Lone Letter Writer Upholds Police As Eyewitnesses' Protests Roll In

As a dozen more letters and eyewitness accounts of Thursday's riot reached the CRIMSON offices yesterday, one man wrote that he wished "to raise one dissenting voice to the choruses of protest against the Cambridge police that have been filling the columns of the CRIMSON lately."

"In my opinion," says Stanley Verba '53, "the riot last Thursday was a disgrace to the name of Harvard exceeded only by the childish recriminations that the CRIMSON, the Student Council, et al have indulged in since the riot."

"When little boys misbehave, they are often punished. This does not mean that little boys should never misbehave, but it also does not mean that they should never be punished. However, if they do get their wrists slapped for acting badly, they ought not to act like martyrs about it and circulate petitions. The CRIMSON might do well to remember this and not make Harvard look ridiculous in the eyes of the nation."

Verba's letter is the only one received which upholds the Cambridge police's handling of the riot. He does not claim to have seen the proceedings.

Cambridge Residents Speak

Two Cambridge residents, both of whom have asked that their names be withheld, have given signed statements of what they saw in the Square Thursday night. "I was up there in the Square," said one man, a citizen and registered voter, "before the patrol wagons came along. As far as I was concerned there just wasn't any riot until the police got there. I thought the whole thing was very orderly for a rally..."

A woman wrote, "I was born and brought up in Cambridge. The police mishandling of students last Thursday night was hardly the first instance of how the politics of this city are rotten and filthy. I say have a check-up from the chief down."

Russell E. Haddleton, of the Boston University College of Business Administration, ended his eyewitness story with, "On the whole, It was one of the most sickening spectacles I have ever witnessed."