and he was waiting for that great moment he'd dreamt of,

0:11:42 > 0:11:44just down there to Hughesovka.

0:11:49 > 0:11:51It wasn't like this then, of course,

0:11:51 > 0:11:55and it wasn't the Hughesovka his mother had known, either.

0:11:55 > 0:11:57No more Hughesovka says the sign.

0:11:57 > 0:12:00It's socialist Staliner now.

0:12:04 > 0:12:07But not everything of his mother's world had disappeared.

0:12:07 > 0:12:10Even today, you can still find houses

0:12:10 > 0:12:12where the more privileged workers lived.

0:12:13 > 0:12:17We even found a woman who was actually living here on this street

0:12:17 > 0:12:20on the very day that Gareth arrived.

0:12:30 > 0:12:34She called the Welshman English, as they all do around here,

0:12:34 > 0:12:38and had a black eye because she'd fallen off her ladder.

0:12:50 > 0:12:52She took me to her house.

0:12:52 > 0:12:54Her father had been a baby here when

0:12:54 > 0:12:57Gareth's mother was living in Hughesovka,

0:12:57 > 0:13:01and Valentina was a little girl of three when Gareth himself turned up.

0:13:26 > 0:13:30Gareth's pilgrimage here, as it turned out, was a brief affair.

0:13:30 > 0:13:32He wrote to his parents saying

0:13:32 > 0:13:34he was sitting in a garden near the church.

0:13:34 > 0:13:38He's addressing this to everyone as usual, especially "Mama".

0:13:41 > 0:13:44He was thrilled to be in Hughesovka, he told them,

0:13:44 > 0:13:48but had to hurry on to join his prearranged tour.

0:13:53 > 0:13:55Stalin's famous five-year plan

0:13:55 > 0:13:59was all about industrialising a land of peasants.

0:13:59 > 0:14:01The new state farms had to produce food

0:14:01 > 0:14:07to feed factory workers and to sell abroad in exchange for machinery.

0:14:07 > 0:14:10Peasants became largely expendable.

0:14:10 > 0:14:14A stream of Western intellectuals, like George Bernard Shaw,

0:14:14 > 0:14:18dined well on the new farms and declared the plan was working.

0:14:18 > 0:14:20And stories of cruel enforcement?

0:14:20 > 0:14:24"Well, you can't make omelettes without breaking eggs,"

0:14:24 > 0:14:25said one journalist.

0:14:33 > 0:14:36Gareth got on well enough with his hosts

0:14:36 > 0:14:40to hitch a rare flight back to Moscow and wrote home to say

0:14:40 > 0:14:43how impressed he'd been by the farm they'd shown him.

0:14:43 > 0:14:46But somewhere out in that vast land,

0:14:46 > 0:14:49he'd met people he wasn't supposed to meet

0:14:49 > 0:14:52and, on his way home, from Berlin, he wrote this,

0:14:52 > 0:14:56"Russia is in a very bad state," underlined again and again.

0:14:56 > 0:15:01"No food, only bread. Oppression, injustice.

0:15:01 > 0:15:03"Misery among the workers.

0:15:03 > 0:15:06"It makes me mad," he says, "to think that people..."

0:15:06 > 0:15:10And it's fascinating, he's crossed it out. I wonder who on earth he meant.

0:15:10 > 0:15:13"People like so-and-so go there and come back,

0:15:13 > 0:15:17"having been led around the nose, and having had enough to eat,

0:15:17 > 0:15:19"and just say that Russia is a paradise."

0:15:19 > 0:15:22He sure as hell doesn't think it's a paradise.

0:15:26 > 0:15:29# I just got an invitation through the mail

0:15:29 > 0:15:34# Your presence is requested this evening... #

0:15:34 > 0:15:36Paradise to Gareth right then

0:15:36 > 0:15:40was an invitation to the man he came to know as the chief,

0:15:40 > 0:15:44fellow Welshman and former Prime Minister David Lloyd George.

0:15:48 > 0:15:50Though a depleted force politically,

0:15:50 > 0:15:55his country house parties still attracted powerful people.

0:15:59 > 0:16:05He was a man who simply had enormous authority, enormous prestige,

0:16:05 > 0:16:08enormous personal charisma and magnetism,

0:16:08 > 0:16:12and that's what gave Churt its special quality, I think.

0:16:13 > 0:16:15It was a great political centre.

0:16:15 > 0:16:19Large numbers of journalists, intellectuals.

0:16:19 > 0:16:23You would have these very intense political weekends,

0:16:23 > 0:16:28political sessions, in which a wide variety of topics were discussed.

0:16:33 > 0:16:36And that was the set Gareth had wanted to join

0:16:36 > 0:16:39when he left Cambridge the year before.

0:16:40 > 0:16:44But unemployment was rising and his mother in Wales pleaded with him

0:16:44 > 0:16:48to take the safe option of life as an academic.

0:16:48 > 0:16:52"Tell me why you have no confidence in my future.

0:16:52 > 0:16:57"Why do you want a son of yours to have no courage

0:16:57 > 0:17:02"and just stick in the mud for the feeling of security?"

0:17:02 > 0:17:04Security.

0:17:09 > 0:17:14So he took a short-term contract with Lloyd George instead,

0:17:14 > 0:17:18and after his first trip to Russia, was invited down to Churt.

0:17:19 > 0:17:23He was picked up by chauffeured limousine and, much to his surprise,

0:17:23 > 0:17:25there were many grandees there.

0:17:25 > 0:17:27And when he came out,

0:17:27 > 0:17:31Lord Lothian said he'd never heard Lloyd George keep quiet for so long.

0:17:31 > 0:17:34He was absolutely fascinated by Gareth's tales.

0:17:35 > 0:17:38This was the upshot, a couple of letters from Lord Lothian,

0:17:38 > 0:17:42one handwritten, introducing him to the editor of The Times

0:17:42 > 0:17:44and, soon after that, Gareth finds

0:17:44 > 0:17:48he has three articles in Britain's leading newspaper of the day.

0:17:54 > 0:17:59At a stroke, Gareth had been reborn as an expert in Russian affairs,

0:17:59 > 0:18:03a journalist and a novice member of the political establishment.

0:18:08 > 0:18:11So how many years back does this go?

0:18:11 > 0:18:13Right back to 1836.

0:18:13 > 0:18:17- So when did I say he joined? - 1930, I think.

0:18:18 > 0:18:23ALED JONES: 'What politics could do was to ensure a degree of mobility.'

0:18:23 > 0:18:25Gareth Richard Vaughan, there we go.

0:18:25 > 0:18:27'Someone like Gareth Jones from Barry,

0:18:27 > 0:18:29'with the right political connections,

0:18:29 > 0:18:33'given Lloyd George's dominant role within British liberalism,

0:18:33 > 0:18:34'that was an open door.'

0:18:34 > 0:18:38Right. Proposer Clement Davies, leader of the Liberal Party.

0:18:41 > 0:18:44The Reform Club was the temple of British liberalism,

0:18:44 > 0:18:46one of those exclusive places where

0:18:46 > 0:18:50the old boy networks that ran Britain met.

0:18:50 > 0:18:52You don't have to like those people.

0:18:52 > 0:18:55You don't have to support those people's policies,

0:18:55 > 0:18:58but you need to get to them and you need to talk to them.

0:18:59 > 0:19:02Easy rules for Gareth Jones to live by,

0:19:02 > 0:19:04as for Chapman Pincher,

0:19:04 > 0:19:07a near contemporary and legend of modern journalism.

0:19:07 > 0:19:09There's a picture of me with the Beaver.

0:19:09 > 0:19:12Lord Beaverbrook to the rest of us,

0:19:12 > 0:19:16but in those days, Pincher was just a student at London University.

0:19:21 > 0:19:25Less than a mile from the Reform Club was a different world.

0:19:25 > 0:19:29I walked down from Bloomsbury to King's College which was in the Strand

0:19:29 > 0:19:35and there, in the gutter, literally in the gutter,

0:19:35 > 0:19:41walking down Southampton Road, was a long string of Welsh miners

0:19:41 > 0:19:44singing their hearts out and then on the pavement,

0:19:44 > 0:19:46a fellow with a collecting tin,

0:19:46 > 0:19:49"Welsh miners, please, Welsh miners, please,"

0:19:49 > 0:19:53trying to get a few pennies to keep themselves alive and, hopefully,

0:19:53 > 0:19:56enough to send home to their families in Wales.

0:19:59 > 0:20:04The world economy was in freefall but one young man from Wales

0:20:04 > 0:20:06seemed to cruise effortlessly above it.

0:20:08 > 0:20:10"Mr Ivy Lee, who is a big businessman,

0:20:10 > 0:20:13"Rockefeller's right-hand man,

0:20:13 > 0:20:16"came to see me today,

0:20:16 > 0:20:20"offered me a post beginning at £800 plus expenses.

0:20:20 > 0:20:24"Mr Somerville says that Mr Ivy Lee is

0:20:24 > 0:20:28"a great force in American public life.

0:20:28 > 0:20:31"His special interest is Russia."

0:20:31 > 0:20:35And since Lee had virtually invented public relations,

0:20:35 > 0:20:38for Gareth it was a fast-track into American society.

0:20:43 > 0:20:49# They used to tell me I was building a dream... #

0:20:49 > 0:20:52But in the land of opportunity, the dream was falling apart.

0:20:52 > 0:20:59# Why should I be standing in line just waiting for bread? #

0:20:59 > 0:21:03Banks were teetering, industrial output was falling,

0:21:03 > 0:21:06and millions were out of work.

0:21:06 > 0:21:09Even capitalists began asking whether the Soviet Union

0:21:09 > 0:21:11might be doing something right.

0:21:14 > 0:21:18Gareth found his expertise in great demand.

0:21:18 > 0:21:22"I'm going to Russia with the son of Mr Heinz,

0:21:22 > 0:21:25"baked beans, 57 varieties.

0:21:25 > 0:21:28"Mr Heinz, whom I liked very much,

0:21:28 > 0:21:32"is paying all my expenses and my salary."

0:21:33 > 0:21:35And for history, a huge bonus.

0:21:37 > 0:21:40Jack Heinz had a camera.

0:21:47 > 0:21:49And among the mementoes,

0:21:49 > 0:21:53a rare picture of Gareth in Russia.

0:22:08 > 0:22:11The whole world was in distress in those days,

0:22:11 > 0:22:14each country in its own way.

0:22:16 > 0:22:19Which of the competing visions of something better would save it?

0:22:22 > 0:22:25That was the puzzle everyone wanted to unravel.

0:22:30 > 0:22:34This crumpled telegram was waiting for Gareth Jones,

0:22:34 > 0:22:36Poste Restante, Stalingrad.

0:22:36 > 0:22:37READS LETTER

0:22:42 > 0:22:45It's asking for more information and then says,

0:22:45 > 0:22:49"Chief desirous of seeing you on your return. Sylvester".

0:22:52 > 0:22:56Sylvester was AJ Sylvester, Lloyd George's secretary.

0:22:56 > 0:23:00By now, Gareth was more of a journalist, but the line between

0:23:00 > 0:23:03journalism and gathering political intelligence then

0:23:03 > 0:23:05was not very clear.

0:23:05 > 0:23:09The detail with which he records his impressions

0:23:09 > 0:23:14and the detail in which he records facts about the people he meets,

0:23:14 > 0:23:20for example, when he goes to the United States,

0:23:20 > 0:23:27are far beyond what any journalist would normally record for use in press articles.

0:23:27 > 0:23:32I'm loath to use the term 'spy' but I'm convinced that he was

0:23:32 > 0:23:36transferring information to the national government in the 1930s.

0:23:41 > 0:23:45Harry Ferguson is at home in that world.

0:23:45 > 0:23:47He used to be a spy himself.

0:23:47 > 0:23:52The service was very much an upper-class institution,

0:23:52 > 0:23:55and if you went to the great universities,

0:23:55 > 0:23:58Oxford, Cambridge, if you mixed in that very clubbable world,

0:23:58 > 0:24:02the world of weekend house parties, there was a good chance that

0:24:02 > 0:24:05you might be asked to take part in intelligence in some way.

0:24:06 > 0:24:10Gareth may have started as the boy from South Wales,

0:24:10 > 0:24:11but his time at Cambridge,

0:24:11 > 0:24:15his talent and ferocious networking had transformed him.

0:24:15 > 0:24:17There he is in the background.

0:24:18 > 0:24:21That building over there, the Post Office, used to be

0:24:21 > 0:24:25the headquarters of something called the Air League.

0:24:25 > 0:24:28On the eve of that first trip to Russia, he'd gone there to

0:24:28 > 0:24:31meet a secret agent called Colonel Thwaites.

0:24:31 > 0:24:37"Colonel Thwaites was in a small room in morning dress,

0:24:37 > 0:24:39"top hat hanging on peg.

0:24:39 > 0:24:45"He had keen dark eyes, not very attractive personality,

0:24:45 > 0:24:49"absolutely unscrupulous and very cold.

0:24:49 > 0:24:54"He told me it was difficult to get facts about Soviet aviation."

0:25:00 > 0:25:04At some point, Thwaites has heard that he's travelling to Russia.

0:25:04 > 0:25:07They would have checked him out, they would have known that

0:25:07 > 0:25:11he came from the right sort of background, so why not ask him?

0:25:11 > 0:25:13It's a good way to test out someone.

0:25:13 > 0:25:15And he seems to have done what he was asked.

0:25:15 > 0:25:21Pages of notes about an obscure organisation called Osoaviakhim,

0:25:21 > 0:25:25abbreviated to Oso, literally aviation and chemicals.

0:25:29 > 0:25:31"Aims.

0:25:31 > 0:25:33"To struggle for the five-year plan.

0:25:33 > 0:25:35"Shop brigade.

0:25:35 > 0:25:39"Every member of Osoaviakhim must be a shop brigade worker.

0:25:39 > 0:25:41"We prepare pilots."

0:25:41 > 0:25:47News, journalism, intelligence - it's all about knowledge.

0:25:47 > 0:25:53Giving your domestic audience an edge, a little bit more power,

0:25:53 > 0:25:57and a capacity to perhaps take better decisions.

0:26:00 > 0:26:04This was the year that would define this man of many parts.

0:26:04 > 0:26:06"Hooray," he says.

0:26:06 > 0:26:11"I have arranged to write some articles for The Economist about Russia."

0:26:11 > 0:26:13But the interesting thing is on the last page.

0:26:13 > 0:26:17"I remain a member of Lloyd George's staff until

0:26:17 > 0:26:20"the end of March - entre nous - at a nominal salary,

0:26:20 > 0:26:25"but it's worth everything to me to go to Germany as his secretary.

0:26:25 > 0:26:28"It gives me a wonderful entree," he says.

0:26:31 > 0:26:32Germany was Gareth's great love

0:26:32 > 0:26:35and he spoke the language even better than Russian.

0:26:35 > 0:26:38But it was changing fast.

0:26:41 > 0:26:43Hitler had just became Chancellor.

0:26:43 > 0:26:46The Nazis were expected to win the coming election.

0:26:50 > 0:26:53Gareth's entree was no less than Joseph Goebbels,

0:26:53 > 0:26:55Hitler's propaganda chief.

0:26:55 > 0:27:01There is just one brief reference

0:27:01 > 0:27:06in Goebbels' voluminous diaries, 1932 to 1934.

0:27:07 > 0:27:12Here, on 24th February 1933, Goebbels writes,

0:27:12 > 0:27:15"A long conversation with Lloyd George's secretary.

0:27:15 > 0:27:18"He's in Germany for purposes of study.

0:27:18 > 0:27:20"A very clever young man.

0:27:20 > 0:27:23"He tells me terrible things about Soviet Russia."

0:27:23 > 0:27:25"For study."

0:27:25 > 0:27:28Gareth was a master at choosing the right word.

0:27:30 > 0:27:34Goebbels, "We dined together and talked. Charming man.

0:27:34 > 0:27:37"Dark brown eyes.

0:27:37 > 0:27:39"Very narrow head.

0:27:39 > 0:27:43"Like a South Welsh miner. High brow.

0:27:43 > 0:27:49"Tremendous humour. Very great personal charm.

0:27:49 > 0:27:52"Small, with limp."

0:27:52 > 0:27:57Gareth's diary of that day makes surreal reading now.

0:27:57 > 0:28:01"The leader is coming. A car drives through the snow.

0:28:01 > 0:28:04"Out steps a very ordinary-looking man.

0:28:04 > 0:28:06"Looks like a middle-class grocer.

0:28:06 > 0:28:13"Has an ordinary greyish brown mackintosh, just as everybody has."

0:28:13 > 0:28:17"His hair is very dark and brushed.

0:28:17 > 0:28:20"Hitler surprised me by his smile.

0:28:20 > 0:28:23"Quite intelligent. Natural."

0:28:23 > 0:28:26And there in the German film archive of that same day

0:28:26 > 0:28:29we found the only surviving shot of Gareth Jones.

0:28:39 > 0:28:44"We saw Goebbels' new car. Most interested.

0:28:44 > 0:28:48"Gets inside, wants to learn all about it.

0:28:48 > 0:28:54"The new brown car with Hitler inside is driven through the snow.

0:28:55 > 0:28:58"Hitler comes out just like a boy."

0:29:01 > 0:29:05Somehow, he got permission to fly with Hitler's entourage,

0:29:05 > 0:29:10so probably about a dozen people flying from Berlin to Frankfurt.

0:29:15 > 0:29:20"If aeroplane should crash, whole history of Germany would change.

0:29:22 > 0:29:27"Hitler is a few feet away. Goebbels behind him."

0:29:31 > 0:29:32He wrote to his parents,

0:29:32 > 0:29:36"The Hitler meeting was the most thrilling thing I've ever seen in my life.

0:29:36 > 0:29:37"Absolutely primitive."

0:29:37 > 0:29:42"Hitler flabbily waves his hand.

0:29:42 > 0:29:44"Young schoolgirls shout.

0:29:44 > 0:29:46"Hitler begins.

0:29:46 > 0:29:48"Calm, deep voice.

0:29:48 > 0:29:52"Gets louder and louder, higher and higher.

0:29:52 > 0:29:56"Tremendous applause."

0:29:58 > 0:30:01And his true friends were Germans, believe it or not.

0:30:01 > 0:30:04Some of them were Nazis and some of them weren't.

0:30:04 > 0:30:07Gareth was a little bit ambivalent.

0:30:07 > 0:30:10Sometimes he could see both sides of the picture,

0:30:10 > 0:30:15and sometimes I don't quite decide which side he would have been on.

0:30:15 > 0:30:17He didn't like to commit himself.

0:30:17 > 0:30:21One has to remember that Gareth had been travelling to Germany

0:30:21 > 0:30:27since he was a teenager, every single year, and had seen a change.

0:30:27 > 0:30:29When he flew with Hitler on that trip,

0:30:29 > 0:30:32he did see that the Nazis were doing good things

0:30:32 > 0:30:34to do with creating employment.

0:30:36 > 0:30:40Gareth commented very favourably on that and even, in an article,

0:30:40 > 0:30:43says this is something Wales might learn from.

0:30:43 > 0:30:46He similarly was intrigued by the labour camps

0:30:46 > 0:30:49which the Nazis were extending for young people,

0:30:49 > 0:30:51and felt that that might be a positive thing.

0:30:56 > 0:31:00Nobody knew that the Holocaust was about to happen at that time.

0:31:00 > 0:31:03When David Lloyd George met Hitler, he referred to him as

0:31:03 > 0:31:07the George Washington of Germany, the greatest living German.

0:31:07 > 0:31:09So having an interest in Germany

0:31:09 > 0:31:13was really having an interest in modernity in many ways.

0:31:17 > 0:31:20It was a delusion many people then shared.

0:31:22 > 0:31:23From Gareth's articles,

0:31:23 > 0:31:27you can see he was acutely aware of the threat of anti-Semitism.

0:31:30 > 0:31:32But at that moment,

0:31:32 > 0:31:35his focus was on a tragedy already happening somewhere else.

0:31:37 > 0:31:43"I go on to Moscow tonight and arrive Sunday, 12.50.

0:31:43 > 0:31:47"I shall be very careful."

0:31:52 > 0:31:54DOGS BARK

0:31:54 > 0:31:57In this house lives the daughter-in-law of a man

0:31:57 > 0:32:01who would play a key part in the next few weeks of Gareth's life.

0:32:04 > 0:32:07Maxim Litvinov was commissar for foreign affairs.

0:32:07 > 0:32:10He had two immediate objectives -

0:32:10 > 0:32:14diplomatic recognition by America and opposition to Hitler.

0:32:26 > 0:32:30In those days, Flora lived in a flat near the railway station

0:32:30 > 0:32:34which brought people in from the Ukrainian countryside.

0:33:19 > 0:33:23This was the real effect of Stalin's policies on the countryside.

0:33:25 > 0:33:30The new farms were failing to meet their targets.

0:33:30 > 0:33:34So every scrap of food was being confiscated by the state

0:33:34 > 0:33:36and the peasants left to starve.

0:33:59 > 0:34:05People knew but mostly said nothing, Litvinov included.

0:34:07 > 0:34:10He admired Stalin as a leader but, very privately,

0:34:10 > 0:34:14his family knew he was becoming uneasy about his methods.

0:34:35 > 0:34:40Gareth Jones had had enough dealings with Soviet officialdom by now

0:34:40 > 0:34:44to know that the key to getting what he wanted lay here,

0:34:44 > 0:34:46in Litvinov's foreign office.

0:34:46 > 0:34:49Two months earlier, a letter had arrived from the embassy in London

0:34:49 > 0:34:53asking them to give Gareth Jones special treatment.

0:34:53 > 0:34:56"Gareth Jones is a really influential journalist.

0:34:56 > 0:34:59"He's got a direct line to Lloyd George.

0:34:59 > 0:35:01"Give him all the help you can."

0:35:01 > 0:35:04That's Majsky, the Soviet ambassador.

0:35:04 > 0:35:07Majsky's saying conversations

0:35:07 > 0:35:11and "bisanye", which probably means diplomatic cables,

0:35:11 > 0:35:15about the critical situation in the Soviet Union are flooding Europe

0:35:15 > 0:35:18and Lloyd George wants to know what's going on.

0:35:19 > 0:35:22So did Gareth Jones.

0:35:22 > 0:35:26And he knew that even if the chief's influence was fading in Britain,

0:35:26 > 0:35:29abroad, his name still carried weight.

0:35:30 > 0:35:36This is his passport, which he would have used at the time.

0:35:36 > 0:35:42'Litvinov knew that bad press right then would be a disaster.

0:35:42 > 0:35:46'He decided to back his ambassador's faith in Jones.'

0:35:46 > 0:35:48This is the 1933 Soviet visa

0:35:48 > 0:35:52which was actually given to him free of charge.

0:35:56 > 0:35:58Gareth duly turned up in Moscow

0:35:58 > 0:36:02on March 5th, to find Litvinov had ordered the red carpet treatment,

0:36:02 > 0:36:06culminating in a key meeting with... See the name down there?

0:36:06 > 0:36:10Comrade Umansky, head of Litvinov's press department

0:36:10 > 0:36:15and the man who controlled the activities of all foreign correspondents.

0:36:19 > 0:36:21As far as Umansky was concerned,

0:36:21 > 0:36:24Gareth was going to the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv

0:36:24 > 0:36:26to look at a tractor factory.

0:36:30 > 0:36:34But it was all a front. Gareth's mission was to expose the famine.

0:36:34 > 0:36:38These are the most important of his diaries

0:36:38 > 0:36:42and I believe that they represent the only independent verification

0:36:42 > 0:36:46of arguably Stalin's greatest atrocity.

0:37:03 > 0:37:05This man, Tim Snyder,

0:37:05 > 0:37:09has just written a monumental book which documents the horrors

0:37:09 > 0:37:14both Stalin and Hitler inflicted on Ukraine.

0:37:14 > 0:37:17Gareth's next few days have a brief but gripping part.

0:37:17 > 0:37:21Gareth Jones does what he knows very well he's not supposed to do.

0:37:21 > 0:37:23He gets on a train to Kharkiv,

0:37:23 > 0:37:25but rather than going all the way to Kharkiv,

0:37:25 > 0:37:29where he might have been controlled when he got out of the train,

0:37:29 > 0:37:32he jumped out at train at a small stop with a knapsack full of food

0:37:32 > 0:37:34and went walking, until he found people.

0:37:45 > 0:37:48And when he found people, they said to him two things he noted down.

0:37:48 > 0:37:51They said, "We are all bursting from hunger,"

0:37:51 > 0:37:55that is, their bellies were bloated from hunger,

0:37:55 > 0:37:57and "We are all waiting to die."

0:38:18 > 0:38:23This is what Gareth was doing in that dreadful winter of '33.

0:38:24 > 0:38:27That's our producer, Teresa.

0:38:27 > 0:38:30She'd once met Mikhailo over 20 years ago.

0:38:30 > 0:38:35- Maybe there's another door. - Try to open the door.- OK.

0:38:47 > 0:38:49- Teresa?- Da.

0:38:53 > 0:38:54Teresa Cherfas.

0:38:59 > 0:39:03He could hardly see now, nor walk,

0:39:03 > 0:39:06but the wanton cruelty of collectivisation

0:39:06 > 0:39:08seemed like yesterday.

0:39:55 > 0:39:58Gareth's plan was to gather evidence like that

0:39:58 > 0:40:02to break the conspiracy of silence about the famine.

0:40:05 > 0:40:10"Everywhere I talked to peasants, they all had the same story.

0:40:10 > 0:40:13"There is no bread, we haven't had bread for over two months.

0:40:13 > 0:40:17"A lot are dying. The first village had no more potatoes left"

0:40:17 > 0:40:21"and the store of buryat, beetroot, was running out."

0:40:21 > 0:40:23They all said the same. "The cattle is dying.

0:40:23 > 0:40:27"We used to feed the world and now we're hungry."

0:40:27 > 0:40:29He went into a little hut and he shared his food,

0:40:29 > 0:40:32and one of the girls who ate some of this food said,

0:40:32 > 0:40:35"Now that I've eaten something so wonderful, now I can die."

0:40:40 > 0:40:44He meticulously recorded virtually every step he took.

0:40:44 > 0:40:49"I caught up with a bearded peasant. We started talking.

0:40:49 > 0:40:53"'You see that field? It was all gold, but now look at all the weeds.

0:40:53 > 0:40:58"'We were the richest country in the world for grain.

0:40:58 > 0:41:02"'Now they've taken it all away from us we, we are ruined.'"

0:41:03 > 0:41:07Gareth understood the reality of what was happening.

0:41:07 > 0:41:09I think for him at that point,

0:41:09 > 0:41:12it became indelible and all his work after that

0:41:12 > 0:41:15was an attempt to try to convey what had actually happened.

0:41:26 > 0:41:31With his notebooks filled, Gareth left these fields of death.

0:41:31 > 0:41:33He headed on to the tractor factory

0:41:33 > 0:41:36and then went to the opera with the German Consul.

0:41:38 > 0:41:42"Plenty of lipstick," he notes, "but no bread."

0:41:52 > 0:41:55Back in Moscow, a big story had broken.

0:41:55 > 0:42:00Six British engineers had been arrested and accused of sabotage.

0:42:00 > 0:42:04It threatened to become a major international row.

0:42:05 > 0:42:08Gareth reverted to his official role.

0:42:08 > 0:42:10On March 19th, he went to a reception

0:42:10 > 0:42:13being held here in Litvinov's official residence.

0:42:13 > 0:42:16"19th March, met Litvinov."

0:42:16 > 0:42:19Same day, another chirpy letter home.

0:42:19 > 0:42:23No mention of famine, all sweetness and light.

0:42:23 > 0:42:26He's saying he had dinner with the German ambassador

0:42:26 > 0:42:31and then he repeats how helpful the foreign office, the Narkomindel...

0:42:31 > 0:42:35"Spared no trouble in making my visit a success."

0:42:36 > 0:42:40He got his private briefing from Litvinov on March 23rd.

0:42:40 > 0:42:43He writes 1932, curiously.

0:42:47 > 0:42:50And then he was off again. This time to Berlin.

0:42:51 > 0:42:55En route, he started writing a letter to Lloyd George.

0:42:55 > 0:42:58"The five-year plan is a complete disaster."

0:42:58 > 0:43:00He describes how he tramped around.

0:43:00 > 0:43:05He then says who he's interviewed, Litvinov, various other key players.

0:43:05 > 0:43:08Then says down here, "The situation is so grave

0:43:08 > 0:43:12"that I'm amazed at your admiration for Stalin."

0:43:13 > 0:43:19Bold words. Did the dynamite in his notebook make him brave, I wondered.

0:43:20 > 0:43:25"Would you like me to come down to Churt...Saturday afternoon?

0:43:25 > 0:43:28"Whenever you like, I'll come and report."

0:43:37 > 0:43:39The election a few weeks earlier

0:43:39 > 0:43:42had left the Nazis the largest party in Germany.

0:43:43 > 0:43:45There in their new heartland,

0:43:45 > 0:43:48this complicated man now did something extraordinary.

0:43:49 > 0:43:54He gathered some journalists together and gave them his story.

0:43:54 > 0:43:56I think Gareth was a man of conviction.

0:43:56 > 0:43:59I think that getting the story out was most important to him.

0:43:59 > 0:44:01Nobody knew who this 27-year-old was

0:44:01 > 0:44:04but everybody knew who Lloyd George was

0:44:04 > 0:44:07and for an aide of Lloyd George to say that there was a famine

0:44:07 > 0:44:10meant that there was probably a famine.

0:44:12 > 0:44:16The Moscow press corps reacted in a way I still find hard to believe.

0:44:16 > 0:44:19They knew they should have written a story themselves,

0:44:19 > 0:44:22so they denied it was true.

0:44:22 > 0:44:25Living in this flamboyant mansion at the time

0:44:25 > 0:44:28was one of Gareth Jones's best contacts,

0:44:28 > 0:44:30a man called Eugene Lyons

0:44:30 > 0:44:33who belonged to a group of American correspondents

0:44:33 > 0:44:35then working in the Soviet Union.

0:44:36 > 0:44:40I could see from Gareth's diary that Lyons had given him

0:44:40 > 0:44:42a full briefing about the situation in the countryside

0:44:42 > 0:44:44before he went down to Ukraine.

0:44:46 > 0:44:48"Death penalty for stealing."

0:44:50 > 0:44:53"Extension of police powers."

0:44:53 > 0:44:56"New policy. Serfdom for the peasant."

0:44:57 > 0:45:00But straight after Gareth's press conference,

0:45:00 > 0:45:03Lyons held a meeting with his colleagues.

0:45:03 > 0:45:08In his memoirs, he describes how they conspired to betray him.

0:45:08 > 0:45:11"Throwing down Jones was as unpleasant a chore

0:45:11 > 0:45:15"as fell to any of us in years of juggling facts

0:45:15 > 0:45:19"to please dictatorial regimes. But throw him down we did."

0:45:23 > 0:45:26Leading the charge was this man, Walter Duranty,

0:45:26 > 0:45:28the New York Times correspondent,

0:45:28 > 0:45:31who'd likened peasants' suffering to broken eggs.

0:45:31 > 0:45:35Duranty was the highest-paid foreign journalist in the world.

0:45:35 > 0:45:39He was the doyenne of the foreign correspondents in the Soviet Union,

0:45:39 > 0:45:44and within 24 hours of Gareth's news conference,

0:45:44 > 0:45:47he had denigrated Gareth in the New York Times.

0:45:52 > 0:45:56"Poor Gareth Jones must have been the most surprised human being alive

0:45:56 > 0:46:00"when the facts he had so painstakingly garnered

0:46:00 > 0:46:04"from our mouths were snowed under by our denials."

0:46:08 > 0:46:10The famine became politics even as it was happening.

0:46:14 > 0:46:15Thanks to the rise of Hitler,

0:46:15 > 0:46:19he's the one person who does want to talk about the famine.

0:46:19 > 0:46:22So what that means is that these victims out in Ukraine,

0:46:22 > 0:46:24even as they are literally still dying

0:46:24 > 0:46:26and Gareth is writing about them,

0:46:26 > 0:46:30they're being folded up into this larger political story

0:46:30 > 0:46:35of the Nazi right, which then the left feels like it has to oppose.

0:46:35 > 0:46:39And that meant denying that millions were starving

0:46:39 > 0:46:40because of Stalin's policies.

0:46:46 > 0:46:50"The filthy business having been disposed of,

0:46:50 > 0:46:52"someone ordered vodka and zakuski.

0:46:52 > 0:46:55"Umansky joined the celebration

0:46:55 > 0:46:59"and the party didn't break up until the early morning hours."

0:47:06 > 0:47:11So far, so good. But Litvinov knew his policies would be in jeopardy

0:47:11 > 0:47:15if stories of the famine gained further traction.

0:47:15 > 0:47:18The documents we'd unearthed in Moscow show what happened next.

0:47:19 > 0:47:21Look at this one, marked "Secret."

0:47:21 > 0:47:24It's from Litvinov to the embassy in London,

0:47:24 > 0:47:27complaining bitterly about Gareth Jones.

0:47:27 > 0:47:31He can't understand how they can possibly not have checked

0:47:31 > 0:47:34that he was really acting for Lloyd George.

0:47:34 > 0:47:38But much more curious is this one, apparently a letter from Sylvester,

0:47:38 > 0:47:41wrong initials though, copied by the London Embassy

0:47:41 > 0:47:46and sent to Litvinov to prove just how furious Lloyd George was too.

0:47:46 > 0:47:49"During the time that he was in his employ,

0:47:49 > 0:47:52"Mr Lloyd George deliberately refused,

0:47:52 > 0:47:55"not once but on a number of occasions,

0:47:55 > 0:47:57"to allow him to go to Russia."

0:47:57 > 0:47:59And so the loyal Sylvester goes on,

0:47:59 > 0:48:04apparently disowning Gareth on the chief's behalf.

0:48:04 > 0:48:08Lloyd George was extremely good at using people,

0:48:08 > 0:48:11squeezing the information out of them.

0:48:11 > 0:48:14When problems occurred, he would drop them.

0:48:14 > 0:48:18In some cases, drop them with extreme savagery.

0:48:18 > 0:48:20Gareth was expecting to be invited to Churt.

0:48:20 > 0:48:24In his letter to Lloyd George he says, "I'll make myself available."

0:48:25 > 0:48:27But the call never came.

0:48:33 > 0:48:36Worse still, the Soviet Secret Police had been alerted.

0:48:53 > 0:48:56One day in Moscow, we traced a man called Nikolai Leonov.

0:48:59 > 0:49:02He's one of those shadowy players who's long had the ear

0:49:02 > 0:49:04of powerful people in the Communist world.

0:49:08 > 0:49:10He rose to be a general in the KGB

0:49:10 > 0:49:12and Deputy Head of Foreign Intelligence.

0:49:12 > 0:49:17He looked at the file we'd extracted from the Foreign Ministry.

0:49:46 > 0:49:50This is what he meant. Some excoriating articles

0:49:50 > 0:49:53written by Gareth as soon as he returned, about the famine.

0:49:55 > 0:49:59What he described as blunders by OGPU, the Secret Police.

0:50:10 > 0:50:12# The very thought of you... #

0:50:12 > 0:50:15Six months later, Gareth was back where he started.

0:50:18 > 0:50:20Realpolitik had triumphed.

0:50:22 > 0:50:25The Metrovick engineers had been released.

0:50:25 > 0:50:30# I'm living in a kind of daydream... #

0:50:30 > 0:50:34Litvinov had established diplomatic relations with America.

0:50:34 > 0:50:36# And foolish though it may seem... #

0:50:36 > 0:50:41And the story of Stalin's lethal famine was buried.

0:50:42 > 0:50:45# The mere idea of you... #

0:50:47 > 0:50:50Gareth was living quietly at home with his parents,

0:50:50 > 0:50:53working as a staff reporter on the Western Mail in Cardiff.

0:50:57 > 0:51:01One day in 1934, he got a letter from Margaret Stewart,

0:51:01 > 0:51:03a great friend from Cambridge.

0:51:03 > 0:51:06She was off to Russia - would he be there too?

0:51:06 > 0:51:10Gareth replied, grimly cheerful...

0:51:10 > 0:51:13"You'll be very amused to hear that inoffensive little Joneski

0:51:13 > 0:51:18"has achieved the dignity of being a marked man on the blacklist of OGPU

0:51:18 > 0:51:21"and is barred from entering the Soviet Union.

0:51:21 > 0:51:25"I hear that there is a long list of crimes which I have committed

0:51:25 > 0:51:27"under my name in the secret police file in Moscow

0:51:27 > 0:51:31"and funnily enough, espionage is said to be among them."

0:51:31 > 0:51:34He joked, but he was restless.

0:51:34 > 0:51:38Instead of being a hero for revealing the truth,

0:51:38 > 0:51:39he was out in the cold.

0:51:42 > 0:51:44That autumn, he went to see some friends

0:51:44 > 0:51:47in the nearby village of Llantwit Major.

0:51:47 > 0:51:49He had some news for them.

0:51:49 > 0:51:56He said that he was on his last long expedition now.

0:51:56 > 0:52:03He told his mother that when he got home from this round-the-world trip,

0:52:03 > 0:52:07he would settle down and take a permanent post

0:52:07 > 0:52:09in this country.

0:52:09 > 0:52:12Morfydd Williams was then a young woman of 17

0:52:12 > 0:52:14in her last year at school.

0:52:14 > 0:52:18One afternoon, she'd met Gareth as she came home on the bus.

0:52:18 > 0:52:20I saw Gareth reading a book,

0:52:20 > 0:52:23so I sat by him and he gave me that book.

0:52:23 > 0:52:27He said, "You'll enjoy that." Which I did.

0:52:27 > 0:52:31I think, actually, he was on his way then to see Mr Hearst

0:52:31 > 0:52:34at St Donat's Castle.

0:52:36 > 0:52:40'Mr Hearst was the eccentric American newspaper tycoon,

0:52:40 > 0:52:42'Randolph Hearst.

0:52:42 > 0:52:44'He owned this castle near Morfydd's home.'

0:52:44 > 0:52:46I think this must be the place.

0:52:47 > 0:52:52It's a bit like the sort of gateway that Randolph Hearst might have had.

0:52:52 > 0:52:54Gareth, ever fascinated by power,

0:52:54 > 0:52:58went to interview him for his newspaper.

0:52:58 > 0:53:01This was the time when Hearst was changing his allegiance

0:53:01 > 0:53:04from the Soviets towards Hitler

0:53:04 > 0:53:07not because he liked Hitler,

0:53:07 > 0:53:10but because he disliked Roosevelt's New Deal.

0:53:10 > 0:53:14Hearst had already in mind an anti-red campaign

0:53:14 > 0:53:18and invited Gareth over to California to spearhead it.

0:53:18 > 0:53:24The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.

0:53:24 > 0:53:28Roosevelt's New Deal was getting people back to work,

0:53:28 > 0:53:33but with methods which to some Americans smacked of socialism.

0:53:35 > 0:53:39Randolph Hearst, initially a Roosevelt supporter,

0:53:39 > 0:53:41had turned into a virulent enemy.

0:53:41 > 0:53:44Gareth crossed America to see him

0:53:44 > 0:53:47in his extravagant palace in California

0:53:47 > 0:53:51and then took his dubious shilling.

0:53:51 > 0:53:54On January 1st 1935, he met Hearst and was then commissioned

0:53:54 > 0:53:58to write probably three of the most vitriolic articles

0:53:58 > 0:54:00against the Soviet Union in the 1930s.

0:54:02 > 0:54:07Now, more than ever, Gareth was a marked man in Soviet eyes.

0:54:07 > 0:54:13This was the very last thing that he sent, and that was to me.

0:54:13 > 0:54:15"With my love from Gareth."

0:54:15 > 0:54:18- Honolulu!- Yes.

0:54:18 > 0:54:23- Can you sing it for me? - Oh, heavens no! No, I'm sorry!

0:54:23 > 0:54:25He hoped to be back for Christmas.

0:54:25 > 0:54:29But he would never see these shores again.

0:54:43 > 0:54:46There is an immense amount of political and military intrigue

0:54:46 > 0:54:49in China around that period.

0:54:49 > 0:54:53Anthony Best is an expert on the world that Gareth was entering.

0:54:53 > 0:54:56This is the area of Manchuria.

0:54:56 > 0:54:58This has been seized by the Japanese

0:54:58 > 0:55:02and turned into the puppet state of Manchukuo.

0:55:02 > 0:55:04Gareth sensed that what the Japanese did next

0:55:04 > 0:55:06was going to be the big story

0:55:06 > 0:55:09and the focus of that was Inner Mongolia.

0:55:09 > 0:55:13We have Japanese activity in this area,

0:55:13 > 0:55:15we have the Soviet Union using Outer Mongolia

0:55:15 > 0:55:18to try to subvert Inner Mongolia

0:55:18 > 0:55:22and we have the Chinese themselves having interests in Inner Mongolia.

0:55:22 > 0:55:27Inner Mongolia is an area of enormous intrigue at this point.

0:55:33 > 0:55:38Gareth arrived here wanting a scoop to relaunch his career.

0:55:38 > 0:55:41My guide on the ground was his great-nephew, Philip.

0:55:43 > 0:55:46Gareth certainly wouldn't recognise Beijing today

0:55:46 > 0:55:48and nor would most of the residents of Beijing from that time.

0:55:48 > 0:55:52Transport from those days was Bactrian camels, horses

0:55:52 > 0:55:56and within the city human rickshaws taking people from place to place.

0:56:04 > 0:56:07He headed for the old embassy zone.

0:56:07 > 0:56:11It's now full of Chinese Government offices.

0:56:13 > 0:56:15Filming is discouraged.

0:56:17 > 0:56:19Behind that scaffolding is the old Peking Club,

0:56:19 > 0:56:23social centre in those days for all foreigners.

0:56:23 > 0:56:26And it was here that Gareth, who'd been made a temporary member,

0:56:26 > 0:56:29was approached by a distinguished German diplomat,

0:56:29 > 0:56:33Baron von Plessen, with a very interesting suggestion.

0:56:33 > 0:56:36He asked Gareth whether he'd like to join him and Dr Herbert Muller

0:56:36 > 0:56:39on a trip up to Inner Mongolia to meet Prince De Wang.

0:56:39 > 0:56:43In Gareth's archive were some photographs.

0:56:43 > 0:56:46This grainy image is Prince De Wang.

0:56:48 > 0:56:50From the front...

0:56:51 > 0:56:53..and from behind.

0:56:57 > 0:57:00And this is the elegant Baron von Plessen.

0:57:02 > 0:57:04And this, I think, is Dr Muller -

0:57:04 > 0:57:09a bit portly, good fun and fluent in Chinese.

0:57:10 > 0:57:12It was just what Gareth wanted

0:57:12 > 0:57:15and the journalist Muller seemed the perfect guide.

0:57:15 > 0:57:19He'd done a lot of travelling in Inner Mongolia and in China.

0:57:19 > 0:57:20He spoke fluent Chinese,

0:57:20 > 0:57:24he'd married a Chinese lady and had some children with her

0:57:24 > 0:57:26and he'd been here for many, many years

0:57:26 > 0:57:28and really knew the country very well.

0:57:36 > 0:57:41So off we went, Phil and I, to follow their trail.

0:57:47 > 0:57:50Our first stop would be a city called Zhangjiakou.

0:57:52 > 0:57:55In those days, a dusty town called Kalgan

0:57:55 > 0:57:58on the very edge of what China controlled.

0:58:02 > 0:58:07What do you think, setting out on the same journey as Gareth?

0:58:07 > 0:58:10It's quite exciting to be following in his footsteps.

0:58:10 > 0:58:13Slightly different. I think he was travelling in first class

0:58:13 > 0:58:16when he set off for Kalgan.

0:58:16 > 0:58:20Actually, in Russia, he was very keen to go hard class, wasn't he?

0:58:20 > 0:58:23- That's right, yeah. - He liked talking to people.

0:58:23 > 0:58:26I think this time because he was travelling with Baron Von Plessen

0:58:26 > 0:58:30who liked the comforts of life, they went first class.

0:58:36 > 0:58:40Gareth as usual was describing everything to his parents.

0:58:40 > 0:58:43The letter he was writing then was never posted,

0:58:43 > 0:58:48but it did survive to lead us through his final journey.

0:59:07 > 0:59:10In those days, this was, as it still is to a certain extent,

0:59:10 > 0:59:13very much a frontier town.

0:59:13 > 0:59:15It still has that frontier feel today.

0:59:15 > 0:59:19Go beyond here, you were taking your life in your own hands.

0:59:19 > 0:59:22In the spidery hand of his last unposted letter,

0:59:22 > 0:59:25I could see that they'd been required by the authorities

0:59:25 > 0:59:27to sign a piece of paper

0:59:27 > 0:59:30saying that they'd been warned of the dangers ahead

0:59:30 > 0:59:32and were going at their own risk.

0:59:32 > 0:59:36Then here are the signatures, Plessen, Muller...

0:59:36 > 0:59:39Gareth Jones...

0:59:39 > 0:59:40Kalgan.

0:59:41 > 0:59:44He was met by Adam Purpiss,

0:59:44 > 0:59:47a Latvian gentleman who was...

0:59:47 > 0:59:48BEEPS HORN

0:59:48 > 0:59:50..running a company called Wostwag.

0:59:50 > 0:59:53I think this one's Purpiss...

0:59:53 > 0:59:55with leather boots.

0:59:55 > 0:59:57He describes him as tall

0:59:57 > 1:00:00and dressed just like that. See?

1:00:00 > 1:00:05That's a close-up of the same photo. And there's another one of him here.

1:00:05 > 1:00:06Leather booted.

1:00:06 > 1:00:10He was known as the King of Kalgan in those days.

1:00:10 > 1:00:14He was the man in the middle between the Chinese and the Mongols.

1:00:14 > 1:00:17Provided them with two cars for their journey

1:00:17 > 1:00:19up to the meeting of the princes.

1:00:27 > 1:00:33It was hard to say who controlled the land they were driving through.

1:00:33 > 1:00:36Prince Teh Wang was one of those local potentates

1:00:36 > 1:00:39who survived by playing all interested parties

1:00:39 > 1:00:41off against each other.

1:00:43 > 1:00:47Most of the major powers had sent someone to his gathering.

1:00:48 > 1:00:51"The Prince summoned me to his presence

1:00:51 > 1:00:53"and gave me an interview in his tent,

1:00:53 > 1:00:55"guarded by two pigtailed Mongol soldiers."

1:00:58 > 1:01:01He wants to have a great Mongol empire,

1:01:01 > 1:01:03uniting the Mongols of Inner Mongolia

1:01:03 > 1:01:06with those under the Soviets and those under Manchukuo.

1:01:10 > 1:01:11Wishful thinking.

1:01:11 > 1:01:14Teh Wang was in league with the Japanese

1:01:14 > 1:01:17who had daggers drawn with Russia.

1:01:17 > 1:01:20Teh Wang.

1:01:20 > 1:01:23If you look at the contemporary literature,

1:01:23 > 1:01:26the one thing all of the international specialists

1:01:26 > 1:01:28on East Asia are telling you

1:01:28 > 1:01:30is there's going to be a Russian-Japanese war.

1:01:30 > 1:01:33Almost as if they would lay money on it.

1:01:35 > 1:01:39At this point, the German diplomat Von Plessen returned to Peking.

1:01:41 > 1:01:43But Gareth and Dr Muller decided to press on.

1:01:46 > 1:01:48"Monday, July 15th.

1:01:48 > 1:01:51"Muller and his boy, aged 46,

1:01:51 > 1:01:54"who's a superior with the Mongols,

1:01:54 > 1:01:57"as an English butler among Hottentots,

1:01:57 > 1:02:00"Anatoli the Russian chauffeur and I,

1:02:00 > 1:02:02"decided to cross a big part of Inner Mongolia,

1:02:02 > 1:02:05"almost as far as the Soviet Manchukuo frontier."

1:02:11 > 1:02:14Their target was a disputed town called Dolonor

1:02:14 > 1:02:17on the border of Manchukuo,

1:02:17 > 1:02:19the territory the Japanese had already seized.

1:02:27 > 1:02:29It would have been a very tough journey,

1:02:29 > 1:02:31three days instead of the six or seven hours

1:02:31 > 1:02:33that they'd anticipated.

1:02:33 > 1:02:36They only really had enough food for one day so they were starving

1:02:36 > 1:02:38by the time they got here.

1:02:38 > 1:02:42They came in through the western gate and there were no sentries there

1:02:42 > 1:02:45so nobody would have noticed their arrival.

1:02:45 > 1:02:51They managed to find an old inn where they slept the night.

1:02:51 > 1:02:56"The innkeeper says they intend to occupy Kalgan on 15th August.

1:02:58 > 1:03:01"About 14,000 troops have assembled not far away."

1:03:06 > 1:03:08The following morning, he and Muller set out

1:03:08 > 1:03:11for a Buddhist temple on the edge of town.

1:03:11 > 1:03:14They never made it here. Instead, they were marched off

1:03:14 > 1:03:17to the Japanese military headquarters

1:03:17 > 1:03:19and questioned for some three or four hours.

1:03:19 > 1:03:21They obviously weren't happy with them being here.

1:03:21 > 1:03:25In fact, they thought they'd come to steal military secrets.

1:03:25 > 1:03:28They were told to get out of town early next morning.

1:03:31 > 1:03:35But the ever confident Gareth was in high spirits.

1:03:35 > 1:03:36"What luck", he writes.

1:03:36 > 1:03:39"There are great events here.

1:03:39 > 1:03:44"The Japanese have decided to make this region part of Manchukuo.

1:03:44 > 1:03:48"Thousands of Japanese soldiers are assembled here

1:03:48 > 1:03:50"and many have left on the road to Kalgan."

1:03:56 > 1:04:01Gareth had his scoop, but he had to get to Kalgan to file it.

1:04:01 > 1:04:04According to the last note he ever wrote,

1:04:04 > 1:04:06there were two principal roads.

1:04:06 > 1:04:09"On one, 200 Japanese lorries have travelled.

1:04:09 > 1:04:13"The other is infested by bad bandits."

1:04:13 > 1:04:18And that road it seems was the one the Japanese told them to take.

1:04:24 > 1:04:26The weather had changed the morning we set off

1:04:26 > 1:04:29to find the place he was captured.

1:04:31 > 1:04:34We were looking for a tiny village called Guan Mah Goh.

1:04:34 > 1:04:38Technically, the whole area still belonged to the Chinese.

1:04:40 > 1:04:43But the Japanese command had insisted that the Chinese

1:04:43 > 1:04:44withdraw all their troops

1:04:44 > 1:04:46to avoid any clashes.

1:04:48 > 1:04:52There was a sort of peacekeeping force called the Ba Wan Deah,

1:04:52 > 1:04:55but they were rarely seen.

1:04:55 > 1:04:58This is the actual road that Dr Muller and Gareth Jones

1:04:58 > 1:04:59would have been driving down.

1:04:59 > 1:05:02According to the story, when they approached Guan Mah Goh,

1:05:02 > 1:05:07Gareth spotted a man dressed as a Ba Wan Deh,

1:05:07 > 1:05:09the Chinese Peace Preservation Corps.

1:05:09 > 1:05:12Dr Muller said, "It's not a problem, don't worry."

1:05:12 > 1:05:15But shortly after they entered the village,

1:05:15 > 1:05:18shots rang out and they were under attack.

1:05:20 > 1:05:23GUN SHOT

1:05:25 > 1:05:27When the firing died down,

1:05:27 > 1:05:29Dr Muller, as the one who spoke Chinese,

1:05:29 > 1:05:31went off to find out what was going on.

1:05:31 > 1:05:38Gareth starts remonstrating with the so-called peace preservation guys.

1:05:38 > 1:05:40Says, "You can't do this, you can't touch me, I'm British."

1:05:43 > 1:05:45It cut no ice with the bandits.

1:05:45 > 1:05:47They took him off into one of the houses

1:05:47 > 1:05:50and threatened to execute him.

1:05:52 > 1:05:53Uh-huh.

1:05:59 > 1:06:01The bandits knew what they were doing.

1:06:01 > 1:06:04They released the driver and the man servant

1:06:04 > 1:06:06and waited for the story to break.

1:06:19 > 1:06:23My sister Dorothy was expecting her first baby...

1:06:24 > 1:06:27..and my brother Lewis

1:06:27 > 1:06:32came back and he opened the door and he shouted out

1:06:32 > 1:06:34to my parents,

1:06:34 > 1:06:36"Be prepared for a shock."

1:06:38 > 1:06:42And I thought, gosh, something's happened to Dorothy's baby

1:06:42 > 1:06:43and to Dorothy.

1:06:43 > 1:06:47And then he said, "Gareth's been captured."

1:06:47 > 1:06:50It was terrible.

1:06:50 > 1:06:54A couple of days later, Dr Muller was freed.

1:06:54 > 1:06:59His improbable story was that he'd been released on parole

1:06:59 > 1:07:00in order to raise ransom.

1:07:02 > 1:07:05My mother went down to Wales which was a long fortnight

1:07:05 > 1:07:09or nearly three weeks while he was in the hands of the bandits.

1:07:11 > 1:07:13It was terribly stressful.

1:07:13 > 1:07:17You didn't go outside the door without someone saying

1:07:17 > 1:07:19something about it.

1:07:19 > 1:07:20And...

1:07:22 > 1:07:25Was he the local hero by then?

1:07:25 > 1:07:27He was then, yes.

1:07:30 > 1:07:34The family waited as the Chinese authorities

1:07:34 > 1:07:36tried to arrange the ransom,

1:07:36 > 1:07:39the usual solution to kidnap stories.

1:07:39 > 1:07:43And one morning, the postman turned up with this...

1:07:43 > 1:07:45Telegram received in Barry.

1:07:45 > 1:07:47"Well treated. Expect release soon. Love, Gareth."

1:07:49 > 1:07:52The telegram came from Kalgan

1:07:52 > 1:07:55probably sent by Dr Muller.

1:07:55 > 1:07:57It was typical.

1:07:57 > 1:08:00Rumours were wild and rife.

1:08:00 > 1:08:03Real information in short supply.

1:08:03 > 1:08:08It was like living on the edge of a precipice all the time.

1:08:09 > 1:08:15And no-one could really feel cheered up by anyone else.

1:08:15 > 1:08:18We were all miserable.

1:08:18 > 1:08:23It was such a sad thing to have happened.

1:08:23 > 1:08:28I don't suppose that any of us really could have expressed

1:08:28 > 1:08:31how we felt, really and truly.

1:08:31 > 1:08:33We were just devastated.

1:08:44 > 1:08:49Then of course when he was actually killed, it was even worse.

1:08:52 > 1:08:55It was the day before his 30th birthday.

1:08:55 > 1:08:58A picture fell off the wall and my aunt said,

1:08:58 > 1:09:01"Gareth is dead." That was on the Monday.

1:09:01 > 1:09:05Of course, we didn't know anything about it until the following Friday.

1:09:05 > 1:09:08It was as though a cloud had come over the house.

1:09:08 > 1:09:12All the gaiety, the jollity and everything

1:09:12 > 1:09:14had gone out of the house.

1:09:18 > 1:09:21My grandmother always wore black after he died.

1:09:21 > 1:09:25She never really recovered from it because she devoted her life to him.

1:09:33 > 1:09:35No-one has worked harder to find out what really happened

1:09:35 > 1:09:37than his niece, Siriol.

1:09:37 > 1:09:41This was under my grandmother's bed, thick with dust.

1:09:41 > 1:09:45To begin with, she more or less accepted a Foreign Office report

1:09:45 > 1:09:48which concluded that Gareth's rescue had been bungled,

1:09:48 > 1:09:52but he had after all gone at his own risk.

1:09:52 > 1:09:54I believed everything I read to begin with.

1:09:54 > 1:09:58Since then, I have questioned every word that they've said.

1:09:58 > 1:10:00I don't know how much is true and how much isn't true

1:10:00 > 1:10:03because I think some of it was made up.

1:10:08 > 1:10:12The files she'd unearthed are kept here at the Public Record Office.

1:10:12 > 1:10:15I went down to take a look for myself.

1:10:15 > 1:10:18Closed for 50 years.

1:10:19 > 1:10:24The documents were a fascinating echo of the politics of the day.

1:10:24 > 1:10:27After the murder, Sylvester in Lloyd George's office

1:10:27 > 1:10:31had written to enquire about rumours that the Japanese were behind it.

1:10:31 > 1:10:33"Lloyd George."

1:10:33 > 1:10:35"Suspicions that Germany and Japan

1:10:35 > 1:10:38"have been trying to effect a military arrangement

1:10:38 > 1:10:43"and they're most anxious that this information should not leak out."

1:10:43 > 1:10:45That was the letters from Sylvester.

1:10:45 > 1:10:51'Had Gareth picked up on the rumour? Was that why he was silenced?'

1:10:51 > 1:10:53The Foreign Office just didn't want to know.

1:10:53 > 1:10:56"We need not, perhaps, tell Mr Sylvester

1:10:56 > 1:10:58"that this is the first kidnapping case

1:10:58 > 1:11:03"which has occurred in this area in recent years, for he may take this

1:11:03 > 1:11:07"as tending to confirm the suspicion of Japanese foul play."

1:11:07 > 1:11:13For the British government, the best possible strategic outcome

1:11:13 > 1:11:17is that Japan and Russia stay on this border,

1:11:17 > 1:11:22eyeball to eyeball, and just deter each other.

1:11:22 > 1:11:25'That meant not rocking the boat,

1:11:25 > 1:11:28'which was just what the Foreign Office feared

1:11:28 > 1:11:30'Lloyd George was likely to do.'

1:11:30 > 1:11:33"I cannot help fearing that Lloyd George is looking for something

1:11:33 > 1:11:37"out of which he can make political capital."

1:11:37 > 1:11:39I think they wanted a cover-up.

1:11:39 > 1:11:42They were worried that Lloyd George might go into Parliament

1:11:42 > 1:11:45and embarrass His Majesty's government.

1:11:45 > 1:11:47GUNSHOT

1:11:47 > 1:11:49But it was her son Nigel

1:11:49 > 1:11:52who'd uncovered what seemed to be the most illuminating material

1:11:52 > 1:11:57about Gareth's enigmatic companions.

1:11:57 > 1:12:00To my amazement, the British Intelligence had a dossier on Muller

1:12:00 > 1:12:05from 1917 through to 1951. That's 34 years.

1:12:05 > 1:12:09So when Muller's name was in the newspapers

1:12:09 > 1:12:11about being kidnapped with Gareth,

1:12:11 > 1:12:14there was another department of the British government

1:12:14 > 1:12:16which had an ongoing dossier about him.

1:12:16 > 1:12:19'And that dossier showed that British intelligence

1:12:19 > 1:12:22'had long marked Muller down as a Soviet agent.'

1:12:22 > 1:12:25"Muller was said to be a member of the Communist Party,

1:12:25 > 1:12:27"working for the Third International,

1:12:27 > 1:12:29"having instructions to try and organise propaganda

1:12:29 > 1:12:31"amongst the Indian troops in China."

1:12:31 > 1:12:35And a later document, closer to the time Gareth was kidnapped,

1:12:35 > 1:12:36was even more incriminating.

1:12:36 > 1:12:39This piece of evidence shows that

1:12:39 > 1:12:42Muller could have been working for the Soviets and possibly the Germans.

1:12:42 > 1:12:47It says that he was something of an adventurer, and unprincipled

1:12:47 > 1:12:49and it's possible he would undertake any task

1:12:49 > 1:12:51for a substantial consideration,

1:12:51 > 1:12:55provided it was not directed against the interests of his own country.

1:12:55 > 1:12:59- Double agent? - He could have been a double agent.

1:12:59 > 1:13:02And there was more to the elegant Adam Purpiss and his company Wostwag

1:13:02 > 1:13:05than just trading with the Mongols.

1:13:05 > 1:13:08"What we've discovered is that Wostwag

1:13:08 > 1:13:10"was created by the Fourth Department in Berlin

1:13:10 > 1:13:12"as cover for espionage activities

1:13:12 > 1:13:15"of a large number of Fourth Department agents

1:13:15 > 1:13:18"and to provide funds for the Fourth Department work."

1:13:18 > 1:13:23The Fourth Department was a branch of Soviet military intelligence.

1:13:25 > 1:13:28And Purpiss was a serious player,

1:13:28 > 1:13:32who would have reported Gareth's presence to Moscow.

1:14:08 > 1:14:11So dangerous, he did not survive it.

1:14:14 > 1:14:16A few weeks before I went to China,

1:14:16 > 1:14:19Siriol Colley had told me that she'd once been visited by a man

1:14:19 > 1:14:23who said he'd been to the village where Gareth's body was found.

1:14:23 > 1:14:26I managed to trace the man, Edward David,

1:14:26 > 1:14:29to the Pyrenees, where he now lived.

1:14:29 > 1:14:31He sent me some photographs.

1:14:31 > 1:14:34This was the well we needed to find

1:14:34 > 1:14:37to be sure we were in the right place.

1:14:39 > 1:14:41There aren't many maps, and the maps we did find

1:14:41 > 1:14:43didn't have tiny villages on them.

1:14:43 > 1:14:46All we had was a name - Meng Jia Ying.

1:14:50 > 1:14:54For two weeks, the bandits made Gareth ride with them

1:14:54 > 1:14:58through this landscape. At what point, I wondered,

1:14:58 > 1:15:02did he realise that his German friend was not coming back?

1:15:02 > 1:15:05That his great adventure might end badly?

1:15:10 > 1:15:13'As we got closer, we tried to compare what we were seeing

1:15:13 > 1:15:17'with the photos Edward David had taken.'

1:15:31 > 1:15:33Our arrival was big news

1:15:33 > 1:15:37and we were taken off to meet the oldest man in the village.

1:15:38 > 1:15:41Wang? Wang, xie-xie. Ni hao.

1:16:29 > 1:16:32He didn't know much about the murder,

1:16:32 > 1:16:36but he remembered the man who'd taken the photographs.

1:16:36 > 1:16:39He's found a picture of himself.

1:16:39 > 1:16:44Liang qian nian, ling san nian? 2004.

1:16:44 > 1:16:47Philip and I had one last place we needed to find.

1:16:52 > 1:16:55The Chinese police had said there'd been one witness of the killing -

1:16:55 > 1:17:02a man from this village, who'd been tending his cows in fields nearby.

1:17:02 > 1:17:03He saw the bandits gallop up

1:17:03 > 1:17:07and he hid behind some trees or behind some mounds and he watched

1:17:07 > 1:17:10and according to his story,

1:17:10 > 1:17:14Gareth had fallen off his horse and refused to get back on

1:17:14 > 1:17:16and the bandits shot him.

1:17:16 > 1:17:20What an extraordinary ending

1:17:20 > 1:17:22to an extraordinary life.

1:17:23 > 1:17:25The boy from Barry.

1:17:32 > 1:17:35The body was moved to a temple in the nearest town.

1:17:35 > 1:17:39The man from the embassy reported, rather touchingly,

1:17:39 > 1:17:41that he'd been identified by his hairy chest

1:17:41 > 1:17:45and was lying in the best coffin available

1:17:45 > 1:17:47with incense burning night and day.

1:17:47 > 1:17:49MONK CHANTS

1:17:57 > 1:17:59The bandits were killed before the coffin was moved,

1:17:59 > 1:18:03and before the British could question them.

1:18:27 > 1:18:33Armies set on war don't like nosy reporters, so Leonov may be right

1:18:33 > 1:18:37to say he was killed for poking his nose into Japanese plans,

1:18:37 > 1:18:41but the Soviet Secret Police have form too.

1:18:41 > 1:18:47I believe that he was murdered by the Soviets, possibly as retribution.

1:18:47 > 1:18:50For breaking the silence.

1:18:50 > 1:18:54Both communism and fascism in those days

1:18:54 > 1:18:58were peddling lies on a grand scale.

1:18:58 > 1:19:02The lies had currency because people wanted to believe them.

1:19:02 > 1:19:08But Gareth wasn't like other visitors to these cruel utopias.

1:19:10 > 1:19:14He was intoxicated by power and access to powerful people,

1:19:14 > 1:19:17but that did not make him blind.

1:19:23 > 1:19:25People died in the fields around here,

1:19:25 > 1:19:29they died along the roadsides, probably along this roadside,

1:19:29 > 1:19:33there's no one place where you can say, "This is where it happened."

1:19:33 > 1:19:36The whole country is dotted by crosses like this.

1:19:40 > 1:19:43Gareth did what he had to do. He actually went out

1:19:43 > 1:19:46into the countryside and took it in with his own eyes.

1:19:46 > 1:19:49That's the simple and the amazing thing about him.

1:19:49 > 1:19:52And that is his true epitaph.

1:19:52 > 1:19:56A young man who dared to speak about this catastrophe

1:19:56 > 1:20:00while those who also knew kept silent

1:20:00 > 1:20:03for more than 50 years.

1:20:03 > 1:20:08MOURNFUL UKRAINIAN SINGING

1:20:21 > 1:20:24MUSIC: "Poor People" by Alan Price

1:20:50 > 1:20:53Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd