Buchman and Hess
Sir: As one who has been associated with the Oxford Group and Moral Re- Armament since 1932, I am sad to throw doubt on Hilda Martin's charming explana- tion (Letters, 3 September) of why Rudolf Hess flew to England in 1941, but as far as I know, it is untrue. No one near the heart of Moral Re-Armament entertained this rumour when it was first aired in the American press, because we knew, as Buchman indeed stated in the Allentown Morning Call (15 May 1941), that neither he nor any of his friends had ever met Hess.
In my recent full-length biography of Buchman, I have been at pains to describe in detail every attempt which Buchman made to help certain Nazis to begin to `love God and peace'. As the rumour about Hess appeared widely, if more critically, in many American papers, I felt I must investigate its origins. The trail led back to a `confident announcement', without evi- dence, by the European Correspondent of Collier's Magazine.
Gareth Lean
Flat 2, Lincombe Lodge, Boar's Hill, Oxford
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