# Report to the U.S. Secretary of State

*Exported from [Holy-Writings.com](https://www.holy-writings.com/) on 2026-06-20 — 1 clipping.*

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> Source: Bahá'í Library Online (bahai-library.com), curated by Jonah Winters. Used by permission of the curator. Original citation: W. Smith Murray, Report to the U.S. Secretary of State, bahai-library.com.
> ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
> 
> Report to the U.S. Secretary of State
> 
> W. Smith Murray
> 
> 1924-08-10
> 
> American Consular Service,
> Teheran, Persia
> August 10, 1924
> 
> [stamped:
> FILED NO V 14 1924 N]
> 
> [stamped: ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF STATE OCT 14
> 1924 A-3]
> 
> [stamped: Department of State Oct 13 1924 Division of Near
> Eastern Affairs]
> 
> [stamped: UNDER SECRETARY, OCT 2 1924 DEPT. OF
> STATE]
> 
> [stamped: ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF STATE OCT 16 1924
> A-4]
> 
> [handwritten: Instruction Drafted 10/6/24 accepted.stamped
> beneath: October 13 1924] [stamped: No. ? INDEX BUREAU Rec'd OCT 13 1924
> Dept. of State]
> 
> [stamped: INDEX BUREAU; handwritten over stamp: P.B.
> 123 ? / 298]
> 
> [stamped: DEPT. OF STATE NOV 12 1924 Division of Foreign
> Service Administration]
> 
> SECRET AND STRICTLY CONFIDENTIAL
> 
> The
> Honorable The Secretary of State, Washington
> 
> Sir: - I have the honor
> to bring to the attention of the Department CERTAIN PHASES OF THE
> MURDEROUS ASSAULT WHICH CULMINATED IN THE DEATH OF VICE CONSUL ROBERT
> WHITNEY IMBRIE IN TEHERAN on July 18, 1924, which, it is my impression,
> have not yet been communicated to the Department and which, I trust, will
> be of assistance in clarifying in some degree the circumstances
> surrounding the tragedy.
> 
> It is generally admitted that the killing of
> Major Imbrie was attended with a viciousness and savagery practically
> unknown in latter-day Persian history; the Persians have not been slow to
> point out that their race has not, in the past, been given to violence
> and that even during the turmoil of the Persian Revolution of 1906 the
> greatest self-control was exhibited in order not to harm in any way
> foreign residents of the country. This fact makes the crime all the more
> remarkable and the necessity
> 
> [page 2]
> 
> for penetrating into its deeper significance all the more imperative.
> 
> It is to be noted
> that the so-called miracle which took place in Teheran some two weeks
> previous to the assault was universally regarded by all Europeans and by
> most intelligent Persians as an absurdity, and there could not have been
> the slightest reason to believe that a visit to that "sacred" spot would
> incur any danger. It is furthermore to be noted that the alleged attempt
> on the part of Major Imbrie to take photographs at the Sakheh Khaneh could
> in no way be ascribed as the motive for the murderous attack at the Kossak
> Khaneh, inasmuch as the latter is more than a mile away from the former
> and the mob, numbering more than two thousand persons, which gathered as
> the carriage proceeded to the latter point, could not possibly have been
> informed of the photographing episode; hence the latter cannot be presumed
> to have inflamed the mob.
> 
> It is of extraordinary significance that
> the attacks upon Major Imbrie and Mr. Seymour should have taken place -
> first, directly in front of the large entrance to the Kossak Khaneh within
> a few feet of the guardhouse at the gate, and second, upon the operation
> tables of the Police Headquarters Hospital, which is perhaps not more
> than a few hundred yards from the gate of the Kossak Khaneh.
> 
> That the
> Government's case in the affair is totally nil and nonexistent ill be
> observed from the following points: -
> 
> 1. Although the situation in
> Teheran since the collapse of the republican movement has, with regard to
> law and order, been a critical one, and although the Government might have
> realized the seriousness at this time of the Sakheh Khaneh demonstrations,
> the Prime Minister admits that he had issued orders, previous to the tragedy, that both the
> police and military should abstain from intervention of any kind in
> religious demonstrations and that under no circumstances was a shot to be
> fired; hence the situation of two men, attacked
> 
> [page 3]
> 
> by a mob of two thousand fanatics, left to their fate.
> 
> 2. Although the attack upon Imbrie and Seymour lasted about half and hour, at a spot
> within a stone's throw of both the Police Headquarters and the Kossak
> Khaneh, where both police and military reserves were at hand, no attempt
> was made to intimidate the mob.
> 
> 3. The participation of the military
> and of at least one officer in the assault is an incontrovertible fact.
> This has been verified in the first deposition
> taken from Seymour, in which he stoutly affirmed that the
> officer-of-the-day was one of the first to strike him. Furthermore, I was
> confidentially informed by an officer of the Persian Army, who was an
> intimate friend of mine, that he was personally acquainted with the
> officer-of-the-day in charge of the guard at the gate, one Lieutenant
> Janmamad, and that the latter had freely confessed to him that not only
> the men in his charge on the fatal morning had rushed out and joined in
> the attack, but that he himself had participated. When questioned as to
> why he did do, he said, "I had no idea it was the American Consul. I
> thought it was a dog of a Bahá'í."
> 
> At this point it is well to cite the
> following proofs that his identity was known to some, at least, of his
> assailants: -
> 
> a) When Major Imbrie's carriage was stopped at the gate
> of the Kossak Khaneh, he drew out his card and handed it to a police
> officer, stating that he was the American Consul and that he could be seen
> at any time at the American Consulate.
> 
> b) Major Imbrie was
> accompanied by a "kavass" of the American Consulate, wearing the American
> insignia on his hat and buttons and coat. Both the insignia and buttons
> were ripped off early in the attack by someone who would appear to have
> extr aordinary presence of mind.
> 
> c) When Seymour was dragged from the
> carriage, which had already passed through the Kossak Khaneh gate, he was
> asked by the
> 
> [page 4]
> 
> officer-of-the-day who he was and where
> he was going. He stated, "I am an American, and I want to go to the
> American Consulate"; whereupon the officer struck him, saying, "I think
> you will be living here for a while."
> 
> d) As the Department will have
> already noted in the deposition of Issak, the Chaldean servant of Doctor
> Packard, who was at the scene of the assault, the latter shouted
> repeatedly to the mob, to the military, and to the police, that they were
> killing the American Consul and that he was not a Bahá'í. Hence, the
> fiction that there could have any misapprehension as to the person upon
> whom the violence of the mob was being vented is totally exploded.
> 
> To
> return now to the officer-of-the-day, Lieutenant Janmamad, I believe the
> Department will agree with me that the government showed a reprehensible
> negligence in that his arrest was not immediately ordered after the
> tragedy, inasmuch as it stands to reason that he and his men, given the
> fact that the incident happened before his very door, could not but have
> been at least cognizant of it. It was not until July 26, eight days
> later, that his arrest was promised, after I had demanded it. It is
> furthermore to be noted that his name does not occur in the police report
> of the crime, made on July 26, and that on august 7, when I called the
> matter to the attention of the Foreign Minister he seemed surprised that
> he had heard nothing of it and, after noting it down, promised to take
> immediate action. although there appears to be ample evidence that a
> considerable number of the military participated in the attack, only one
> soldier, named Morteza, of the Army Transport, had by July 26 been
> arrested, and apparently none of the guard of the day. The police report
> of the above mentioned date states, "Several other soldiers have also,
> according to investigations made, taken part in the beating and
> insulting. The Emergency Commission is searching for them."
> 
> [page 5]
> 
> The American Minister, shortly after the murder, received
> authoritative information, to the effect that Reza Khan had threatened "to
> cut the tongue out of
> any officer or man who opened his mouth with regard to the affair." That
> is was his original determination to shield the military is furthermore
> evident from a conversation which he had about the same time with Mr.
> Soppier, the Sinclair representative, in which he flew into a rage at a
> suggestion of the latter that the military were involved.
> 
> 4. When,
> finally, Imbrie and Seymour were rescued by the police and placed in an
> automobile to be transported to the hospital, the authorities were either
> unwilling or unable to prevent the crowd from beating and assaulting the
> senseless men in the automobile.
> 
> 5. When the two Americans finally
> reached the hospital and had been carried to the operation tables, the
> police authorities, in their own headquarters, were again either
> unwilling or unable to prevent the storming of the hospital by the savage
> mob, which was led by Seyed Hossein, followed directly by a group of
> Cossacks with drawn swords.
> 
> I, myself, through Dr. Packard, heard the
> statement of one Ali, the hospital attendant who was present when the
> wounded men were brought in, and who stated that he was unable to prevent
> the mob from entering the operation room. He showed me the tiles of the
> floor which had been torn up and shattered on the body of
> Imbrie, as well as a chair which was smashed in assaulting him. although
> Seymour was lying in a room through which the mob had to pass, he was
> spared further assault because the mob was told that he was dead.
> 
> The
> Department is already in possession o f the deposition which I took from
> doctor Jalal Shaffa, one of the native physicians at the American
> Hospital, who was one of the first to arrive at the Police Hospital and to
> whom a policeman present volunteered the information that he was unable to
> 
> [page 6]
> 
> hold back the mob because they were led by
> Cossacks, armed with sabres. The truth of this statement was, on the same
> day, verified by the admission of Lieutenant Nehmattollah, a police
> officer on the Investigation Commission, to the effect that the latter
> attack was led by Cossacks, but that they were fired to vengeance by Seyed
> Hossein, crying that he would "have the blood of this infidel dog to
> avenge the death of Hossein and his grandfather."
> 
> FOREIGN
> POLITICAL BACKGROUND
> 
> Almost simultaneously with the killing, the
> rumor arose in the city that it was the result of oil intrigues and that
> the mob believed it had got Soper, the Sinclair representative. In this
> connection I may state that such was apparently the belief of the
> authorities at the hospital upon the arrival of Mrs. Imbrie, inasmuch as
> they refused permission to her and Doctor Packard to enter and insisted
> that Imbrie was not her husband.
> 
> Almost immediately also, the hue and
> cry against the British was taken up
> in the Persian press, and it was openly intimated that they were
> responsible for the crime. In this connection, I have positive information
> that it is the firm conviction of the Prime Minister that the British are
> responsible for the encouragement and subsidizing of the Sakheh Khaneh
> storm center, if not for the actual crime itself.
> 
> On the day of Major
> Imbrie's funeral the British Charge d'Affaires, Mr. Esmond Ovey, who had
> already gotten wind of the above rumors, solemnly warned Zoka-ol-Molk, the
> Foreign Minister, that the control of the press must be tightened and
> that he would not tolerate any publication of such rumors. The warning was
> apparently ineffective inasmuch as the next few days brought a torrent of
> abuse and the vilest insinuations against "the land of the lion and the
> unicorn."
> 
> Thereupon the British Charge rushed, with his oriental
> secretary,
> 
> [page 7]
> 
> Mr. Harvard, to the Prime Minister's
> country house, and delivered an ultimatum to him, that categorical
> instructions be issued to suppress any paper in Teheran intimating Great
> Britain's participation in the affair. The Prime Minister was at first
> obdurate and stated that the whole matter would first have to be
> investigated; but he finally yielded and published a dementi, after which
> the situation, as far as the British were concerned, was for the moment
> relieved.
> 
> Another and still more tense situation was created, however,
> when the Persian authorities attempted a few days later to arrest Mostafa
> Khan, the Persian private secretary of Mr. W. C. Fairley, the
> Anglo-Persian representative in Teheran. The attempt was met by a still
> more vigorous intervention on the part of Mr. Ovey, who told Reza Khan
> that any such act on his part would be regarded by the British Government
> as proof positive that he considered the rumors concerning the British
> true.
> 
> I may state at this point that the young man in question,
> Mostafa Khan, a graduate of Columbia University and pretended friend of
> America, is positively known to have engaged, for the sake of his
> employer, in the most unsavory and unwarranted attacks on everything
> American, in order to prevent at all costs the passage of the Sinclair oil
> bill. I am reliably informed that he has, during the last critical days,
> offered to several members of the Mejliss, whose names are known to me, a
> bribe of eight tomans a month, if they will abstain from their duties and
> thus break the quorum. I furthermore know that he approached the Deputy
> from Isfahan and used the novel argument, as to
> why he should vote against the oil bill, that the American people,
> "enraged at the treason of the late President Harding for having sold them
> out to the Sinclair Oil Company," had torn open his grave and burned
> his
> 
> [page 8]
> 
> body. This is the
> man who, though a Persian subject, enjoys the protection of the British
> Legation.
> 
> It was clear from the outset that the Russians intended to
> leave no stone unturned in order to push the responsibility for the crime
> into the shoes of the British. On the day of the funeral one of the
> Secretaries of the Bolshevist Legation, Mr. Walden, stated to a personal
> friend of mine, Mr. Swiminoff, who was educated and has lived many years
> in America, that the whole thing had been engineered by the British in
> order to prevent passage of the oil bill. Both the local Persian press,
> enjoying the Russian subsidy, as well as the organ of the Russian
> Telegraphic Agency, "Rosta", launched a violent campaign against the
> British, containing open accusation. The British Charge d'Affairs
> immediately wired for instructions to London, and thereafter called upon
> the Russian Minister, and, after a three and a half hours' conference, was
> unable to persuade him to make a frank retraction of these statements. The
> best that could be done was a half-hearted statement on the following day
> in the "Rosta", to the effect that the published reports "were not the
> individual opinions of the editor."
> 
> As I pointed out to the Department
> in my telegram No. 8 of July 29, the attitude of the Russians with regard
> to the affair was fully clarified by their behavior in the three meetings
> of the Diplomatic Corps which followed the murder.
> 
> In the first, they
> strongly objected to any reference whatsoever to the military, as having
> participated, and insisted, in addition, that the minorities clause be
> added, condemning religious fanaticism.
> 
> In the second, they moved that
> the Diplomatic Corps unanimously accept the Government's reply to the
> protest drawn up in the first meeting, despite the fact that this body
> was therein informed that its protest was unjustified. After vainly
> attempting to block any further conferences, the Russian Delegation rose
> in the midst of the third session and
> 
> [page 9]
> 
> walked out
> when it was agreed by the
> rest that the American note of protest to the Persian Government was not
> to be read or discussed. At this last meeting, the protocol of the two
> preceding meetings was drawn up, a copy of which the Russians attempted to
> obtain from the Dean, the Turkish Ambassador, who flatly refused to
> accede to their demand.
> 
> I have already pointed out to the Department,
> in my telegram No. 7 of July 28, that the Russian Delegation in Teheran
> has shown a curious interest in what they stated to have been Major
> Imbrie's "anti-Bolshevist record" in Russia.
> 
> RELIGIOUS BACKGROUND
> 
> In
> the larger analysis, it may safely be said that the recrudescence of
> clerical power in Persia in the last two years has supplied the background
> and, in large part, the motivation for the tragedy which has just
> occurred. It is worth noting that never since the Persian Revolution of
> 1906, when the clergy was terrified into immobility by the public
> execution at the hands of the Revolutionaries of their Chief Mujtahed,
> Sheik Fazlullah, have the clergy been in possession of such dangerous
> power as is theirs today. So complete was their eclipse, that by 1918 it
> was possible to disregard their constitutional and religious right to
> interpret and execute the laws of the land in accordance with the Koran
> when a new Penal Code, based on the "Code of Napoleon", was drafted and
> put into temporary execution pending its consideration and acceptance by
> the Mejliss. To anyone with even a slight knowledge of the corruption of
> the Persian Law Courts, this was an amazing act of progress.
> 
> It was
> not until the late summer of 1922, when the struggle between Reza Khan,
> then Minister of War, and the then Prime Minister, Ghavam-os-Saltaneh, had
> reached a critical stage, that the latter turned to the Mullahs and
> enlisted their support in an attempt to break the menacing power of the
> War Minister. Be it said to Reza Khan's credit, that although
> he
> 
> [page 10]
> 
> is an uneducated man and has evinced a
> lamentable moral weakness in all the crises of his career, he is
> (fortunately for Persia) religiously tolerant and enlightened, and has
> freely made use in the Army and the Government of the intelligent services
> of the Bahá'ís, who may well be considered the only hope of Islam.
> 
> On
> the occasion above mentioned, Ghavam-os-Saltaneh, in order to reinforce
> his political position, then insecure, encouraged the Mullahs to make
> their notorious "Twelve Demands", among which was the abolition of the
> Penal Code of 1918, obviously necessitating a return to the a rchaic
> religious courts. A second demand was the establishment of the Mullah's
> Committee of Veto in the Mejliss, which is unfortunately provided for in
> Article 2 of the Supplement to the Constitution, but which has remained
> until the present time a dead letter.
> 
> To a close observer of Persian
> affairs it is beyond question that, had Reza Khan succeeded in
> establishing the Republic in March of this year, it would have been the
> death knell to the power of the clergy, which the latter realized only too
> well. I furthermore know personally that it was his firm determination to
> have proceeded, immediately upon the establishment of the Republic, with a
> revision of the Constitution which would have separated church from state
> and secularized the law.
> 
> It is curious that, for the first time since
> the establishment of Bolshevism in Russia, Great Britain and the Russians
> joined hands cordially in support of the clergy last March, in order to
> break the power of the Prime Minister and annihilate the Republic. It was
> they who subsidized and demonstrated in the gardens of the Mejliss on the
> day before the Republic was to be declared, and it was the fatal moral
> weakness of the Prime Minister in handling this demonstration which
> demolished at a blow his prestige with
> the Persians as
> 
> [page 11]
> 
> "the dreaded and infallible Reza".
> 
> The clergy immediately rose to the occasion, and they, who had
> the day before been suppliants, now became dictators. They directed what
> steps the Prime Minister should take thenceforth, that he should proceed
> forthwith to Qum for consultation with the exiled Mesopotamian Mullahs,
> who ordered him to publish his famous decree forbidding further discussion
> of the Republic.
> 
> Since that time Reza Khan's political enemies have taken advantage of the restored prestige of the clergy to raise the hue and
> cry of Bahá'ísm against him, the danger of which accusation in present-day
> densely ignorant Persia is by no means to be underestimated. To many
> observers on the spot, the Prime Minister's patience under these trying
> circumstances has appeared incomprehensible, and he has often been
> criticized for not having met the issue squarely and either smashed his
> opposition or gone down in defeat.
> 
> The reason for his inaction is
> unquestionably the fact that he has realized that any successful
> demonstrations against him at the present time may compromise his
> "American program", which contains, of course, the passage of the oil
> bill. He has realized, furthermore, that it was a mistake to have
> proceeded with his republic last March before his program was completed,
> and it is now definitely known that he is determined at all costs to keep
> the Mejliss open until the oil bill has passed, after which there is every
> reason to believe the Deputies wi ll be immediately dismissed and Reza
> Khan will assume dictatorial powers in the country. The realization of
> this situation on the part of the clerical opposition has incited them
> more than anything else to oppose the passage of the bill.
> 
> From a
> knowledge of Persian affairs, it is impossible to believe that the
> so-called miracle, which occurred some two weeks previous to Imbrie's
> death, was a spontaneous occurrence.
> 
> [page 12]
> 
> It had the earmarks from the beginning of an artificially inspired movement, of
> which the organized powers of evil were quick to take advantage in order
> to create disorder for the Government. It is well-known that large sums of
> money were paid to a committee organized at the Sakheh Khaneh, to which
> even peasants made contributions in sheep and grain. The sums collected are variously
> estimated from five to twenty thousand tomans. It is generally believed
> that the big grandees of Persia generously donated, among them being
> Vossough-ed-Dowleh, the notorious Anglophile Prime Minister of the Anglo-
> Persian Agreement, Ghavam-os-Saltaneh, his brother, now in exile, and
> Farman Farma, the most notorious of British agents. Reza Khan found
> himself faced with a situation before which he was powerless. The
> fanaticism of the crowd was so incited by the continuous preaching of the Mullahs that any act on
> his part would have been interpreted as treason to Islam and prima facie
> evidence that he was a Bahá'í; hence his unfortunate orders to the military
> and the police not to intervene under any circumstances in religious
> demonstrations and under no circumstances to fire.
> 
> It is clear that
> such a spot as the Sakheh Khaneh would be chosen by both foreign and
> domestic troublemakers as an advantageous station for their spies and
> agents, and the secret of this affair will never be fully revealed until the true
> character and affiliations of the hangers-on at the Sakheh Khaneh have
> been ascertained. It is obvious that the man in the crowd at the Sakheh
> Khaneh who had the presence of mind to spring to his feet the moment he
> saw Imbrie and cry, "That is a Bahá'í! He has poisoned the water of our
> Sakheh Khaneh and killed Musselmen women and children!" is of more than
> passing importance to the prosecution. It has been stated that this man is
> the same Seyed Hossein who stormed the operation room with the Cossacks;
> but I have not received confirmation of this.
> 
> [page 13]
> 
> Viewing the tragedy, in its larger issue, one is led to the
> inevitable conclusion that, unless Reza Khan is able and willing to purge
> the military of its criminal lawlessness, and, unless the malign power of
> the clergy can be broken forever in the land, there is every reason to
> believe that the killing of Imbrie is but a foretaste of more terrible
> events to come.
> 
> I have the honor to be, Sir,
> Your obedient
> servant,
> 
> (signed) W. Smith Murray
> 
> Second Secretary of Legation In
> charge of Consulate
> 
> METADATA
> 
> Views14590 views since posted 1998; last edit 2025-02-28 02:56 UTC;
> 
> previous at archive.org.../imbrie_report_secretary_state;
> URLs changed in 2010, see archive.org.../bahai-library.org
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> Scanned 1998 by Robert Stauffer.
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> — *Report to the U.S. Secretary of State (Used by permission of the curator)*