L. Patrick Gray III was the man caught in the middle of the Watergate scandal. He was a lifelong Republican, but Richard Nixon considered him a threat. Closing in on the conspiracy, Gray became the target of one of Watergate's most shocking acts—Nixon's "smoking gun" attempt to have the CIA stop the FBI investigation. And when the U.S. Senate focused its attention on Gray in April 1973, the White House threw him to the wolves; John Ehrlichman famously advised that he be left to "twist slowly, slowly in the wind."
This book is Gray's firsthand account of what really happened during his crucial year as acting director of the FBI, based on a never-before-published first-person account and previously secret documents. He reveals the witches' brew of intrigue and perfidy that permeated Washington, and he tells the unknown story of his complex relationship with his top deputy, Mark Felt, raising disturbing questions about the methods and motives of the man purported to be Deep Throat.
Gray's book was completed and expanded by his son, journalist Ed Gray, who has supplemented the text with revelatory excerpts from documents, tape transcripts, and third-party accounts. Every other major figure has told his story, and now Patrick Gray's unique inside account will change the way we think about the crisis that destroyed the Nixon presidency.
L. Patrick Gray III did not speak publicly about his role in Watergate for thirty-two years, breaking his silence only for one brief interview before his death in 2005. This book contains details and revelations about Watergate that have never been published before.
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“A fast-paced, sometimes chilling insider’s account of the desperate attempt to save a corrupt administration, without regard to whose lives were destroyed.”
— Library Journal
A fast-paced, sometimes chilling insider's account of the desperate attempt to save a corrupt administration, without regard to whose lives were destroyed.
— Library JournalBe the first to write a review about this audiobook!
L. Patrick Gray III (1916–2005) was an American lawyer and government official who served as interim director of the FBI after the death of J. Edgar Hoover in 1972. He attended Rice Institute and later won a scholarship to the US Naval Academy, eventually serving on five submarine combat patrols in the Pacific during World War II. Upon Nixon’s election to the presidency in 1968, Gray became executive assistant to the secretary of health, education, and welfare. Nixon later made him assistant attorney general in charge of the civil division and nominated him to be deputy attorney general, before appointing him to the FBI job.
Ed Gray, the son of former FBI director L. Patrick Gray III, is a naturalist writer and cofounder, with his wife, Rebecca, of Gray’s Sporting Journal. He is the author of several books, including Flashes in the River and Shadows on the Flats. He lives in Lyme, New Hampshire.
Michael Prichard is a Los Angeles-based actor who has played several thousand characters during his career, over one hundred of them in theater and film. He is primarily heard as an audiobook narrator, having recorded well over five hundred full-length books. His numerous awards and accolades include an Audie Award for Tears in the Darkness by Michael Norman and Elizabeth M. Norman and six AudioFile Earphones Awards. He was named a Top Ten Golden Voice by SmartMoney magazine. He holds an MFA in theater from the University of Southern California.