In Matthiessen’s account, which quotes a Skull and Bones log book from 1919, the skull had been unearthed by six Bonesmen-identified by their Bones nicknames, including “Hellbender,” who apparently was Haffner. Matthiessen ’23, a Skull and Bones member. The writer included a photograph of a skull in a display case and a copy of what is apparently a centennial history of Skull and Bones, written by the literary critic F. Anderson received an anonymous letter from someone who claimed to be a member of Skull and Bones, alleging that the society had Geronimo’s skull. At the time, Ned Anderson, then chair of the San Carlos Apache Tribe in Arizona, was campaigning to have Geronimo’s remains moved from Fort Sill-where he died a prisoner of war in 1909-to Apache land in Arizona. The Geronimo rumor first came to wide public attention in 1986. Allen ’19 had been initiated as a member in Saumur, France, and Allen’s yearbook entry confirms his membership in Bones and his posting to artillery school in Saumur. Mead’s letter also relays the news that Parker B. “Lists of people to be tapped would come to Trubee and he would comment on them,” says Wortman. With the war on, the Bonesmen were scattered around the United States and Europe, and society business like choosing new members had to be conducted by mail. Mead’s was one of many letters Davison received that year about Bones matters. The letter is preserved in a folder of 1918 correspondence in one of the 16 boxes of the F. Marc Wortman, a writer and former senior editor of this magazine, discovered the letter in the Sterling Memorial Library archives while researching Davison’s war years for a book- The Millionaires’ Unit, released this month by PublicAffairs press-about Yale’s World War I aviators. (The membership of the societies was routinely published in newspapers and yearbooks until the 1970s.) Haffner’s entry confirms that he was at the artillery school at Fort Sill some time between August 1917 and July 1918. Moreover, the yearbook entries for Haffner, Mead, and Davison confirm that they were all Bonesmen. “It has a very strong likelihood of being true, since it was written so close to the time.” Members of a secret society, she points out, were required to be honest with each other about its affairs. “It adds to the seriousness of the belief, certainly,” says Judith Schiff, the chief research archivist at Sterling Memorial Library, who has written extensively on Yale history. But the letter shows that the story was no after-the-fact rumor. And if the Bonesmen did rob a grave, there’s reason to think it may have been the wrong one. Mead was not at Fort Sill, so his letter is not proof. ’19 (a new member, or “Knight”), have been deposited in the society’s headquarters (the “Tomb”): “The skull of the worthy Geronimo the Terrible, exhumed from its tomb at Fort Sill by your club & the K-t Haffner, is now safe inside the T- together with his well worn femurs bit & saddle horn.” It announces that the remains dug up at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, by a group that included Charles C. The letter was written on June 7, 1918, by Winter Mead ’19 to F. “The skull of the worthy Geronimo the Terrible is now safe inside the T -.”Ī former senior editor of the Yale Alumni Magazine has now discovered the only known contemporary evidence: a reference in private correspondence from one senior Bonesman to another. But Bones spokesmen have always dismissed the story as a hoax. An internal history of Skull and Bones, written in the 1930s and leaked to the Apache 50 years later, mentioned the theft. The story was widely rumored but, despite the efforts of reporters and historians and the public complaints of Apache leaders in the 1980s, never verified. The content of the magazine and its website is the responsibility of the editors and does not necessarily reflect the views of Yale or its officers.īy Kathrin Day Lassila ’81 and Mark Alden Branch ’86ĭownload a PDF of this article as it appeared in the May/June 2006 issue of the Yale Alumni Magazineĭid Skull and Bones rob the grave of Geronimo during World War I? For decades, it has been the most controversial and sordid of all the mysteries surrounding Yale’s best-known secret society. The Yale Alumni Magazine is owned and operated by Yale Alumni Publications, Inc., a nonprofit corporation independent of Yale University. Yale Alumni Magazine: Skull & Bones (May/June 2006)
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