David Greenglass, who was assigned as a machinist to the Manhattan Project to build the atomic bomb, provided the Rosenbergs with data on nuclear weapons. When questioned, Greenglass admitted to spying. In the years after the Rosenbergs executions, there was significant debate about their guilt. But when he was arrested, his wifes arrest also followed soon after, although there was no proof of any active espionage involvement on her part. FBI agents took her into custody as she left the courthouse. They were executed in 1953. David Greenglass received a 15 year prison sentence and was released in 1960. Robert wrote a later memoir, An Execution in the Family: One Son's Journey (2003). He also explains that Rosenberg was fired from the Army Corps of Engineers in January of 1945, and that KGB files state his espionage activities ended by 1945, so the meeting David Greenglass mentioned could neverhave occurred. But this testimony was not shown to lawyers during the Rosenbergs trial. Many Americans who were politically left-wing believed the Rosenbergs were persecuted solely for their past involvement with the Communist Party. His wife, born Ethel Greenglass, also in New York, on September 28, 1915, worked as a secretary. The arrests of Greenglass and Julius Rosenberg followed quickly in June and July, and Ethel was arrested in August. Photograph: Kypros/ Getty. Ethel became the first woman executed by the U.S. government since Mary Surratt was hanged in 1865 for her alleged role in the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. Their legal team worked to have the verdict overturned, but their efforts failed. "[52], At the grand jury, Ruth Greenglass was asked, "Didn't you write [the information] down on a piece of paper?" In the intervening decades, it has since been conclusively proved that David Greenglass committed perjury against his own sister. Julius Rosenberg was a key Soviet spy who passed along information to the Soviet Union and recruited Manhattan Project spies. Both Rosenbergs were sensationally sentenced to death by electrocution. As a young attorney in 1951, Cohn pushed for the execution of Meeropol's grandparents Julius and Ethel Rosenberg on espionage charges. They provided top-secret information about American radar, sonar, jet propulsion engines, and valuable nuclear weapon designs. Ethels execution was botched. The two were frequently regarded as victims of cynical and vindictive officials of the FBI. They were both found guilty. Our editors will review what youve submitted and determine whether to revise the article. [24], After the publication of an investigative series in the National Guardian and the formation of the National Committee to Secure Justice in the Rosenberg Case, some Americans came to believe both Rosenbergs were innocent or had received too harsh a sentence, particularly Ethel. "[59], The Venona project was a United States counterintelligence program to decrypt messages transmitted by the intelligence agencies of the Soviet Union. [13][14], The USSR and the U.S. were allies during World War II, but the Americans did not share information with, or seek assistance from, the Soviet Union regarding the Manhattan Project. But they would have been better advised to have said straight up, yes we are communists, but no, we are not spies.. Photograph: Craig F Walker/The Boston Globe via Getty. On March 29 they were found guilty, and on April 5 the couple was sentenced to death. [43][44], The execution was delayed from the originally scheduled date of June 18, because Supreme Court Associate Justice William O. Douglas had granted a stay of execution on the previous day. On June 19, 1968, a long-term anti-poverty demonstration known as Resurrection City reaches its high-water mark. In the following year Julius obtained a job as a civilian engineer with the U.S. Army Signal Corps, and he and Ethel began working together to disclose U.S. military secrets to the Soviet Union. They took assumed names and he tried to figure out a way to reach Europe without a passport. Ethel Rosenberg: A Cold War Tragedy by Anne Sebba, W&N 20, 304 pages/St Martin's Press $28.99, 304 pages Rebecca Abrams is the author of 'The Jewish Journey: 4,000 Years in 22 Objects . [75], Their sons' current position is that Julius was legally guilty of the conspiracy charge, though not of atomic spying, while Ethel was only generally aware of his activities. On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. Key to the prosecution's case was testimony by Ethel's . The young couple were arrested in 1950 for . Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree. Would they have believed him? Gordon Dean, the chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, said: "It looks as though Rosenberg is the kingpin of a very large ring, and if there is any way of breaking him by having the shadow of a death penalty over him, we want to do it." At a time when American fears about communism were high, the Rosenbergs did not receive support from mainstream Jewish organizations. There was no compassion.. John Earl Haynes, Harvey Klehr, and Alexander Vassiliev. [60], In 1995, the U.S. government made public many documents decoded by the Venona project, showing Julius Rosenberg's role as part of a productive ring of spies. They stated Ethel was present during all meetings, typing notes for Julius. Greenglass served in the ArmysSpecial Engineer Detachment (SED), and was a machinist at Los Alamos. Du Bois wrote a poem titled "The Rosenbergs", which began "Crucify us, Vengeance of God, as we crucify two more Jews" and ended "Who has been crowned on yonder stair? Feklisov learned through Rosenberg that Ethel's brother David Greenglass was working on the top-secret Manhattan Project at the Los Alamos National Laboratory; he directed Julius to recruit Greenglass. Under Feklisov's supervision, Rosenberg recruited sympathetic individuals into NKVD service, including Joel Barr, Alfred Sarant, William Perl, and Morton Sobell, also an engineer. Ethel then sat down at the typewriter which she placed on a bridge table in the living room and proceeded to type the info which David had given to Julius. After this new testimony, the charges against Ruth were dropped. The minutes count. I ask if she can think of a modern equivalent of Ethels predicament: incarceration by association. The case against Ethel in particular was rather . They married in 1939. Files Show About Ethel Rosenberg", "The New York Times Gets Greenglass Wrong", "Greenglass, in Prison, Vows to Kin He Told Truth about Rosenbergs", "National Archives of the United States of America", "Rosenberg Atomic Espionage Spy Case Chronology", "The Rosenbergs were executed for spying in 1953. ETHEL ROSENBERG. [10], According to a 2001 book by his former handler Alexander Feklisov, Rosenberg was originally recruited to spy for the interior ministry of the Soviet Union, NKVD, on Labor Day 1942 by former spymaster Semyon Semyonov. did not give her a code name, and evidently did not consider her a spy; and the prosecutions strategy was to use Ethel to coerce her husband to confession.. The American pair were . The family moved to the Lower East Side by the time Julius was 11. On April 5, 1951, a judge sentenced them to death and the pair was taken to Sing Sing to await execution. During the 1940s, the U. S. Army Signal Intelligence Service (SIS) conducted the Venona project. In later interviews, he claimed: I frankly think my wife did the typing, but I dont remember, and, My wife is more important to me than my sister. Overall, their testimony remains controversial because of the deal, the lack of tangible evidence, and the conflicting statements. Author of. I find innocence quite a difficult word to use with Ethel, she says. Many individuals still question whether or not there was enough valid evidence used during the trial to convict and execute the Rosenbergs. The storefront theater boasted 96 seats and charged each patron five cents. A country prepared to flout the law, to instil fear, and to also arrest his girlfriend: does that not strike you as terrifying?, She was removed from the electric chair after three charges, only for it to be discovered her heart was still beating. Due to the Greenglass August 1950 testimony, and no tangible evidence, there was a weak case against Ethel for her alleged involvement. Photograph: Brendan Smialowski/ AFP via Getty. He reportedly said, "She called our bluff", as she made no effort to push her husband to any action. In August of 1950, a grand jury indicted the Rosenbergs for espionage. [41] Cinema artists such as Fritz Lang registered their protest. In exchange for this new testimony, Ruth was permitted to remain with their children and care for them. Greenglass secretly testified before a grand jury in August 1950. They married in 1939. All Rights Reserved. [1][2][3][4], Other convicted co-conspirators were sentenced to prison, including Ethel's brother, David Greenglass (who had made a plea agreement), Harry Gold, and Morton Sobell. it is believed that he made his accusations out of challenges to his authority. A native of Belgium, De Smet came to the United States in 1821 at the age of 20. Later, Ethels brother, Sgt. [11], In February 1944, Rosenberg succeeded in recruiting a second source of Manhattan Project information, engineer Russell McNutt, who worked on designs for the plants at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. He also claimed that his sister Ethel's husband Julius Rosenberg had convinced David's wife Ruth to recruit him while visiting him in Albuquerque, New Mexico, in 1944. "[67] He said he gave false testimony to protect himself and his wife, Ruth, and that he was encouraged by the prosecution to do so. He later served 10 years in prison. Due to the recent evidence provided by Sobells interview, witness testimonies, and the Venona documents, calls have been made for Ethels exoneration. In June 1953, Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were executed for conspiracy to commit espionage under the U.S. I believe your conduct in putting into the hands of the Russians the A-bomb years before our best scientists predicted Russia would perfect the bomb has already caused, in my opinion, the Communist aggression in Korea, with the resultant casualties exceeding 50,000 and who knows but that millions more of innocent people may pay the price of your treason. The son of working-class read more. After going through various state organisations, they were adopted by Anne and Abel Meeropol, whose surname they took. The Soviet Union secretly conducted its first atomic weapons test on August 29, 1949. Venona documentsproved that Julius Rosenberg helped lead a productive ring of Soviet spies. During the trial, both Ethel and Julius pleaded the Fifth Amendment when asked repeated questions related to espionage, and when questioned about being members of the Communist Party. His arrest began a chain of investigations, which ultimately led to the arrest of Julius and Ethel. [8], Ethel Greenglass was born on September 28, 1915, to a Jewish family in Manhattan, New York City. Indeed, by your betrayal you undoubtedly have altered the course of history to the disadvantage of our country. The cable also makes clear that the sister's husband is involved enough in espionage to have his own codename ("Antenna" and later "Liberal"). Despite these fears, the trial of the Rosenbergs produced mixed reactions among the public. Conspiracy to commit espionage (50 U.S.C. Harry Gold, a lab chemist and Soviet spy, passed this information to the USSR. On Solidarity Day, over 50,000 people flock to the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. to protest, sing, hear speeches and demonstrate on behalf of national read more, Chinese American Vincent Chin, 27, is beaten in the head with a baseball bat by two white autoworkers in Detroiton June 19, 1982. After Semyonov was recalled to Moscow in 1944 his duties were taken over by Feklisov. Timeline of Events Relating to the Rosenberg Trial. The couple met as members of the Young Communist League, married in 1939 and had two sons. Moynihan found that in 1945, physicist Hans Bethe estimated that the Soviets would be able to build their own bomb in five years. They were convicted and executed in 1953. In February 1950, Fuchs was arrested in the United Kingdom. Michael and Robby Rosenberg were 10 and six respectively when their parents were executed. As a result of this new testimony, all charges against Ruth Greenglass were dropped. Nevertheless, these decryptions formed the background of U.S. government investigation and prosecutions of American communists during the Cold War period. Updates? Many commentators of the time argued that the death penalty was used unjustly in the courts as a way to force the Rosenbergs and others to confess to espionage, or to name others involved. [11] By this time, following the invasion by Nazi Germany in June 1941, the Soviet Union had become an ally of the Western powers, which included the United States after Pearl Harbor. [7], Julius Rosenberg was born on May 12, 1918, in New York City to a family of Jewish immigrants from the Russian Empire. The Greenglasses never withdrew their new testimony. Julius Rosenberg, born on May 12, 1918, the son of Polish immigrants and the youngest of five children, grew up poor on Manhattan's Lower East Side, a studious boy interested in rabbinical studies. At age 23, he was a prosecutor on the trial of Ethel and Julius Rosenberg, who were convicted of espionage on behalf of the Soviet Union in 1951 and executed by electric chair two years. READ MORE: Why Were the Rosenbergs Executed? Others argue that Julius and Ethel were guilty, with Ethel playing a minor role, but that their trial and sentence were unjust due to the lack of evidence. Fuchs was charged with violating the Official Secrets Act, and he confessed to spying for the Soviet Union. There was genuine fear that the Russians and Stalin would launch an atom bomb on America. There were protest marches held around the world at their sentence, including in Ireland. He also said that he believed Ethel Rosenberg was aware of her husband's deeds, but took no part in them. Here's the story of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. Omissions? They were persuaded to change their original stories. McNutt's employment provided access to secrets about processes for manufacturing weapons-grade uranium. At this time, Greenglass worked at Los Alamos. The execution of two human beings is a grave matter. I think it is the most horrific story, Sebba says. The documents were not declassified until 1995. In 1949, the U.S. Army Signal Intelligence Service (SIS) discovered that Fuchs was a Soviet spy. Cohn would go on later to work for Senator Joseph McCarthy, appointed as chief counsel to the investigations subcommittee during McCarthy's tenure as chairman of the Senate Government Operations Committee. Both refused to admit any wrongdoing and proclaimed their innocence right up to the time of their deaths, by the electric chair. The vault, which now has the capacity to hold read more, In what is nowknownas Juneteenth, on June 19, 1865, Union soldiers arrive in Galveston, Texas with news that the Civil War is over and slavery in the United States is abolished. Lawyers Emanuel Bloch and Alexander Bloch defended the Rosenbergs. [15] However, the head official of the Soviet nuclear project, Lavrentiy Beria, used foreign intelligence, which he did not trust by default, only as a third-party check, rather than giving it directly to the design teams, who he did not clear to know about the espionage efforts, and the development was indigenous; considering that the pace of the Soviet program was set primarily by the amount of uranium that it could procure, it is difficult for scholars to judge accurately how much time was saved, if any. Or Black Despair? For two years the Rosenberg case was appealed through the courts and before world opinion. I ask Sebba how culpable she thinks Julius Rosenberg was in his wifes death sentence. In the scant three years between her arrest and. Ethel Greenglass and Julius Rosenberg were both born into immigrant Jewish families in New York City during World War I. The request was denied. Both Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were indicted, as were David Greenglass and Anatoli Yakovlev. They were accused of sending a rough sketch of the atomic bomb to Russia. [42] Pope Pius XII appealed to President Dwight D. Eisenhower to spare the couple, but Eisenhower refused on February 11, 1953. Espionage Act of 1917. Copyright 2022 by the Atomic Heritage Foundation. The Rosenbergs turned over this information to Harry Gold, a Swiss-born courier for the espionage ring, who then passed it to Anatoly A. Yakovlev, the Soviet Unions vice-consul in New York City. Or was he more likely to get off by pleading innocence for both of them? Abandoning that effort, he returned to Mexico City. In 1933, in his early teens, he became politically inflamed after hearing a street corner orator talk about Tom Mooney, a San Francisco labor leader who, said the speaker, had been unjustly . He also named Julius and Ethel Rosenberg as contacts and denied that his wife, Ruth Greenglass, was involved with any espionage activities. [25], On August 11, Ethel Rosenberg testified before a grand jury. That same year, the FBI arrested both Greenglass and Gold based on information provided by Fuchs. "Great Importance World-Wide: Presidential Decision-Making and the Executions of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. Now, however, Greenglass claimed that this exchange occurred in the living room of the Rosenbergs New York apartment, and that Ethel was present. [27], The trial of the Rosenbergs and Sobell on federal espionage charges began on March 6, 1951, in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. They were sentenced to death on April 5 under Section 2 of the Espionage Act of 1917,[31] which provides that anyone convicted of transmitting or attempting to transmit to a foreign government "information relating to the national defense" may be imprisoned for life or put to death. The direct evidence of the Rosenbergs involvement came from the confessions and testimonies of David and Ruth Greenglass. Getty Images. There was international outrage at her death. Case Summary. Meeropol, Michael, " 'A Spy Who Turned His Family In': Revisiting David Greenglass and the Rosenberg Case,", This page was last edited on 28 February 2023, at 07:05. Ethels own brother, David Greenglass, testified against her, in a blatant act of perjury. "[23] FBI director J Edgar Hoover wrote that "proceeding against the wife will serve as a lever" to make Julius talk.[24]. During the next two years, the couple became the subject of both national and international debate. I have spent ages agonising over that. [12] Perl supplied Feklisov, under Rosenberg's direction, with thousands of documents from the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, including a complete set of design and production drawings for Lockheed's P-80 Shooting Star, the first U.S. operational jet fighter. T he case of Ethel and Julius Rosenberg, the young Jewish American couple executed in June 1953 at the height of the cold war for allegedly passing atomic secrets to the Russians, has weighed . By killing the Rosenbergs, you have quite simply tried to halt the progress of science by human sacrifice. He stated that Julius asked him to help provide secrets about atomic weapons so that Julius could pass on the information to the USSR. "[56], Boris V. Brokhovich, the engineer who later became director of Chelyabinsk-40, the plutonium production reactor and extraction facility that the Soviet Union used to create its first bomb material, alleged that Khrushchev was a "silly fool". Magic, witch-hunts, autos-da-f, sacrifices we are here getting to the point: your country is sick with fear you are afraid of the shadow of your own bomb. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). Some scholars argue that if it would have been possible to use Venona documents in court, both Hall and McNutt would have been revealed as spies and prosecuted, along with Greenglass and Fuchs. She became involved in labor disputes and joined the Young Communist League, where she met Julius in 1936. All other appeals were also unsuccessful. She and David met in the YCL, and married in 1942. She originally was an aspiring actress and singer, but eventually took a secretarial job at a shipping company. Despite some public outrage and failed appeals, the Rosenbergs were executed by electric chair at Sing Sing Prison on June 19, 1953. Corrections? The subsequent trial of the Rosenbergs made news all over the world. But even graver is the thought of the millions of dead whose deaths may be directly attributable to what these spies have done.. All 119 References in We Didnt Start the Fire, Explained, Spies Like Us: 10 Famous Names in the Espionage Game, https://www.britannica.com/biography/Julius-Rosenberg-and-Ethel-Rosenberg, Atomic Heritage Foundation - The Rosenberg Trial, Spartacus Educational - The Trial of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, Famous Trials - Trial Of The Rosenbergs: An Account, Ethel Greenglass Rosenberg - Student Encyclopedia (Ages 11 and up), Communist Party of the United States of America. Julius became a leader in the Young Communist League USA while at City College of New York during the Great Depression. Julius Rosenberg became an infamous figure in American history when he was convicted, along with his wife, Ethel, of giving military secrets to the Soviet Union in the early 1950s. "Injustice", Sutton Publishing. They write new content and verify and edit content received from contributors. It was the wrong advice to them to go on pleading the Fifth Amendment because it made it seem as if they were on trial for being communists, which at some subliminal level, of course they were. Nickelodeons (named for a read more, Francesca Rojas two young children are killed in their home in the small town of Necochea, Argentina. Robert Meeropol poses for a portrait at the Rosenberg Fund For Children in Easthampton, Massachusetts in 2016. Mr. Bloch [their counsel], who delivered one of the main orations, bitterly exclaimed that America was "living under the heel of a military dictator garbed in civilian attire": the Rosenbergs were "Sweet. [63][64] According to Vassiliev, Julius and Ethel worked personally with KGB agents who were given the codenames Twain and Callistratus and were also described as being the ones who recruited Greenglass and McNutt for the Manhattan Project spy mission. The case was intensely controversial, touching nerves throughout American society, and debates about the Rosenbergs continue to the present day. [77], In March2016, Michael and Robert (via the Rosenberg Fund for Children) launched a petition campaign calling on President Obama and U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch to formally exonerate Ethel Rosenberg. John Philip Jenkins; 3 1952, -, , ) , "You sat the Rosenbergs in the electric chair for nothing", he said. This collection provides interesting Agency insights on this post-WWII spy case. "[40] The all-black labor union International Longshoremen's Association Local 968 stopped working for a day in protest. It was there, working in a cubicle with a piano, staff paper and tape recorder that read more, On June 19, 1905, some 450 people attend the opening day of the worlds first nickelodeon, located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and developed by the showman Harry Davis. And Intelligent" and the course they took was one of "courage and heroism. He said, "I frankly think my wife did the typing, but I don't remember. Rosenberg had been introduced to Semyonov by Bernard Schuster, a high-ranking member of the Communist Party USA and NKVD liaison for Earl Browder. Important research on electronics, communications, radar and guided missile controls was undertaken at Fort Monmouth during World War II. She was impassive in court, and poorly turned out, due to the fact they had very little money: Julius Rosenberg embarked upon espionage for his ideals, not for monetary reward. Julius Rosenbergwas a key Soviet spy who passed along information to the Soviet Union and recruited Manhattan Project spies. The security of the Marianas Islands, in the western Pacific, were vital to read more, Attempting to convince local Native Americans to make peace with the United States, the Jesuit missionary Pierre-Jean De Smet meets with the Sioux leaderSitting Bull in present-day Montana. He escaped prosecution because his involvement was not proven until the Venona documents became unclassified. Ethel and Julius Rosenberg, orig. The Meeropols were both teachers, and Abel was also a lyricist. In May 1951, Pablo Picasso wrote for the communist French newspaper L'Humanit, "The hours count. The constitutionality and applicability of the Espionage Act of 1917, under which the Rosenbergs were tried, as well as the impartiality of the trial judge, Irving R. Kaufmanwho in pronouncing sentence had accused them of a crime worse than murderwere key issues during the appeals process. Not answering questions proved to be problematic for the Rosenbergs because during theera of McCarthyism, many believed that the refusal to answer questions was an admission of guilt and involvement with the Communist Party. In this testimony he named Julius and claimed he was recruited to join the Soviet spy ring by him. The execution of New York City couple Ethel and Julius Rosenberg after their conviction for being Soviet spies was a major news event of the early 1950s. Soviet cables were deciphered, revealing Julius codename to be LIBERAL. LIBERAL was mentioned in numerous documents. This connection would be necessary as evidence if there was to be a conviction for espionage of the Rosenbergs. [48], On June 19, 1953, Julius died after the first electric shock. The attorneys appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court nine times, but the Court never reviewed the record. Gold paidGreenglass $500 in exchange for information about the implosion lens in the atomic bomb. The US government offered to spare the lives of both Julius and Ethel if Julius provided the names of other spies and they admitted their guilt. [55], Nikita Khrushchev, leader of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964, said in his posthumously-published memoir that he "cannot specifically say what kind of help the Rosenbergs provided us" but that he learned from Joseph Stalin and Vyacheslav Molotov that they "had provided very significant help in accelerating the production of our atomic bomb. Ronald Radoshconcludes, after Sobells 2008 confessions, that the Rosenbergs were Soviet spies. [26] Julius and Ethel were put under pressure to incriminate others involved in the spy ring. For this success Rosenberg received a $100 bonus. They married three years later, and raised their two small sons in borderline poverty. John Seven Sep 19, 2018 Julius and Ethel Rosenberg who. He provided classified documents and led an espionage network within the Manhattan Project, recruiting spies, most notably Russell McNutt and Ethels brother,David Greenglass, along with his wifeRuth. [49], The funeral services were held in Brooklyn on June 21. Deputy Attorney General of the United States William P. Rogers, who had been part of the prosecution of the Rosenbergs, discussed their strategy at the time in relation to seeking the death sentence for Ethel. Julius Rosenberg and Ethel Rosenberg, Ethel Rosenberg ne Ethel Greenglass, (respectively, born May 12, 1918, New York, New York, U.S.died June 19, 1953, Ossining, New York; born September 28, 1915, New York Citydied June 19, 1953, Ossining), the first American civilians to be executed for conspiracy to commit espionage and the first to suffer Some sections of the popular media of the day revelled in lurid coverage of Ethel: the female spy. HISTORY reviews and updates its content regularly to ensure it is complete and accurate. On August 11, 1950, Ethel Rosenberg was arrested after testifying before a grand jury (see section, below). [46] The Times reported that 500 people attended, while some 10,000 stood outside:[50], The bodies had been brought from Sing Sing prison by the national "Rosenberg committee" which undertook the funeral arrangements, and an all-night vigil was held in one of the largest mortuary chapels in Brooklyn. Anne Sebbas biography of Ethel Rosenberg, a book five years in the research and writing, has just been published. forces. Julius Rosenberg was an engineer for the U.S. Army Signal Corps who was born in New York on May 12, 1918. The Rosenbergs were implicated by David Greenglass, Ethels younger brother and a former army sergeant and machinist at Los Alamos, the secret atomic bomb lab in New Mexico. Will there ever be a pardon for Ethel Rosenberg? She didnt cry in public, and the media gleefully judged her unfeeling and, by implication, guilty of the accused crime, as a result. "use strict";(function(){var insertion=document.getElementById("citation-access-date");var date=new Date().toLocaleDateString(undefined,{month:"long",day:"numeric",year:"numeric"});insertion.parentElement.replaceChild(document.createTextNode(date),insertion)})(); FACT CHECK: We strive for accuracy and fairness. (. They claimed that David gave a sketch and description of an atomic bomb to Julius in September 1945. Members of the communist party, the Rosenbergs were convicted of passing secret information about the atomic bomb to the Soviet Union in 1945. [80][81] The second son of read more. Communism in this country and Communism throughout the world. 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Parents were executed for conspiracy to commit espionage under the U.S [ 48 ], on June 19,,. Greenglass, testified against her, in a blatant Act of perjury Signal Corps was. Longshoremen 's association Local 968 stopped working for a day in protest and... She became involved in the atomic bomb to Russia, it has since been conclusively proved that David gave sketch! Immigrant Jewish families in New York during the trial of the Rosenbergs did receive! To spying for the Communist French newspaper L'Humanit, `` i frankly think my did. See section, below ) halt the progress of science by human sacrifice weapons so that Julius him... With any espionage activities i find innocence quite a difficult word to use with Ethel, she says in 1951! Because of the Rosenbergs [ 48 ], on September 28, 1915, worked as a of. The subsequent trial of the Rosenbergs continue to the Soviet Union in 1945, physicist Hans Bethe estimated the. Became the subject of both national and international debate in August of 1950, Fuchs was weak! For information about the atomic bomb to Russia returned to Mexico City Russians and Stalin would launch an bomb. Wife, born Ethel Greenglass, also in New York during the trial of the Young Communist League USA at. For her alleged involvement Project spies decades, it has since been conclusively proved that David a... Boston Globe via Getty to Mexico City surname they took assumed names and he tried figure... Conflicting statements can think of a modern equivalent of Ethels predicament: incarceration by association both and! Jury indicted the Rosenbergs, you have quite simply tried to halt the progress of by! Children and care for them against Ethel for her alleged involvement was permitted to remain their! Into immigrant Jewish families in New York, on September 28, 1915, worked as a secretary it complete. But i do n't remember and determine whether to revise the article title Sebba how culpable she thinks Julius helped... Both Rosenbergs were persecuted solely for their past involvement with the Communist Party efforts failed likely to off! Five years estimated that the Russians and Stalin would launch an atom bomb America! 'S employment provided access to secrets about atomic weapons so that Julius was. Submitted and determine whether to revise the article Schuster, a lab chemist and Soviet ring! On March 29 they were adopted by Anne and Abel Meeropol, whose they... To Semyonov by Bernard Schuster, a lab chemist and Soviet spy, passed this information to the U.S. Court. Its first atomic weapons so that Julius could pass on the information to the Soviet Union came.