American Experience

On-screen text: November 17, 1978

Stanley Clayton, Peoples Temple Member: When Ryan came, he came on a Friday night and we put on a reception for him.

Tim Carter, Peoples Temple Member: The songs that we sang that night — it was people saying, “This is who we are and this is what we are about.”

Jackie Speier, Aide to Congressman Leo Ryan: It was a vibrant community. I would never have imagined that twenty-four hours later, those people would be dead.

Stanley Clayton, Peoples Temple Member: Everything up to that point was, was — was good. Everybody was thrilled that Ryan was thrilled. He just kind of praised us.

Congressman Leo Ryan (archival): I think that all of you know that I am here to find out more about — questions have been raised about your operation here. And I can tell you right now, that from the few conversations I’ve had with some of the folks here already this evening, that whatever these comments are — there are some people here who believe that this is the best thing they’ve ever had in their whole lives.

Tim Carter, Peoples Temple Member: That response to him was spontaneous. It was loud. It was emotional. What I was feeling was — this is an opportunity that I can vocalize how much I believe in what we are doing here. The reporter next to me said, “I’ve never felt anything like this before,” and I said, “Because you haven’t felt anything like this before.” I actually felt pretty good overall. This went probably as well as it possibly could go, so far.

Vernon Gosney, Peoples Temple Member: When Congressman Ryan came, I wanted to pass him a note that said, “Help us get out of Jonestown.” When one of the reporters was walking around toward the edge of the pavilion, I stuck the note in the fold of his arm and it fell to the ground. And so I picked up the note and I — and I gave it back to him. I said, “You dropped something,” and this little boy, about nine years old, started saying, “He passed a note! He passed a note!”

Jackie Speier, Aide to Congressman Leo Ryan: Don Harris, who was the NBC reporter, came up to me and Congressman Ryan and handed us these two notes from people that wanted to leave. So at that point, we knew that something was very, very wrong.

On-screen text: November 18, 1978

Stanley Clayton, Peoples Temple Member: I was like the first to rise up the following morning. It was a bright sunny day, but it was a dark day. It just didn’t feel right.

Stephen Sung, Sound Technician: We were there, supposed to interview some of the family members to ask them why they cannot leave.

Reporter (archival): Are you happy here?

Female (archival): Oh, I should say I am. I’ve never been any happier in my life.

Reporter (archival): Do you want to stay?

Female (archival): Definitely. I certainly do.

Reporter (archival): Some people have said they couldn’t leave if they wanted to. Do you think you could?

Girl (archival): Yeah. If I really wanted to I’m — I’m free to go, if I really wanted to. I would be free to go.

Girl’s Mother (archival): Well, I believe it. I’ve been here a few days and I have — I have absolutely no complaints at all. It is really nice here. It is really nice. And I’ll be leaving in a couple weeks and they could come with me, but they said they didn’t want to come.

Tim Carter, Peoples Temple Member: Literally, out of nowhere, this storm came blowing in. The sky turned black. The wind came up and it just — torrential rain. But what I personally felt was that evil itself blew into Jonestown. It was about 11:30 in the morning. Edith Parks walked up to Jackie Speier and said, “I’m being held prisoner here, I want to go home.”

Jackie Speier, Aide to Congressman Leo Ryan (archival, subtitles): Now do I both understand you to say that you both want to leave Jonestown on this date, November 18th, 1978?

Young Man (archival): Yeah.

Tim Carter, Peoples Temple Member: Immediately, the whole vibe changed. I mean this reporter said, “We got our story.” You know, “The story’s here. It’s happening right now.”

Vernon Gosney, Peoples Temple Member: Jim Jones came to talk to me and the first thing he said was, “Don’t say anything to the reporters. They’re all liars.” The last words I heard from Jim Jones was, “I just want you to know that you can come back to Jonestown and visit your son any time you want.”

Reporter (archival): Last night, someone came and passed me this note.

Jim Jones (archival): He’s the one that I’m just talking about. This is the man that wants to leave his son here.

Reporter (archival): Doesn’t it concern you, though, that this man, for whatever reason, one of the people in your group…

Jim Jones (archival): People play games, friend. They lie. They lie. What can I do about liars? Are you people going to — leave us. I just beg you, please leave us. Bill, we will bother nobody. Anybody wants to get out of here, can get out of here. They have no problem about getting out of here. They come and go all the time.

I don’t know what kind of games people like. Who — people like publicity. Some people do. I don’t. But some people like publicity. But if it’s so damned bad, why is he leaving his son here? Can you give me a good reason for that?

Jackie Speier, Aide to Congressman Leo Ryan: When word got out that people were leaving, all hell broke out.

Woman (archival): You bring those kids back here! You bring them back!

Male (archival): One second. One second.

Woman (archival): Don’t you touch my kids!

Jackie Speier, Aide to Congressman Leo Ryan: More people wanted to leave. And then Jim Jones started to make pleas to people, saying, “You can’t leave. You’re my people. Why do you want to leave?” It was an emotional roller coaster for everyone there.

Woman (archival): Don’t you touch my kids! Mother! You’re not taking my kids! No!

Jackie Speier, Aide to Congressman Leo Ryan: Jones was in the pavilion. At one point, he said, “Well, of course you can go if you want.” But clearly, that was not the message. The message was, “You are betraying me.”

Vernon Gosney, Peoples Temple Member: I went and I spoke to the Congressman in the pavilion. I told him, “You are in extreme danger. You need to leave.” And he said, “You don’t have anything to worry about.” He says, “You have the Congressional shield of protection around you.” And I just looked at him like he was totally insane.

Tim Carter, Peoples Temple Member: Congressman Ryan was directly across from me, and I saw this Temple member walk up behind him — and he was actually crying and shaking — and all of a sudden, he pulled out this knife and said, “All right, [expletive], you’re gonna die.” We all jumped on him, and there were just screams of horror everywhere.

Jackie Speier, Aide to Congressman Leo Ryan: We heard this great uproar in the pavilion and the truck stopped. Then, shortly thereafter, Congressman Ryan starts walking out in this bloodstained shirt.

Tim Reiterman, Journalist: Those of us in the news media viewed Congressman Ryan as a form of protection, a shield of the United States. What happened there in those few moments made it clear that nobody was safe.

Tim Carter, Peoples Temple Member: I went back to my cottage. All I wanted to do was see my wife and my son. Gloria and I were laid down on the cot and we just held each other and I said, “You know, I think we may all die.” And she said — she kind of looked at me and then she looked down at our son, who was playing on the floor with the toys, and she said, “You’re scaring him.” I had literally opened my mouth to say we need to leave, when there was an announcement on the loud speaker — “Will everybody report to the pavilion for a meeting.”

Stephen Sung, Sound Technician: We drove back to the airstrip, Port Kaituma. All of a sudden, we saw a dump truck from far away arriving to this airstrip. We realized these people catch up from people from Jim Jones, they’re very close lieutenant to Jim Jones. These three guys, they get off the truck and walk around this area as though they were looking for somebody. They looked in people’s faces. They stared at us for a little bit, but they didn’t say one word. They didn’t ask anything. Right away, they walked back to the truck.

They drove this truck all the way across the airstrip and stop on this side of the plane, so literally they cut us off from the jungle. We never know there’s people hidden inside the dump truck. The moment it stopped, they start shooting right away. Everybody ran toward the plane, on this side of plane. They try to hide underneath the wheels.

Jackie Speier, Aide to Congressman Leo Ryan: Then the Congressman ran under the plane, and I sort of followed suit and got behind one of the tires.

Stephen Sung, Sound Technician: All you can hear is the gun — pop, pop, pop — goes off constantly. We lie flat on the tarmac at that moment. But shortly afterwards, I heard my partner, the cameraman. He yelled, “Oh [expletive].” He said he got — he got shot. He was sitting up.

Tim Reiterman, Journalist: There were people tumbling and yelling and letting out cries as they were hit. I was hit in my arm and wrist.

Stephen Sung, Sound Technician: I felt a tremendous explosion, right next to my head. I got a tremendous pain ran through my arm and on my shoulder. I was really shaking, but I didn’t move. I took the pain and hold still.

Jackie Speier, Aide to Congressman Leo Ryan: I was lying on my side, pretending that I was dead, with my head down. And — they came and shot me at point blank — point blank range. I remember someone coming to me and telling me that Congressman Ryan was dead. But I was at a point where I didn’t know how much more time I was going to be alive.

Stephen Sung, Sound Technician: The gun’s dead and all we can hear — this one engine was still running. So all you could hear the engine noise. And that’s it.

Tim Carter, Peoples Temple Member: We walked up to the pavilion together, with everybody else. It was very quiet. It was very somber. It was very sad, but it wasn’t a death march.

Jim Jones (archival, subtitles): The congressman is dead! You think they’re going to allow us to get by with this? You must be insane. They’ll torture some of our children here. They’ll torture our people. They’ll torture our seniors. We can not have this!

Stanley Clayton, Peoples Temple Member: He said, “Well, we got to go. We got to get out of here. We got to — we got to go to sleep. Get the solution together.”

Jim Jones (archival, subtitles): If we can’t live in peace, then let’s die in peace.

Tim Carter, Peoples Temple Member: Maria Katsaris walked up to him and whispered in his ear, and he looked at her and said, “Is there anyway to make it taste less bitter?” And she said, “No, no apparently not.” And he said, “Is it quick?” And she said, “Yeah, it’s supposed to be quick.”

Jim Jones (archival, subtitles): Anyone that has any dissenting opinion, please speak.

Christine Miller, Peoples Temple Member (archival, subtitles): When we destroy ourselves, we’re defeated. We let them, the enemies, defeat us.

Tim Carter, Peoples Temple Member: On the last day of Jonestown, Christine Miller stood up and said, “I don’t want to die here. Why are we going to throw all this away? We’ve worked too hard.”

Christine Miller, Peoples Temple Member (archival, subtitles): I look at all the babies, and I think they deserve to live.

Jim Jones (archival, subtitles): I agree,

Christine Miller, Peoples Temple Member (archival, subtitles): You know…

Jim Jones (archival, subtitles): but also they deserve…what’s more, they deserve peace.

Christine Miller, Peoples Temple Member (archival, subtitles): We all came here for peace. ... Is it too late for Russia?

Fielding McGehee, Relative of Peoples Temple Member: She’s calling Jim Jones on some of the things that he has promised them that they were going to do. Jim had promised, as an alternative to them dying in Jonestown, that they could go to the Soviet Union.

Jim Jones (archival, subtitles): I’m listening to you. You asked me about Russia. I’m right now making a call to Russia. What more do you suggest?

Fielding McGehee, Relative of Peoples Temple Member: Eventually, the rhetoric ratchets up enough that she is shouted down.

Man (archival, subtitles): Christine, your life has been extended to today. That you’re standing there is because of him.

Tim Carter, Peoples Temple Member: That’s when I noticed that there were armed guards that had kind of taken positions up around the pavilion. I’m thinking, “Where did all of these [expletive] guns come from?”

Stanley Clayton, Peoples Temple Member: Jones came down off the podium and he said, “Hey, we got to do this. We got to — we got to go, that if we don’t go this way, we going to go like this.” They were coming, taking like newborn babies out of their mothers’ arms.

Jim Jones (archival, subtitles): Mother, mother, mother, mother, mother please. Mother, please, please, please don’t…Don’t do this! Don’t do this! Lay down your life with your child. But don’t do this.

Stanley Clayton, Peoples Temple Member: There was a young kid, his name was Thurman and when he came inside, he bumped into me. At that same time, he’s falling to the ground and he’s going into convulsion.

Jim Jones (archival, subtitles): Hurry, hurry, my children, hurry! All right, let us not fall into in the hands of the enemy. Hurry my children!

Stanley Clayton, Peoples Temple Member: I grabbed the kid from the shoulders up, and in that process of taking him out of the pavilion, this kid died in my arms. I mean, I just felt the life go out of him. To me — at that point, I knew that this [expletive] was real.

Jim Jones (archival, subtitles): Die with respect, die with a degree of dignity. It’s nothing to death, it’s just stepping over into another plane. Don’t, don’t be this way!

Stanley Clayton, Peoples Temple Member: I ain’t never used the term “suicide,” and I’m not gonna never use the term “suicide.” That man killed — was killing us.

Tim Carter, Peoples Temple Member: As I walked up to the back of the pavilion, I saw a woman name Rosie on the ground crying, holding her dead baby. There were maybe eight or nine other people who were dying, or in the process of dying. Inside, I just wanted things to stop. Please, just let me catch my breath; let me figure out what’s happening here.

I looked to my right and I saw my wife, with our son in her arms and poison being injected into his mouth. My son was dead and he was frothing at the mouth. You know, cyanide makes people froth at the mouth. My wife died in my arms and my dead baby son was in her arms. And I held her and said, “I love you, I love you,” because it’s all I could say. She died in my arms, man.

Jim Jones (archival, subtitles): Quickly! Quickly! Quickly! Quickly! Quickly! Where is the vat? The vat, the vat…Bring it here, so the adults can begin.

Stanley Clayton, Peoples Temple Member: My wife came up to me, she didn’t have no tears in her eyes. She just was — was just in a daze. “My mother, my grandmother, my sister, my brother, they gone.” You know she said, “Just take me. Just take me and just lay me down next to my grandmamma.”

And she went up to that Kool-Aid, to that death barrel and she just, I mean — didn’t hesitate, just took it and drunk it and then told me to hold her, to take her, and I did. And she died in my arms. And once I laid her down and she told me how she wanted to lay with her grandmother, I — at that point, knew that I didn’t have no reason to be here no more.

*Jim Jones (archival, subtitles) *: We laid it down…we got tired. We didn’t commit suicide. We committed an act of revolutionary suicide protesting the conditions of an inhumane world.

Tim Carter, Peoples Temple Member: We were just [expletive] slaughtered. [Expletive] slaughtered. There was nothing dignified about it. Had nothing to do with revolutionary suicide, nothing to do about making a [expletive] statement, it was just senseless waste, senseless waste and death.

On-screen text: From an anonymous letter

Narrator (anonymous letter, archival): “To whomever finds this note. Collect all the tapes, all the writing, all the history. The story of this movement, this action, must be examined over and over. We did not want this kind of ending. We wanted to live, to shine, to bring light to a world that is dying for a little bit of love.”

Laura Johnston Kohl, Peoples Temple Member: I never believed in Heaven in my whole life. You know, that’s not the way I operated — but when I was in Guyana, and when I’d watch the sun rise, I actually thought there was a heaven on Earth. And now, I can’t believe in heaven anymore.

Narrator (anonymous letter, archival): “There’s quiet as we leave this world. The sky is gray. People file by us slowly and take the somewhat bitter drink. Many more must drink.”

Juanell Smart, Peoples Temple Member: I’m saddened because it didn’t work out. Because it just seemed so beautiful. And I’ll say this about November 18th, I felt I’d lost a family and I knew I’d lost my children.

Narrator (anonymous letter, archival): “A teeny kitten sits next to me watching. A dog barks. The birds gather on the telephone wires. Let all the story of this Peoples Temple be told.”

Eugene Smith, Peoples Temple Member: We were people that — we wanted to make a change. It’s a shame it didn’t happen. It might not never happen. But one thing I can say, at least we tried and we didn’t sit back and wait on the laurels for somebody else to try it. Yes, we tried it. Yes, it was a failure. Yes, it was very tragic. But at least we tried.

Narrator (anonymous letter, archival): “If nobody understands, it matters not. I am ready to die now. Darkness settles over Jonestown on its last day on Earth.”

Hue Fortson Jr., Peoples Temple Member: I never had any dreams of Jonestown until this one dream came. I could see myself in Jonestown walking, and when I looked to my left, there was my son. He was standing in the middle of a duffel bag. And just right when I got ready to reach to touch his head, he pulled the bag up like this. And the bag fell and he was gone.

On-screen text: 909 Peoples Temple members died at Jonestown. Tim Carter, Stanley Clayton and three others escaped into the jungle. Five people were killed on the airstrip.

Approximately eighty Jonestown residents, including three of Jim Jones’ sons, were away that day and survived.

Jim Jones died from a shot to the head.

Neva Sly Hargrave lost her husband and son.

Eugene Smith lost his wife, son, daughter, and mother.

Rebecca Moore lost her two sisters and nephew.

Hue Fortson Jr. lost his wife and son.

Tim Carter lost his wife and son, sister, niece and nephew.

Stanley Clayton lost his wife.

Juanell Smart lost her four children, mother, and uncle.

Claire Janaro lost her two children.

Vernon Gosney lost his son.

Jim Jones Jr. lost his wife, unborn child, sister, two brothers, four nephews, niece, mother and father.

Jordan Vilchez lost two sisters and two nephews.

Mike Touchette lost his mother, sister, brother, uncle, and grandfather.

Grace Stoen lost her son.

Eugene and June Cordell lost Edith Cordell and nineteen other relatives.