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Jonestown

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Alternate uses: See Jonestown (disambiguation)

Jonestown was a town in Guyana established by People's Temple cult leader Jim Jones. It was located about six to eight miles (10 to 12 km) from Port Kaituma (7°44'N 59°53'W). At Jones' directions, the inhabitants committed mass suicide in 1978.

The Beginning of Jonestown

Jim Jones' the People's Temple was formed in Indianapolis, Indiana during the late 1950s.

Jones was convinced that in Guyana, he would be out of reach from US intervention and worried relatives of the members, and in so cementing his absolute power over his members. In 1974, he leased 300 acres (1.21 km&sup2) of land from the Guyanan governent and started the construction of Jonestown He moved himself and his most devoted followers there.

Life in Jonestown

"The moment I got off that plane I knew something was wrong," said a former member Richard Clark, who ran away when he arrived in Guyana.

Many of the People's Temple members believed that Guyana was, as Jones promised it, to be their paradise. Instead, everyone including children ended up working six days a week, from seven in the morning to six in the evening, and often when temperature was as hot as 100 degrees Fahrenheit (38 degrees Celsius). Calling it the "People's Temple Agricultural Project", they grew food and raised animals.

Meals for the members consisted nothing more than rice and beans while Jones ate seperately, ate meat regularly and had a refrigerator which was stocked with food. Medical problems such as severe diarrhoea and high fevers struck half the community in February 1978.

Members considered to be serious disciplinary problems were imprisoned in a 6 by 4 by 3 foot (2 by 1.2 by 1 m) plywood box. Members who attempted to run away also had their ankles fitted with balls and chains. Armed guards patrolled the compound day and night to ensure that Jones' orders were followed.

The care of children was surrendered to the group as a whole, and they were made to address Jones as "Dad", and they were only allowed to see their parents briefly at night.

Local Guyanese, including a police official, related horror stories about harsh beatings and a "torture hole", a well where Jones had "misbehaving" children threwn into in the middle of the night. Jones had terrifed the children by making them believe that there was a monster living at the bottom of the well, where in fact it was Jones' henchman who pulled and tugged their legs as they descended into the well.

Older children were said to have been tied naked and electrcal shocks would be administered to their genitalia. Guyanese officials had attempted to investigate these allegations but they were denied entry to the compound.

Shootout

On November 18, 1978, Congressman Leo Ryan, a Democrat from San Francisco, California, flew to Guyana along with a team of media representatives and members of Concerned Relatives to investigate charges of massive social security fraud and the siphoning of millions of dollars from the accounts of wealthy members. While relatives of the members spoke out that human rights were being violated at an almost daily basis, people were being held against their free will and most disturbingly, rehearsals of mass suicide were being conducted.

While the Ryan party were greeted warmly and shown around by Jones, there was clearly something amiss. Ryan, and his party of 18 journalists and photographers, discovered a fearful, depressed group of followers. Some members were too afraid to speak, some were angry and saw the Congressman's visit as troubles brought in from outside, and others complained of the dire situation within the compound.

When Jones learned about some of his followers' reactions, and that some of them wished to leave, he was angry and believed that those who wanted to leave the community would "lie" and destroy Jonestown. Jones and many other members of the People's Temple saw themselves as a family that had the right and the duty to stay together. Like most families they felt that they had the duty to defend itself against people who tried to take away its members.

Ryan had intended to investigate further when Don Sly, a member of the Temple acting under Jones' orders, attacked the congressman with a knife. Although he wasn't hurt in the attack, he realised that the visiting party along with the defectors were in danger. Ryan's party and 16 ex-Temple members left Jonestown and reached to the nearby Port Kaituma airstrip at 4:30pm, where they planned to use the two planes, which was a six-passenger Cessna and a twin-engine Otter planes planned to arrive there and fly to the Georgetown, the capital of Guyana.

Before the Cessna was set to take off, one of the "defectors" took out a gun and started shooting at the passengers. The "defector" was actually Larry Layton, a senior general at the Temple and loyal to Jones. He killed two people, including defector Monica Bagby. Jones' armed guards, or "Red Brigade" then emerged and pulled up to 30 feet of the Otter, where they proceeded to open fire. Leo Ryan, three journalists and one 18-year-old Jonestown defector were killed in the 5 minute shooting, which was captured on camera. Robert Brown, the camera operator was among the dead while Jackie Speier was injured. The Cessna was able to take off and fly to Georgetown for help but the Otter was badly damaged by the gunfire. They carried with them a filmed footage of the surprise attack, a first glimpse of Jonestown for the outside world.

Mass Suicide

Shortly after the shootings, Jones had decided to start the mass suicide, as he knew that the Guyanese Defence Force would be coming for him once they got word of the shootout at the airstrip.

Two metal buckets of grape Flavor Aid laced with Valium and cyanide were brought into the assembly hall and the mixture was dispensed in small paper cups. Babies and children were the first ones, as the mixture was squirted into their throats with a syringe. Then it was the elderly and then the adults' turn. Many blindly drank it even after watching their children die horribly. The rest had the mixture poured down their throats after resisting drinking.

Some sources ([1], [2]) claim that some bodies bore the marks of hypodermic needles with which the poison was injected into unwilling victims, although the numbers vary widely. The precise circumstances are the focus of a number of conspiracy theories (see, for example, [3]).

Those who tried to hide were tracked down and killed by Jones' armed guards but some survivors did manage to escape into the jungle.

Jones himself was killed by a gunshot to his head. Whether the trigger was pulled by himself of by a disgruntled member wasn't clear.

Hours after news of the mass suicide got out, local authorities found 913 of the 1,110 inhabitants dead, including 276 children. One of the survivors, Laura Johnston Kohl escaped the mass suicide as she was away from Jonestown at that time.

Jonestown itself became a "ghost town" after 1978 and was mostly destroyed by a fire in the mid-1980s, after which the ruins were left to decay; as of 2004 there is little to mark the site of one of the most notorious mass suicides in history.

CIA Involvement?

Rumour had spread that the Jones himself was a CIA agent and that Jonestown was a mind-controlling experiment gone wrong. The drugs found at the premises include Quaaludes, Valium, morphine, Demerol, chloral hydrate and thallium.

Another rumour is that the CIA had used this oppourtunity to assassinate Leo Ryan, as he was was a harsh critic of the CIA and had authored the Hughes-Ryan Amendment, which if passed would have required the CIA to report its planned covert missions to congress for approval. This may seem far-fetched, as almost a thousand people had to be killed just for the cover-up of a single person.

In 1980, the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence announced that there was no evidence of CIA involvement at Jonestown. Nevertheless, conspiracy theories and rumours still continue to roam persistently.

Bibliography

  1. Troubled Society (series): Cults by Renardo Barden
    Discusses in general, the different types of cults, how they begin and prosper, deprogramming, the 60s, and detailed examination of events surrounding cult leaders Charles Manson and Jim Jones.
  2. The Need to Know Library (series): Everything You Need to Know About Cults by Sean Dolan
    Existence of cults, what it is and what it does, understanding cults, process of joining and leaving cults, glossary, where to go for help, and recommended further readings.
  3. True Crime (series): Death Cults by various authors, edited by Jack Sargent
    A book compiling 12 in-depth essays from a variety of experts on cults. These includes the usual sects like Aum Shinrikyo in Japan to the Thugs in British Colonial India and relatively unknown sects like the Russian Skoptsy castration sect.
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