The Morning of March 10

What happened early that morning of March 10, 1948 in the third-floor, right-wing apartment of the Foreign Ministry in Prague? Afterward, when the body lay in the morgue, the new Red regime made its announcement: Foreign Minister Jan Masaryk was so depressed by letters from British and U.S. friends denouncing him for collaborating with the Communists that he climbed through the small window of his bathroom and plunged 60 feet to a stone-flagged courtyard.

Many of Masaryk's friends in the West were convinced that it was murder--that he had been shoved out the window. But they had no proof: the Reds controlled the evidence. Last week, almost four years later, C. L. Sulzberger, chief of the New York Times's foreign newsmen, concluded that Jan Masaryk "was murdered after having been cruelly beaten." Sulzberger's source: a document reportedly dictated by a Dr. Teply, eminent Prague criminologist and police surgeon, which Sulzberger said has recently been checked by Western intelligence officers and at least one Western foreign minister. The story:

The Evidence. At 5 a.m. on the morning of March 10, a phone call awoke Dr. Teply. It was the Interior Ministry: Would he go immediately to the Foreign

Office? Upon arrival, Teply was taken to the courtyard, where he saw a body sprawled out under a blanket. A security agent pulled back the cover, and Teply, with a shock, recognized the pajama-clad corpse of Dr. Masaryk. "I ordered one of the policemen to open the pajamas, and noticed all over the body traces of blows and scratches that appeared to be marks of violence. I saw in the nape of the neck the mark of a wound, probably made by a projectile of 7.65-mm. caliber. I thought: 'This is infamous, a bestial assassination.' "

In his cursory examination (the light was dim), Teply found also that the heel bones were broken, apparently beaten "repeatedly, with a very heavy instrument, for example a hammer." Masaryk's hands were also marked as though he had fought desperately before death.

The body was carried back to Masaryk's apartment, with Dr. Teply following. As he passed into the building, a black automobile drew up; out stepped Vaclav Nosek, Himmler of the Red Czech regime, and Dr. Vladimir Clementis, Deputy Foreign Minister (later arrested as a Western agent). They hurried into an elevator and got to Masaryk's apartment before Teply.

By the time Teply got there, they were already at work, trying to rearrange the heavy furniture and ornate rugs in the study, which showed signs of a struggle. Nosek was putting together a footstool which had a leg smashed off. Masaryk's bedroom was a shambles. The bedside table was topsy-turvy, a shattered cup and jug lay alongside, the bed was scrambled. Nosek smoothed the bed, and bearers brought in Masaryk's body. Then Interior Minister Nosek went to the window, stared into the courtyard and muttered gravely: "Suicide." Teply indiscreetly disagreed with Nosek, who ordered him to get back to Masaryk's study and stay there.

The Visitor. Twenty minutes later a man in civilian clothes, carrying a towel on his arm, entered the apartment, said something in a low voice to Clementis and Nosek, walked toward the bedroom. When a policeman barred the way, the newcomer, reported Teply, said in Russian: "Don't be stupid, fellow, let me pass." The visitor remained alone with Masaryk's body half an hour. Then, concluded Teply, Nosek called all in the apartment together and warned them: they had not "seen or heard a thing."

What happened to Dr. Teply? Three or four months later, Sulzberger reports, he died in Prague police headquarters. He had accidentally taken, it was said, a "wrong injection."

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