America's Secret Establishment

An Introduction to The Order of Skull and Bones (condensed edition)
-- by: Antony C. Sutton, 1986, source: Liberty House Press
MHP hypertext version for non-profit educational use only

3.2  Operational Vehicles for Conflict Creation

Guaranty Trust and Brown Brothers, Harriman

A Universal Mindset

Our first task is to break an almost universally held mind set -- that communists and elitist capitalists are bitter enemies. This Marxist axiom is a false statement and for a century has fooled academics and investigators alike.

To illustrate this mind set, let's look at a report on revolutionaries in the U.S. compiled by the respected Scotland Yard (London) in 1919. [They] were then tracking the Bolshevik Revolution and attempting to identify its Western supporters.

"Martens is very much in the limelight. There appears to be no doubt about his connection with the Guarantee Trust Company. Although it is surprising that so large and influential an enterprise should have dealings with a Bolshevik concern."

Scotland Yard had picked up an accurate report that the Soviets were deeply involved with Guaranty Trust of New York, but they couldn't believe it, and dropped this line of investigation. [Too hot to handle? --ed]

The key to modern history is in these facts: that elitists have close working relations with both Marxists and Nazis. The only questions are who and why?

In this memorandum we will present the concept that world history, certainly since about 1917, reflects deliberately created conflict with the objective of bringing about a synthesis, a New World Order.

The operation actually began before 1917. [For example,] the Spanish-American War and the Anglo-Boer War of 1899. The first was created by The Order, i.e. the U.S. elite, and the second by " The Group", i.e. the British elite (with some U.S. assistance). We might aptly term these the First and Second Hegelian Wars...

In this volume, we are limited to the rise of Hitler in Germany and the rise of the Marxist state in the Soviet Union. The clash between these two powers or the political systems they represent was a major source of World War II. After World War II, the world stage was changed. After 1945 it became the Soviet Union on one side versus the United States on the other.

The first dialectical clash led to the formation of the United Nations, an elementary step on the road to world government. The second dialectical clash led to the Trilateral Commission, (i.e. regional groupings), and more subtly to efforts for a merger [or synthesis] of the United States and Soviet Union.

We are now going to demonstrate how The Order created and developed two global arms needed for Hegelian conflict. Since 1917, the operational vehicles for this global battle have been (a) Guaranty Trust Company of New York, the same firm cited in the 1919 Scotland Yard report, and (b) Brown Brothers, Harriman, private bankers of New York. (see note [E1])

Before 1933, Brown Brothers Harriman consisted of two firms: W.A. Harriman Co. and Brown Brothers. Numerous members of The Order have been in both firms, but one individual stands out above all others as the key to the operation of The Order: W. Averell Harriman (1913).

W. Averell Harriman

Born in 1891, graduated Yale in 1913, Harriman [was] still newsworthy in the 1980s. In June 1983, Harriman had a private meeting with Yuri Andropov in Moscow...

In official Harriman biographies, however, there is no mention of The Order, Skull & Bones, or the Russell Trust. Like other initiates Harriman has carefully expunged membership from the public record.

To understand Averell Harriman we need to back to his father, Edward H. Harriman, the 19th century "robber baron". Edward Harriman's biography, "E.H. Harriman: A Biography" (Houghton Mifflin, 1922), is as self-serving as all hired biographies. It was written by George Kennan who was active in the Dean Acheson State Department.

Edward Harriman started work at 14 with little education, but married Mary Averell, daughter of a New York banker and railroad president. At 22, Harriman bought a seat on the New York Stock Exchange and got lucky or smart with Union Pacific after the crash of 1893.

Harriman printed securities with a nominal value of $80 million to expand capitalization of his railroads. [However, he failed] to acquire improvements and property for more than $18 million. In other words, $60 million of the securities was "water", mostly sold through Kuhn Loeb & Co., his backers and bankers. The $60 million went into Harriman's pocket. The 1904 ICC report stated:

"It was admitted by Mr. Harriman that there was about $60 million of stock and liabilities issued, against which no property had been acquired and this is undoubtedly an accurate estimate."

-- from Gustavus Myers, "History of the Great American Fortunes", Modern Library, New York, 1937, p. 500

Harriman stayed out of jail by judicious expenditures to politicians and political parties. Biographer George Kennan relates how Harriman responded to President Theodore Roosevelt's 1904 plea for $250,000 for the Republican National Committee.

These funds were turned over to the Committee by Harriman's friend and attorney, Judge Robert Scott Lovett. Lovett was also general counsel for the Union Pacific Railroad and could be described as Harriman's bagman. Judge Lovett's son, Robert Abercrombie Lovett (1918) went to Yale and with the two Harriman boys, Roland (1917) and Averell (1913) was initiated into The Order.

Averell Harriman, given his decades on the political inside, must be well aware of the dependence of the Soviet Union on Western technology -- that the Soviet Union can make no economic progress without Western enterprise technology. In fact, Stalin himself told Harriman as much back in 1944. Here's an extract from a report by Ambassador Harriman in Moscow to the State Department, dated June 30, 1944:

"Stalin paid tribute to the assistance rendered by the United States to Soviet industry before and during the war. He said that about two-thirds of all the large industrial enterprises in the Soviet Union had been built with United States help or technical assistance."

-- U.S. State Department Decimal File 033.1161, Johnston Eric/6-3044 telegram, June 30, 1944

Harriman knew first hand back in 1944 at least that the West had built the Soviet Union. Now examine Harriman's official biography [see link --ed]... In these posts Harriman actively pushed for a military build-up of the United States. But if the Soviet Union was seen to be an enemy in 1947...what we should have done was cut off technology [transfers]. There was no Soviet technology -- and Harriman KNEW there was no Soviet technology. (see note [E2])

Furthermore, Harriman has been in the forefront of the cry for "more trade" with the Soviet Union -- and trade is the transfer vehicle for technology. In other words, Harriman has been pushing two conflicting policies simultaneously: (a) a buildup of Soviet power by export of our technology and (b) a [buildup of] Western defense against that power.

In 1971, author Edward Weintal was at a dinner party with Harriman when [he] trotted out his well worn line: "I was the first to warn of Soviet dangers...". Weintal stopped him cold. Weintal had found documents incriminating Harriman in the National Archives [including] a State Department telegram dated Feb 12, 1944 from Harriman to Roosevelt. Said Weintal: "You told Roosevelt that you were convinced that the Soviets did not want to introduce a Communist government into Poland." Shouted Harriman, "If you print anything like that in your book, I'll break your jaw!" (see Washington Post, Mar 17, 1971, VIP Column by Maxine Cheshire).

The Guaranty Trust Company

Guaranty Trust was founded 1864 in New York. Over the next 100 years, the banking firm expanded rapidly by absorbing other banks and trust companies... The J.P. Morgan firm has effectively controlled Guaranty Trust since 1912 when Mrs. Edward Harriman (mother of Roland and Averell Harriman) sold her block of 8,000 shares of the total outstanding 20,000 shares to J.P. Morgan. By 1954 Guaranty Trust had become the most important banking subsidiary of the J.P. Morgan firm.

The original capital for Guaranty Trust came from the Whitney, Rockefeller, Harriman and Vanderbilt families -- all represented in The Order -- and on the Board of Guaranty Trust throughout the period we are discussing.

Harry Payne Whitney (1894) inherited two Standard Oil fortunes from the Payne and Whitney families. H.P. Whitney was a director of Guaranty Trust, as was his father, William C. Whitney (1863). Alfred Gwynne Vanderbilt (1899) represented the Vanderbilt family until he drowned at sea in the sinking of the Lusitania in 1915. His sister married married H.P. Whitney.

The power of The Order is reflected in a bizarre incident as Alfred Gwynne Vanderbilt boarded the Lusitania in New York on its fateful voyage. A telegram warning Vanderbilt not to sail was delivered to the Lusitania before it sailed -- but never reached Vanderbilt. Consequently, Vanderbilt went down with the ship. (see note [E3])

The Harriman investment in Guaranty Trust has been represented by W. Averell Harriman (1913). The Rockefeller investment in Guaranty Trust was represented was represented by Percy Rockefeller (1900). In brief, The Order was closely associated with Guaranty Trust and Morgan Guaranty long before 1912 when Mrs. Edward Harriman sold her interest to J.P. Morgan. Averell Harriman remained on the board of Guaranty Trust after the transfer.

The following members of The Order have also been officers and directors of Guaranty Trust Company:

[Table adapted from text --ed]

Harold Stanley (1908)

1915: Vice President of Guaranty Trust

1921-28: President of Guaranty Trust

1929-34: Partner, J.P. Morgan Co. replacing William Morrow

1935-41: President, Morgan, Stanley & Co.

1941-55: Partner, Morgan Stanley

1956-63: Limited Partner, Morgan Stanley

Joseph R. Swan (1902)

Director, Guaranty Trust Co.

President, the Guaranty Company (a subsidiary)

Percy Rockefeller (1900)

1915-30: Director, Guaranty Trust Co.

A member of The Order was Vice President, then President of Guaranty Trust Company in the years 1915 to 1928 -- the years which record the Bolshevik Revolution [in Russia] and the rise of Hitler to power in Germany.

How The Order Relates to Guaranty Trust Company and Brown Brothers, Harriman

Guaranty Trust Company:

• Harold Stanley (1908)
• W. Murray Crane (1904)
• Harry P. Whitney (1894)
• W. Averell Harriman (1913)
• Knight Woolley (1917)
• Frank P. Shepard (1917)
• Joseph R. Swan (1902)
• Thomas Cochran (1894)
• Percy Rockefeller (1900)

Post World War II Partners:

• George H. Chittenden (1939)
• William Redmond Cross (1941)
• Henry P. Davison, Jr. (1920)
• Thomas Rodd (1935)
• Clement D. Gile (1939)
• Daniel P. Davison (1949)

Brown Brothers, Harriman (formerly W.A. Harriman Co.):

• W. Averell Harriman (1913)
• E. Roland Harriman (1917)
• Ellergy S. James (1917)
• Ray Morris (1901)
• Prescott Sheldon Bush (1917)
• Knight Woolley (1917)
• Mortimer Seabury (1909)
• Robert A. Lovett (1918)

Post World War II Partners:

• Eugene William Stetson, Jr. (1934)
• Walter H. Brown (1945)
• Stephen Y. Hord (1921)
• John Beckwith Madden (1941)
• Grange K. Costikyan (1929)

Partner not in The Order:

• Matthew C. Brush, 32nd degree Mason

Brown Brothers, Harriman

The other operational vehicle used by The Order was the private banking firm of Brown Brothers, Harriman. Before 1933 W.A. Harriman Company was the vehicle, and Brown Brothers did not enter the picture. After 1933, the merged firm continued Harriman Company activities. (see note [E4])

The following five members of The Order class of 1917 were involved:

Knight Woolley (1917)

1919-20: Guaranty Trust Company

1927-31: W.A. Harriman Company

1933- : Brown Brothers, Harriman

also a Director of the Federal Reserve Bank

Frank P. Shepard (1917)

1919-34: Guaranty Trust Company, Vice President (1920-34), the period concerned with the developments of both Soviet Russia and Hitler's Nazi Party

1934- : Bankers Trust Company, a member of the Morgan group of banks

Ellery Sedgewick James (1917)

Partner, Brown Brothers Harriman

Edward Roland Noel Harriman (1917)

[Brother of W. Averell Harriman]

Prescott Sheldon Bush (1917)

Father of George Herber Walker Bush (1949), Vice President of the United States (1981-88), [and President (1989-92)]

[Grandfather of George W. Bush (1968), President of the United States (2001-08)]

The Order's "Front Man": Matthew C. Brush

From World War I until well into the 1930s, The Order's "front man" in both Guaranty Trust and Brown Brothers Harriman was Matthew C. Brush. Brush was not Yale, nor a member of The Order, but through an accidental meeting in the 1890s his talents were used by The Order. Brush became a Knight Templar, a 32nd degree Mason and a Shriner.

His first job in the 1890s was as a clerk with Franklin MacVeagh & Co. of Chicago. Franklin MacVeagh was a member (1862), and later Secretary of the Treasury (1909-13) under President William Taft (The Order, 1878).

In 1913, MacVeagh left the Treasury and resigned as trustee of the University of Chicago. While the trail of MacVeagh fades out after 1913, that of Matthew Brush, his one-time clerk, blossoms forth... Brush was made Vice President of American International Corporation in 1918 and President in 1923. He was also Chairman of the Equitable Office Building, also know as 120 Broadway. Moreover, Brush was President of Barnsdall Corporation and Georgian Manganese Company.