Gen. Ramey and Special Team Enter the Picture
The newspapers then reported that Col. Blanchard notified Gen. Ramey of the find and that Gen. Ramey ordered the "flying disk" flown to Fort Worth. Marcel said that morning Col. Blanchard ordered him to fly his recovered material to Wright Field, first stopping at Fort Worth to see Ramey. Some AP newspaper articles reported that Marcel left at 10:00 a.m., but Marcel said they left that afternoon, which agrees with other evidence.
A major witness, who has chosen anonymity, has also recently claimed that Ramey secretly flew in that morning to Roswell base to confer with staff. It was decided at that time that they would go with a weather balloon cover story.
Also at this point there a few reports from witnesses of a special team or teams flying in from Washington to take charge of the recovery, perhaps part of the Army Counter-Intelligence Corp, or CIC (E.g. see the affidavit of Sgt. Robert Smith) In the Ramey memo, they are perhaps referred to as the "CIC/TEAM." Witness Frank Kaufmann has claimed to be a member of this special CIC team, which he said consisted of nine main members.
There are other allusions to this team or other teams in the memo in the third person, such as "THEY WILL SHIP" or "IF THEY ADD."
Kaufmann may also have implied that Gen. Ramey and Charles Lindbergh were involved with this team. As remarkable as this claim may seem, there is some corroboration for it. E.g., see the affidavit of Earl Zimmerman, formerly with AFOSI (Air Force equivalent of the CIC). Zimmerman said he saw both Ramey and Lindbergh together at the Roswell officer's club at the time of all the flying saucer rumors. Lindbergh's presence wasn't publicized. Furthermore, he was told that they were there "because of the flying saucer business." Zimmerman also noticed an unknown CIC officer at the base whom he pointed out to Col. Blanchard, who was likewise unaware that he was there.
I also received an e-mail from Jesse Marcel Jr. who wrote that he remembers his father pointed out Lindbergh to him while the family was eating dinner at the officers' club.
Another source of support for Ramey being at the base comes from Walter Haut, then the Roswell public information officer. In a taped interview, Haut stated that Ramey had flown out to the base the morning of July 8 for the morning staff meeting.
It is also known that Ramey's involvement with UFOs did not end with Roswell. The next large UFO "wave" after 1947 was in 1952 and climaxed in July with several well-publicized radar/visual UFO cases over Washington D.C., including jet interceptions. Major Gen. Ramey was now in charge of Air Force Operations.
In an attempt to quell public concern, on July 29 the military held its largest press conference since the end of WWII, headed by Maj. Generals Samford (Chief of Air Intelligence) and Ramey. They were said to be handling the current investigation. Furthermore, some newspapers reported that the Air Force said they were their top two UFO experts (an Associated Press article a few days later also called Ramey the "Air Force 'saucer man'"). They denied that any interceptors had been scrambled and attributed the anomalous radar returns to artifacts of a temperature inversion layer. Both statements they knew to be untrue.
A few days later, Gen. Ramey also appeared on CBS television on their "Man of the Week" show. While admitting that some 20% of UFO sightings remained unsolved, he claimed that none had been tracked consistently on radar, there was no evidence that they were material objects, and that they were probably some type of natural phenomenon and constituted no threat. [N.Y. Times, 8/4/52, Baltimore Sun, 8/4/52, Los Angeles Times, 8/4/52]
Return to Roswell
Marcel said that he and Cavitt collected only a tiny fraction of the debris field material. Cavitt returned first in a Jeep carry-all. Marcel followed a the end of the day in a Buick staff car. It would have taken Marcel about 4 hours to get back to Roswell.
Before returning to the base, Marcel stopped at his home. According to his son, Dr. Jesse Marcel Jr., his father woke his mother and himself in the middle of the night to show them the boxes of material he had brought back, which he said was from a flying saucer. They laid out the material on the kitchen floor and tried to make sense of it. Marcel Jr. says he noticed a metallic "I-beam" with purplish symbols on it and pointed this out to his parents. (Dr. Marcel's affidavit)
Another witness to these "I-beams" with hieroglyphics was Lt. Robert Shirkey, who was in flight operations at Roswell. He said saw them being carried out to the B-29 which was to fly Marcel and his recovered debris to Fort Worth. (Shirkey's affidavit)
New! Yet another possible witness is Brig. Gen. Steven Lovekin, who has given recent testimony on behalf of the Disclosure Project, that he was shown a metallic, yardstick-like beam with symbols on it during a Pentagon briefing in 1959. He was told it was from "one of the craft that had crashed in New Mexico" (thus implying more than one crash). The "encryptions," he was told, were "instructions" of some kind, and that the military was still working on trying to figure them out.
(A similar, though second-hand account, was provided by Steve Lytle. Lytle said his his father, a mathematician who worked with Robert Oppenheimer, was given the task of deciphering the writing on the I-beams. See metal beam descriptions.)
Also this night, Mac Brazel may have been brought back to Roswell by Walt Whitmore, Sr., co-owner of radio station KGFL. Whitmore apparently heard of Brazel's story from Frank Joyce, who had spoken to Brazel when he first got to the Sheriff's office. He then drove out to Brazel's place. Whitmore reportedly wire-recorded an interview with Brazel which was to air the next day. Brazel stayed at the Whitmore house, according to Walt Whitmore Jr., who said Brazel slept in his bed and he saw him there the next morning making breakfast..
Main Recovery Operation Begins
Early the next morning, Marcel (and presumably Cavitt) reported their findings to Col. Blanchard. Blanchard later privately admitted to others that the material his men brought in from the field was the strangest stuff he had ever seen and definitely not from any balloon.
A staff meeting was called on how to deal with the situation. A major recovery operation at the ranch was ordered, which is alluded to in the Ramey message when it mentions new finds, including victims, "NEAR OPERATION AT THE 'RANCH'"
A military cordon was also set up to seal off the area, particularly north of Roswell along highway 285, blocking all access roads to the west. This cordon is likewise mentioned in the Ramey memo. "A 'DISK'" was the "NEXT NEW FIND WEST OF THE CORDON."
