BRITISH SCIENTISTS AND THE MANHATTAN PROJECT Also by Ferenc Morton Szasz THE DIVIDED MIND OF PROTESTANT AMERICA RELIGION IN THE WEST (editor) THE DAY THE SUN ROSE TWICE: The Story of the Trinity Site Nuclear Explosion, July 16, 1945 THE PROTESTANT CLERGY IN THE GREAT PLAINS AND MOUNTAIN WEST British Scientists and the Manhattan Project The Los Alamos Years Ferenc Morton Szasz Professor of History University of New Mexico, Albuquerque MMACMILLAN © Ferenc Morton Szasz 1992 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 1992 All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No paragraph of this pub1ication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any 1icence permitting 1imited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, 33-4 A1fred P1ace, London WClE 7DP. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liab1e to crimina1 prosecution and civil claims for darnages. First published 1992 by MACMILLAN ACADEMIC AND PROFESSIONAL LTD. Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 2XS andLondon Companies and representatives throughout the world ISBN 978-1-349-12733-7 ISBN 978-1-349-12731-3 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-1-349-12731-3 A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. For Margaret and Maria Contents Preface IX Introduction Xlll Background 2 The British Mission at Los Alamos: The Scientific 16 Dimension 3 The British Mission at Los Alamos: The Social 32 Dimension 4 The Aftermath 46 5 Varieties of the British Mission Experience 56 6 The Strange Tale of Klaus Fuchs 82 7 The British Mission and the Postwar Nuclear Culture 97 Notes 107 Appendix I The Postwar Careers of the British Mission 133 II The Frisch-Peierls Memorandum (March 1940) 141 III Ralph Carlisle Smith's Summary of the 148 British Mission at Los Alamos IV Otto Frisch's Eyewitness Account of the 152 July 16, 1945, Atomic Explosion at Trinity Site, Alamogordo Air Base, New Mexico Bibliography 154 Index 163 VB Preface This is a study of the British scientific mission to Los Alamos, New Mexico, from 1943 to 1947, and the impact it had on the early history of the atomic age. In retrospect, it is clear that this book had a dual origin. During the late 1970s and early 1980s, I researched and wrote an account of the world's first atomic explosion (July 16, 1945) at Trinity Site, on the Alamogordo Air Base in central New Mexico. In 1984, the University of New Mexico Press published this as The Day the Sun Rose Twice. The research for this project, especially the opportunity to interview many of the original participants of the Manhattan Project, lured me forever into the fascinating world of atomic history. During the academic year of 1985-6, I taught at the University of Exeter in Devon as a Visiting Fulbright Professor for the American and Common- wealth Arts Division. There my family and I became fascinated with British life, especially that of the West Country. This study of the British scientists who went to wartime Los Alamos is an attempt to combine these two themes. Any project that stretches over a decade acquires numerous obligations. Consequently, I would like to begin by thanking the following: Don Pierce, Gerald Lane, and Charles Bates, three Albuquerque book dealers who always kept their eyes open for anything that touched on atomic history; Brenda Spurlock Landstedt, who proved that an undergraduate work-study person could do graduate level research; Dennis Bilger of the Harry S Truman Library in Independence, Missouri, for gracious treatment during my visit there; the staff at the Franklin D. Roosevelt Library in Hyde Park, New York, for making available the "Atomic Bomb folder"; Edward J. Reese of the Modem Military Branch of the National Archives, Washing- ton, DC; the staff at the Public Record Office in Kew, London; Anna Broussard and Dorothy W onsmos of Zimmerman Library, the University of New Mexico; Mrs Ashley C. Oates for generously serving as a "broker" to put me in touch with her parents, Sir Ernest Titterton and Peggy Titterton; Sarah (Polly) Tuck for sharing memories of her parents, James and Elsie Tuck; Los Alamos veteran Robert Porton for loaning me his priceless collection of the Laboratory daily bulletins for 1943-5; Mrs Lorna Arnold of the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority for responding so splendidly to a stranger's phone call; and Professor W.N. Everitt of the Department of Mathematics, University of Birmingham, for sending me materials on his late colleague, Tony Skyrme. Reference librarian Kate ix x Preface Luger deserves special commendation for devising increasingly intricate ways of tracking down missing British scientists. Thanks to her, I was eventually able to account for every member of the British Mission who came to Los Alamos from 1943 to 1947. Research in the early history of the atomic era is ever entwined with current matters of state. On both sides of the Atlantic, national security measures are such that certain World War II materials still remain closed to historians. This is especially true for the British side of the story, where numerous documents are unlikely to be available within the foreseeable future. On the American side, materials that had been declassified in the 1950s have suddenly been reclassified again. (The rise of international terrorism prompted this move. While the nuclear technology of the World War II years may be outdated, it still works.) Consequently, a special word of thanks must go to Roger A. Meade, head ArchivistIHistorian at the Los Alamos National Laboratories. Meade did yeoman work in uncovering virtually everything in the archives that pertained to the British experience in New Mexico. In addition, he and his staff provided invaluable assistance in transcribing the many interviews that I conducted over the years. I would also like to credit my colleague, Dr Donald Skabelund, and Paul W. Henricksen of Los Alamos for their aid; the late Dr Ralph Carlisle Smith, who read an earlier draft; and Professors A.P. French and Janet Roebuck, who read through the entire manuscript. After almost thirty years, I am still indebted to Richard W. Smith, Professor Emeritus at Ohio Wesleyan University, for his inspiration and guidance. Richard G. Robbins, Barton J. Bernstein and Robert Del Tredici were all most generous in sharing primary documents. Two anonymous reviewers for St. Martin's Press saved me from a number of potentially embarrassing errors. The typing skills of Pat E. Devejian and Penelope P. Katson were at their usual level of excellence. So, too, were Margaret Connell Szasz's highly valued editorial skills. Special mention should also be made to our colleagues and friends at the University of Exeter: Mick and Nancy Gidley, Richard Maltby, David and Gillian Hom, Ron and Anne Tamplin, and Peter and Louisa Quartermain. They patiently answered all our questions about British life, even the foolish ones, without a hint of embarrassment. I could not have completed this study without the courtesy of those who graciously allowed me to interview them regarding their knowledge of the British Mission to Los Alamos: Ms Ellen Bradbury, Dr Norris Bradbury, Mrs Hanni Bretscher, Ms Judy Florence, Dr Anthony P. French, Dr D.J. Littler, Dr Donald C. Marshall, Dr J. Carson and Kathleen Mark, Dr John Manley, Dr P.B. Moon, Sir Rudolf Peierls, Lord William George Penney, Dr M.J. Poole, Mrs Mollie Rodriguez, Dr Joseph Rotblat, Dr Alice Kimball Preface xi Smith, Dr Cyril Stanley Smith, Dr Ralph Carlisle Smith, Sir Ernest and Peggy Titterton. Of course, all scholarship treating these issues must begin with the works by Margaret Gowing, the official historian of the British atomic world: Margaret Gowing, Britain and Atomic Energy, 1939-1945 (London: Macmillan, 1964); Margaret Gowing, Independence and Deter- rence, Vol. I, P olicy Making; Vol II, Policy Execution (London: Macmillan, 1974); and her American counterparts, who wrote the official history of the Atomic Energy Commission: Richard G. Hewlett and Oscar E. Anderson, Jr., The New World, 193911946: Vol. I of A History of the United States Atomic Energy Commission (University Park, Penn.: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1962); Richard G. Hewlett and Francis Duncan, Atomic Shield, 194711952: Vol. II of A History of the United States Atomic Energy Commission (University Park, Penn., and London: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1969); Richard G. Hewlett and Jack M. Holl, Atoms for Peace and War, 1953-1961: Eisenhower and the Atomic Energy Com- mission: Volume III of A History of the Atomic Energy Commission (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989). Finally, I would like to thank all the members of my family. My father, Ferenc P. Szasz, Ing. (1906-1984), introduced me to both the world of science and that of emigre life. My mother, Mary Szasz, received updates on this project almost every week for the last five years. Chris, Scott and Eric also heard about it with regularity. And I would especially like to thank Margaret and Maria for listening so patiently to the endless stories about the British Mission to Los Alamos. In an academic household, the gift of listening is far more precious than can ever be imagined. FMS Introduction The first weeks of August, 1945, proved the most decisive in the history of humankind. Or so thought Isaiah Berlin, then head of the Special Survey Section of the British Embassy in Washington, DC. Berlin would later go on to become an internationally famous philosopher/historian, but in 1945 he was drafting manuscript dispatches for the British home front.