SOMERTON MAN: CLANDESTINE COMMUNICATIONS, SOPHISTICATED CONCEALMENT UNCOVERED

THE PRIME OBJECTIVE OF CLANDESTINE COMMUNICATIONS:

SOPHISTICATED CONCEALMENT

The image of Verse 70 below highlights the more obvious and previously seen examples of hidden code, but where else could they possibly hide information on this page? It has fooled everyone for more than 70 years now, even some very smart Academics found some but missed the less obvious locations.

In this post you will see a couple of unusual locations but there are more.

Right-click to download these images. For best results of any of our images, print out at High-Quality setting on a decent inkjet printer

THE WORK OF EXPERTS

In my view, it is more and more obvious that these examples have been done by an expert, this is not just a young nurse playing games with an enamoured Lieutenant, this is serious and it's very real. It is full-on clandestine communications using some very sophisticated concealment techniques. It was taught by professionals and it was used by professionals.

EXAMPLES

I will show just a few examples for now but there are more using yet another super clever concealment method.

This first of the four examples show quite clearly the presence of micro writing in the 'smudged' areas as well as in the letters, rest your eyes for a few moments on the smudged areas:

Quite a lot of detail to show but look particularly within the 'smudged' areas, they appear to be quite faint but they are definitely there:

The upright in the letter P in 'Spring' and the coma are good examples of concealment:

Having viewed these in great detail and using varius technqiues, it seems to be very possible that a pin or safety pin could have been used to create some of these examples, especially those within the writing.

SOMERTON MAN: THE FOURTH OPTION UPDATED 31 October

A BODY ON THE BEACH

In the previous post on this subject, our focus was a humble pasty, remnants of which were found in the man's stomach. We found that:

1. The man's time of death was between Midnight and 2 am on Wednesday 1st December 1948. This has been revised, the Doctor who examined the man at 9.40 am on December 1st stated that he had been dead for no more than 8 hours. That puts his death at around 2 am.
2. We also found that according to the coroner's report, the man had eaten the pasty between 3 and 4 hours before his time of death
3. We, therefore, were able to deduce that the man ate the food at some time between 10pm and 11 pm on Tuesday 30th November 1948

Traditional Cornish Pasty was made from meat, carrot, and potato

The natural question was, just how did he get that pasty? 

1.  Did he walk to the local shops and buy one at sometime after he was seen, that is shortly after 8 pm on Tuesday night or even up to 11 pm? 
2. His being found on the beach in a very similar position to the way a man was seen lying that Tuesday evening would have to mean he walked to the shops and he walked back. My view would be that this would be unlikely.
3. Did someone perhaps stop and give him a lift on his way back? If he walked along the road then whilst it's a possibility, once again in my view, it would be unlikely.
4. Was he the man that was reportedly seen being carried on someone's back along the beach at around 10 pm that Tuesday night? Possible, but why would he want to go back to the same location? Bear in mind that the man was big and no doubt quite weighty, whoever carried him on his shoulders would have to have been very fit and big enough for the job. He was walking on sand which wouldn't have been much help to the task.
5. Was he a different man altogether to the man seen on the beach on that Tuesday evening by Mr. Lyons and the young couple? That being the case, it's more than interesting that he was found in the same position as the man first sighted.

Another question relates to the issue of the cigarette found between his lapel and cheek. Given that it was part smoked by the man shortly before his death, which probably means in reality, shortly before he fell unconscious followed by his death. Where was the match with which he lit that cigarette? 

Constable Moss was quite clear about the presence of the cigarette and the fact that it was more than half-smoked but not fully smoked. I looked at that issue and found that a cigarette left without puffing would self extinguish in about 1 minute. A full cigarette takes about 5 minutes to smoke. That suggests that he smoked the cigarette for around 2 minutes before he fell unconscious.  Was that enough time for a poison to be delivered by the cigarette and would it pack enough punch to cause catastrophic damage to man's internal organs? I don't know the answer to that but it is, I think, a valid question.

Constable Moss also acknowledged in his statement to the coroner, that he did not compare the 

part smoked-cigarette with those found the Army Club packet that was in the man's possession. In my view, that was a critical error.

It's very important to note that when, as a Police officer, you are called to a sudden death incident and there being no obvious medical reason for that death, then you treat the incident as a potential murder and you carefully check and note everything. To his credit, Constable Moss acknowledged that he didn't follow procedures when it came to comparing the part smoked cigarette.

Something else he didn't do given that this was a potential murder, he didn't look for the match that was used to light the cigarette. 

Moreover, he did not discuss the methodical search of the area around where the man was found, no waste bin was spoken of for example. Was there a waste bin nearby, perhaps near the seat from where the couple saw him? What could be in that bin? a syringe? Or maybe a paper bag that once contained a pasty? It does not appear that a thorough and detailed search was carried out and the questions raised by the coroner did not include a reference to the detail.

Something else wasn't checked, it was a hindsight issue in some ways. The man had nicotine-stained fingers to the extent that detective Sergeant Leane commented on them saying, 'the man was an inveterate smoker judging by the stains on his fingers'. 

So here we have an inveterate smoker sitting by the beach for a good 5 hours and he only got to part- smoke 1 cigarette and that was possibly around midnight? Your bones should tell you that such a man would have smoked at least 2 and maybe 3 cigarettes in that time but no mention of other cigarette stubs or spent matches.

One last question, if the man had not long eaten a pasty, wouldn't there have been traces of the pastry/filling in his mouth? No mention of it that I can find in the documents. Does that mean he had time to brush his teeth? And just where would he have done that?

On the subject of matches, Pete Bowes raised the issue of what he saw as a conflict in the evidence in that Constable Moss did not mention finding a box of matches but Detective Sergeant Leane did. The coroner believed the matches were there as well. Was this another detail that Constable Moss had missed? Or were they not there in the first instance? Both are quite possible given what we have now deduced.

Pete Bowes also mentioned the different patterns of the trousers that the man was wearing given it was the same man on Monday evening and found on Tuesday morning. What we are saying here though is that it very likely was not the same man and therefore a different pair of trousers was more than likely, so if anything that observation supports the view held here and vice versa. It was a different man found on Tuesday morning.

SOMERTON MAN: THE NIGHT OF 30th NOVEMBER/1st DECEMBER, A BROADER VIEW A MAJOR DISCOVERY?

A BROADER VIEW A  MAJOR DISCOVERY

In the previous post, we looked at the likely events of the man's last minutes. We walked through it step by step and demonstrated what could well have been the actual sequence of events within those minutes. The conclusion we came to was that the man had lit a cigarette, smoked it for about 2 minutes annd then stopped puffing on it, as a result about 1 minute later, that cigarette went out and eventually dropped from his lips onto the lapel of his coat.

In this post we will take a step backwards, we will take a broader view and in doing so we reveal another significant insight about the timings of the happenings that night.

The inquest documents are clear:

1. John Lyons and his wife saw a man with his head and shoulders supported by the low sea wall near the steps opposite the Crippled Children's Home. We don't have the exact timing but believe it to have been a little before Gordon Strapps and his young lady also saw the man.

2. Lyons had said in a jocular fashion, 'I will report this to the Police' at which point the man put his hand up in the air and dropped it down. At that time Lyons said he would have been about 15 to 20 yards distant from the man, so within earshot I would conclude.

3. Gordon Strapps and his young lady first saw the man at approximately 7.30 pm., they watched him for a while and noticed another man who was wearing a hat situated behind and above them and to their right. He also seemed to be watching the man. The couple left at around 8 pm, the man with the hat was never traced.

4. The time of death was put at between 12 midnight and 2 am. 

5. The autopsy revealed that the man had eaten earlier and that the food had been present in the stomach for between 3 and 4 hours before death.

6. Now let's look at the timeline in reverse, if the man had died at 2 am, then he would have eaten that pasty at between 10 pm and 11 pm on 30th November. If he died at 1 am then the food would have been consumed between 9pm and 10pm and if he had died at midnight then he would have eaten it between 8pm and 9pm. The broad picture says that the food he ate, the 'pasty', had been consumed between 8 pm and 11 pm.

THE FOOD, THE OPTIONS

Just where did the man get that food from? 

1. Did he have it with him when seen by the couple and Lyons? If he had you would expect it to have been wrapped in a paper bag at least but no bag was found, perhaps it had been placed in a waste bin, but no mention of a waste bin in the evidence. Perhaps it was simply missed?

2. Did someone unknown bring the pasty to him after 8pm? But still no paper bag if that was the case.

3. Or did he get up, walk into Glenelg and buy a pasty at one of, I think, a few late-night places where such food could be bought? And then return to his pace at the sea wall?

Out of the options described, my view is that just maybe the man with the hat is the one that has the answer to the question and it may be another option:

THE FOURTH OPTION

 Coroner Cleland's words:

WHERE TO FROM HERE

Hopefully, we can bring informed minds together and work on the clues provided by the timeline. If we look at the possible times of death and the possible poisons that could have been used, which ones best fit the bill? Or was it the cigarette? Was the man seen that night by Lyons and the young couple the same man found the next morning?

All for consideration and discussion. 

SOMERTON MAN: HIS LAST MINUTES...

THE LAST MINUTES

The following is based on known facts and evidence with reasonable assumptions:

1. It was dark and it was late, digging into his pocket the man drew out his packet of Army Club cigarettes and withdrew one of the 8 Kensitas brand cigarettes that he kept in that packet. EVIDENCE

2. He also took out his Bryant and May matches, (B& M made them in Melbourne under the REDHEAD logo from 1946) After hearing the evidence of both Constable Moss and Detective Sergeant Leane, Mr. Cleland, the Coroner,  concluded that he did have a box of matches with him. EVIDENCE

3. He put the cigarette between his lips, struck a match and lit up. He shook the match out and tossed it aside, perhaps even pushing it into the sand to extinguish it. The match was never entered in evidence, therefore, the assumption is that it was not found.  REASONABLE ASSUMPTION

4. He slowly drew a couple of times on the cigarette and contemplated the darkened beach before him, he felt suddenly drowsy even though he had just awoken. He drew again, a longer draw this time in an effort to shake himself from the drowsiness. REASONABLE ASSUMPTION 

5. Just two minutes after lighting his cigarette and one more puff and his eyes slowly closed, he lost consciousness. REASONABLE ASSUMPTION

6. One minute later and the cigarette had self-extinguished, slowly every muscle in his body relaxed, his head drooped a little to one side and his lips loosened around the cigarette. It fell from his mouth landing between his cheek and the lapel of his coat. FACT AND LOGICAL CONCLUSION

7. The time of death was estimated between midnight and 2 am, shortly before that time of death was when he had his last cigarette. EVIDENCE AND LOGICAL CONCLUSION

And that's how Constable Moss found the Somerton Man the next morning, he was dead with his head against the sea wall, legs slightly spread and arms down. The cigarette was still there on his lapel. Constable Moss noted that the sand around the body was undisturbed. EVIDENCE

From that mental picture, we can reasonably assume that no one had gone near the man, nothing was added to his possessions and nothing was taken from him. LOGICAL CONCLUSION

The fast-acting toxin had done its work swiftly and surely. LOGICAL CONCLUSION

The partially smoked cigarette was not compared to the cigarettes in the packet. EVIDENCE

As far as the evidence goes, neither the partially smoked cigarette nor the cigarettes in the packet were tested for the presence of poisons. EVIDENT

Paul Lawson in his latest interview with Clive discussed how he had a number of calls from Cleland over the years and in Paul's view death was due to a massive Phenobarbitone injection, sufficient to kill him in minutes. HEARSAY EVIDENCE FROM PAUL LAWSON (Hearsay evidence is still evidence, of lesser value but still evidence)

No evidence or finding was put forward as to the presence of a syringe at the scene. EVIDENT

We know that Saxitoxin was in use at the time by both CIA and KGB operatives, sometimes as a suicide pill or sometimes as an assassination tool. In later years, Gary Powers, the U2 pilot shot down over Russia, had Saxitoxin with him but never took the poison. FACT

The effects of Saxitoxin are said to be calming and death whilst swift is not painful. FACT

SOMERTON MAN: ANOTHER INTERVIEW WITH PAUL LAWSON. UPDATED 18 October

AN INTERVIEW WITH PAUL LAWSON

Some time ago Clive Turner organised a set of interviews with Paul Lawson, the man who made the bust of the Somerton Man.

Today, Clive returned to visit to Paul and spoke with him for some time on a number of issues, the answers for some are quite intriguing.

Here's Clive's report:


Paul mentioned that a ship called the "Karata(?)" was captained by a Harkness, and he reckoned the SM ate a fish diet due to his teeth, hence the Mercury. A Captain Kenneth Lanyon Harkness, RN, was Chief of Intelligence staff up to the fall of Singapore. We do not know if this was the same Captain or in fact whether the KARATA was a naval vessel at this time.

He did state that Cleland wanted the bust making as he was suspicious of the death.

Paul confirmed that the mold for the bust was destroyed.

He was adamant 100% that Jessie, when viewing the bust, knew who the man was.

There were more photos taken of the face, Paul had passed them to Wayne Groom.

Jessie had a married sister who lived on Kangaroo Island.

Cleland rang Paul about a boarding house on Kangaroo Island.

The ears on the mold were thinner than as per the photo.

Also told me that GF had spoken to Ina Harvey at the 'Strathmore Hotel" about her 'softly spoken guest'.

Paul believes that the Somerton Man was between 46-50 years old.

Paul thinks the SM was poisoned by an injection of Nembutal. He was in good company, the Isdal woman is thought to have died of Phenobarbital as was Marilyn Monroe. It would be interesting to pursue this issue in order to clarify whether he self-administered the poison or someone else had a hand in it. It is commonly used today in veterinary applications but also for Euthanasia.

Wasn't sure where Cleland/ Brown examined the clothes, probably at the morgue.

We talked about Alf Boxall and the name "Jestyn" inscribed in the"Rubaiyat".  He told me that he believed that Jessie was into a Persian religion and, it was their practice to sign their name with the first two letters in capitals, 'JEstyn'. 

I asked him if the suitcase had been tested for fingerprints, he didn't give me an answer, but what he did tell me is that Cleland asked him to give a talk about the case.  When he looked at the suitcase it was new and wasn't the suitcase as found at the railway station and, all the clothes had been washed/pressed.

I asked him about the newspapers describing the photos of the SM as being 'reconstructed'.  He told me that's because after the PM, the frontal part of the skull wasn't replaced as it should have been.

THE KARATTA FOUND

Another great find by Clive, in a 1932 article, the Karatta is mentioned as is a name, a Mr. Jensen:

Yet more pieces of the puzzle are falling into place thanks to Clive, a great job done and very much appreciated.

SOMERTON MAN: DEEP LEVEL CODE REVEALED

THE DEEP LEVEL CODE

The images here show clearly the presence of a deep level code on the code page, in Verse 70 and the similarities with those and the Internee Hay BankNotes.

First the latest video showing the microcode within Verse 70, the inscription supposedly written by Jessica and handed to Alf Boxall in a copy of the Rubaiyat that Jessica had bought for him.

Next, here is a fairly lengthy clip, around 12 minutes, which looks at the code page and shows the presence of microcode in most of the letters and markings. This clip needs to be viewed at the size shown, if you make the screen full size, it loses its focus and is very difficult to see.

Below is a clip from one of the Hay Banknotes, the highlighted, yellow, area shows the use of micro letters and numbers which is very similar to that found in the code page and verse 70.

SOMERTON MAN: OF SPIES AND POISONED CIGARETTES. UPDATED 12th October

SPIES & POISONED CIGARETTES
TROVE: HERALD MELBOURNE 16th FEBRUARY 1944

(PDF Download of German Poison Information)

A most interesting article! Not just from the perspective of the cigarettes but also to the chase of the suspected double agents, but the latter will be subject of another post.

Been spending a little more time than usual reviewing the 1948 Somerton Man  Inquest papers and it struck me that one of the potential ways in which he could have been poisoned was via his cigarette. Those familiar will know that a cigarette, more than half smoked according to Constable Moss who was the first Police Officer on the scene, was found lying between his right cheek and his coat lapel.

On another blog, I had stepped through the process of how cigarettes are generally lit up, take out cigarette, take out matches, extract a match, strike it and light up and then shake the match to extinguish it or alternatively, given he was seated on the sand, he may have simply dropped it. In either case, that dead match should have been near his right hand. it wasn't. Constable Moss said that the sand around the body hadn't been disturbed.

So, we have our man, lighted cigarette in mouth, when suddenly he stops drawing on it. The cigarette goes out and shortly after it falls from his lips and wedges between his cheek and coat lapel. With it being out then it couldn't have burnt his cheek or scorched his lapel.

How long does it take to smoke a cigarette? 4 minutes maybe 5? If we take 5 minutes as our starting position and the man had smoked over half of his cigarette then we could probably say 3 minutes for that to be achieved. Enough time for a fast-acting and non-traceable poison within the cigarette to be delivered and to stop him dead. The question is would the length of time between his time of death and the time of the autopsy be enough for a fast-acting poison to dissipate?

I think we can take it as read that poisoned cigarettes were a reality, I think we can also take it that they would have been in use by all sides in the Cold War period. The question is, did they have fast acting poisons that could be delivered this way and if so would they dissipate quickly in the body?

THE BURNING QUESTION

There is another question of course, from the evidence submitted at the inquest, the part smoked cigarette was never examined.

AN OPTICAL ILLUSION

One last matter to consider, colours and shadows can be deceiving, below you can see an example of one optical illusion. You can probably see that there is what looks like a cube in the image with two distinct shades of grey showing within it. If you take either your finger or perhaps a pen and lay it across the paler shade that lies between the two panels, what do you now see in terms of colours?

What now in terms of the photographs of Fedosimov and the shape of his nose?

NB:

Milongal, if you check Constable Moss's statement, he makes reference to the weather.
Document download here..

SOMERTON MAN: FEDOSIMOV. THE NOSE QUESTION RESOLVED

FEDOSIMOV: THE NOSE QUESTION RESOLVED

Above is a clip from an article that proves the point about shadows and how easy it is for the shape of a nose or an ear for that matter to be not as it seems.

In the images 'B' and 'C', we have exactly the same man and yet his nose looks decidedly different purely because of the lighting effects.

Here's the link to the article:
https://academic.oup.com/asj/article/35/5/524/239246

 Two, images of Fedosimov, one light, and one dark.

In the darkened image you can more clearly see the shadow being cast across his nose and mouth in particular.

In the negative image below, you can quite definitely see the 'halo' effect of the shadow.

The shape of this 'Halo' could also be the result of
some kind of facemask. Oxygen mask maybe?

IT'S ALL ABOUT THE LIGHTING

Original

Lightened

An example showing how difficult if not impossible it is to see the
shape of a persons nose from a full-face view.

WHAT DO YOU SEE?

One last matter to consider, colours and shadows can be deceiving, below you can see an example of one optical illusion. You can probably see that there is what looks like a cube in the image with two distinct shades of grey showing within it. If you take either your finger or perhaps a pen and lay it across the paler shade that lies between the two panels, what do you now see in terms of colours?

As you can see it's not straighforward, it is incorrect to say that the original image of the man known as Fedosimov, has a saddle-nose. He simply doesn't.

SOMERTON MAN: NEW BROADCAST MONDAY 14th OCTOBER

NEW BROADCAST

DANCING WITH THE DEAD

Introduced by barrister and former ABC journalist Stuart Littlemore

When the body of well-dressed man was found on Adelaide's Somerton Beach in 1948, police assumed that somebody would soon come forward to identify him. But nobody did.

More than 70 years later, the mysterious case of the "Somerton Man", as he became known, regularly makes the lists of Australia’s most baffling unsolved cases.

Was he murdered? Was he a Russian spy? Was it suicide? Or was he the victim of a love triangle?

In an effort to finally unearth the truth, Adelaide University Professor Derek Abbott is pushing for the Somerton Man’s remains to be exhumed.

Professor Abbott has a more personal motivation to solve the case: He is married to a woman he believes is the Somerton Man’s granddaughter.

Airs Monday October 14, 8:00pm (AEDT), on ABCTV and iview.

SOMERTON MAN: THE DANETTA CODE, GEORGE MARSHALL A THIRD VICTIM?

THE DANETTA CODE

Ah make the most of what we yet may spend,Before we too into the dust descend;
Dust into dust, and under dust to lie.
Sans wine, sans song, sans singer and-sans end. 

An opened copy of the Rubaiyat was found on the chest of 'George' Joseph Saul Haim Marshall when his body was discovered near Taylor's Bay, Sydney on June 3rd, 1945. He had died of poisoning. The book was opened on the page that contained the verse above and a pencil mark was alongside it and. like the still to come TAMAM SHUD and its torn piece case, this verse finishes with 'END'

I decided to take a closer look at the actual verse and was surprised by what I found. Seemingly hidden within the words of this verse was the acrostic coded word DANETTA.

This same name has turned up in the Somerton Man case in both the so-called code page and in Verse 70 inscription in the book given by Jessica to Alf Boxall. Not only that but it was also found in the last letter left by the man, Tibor Kaldor, whose body was found in an Adelaide hotel room 2 weeks to the day following the death of the Somerton Man. Tibor had hidden within an acrostic code inside that note the name 'DANETTA'.

DANETTA again, another instance of the apparent coded name only this time it shows up in the MARSHALL case. 

THE MARSHAL CASE INSTANCE

The method used for this kind of acrostic code was to incorporate the name DANETTA within a set of lines or a paragraph but, and it's a big but, the locations of these letters must be numbered sequentially.  It is an advanced acrostic method that has been used in other codes and is documented as such.

1. The code letters can be read from left to right

2. Their position can be numbered within a word 

3. or within a line 

4. or within a paragraph

5. The sequence can also be read from the top or first line to the bottom line 

6. or from the bottom line to the top

7. Or a combination thereof as in starts on line 3, goes to line 4 then moves back up to line 3 etc. 

The Marshall case verse:

Top line down reading left to right:

D, Third line first word and the first letter in line, D

A, Fourth line, first word 'Sans' second letter A

N, Fourth line first word 'Sans', third letter N

E, Fourth line, the second word 'Wine", fourth letter E

Reverse, bottom to top line reading right to left:

T, Third line, the second word in 'to', 5th letter in the line letter T

T, Third line, the third word in 'dust', 6th letter in the line letter T

A, First line, the second word in 'may', 7th letter in the line, letter A

The same acrostic code word DANETTA appears in numerical sequence in the Marshall case verse.

Three Dead Men

This could, of course, be a coincidence, three dead men, two copies of the Rubaiyat one with a hidden code that contains the word DANETTA in the numerical sequence and the other two have DANETTA within a verse in the numerical sequence. 

Further, In Verse 70 inscription in Alf Boxall's copy of the book, the acrostic coded word DANETTA is present also in the numerical sequence 

Again, this same word, DANETTA was first discovered with another dead man found poisoned in Adelaide 2 weeks to the day after the Somerton Man was found. Tibor Kaldor's last letter/suicide note contains the Acrostic coded word DANETTA, this discovery being made with the use of an acrostic decoder.

Finally, the acrostic coded word DANETTA was found in numerical sequence in the ad for a 'Lost Gold Watch' placed with Prosper's phone number as a contact.

Three dead men, all three having died by poisoning. 

A total of six instances of this acrostic coded word and all in strict numerical sequence.

Coincidence?

THE SEQUENCING IS KEY

In years gone by, it was asserted by some that you can make the name up from lots of paragraphs that contain the necessary letters. Yes, that's true but, it is far more difficult, though not impossible, to make the name when you use an acrostic positioning method and one that is based on a seven consecutive numbers system. 

Here we have six instances related to the deaths of 3 men and in which the Rubaiyat figures in two of those cases. All three men died of poisoning, two died in Adelaide within days of each other in 1948 and one died in Sydney some 3 years earlier.

EARLIER POSTS:

Link to acrostic decoder, this was used on the contents of Tibor Kaldors last letter and it revealed the name DANETTA and other words : https://www.dcode.fr/acrostic-extraction

https://tamamshud.blogspot.com/2016/09/somerton-man-tibor-kaldor-last-letter.html

https://tamamshud.blogspot.com/2016/10/somerton-man-tibor-kaldor-acrostic-code.html

https://tamamshud.blogspot.com/2018/06/somerton-man-tibor-kaldor-another.html

https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/129887704