The Catonsville Nine: A Story of Faith and Resistance in the Vietnam Era by Shawn Francis Peters (review)

Abstract

Reviewed by: The Catonsville Nine: A Story of Faith and Resistance in the Vietnam Era by Shawn Francis Peters Patrick J. Hayes The Catonsville Nine: A Story of Faith and Resistance in the Vietnam Era. By Shawn Francis Peters. (New York: Oxford University Press. 2012. Pp. xxii, 390. $34.95. ISBN 978-0-19-982785-5.) This is a book about memory and how slippery it can be. On May 17, 1968, one such rupture was the peace action at Catonsville, Maryland, where nine protesters against the Vietnam War entered a Knights of Columbus Hall, rifled through the files of the Selective Service office upstairs, and set them ablaze in the parking lot using homemade napalm. Numerous witnesses— from the Selective Service staff to the reporters waiting outside—eventually gave testimony that convicted the group on state and federal charges of destruction of property. In 1970, two years after the event, the Supreme Court declined to hear the appeal. With all defense measures exhausted, some in the group extended their protest by going underground and evading capture for weeks, months, and years. These are the facts, yet some see little effect in the Nine's theatrics, whereas others view their actions as courageous witness. Yet the interplay between the Nine's motives, rooted as they were in their Catholic faith, and those of the American government, form a story whose power has not diminished. With its legend fueled by books, documentaries, and feature films like The Trial of the Catonsville Nine (financed in part by Gregory Peck), Shawn Francis Peters's volume hopes to set aright the historical record, judiciously withholding the sweeping judgments that have often fed polarization. Peters grew up in Catonsville, where the story was part of his DNA. Although he was hardly more than a toddler when the action took place, he often heard about the Nine's exploits. For his history, he sorts through the extant oral histories, trial testimonies, press accounts, and the literature penned largely by Philip and Daniel Berrigan, two of the more famous participants and on whom Peters's narrative frequently shines a spotlight. The facts are laid out well, with few deviations from the standard narrative, and the discrete episodes that form his twenty-five chapters read like vignettes on the personalities involved. What is new is the deep background Peters explores related to the formation of each of the protagonists—whether the Nine's lawyers, the judge at trial, or the activists themselves. We also get a glimpse of what life was like on the inside of the prison gates during the Nine's incarceration. The letters smuggled out of prison by Philip Berrigan served to lead the FBI agents to successfully capture his brother Dan. Once imprisoned, Dan [End Page 588] had a severe allergic reaction to medication and later had a painful kidney ailment. George Mische's transfer to another facility was protested by inmates, which resulted in subsequent sanctions against his fellow prisoners, including increased jail time. Mische himself has expressed his displeasure with Peters's claims,1 particularly those in the book referring to himself, Mary Moylan, and David Darst (the former Christian Brother). Mische, one of the four surviving members of the Nine, is especially critical of Peters's assertions that, at the end of his life, Darst was suicidal (he died in an automobile crash in October 1969) and that Moylan later regretted her participation in the Catonsville action. Peters based some of his information on a cache of letters sent by Darst to a friend, as well as Moylan's publications. However one reads these sources, the book is a detailed explanation of the Catonsville event and will appeal to those interested in the history of the radical Catholic left, to those studying Catholic peace movements either related to Vietnam or Latin America, and to historians of race and gender concentrating on the America of the 1960s. Patrick J. Hayes Redemptorist Archives of the Baltimore Province Footnotes 1. See Mische's review, "Inattention to Accuracy about 'Catonsville Nine' Distorts History," National Catholic Reporter, May 17, 2013, http://ncronline.org/news/peace-justice/inattention-accuracy-about-catonsville-nine-distorts-history-era. Copyright © 2013...