The Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training Foreign Affairs Oral History Project
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The Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training Foreign Affairs Oral History Project PETER K. MURPHY Interviewed by: William D. Morgan Initial interview date: April 4, 1994 Copyright 1998 ADST TABLE OF CONTENTS Background Born and raised in Boston Boston College Passport Office, New York Paris, France 1962-1965 Consular Office - functions FSI - Spanish Language Student Cordova, Argentina 1965-1967 Environment and security Consul assassination attempt FSI - Italian Language Student 1967 Milan, Italy - Consular Office 1967-1971 Commercial problems Venice drug problems Paris, France - Consular Office 1971-1975 Chinese relations Visa problems Vietnamese refugees Nice, France 1975-1977 Personnel problems Environment Cost in representation Sixth Fleet visits Princess Grace and Prince Rainier Shah of Iran 1 Genoa, Italy 1981-1984 The Vatican, Rome, Italy - DCM 1984-1988 Organization and functions of mission Relations with embassy Vatican relations with other various countries Background (history) of U.S. relations with the Holy See Vatican and the Government of Italy Lebanon hostages The Pope Ambassador Wilson's flying visit to Libya Bonn, Germany - Consul General 1989-1990 Supervisory functions over Consulates Dept. of State - Dir. of Gulf War Task Force 1990 In charge of Consular Affairs Ms. Tamposi Operations of Task Force Retirement - Mission to Bucharest, Romania Adoption issue National Passports and Visas Center - Portsmouth, New Hampshire Private Business – Boston INTERVIEW Q: Mr. Peter K. Murphy, of Massachusetts, is a retired Senior Foreign Service Officer (Minister Counselor) whose career encompasses three assignments in France, three in Italy, Argentina, Germany, the Holy See as well as in the United States. Mr. Murphy retired from the United States Foreign Service in 1991 and is now employed with a private firm - Stanley Associates, Inc. of Alexandria, Virginia. Mr. Murphy lives in Boston and works in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Peter, it is good to welcome you on this lovely spring day. MURPHY: Thank you, Bill. 2 Q: We are here to record some of your memories of your days in the Foreign Service of our nation. Let's start first with your explanation of what brought you to the Foreign Service. MURPHY: Well...for that - we should go back a bit in time. I'm originally from the Boston area. I was born in Medford, Massachusetts - a suburb of Boston - and was raised and educated in the nearby town of Winchester. Strange as it may seem, throughout my grammar school years - and continuing right through high school and college - I had an interest in foreign lands, cultures and peoples. When I was in the fifth grade of grammar school - together with two school chums - I joined the International Friendship League on Mount Vernon Street in Boston. Through this organization I was put in contact with students my own age around the world. I recall writing regularly to a fellow in Tokyo - who later turned out to be a rather noted Japanese baseball player. A young man I also wrote to in Le Havre, France became a lifelong friend - as is an Italian lawyer I corresponded with for years in Rome. I have visited both of these friends over the years - and know them and their families well. I guess you could say that my interest in "lands beyond the sea" was also manifest in my decision to leave Boston College - in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts - at the end of my sophomore year to enter a Catholic missionary order - the Maryknoll Fathers. I remained ass a seminarian at the Maryknoll Seminary (The Venard) in Clarks Summit, Pennsylvania for only one year before concluding that I had no real vocation to the priesthood. I have, however, no regret whatsoever at having spent that year of study in Pennsylvania. I learned a lot - and also met interesting men from around the country - some of whom have remained life-long friends. My studies in Clarks Summit were geared to overseas living; life among other peoples and cultures. This part of my studies fascinated me - more so than the heavy dose of Latin - although I am sure that the concentrated study of the Latin language assisted me with my French, Italian, Spanish and German in later Foreign Service life! A key catalyst to my interest in foreign affairs and cultures was Dorothea Wool. Dorothea Wool was a Foreign Service Officer from the Boston area....the first FSO I had ever met. Her cousin, Clifton Keane, was our next door neighbor in Winchester, Massachusetts. From time to time, Dorothea returned to the Boston area on her Home Leave. During those periods when she was visiting her family in Winchester, she spoke at length to me about her work in our embassies Indonesia, India, and France ....and other exotic places. I was perhaps in the seventh or eighth grade at the time - a most impressionable age, Bill! So - - it was through Miss Wool that I first became interested in the Foreign Service as a possible career choice. When I graduated from Boston College with a Bachelor of Arts degree in English literature, I made application to the Department of State. The whole process seemed very complicated to me at the time but our then Senator - John F. Kennedy - was most helpful sending me the necessary information to make application to enter the State Department. I recall that he sent me a follow-up letter of encouragement after my application was made. 3 During the long waiting period to enter the Foreign Service, I did a variety of things. For a few months I was a “ sales management trainee ” with DuPont Paint Company. Following this experience (which quickly convinced me that I wanted nothing at all to do with sales of any sort!!) I became a substitute teacher of French and Latin in Lexington, Winchester and Medford, Massachusetts High Schools. These were “filler” jobs until the date arrived for me to embark on a five month trip to Europe. In order to make this trip, I was obliged to receive the permission of my local Selective Service Board to leave the country - and promise that I would enter military service upon my return! To tell the truth, Bill - this first trip to Europe was like a dream come true for me! To earn the funds for such a voyage, I worked for three months in the summer as a bartender in an exclusive club on Cape Cod (Oyster Harbors Club in Osterville) and saved every penny for my great adventure. I also spent many hours during that long, hot summer on Cape Cod planning my "trip of a lifetime." I booked passage (for $175) Third Class from New York to Southampton, UK on the SS Liberte of the French Line ( Compagnie Generale Transatlantique ....which no longer exists - alas!) Off I went with $1,200 in my pocket - a fortune in those days! I guess I thought of myself as a reincarnation of Richard Haliburton - whose travel books I had devoured as a child. Aboard ship I had with me a newfangled European railway ticket which was called a Eurail Pass. Prior to leaving Boston, I saw an add in the New York Times and purchased what turned out to be the third Eurailpass ever issued - - for a total of $125 - for a three month validity. (They surely lost money on me!!) The crossing of the Atlantic was an adventure in itself: new food (wine with every meal - can you imagine the impression for a young guy from Boston!), new friends, many students - both American and foreign. Very little sleeping was accomplished on the crossing - - but there were lots of parties and even more dancing. (I was not very good -- and never improved much in that field!) I shall never forget my impressions of arriving in Southampton at 4:00 AM in the cold, damp fog of an October morning and climbing into a tender to go ashore - (too few passengers were disembarking at that port to permit a formal call inside the port at quay- side.) My first steps onto the soil of the "Old World" remains vividly implanted in my mind even to this day! I recall the kindness of the British customs officers who offered me and my four companions from the ship a mug of hot English tea - which tasted so good that early in the morning after a week of little sleep on the ship! The views of the English countryside - of Eaton (where the "battles of the Empire were won on those playing fields"!)- and farmlands - and the quaint English villages and houses with thatched roofs which raced past our window as our train rushed towards London! To me - this was really traveling!! Today's travel by jet aircraft - while admittedly far easier and swifter - does not lend itself to the adventure of actually traversing the miles to a foreign land. I spent a lot of time exploring London, several weeks at Jesus College at Oxford University - where I took a literature course - and also visited family friends in Kings Lynn in Norfolk. Every day was a new adventure - from bring treated by the English Heath System at no charge! -- to visiting the Boston "Stump" (as the tower of the Cathedral at Boston is called) and the ruins of old Castle Rising in Norfolk - - and the Abbey and Shrine at Walsingham - - and the unforgettable Christmas Carol Service I attended at Kings College at Cambridge. All these memories of my first taste of life in a 4 foreign land became an intimate part of my being...and convinced me - (if I needed more convincing) that the Foreign Service was for me! From England I crossed the English Channel (by ferry, of course! There was no Chunnel in those days!).