Update: You can now read all my Hendrix Posts in one article, click "Check Out My Lens" to see the whole thing 
My research into the death of Hendrix yesterday led me to a very interesting site called “The Centre For An Informed America” written by David McGowan and Chapter 3 of the part called “Inside LC - The Strange And Mostly True Story Of Laurel Canyon And The Birth Of The Hippie Generation” is where I found much of the information I’ll be sharing today.
In 1961 Hendrix got into trouble for riding in stolen cars, he was given a choice between serving 2 years in prison or joining the army, not surprisingly he chose the Army and enlisted on 31st May that year. He was assigned to 101st Airborne division stationed at Fort Cambell in Kentucky, it’s been suggested this is an unusually elite division for a young car thief to be sent to on a court order, but it apparently happened.
All reports suggest he was a poor soldier and that’s putting it lightly, 3 days before he was booted out of the army a scathing report was written about him by his commanding officers Captain Gilbert Batchman and Sergeant Louis Hoekstra, Batchman claimed he slept on the job had little regard for regulations and was once caught masturbating in the latrine while he was supposed to be helping other soldiers wash a ceiling!
Hoekstra noted he was habitual offender when it came to missing midnight bed checks, said he was unable to carry out intelligent conversation and was suspected of taking dope. They also criticised him for playing a musical instrument while off duty saying he could not concentrate on his work when he was on duty as he thought of his guitar constantly. Read more about Jimi's time in the army at the smoking gun website it makes amusing reading I can tell you.
Whether Hendrix was deliberately messing up to get out of the army or really did just suck as soldier I’m not sure but he certainly was awful. One thing that is unusual is that he wasn’t given disciplinary measures, he only served a year and had signed up for three, though he was apparently just given a free pass to go which seems slightly odd. Though it does say they ordered a psychiatric assessment of him and it was decided his problems couldn’t be corrected with counselling or hospitalisation so maybe they just decided it was pointless trying to mould that one into a soldier.
I found out something else that might be of interest too, in 1968 Hendrix Briefly occupied a mansion in Laurel Canyon just north of the renowned Log Cabin Frank Zappa famously Occupied until that year when he moved out and Eric Burdon (lead singer of the Animals also managed by Michael Jeffery) moved in. Eric Burdon incidentally didn’t like Hendrix much as he is supposed to have had an affair with his wife, Burdon is also one of the main people who insists Hendrix committed suicide and stated in the days after his death that there had been a suicide note and everything, which was bull, or at least evidence of it no longer exists now. Strangely enough Burdon was also the first person Hendrix’s “girlfriend” Monika Danneman phoned upon discovering Hendrix’s body, though she always claimed Hendrix was not dead when she found him (see post below for more detail on this).
Another strange death shortly after Hendrix’s was that of “super groupie” Devon Wilson (who apparently was run away who became prostitute at 15) she “fell” 8 stories from the window of the Chelsea Hotel in New York. On the night of his death Hendrix is supposed to have visited her in London before going to Monica Danneman’s flat, but Danneman claimed in her book that she drove him to Devon Wilson's after he visited her place and he only stayed a few minutes before going back to Danneman's. He apparently later said to Danneman he thought Wilson had “slipped him and OD”, though many sources state you can't believe anything Danneman says as she was deluded (or just plain lying).
Devon Wilson is also reported to have dated Eric Clapton and Miles Davis amongst others, and she is also rumoured to have had a baby boy by Mick Jagger though what happened to him I haven't been able to ascertain yet. She was also apparently the subject of the song “Dolly Dagger” and was in the control room when it was recorded.
My research into the death of Hendrix yesterday led me to a very interesting site called “The Centre For An Informed America” written by David McGowan and Chapter 3 of the part called “Inside LC - The Strange And Mostly True Story Of Laurel Canyon And The Birth Of The Hippie Generation” is where I found much of the information I’ll be sharing today.
In 1961 Hendrix got into trouble for riding in stolen cars, he was given a choice between serving 2 years in prison or joining the army, not surprisingly he chose the Army and enlisted on 31st May that year. He was assigned to 101st Airborne division stationed at Fort Cambell in Kentucky, it’s been suggested this is an unusually elite division for a young car thief to be sent to on a court order, but it apparently happened.
All reports suggest he was a poor soldier and that’s putting it lightly, 3 days before he was booted out of the army a scathing report was written about him by his commanding officers Captain Gilbert Batchman and Sergeant Louis Hoekstra, Batchman claimed he slept on the job had little regard for regulations and was once caught masturbating in the latrine while he was supposed to be helping other soldiers wash a ceiling!
Hoekstra noted he was habitual offender when it came to missing midnight bed checks, said he was unable to carry out intelligent conversation and was suspected of taking dope. They also criticised him for playing a musical instrument while off duty saying he could not concentrate on his work when he was on duty as he thought of his guitar constantly. Read more about Jimi's time in the army at the smoking gun website it makes amusing reading I can tell you.
Whether Hendrix was deliberately messing up to get out of the army or really did just suck as soldier I’m not sure but he certainly was awful. One thing that is unusual is that he wasn’t given disciplinary measures, he only served a year and had signed up for three, though he was apparently just given a free pass to go which seems slightly odd. Though it does say they ordered a psychiatric assessment of him and it was decided his problems couldn’t be corrected with counselling or hospitalisation so maybe they just decided it was pointless trying to mould that one into a soldier.
I found out something else that might be of interest too, in 1968 Hendrix Briefly occupied a mansion in Laurel Canyon just north of the renowned Log Cabin Frank Zappa famously Occupied until that year when he moved out and Eric Burdon (lead singer of the Animals also managed by Michael Jeffery) moved in. Eric Burdon incidentally didn’t like Hendrix much as he is supposed to have had an affair with his wife, Burdon is also one of the main people who insists Hendrix committed suicide and stated in the days after his death that there had been a suicide note and everything, which was bull, or at least evidence of it no longer exists now. Strangely enough Burdon was also the first person Hendrix’s “girlfriend” Monika Danneman phoned upon discovering Hendrix’s body, though she always claimed Hendrix was not dead when she found him (see post below for more detail on this).
Another strange death shortly after Hendrix’s was that of “super groupie” Devon Wilson (who apparently was run away who became prostitute at 15) she “fell” 8 stories from the window of the Chelsea Hotel in New York. On the night of his death Hendrix is supposed to have visited her in London before going to Monica Danneman’s flat, but Danneman claimed in her book that she drove him to Devon Wilson's after he visited her place and he only stayed a few minutes before going back to Danneman's. He apparently later said to Danneman he thought Wilson had “slipped him and OD”, though many sources state you can't believe anything Danneman says as she was deluded (or just plain lying).Devon Wilson is also reported to have dated Eric Clapton and Miles Davis amongst others, and she is also rumoured to have had a baby boy by Mick Jagger though what happened to him I haven't been able to ascertain yet. She was also apparently the subject of the song “Dolly Dagger” and was in the control room when it was recorded.
3 comments:
Consider this: Devon was Hendrix's serious girlfriend at this time and they lived together in Hendrix's apartment in NYC. Shortly after she arrived in London, an argument ensued after Monika Dannemann claimed that she and Hendrix were engaged.
That means two people - Devon and Jeffery - felt they were on the verge of being "dumped" by Hendrix. Have you ever considered that Jeffery might have persuaded a spurned Devon to slip Hendrix an OD that night? He might not have told her his full intentions, but might have convinced her to help him under some false pretext or another.
Once Hendrix was sufficiently immobilized (back at Monika's flat), Jeffery and his thugs could easily break in and finish him off with the wine and pills. Remember, the coroner's report states that in addition to the sleeping pills, there was ANOTHER powerful barbituate in Hendrix's system at the time of his death.
This might seem far-fetched but remember that Devon was not only a famous groupie, but also a serious heroin addict whose occasional desperate actions when in need of quick cash are chronicled in all of the Hendrix biographies. Hendrix's biographer Sharon Lawrence claimed that Devon admitted to her (after Hendrix's death) that she was extremely guilt-ridden about many things she had done to deceive Hendrix during the time they were together. Did Jeffery pay Devon off to dose Hendrix? Read the accounts of Hendrix's funeral, where Devon went completely nuts and had to be restrained from jumping into the grave herself!?
And how is it that Devon herself dies in an unexplained eight-story fall about a year after Hendrix's death? Was this Jeffery covering up his tracks? Or was she just so guilt-ridden that she couldn't live with herself?
And how is it that Monika Dannemann dies of an apparent suicide (although her boyfriend has consistently claimed there was foul play involved), just as Scotland Yard is reopening its investigation?
And what is the role of Eric Burdon in all this? Like Minka Dannemann, his story has also changed over the years. If you read Tony Brown's book, it describes Hendrix having an affair with Eric's wife shortly after arriving in England for the Isle of Wight gig. We all know this was the era of free love, but is it possible that Burdon had a serious gripe with Hendrix, too?
Just some things to think about...
I don't think it was Devon, even though Jeffery used the classic intelligence method of hiring her as a spy for him on Hendrix. I read that Hendrix used to use the marriage proposition as a pick-up line on many women. So consider "marriage" a loosely-defined thing in this context.
I would look more closely at Dannemann since she was recorded as putting more weight on the fianace business. Perhaps it wasn't Wilson but Dannemann who was spurned? Jimi had taken another woman into a bedroom right in front of her at Phillip Harvey's party that afternoon. So it was actually Dannemann who had the screaming fit.
If I were to sleuth this I would say perhaps Dannemann had such an emotional breakdown over the Harvey incident that she broke down and finally accepted Jeffery's offer to spy. Perhaps she went along with the plan after this insult where she was angry enough to do it? Me personally, I'm not unconvinced that Dannemann wasn't an intelligence agency infiltrator from the start since she had a weird background in Germany of only dating black musicians - which would have made her a perfect profile for intelligence operations. In any case, I feel Dannemann's constant buzzing on the intercom at the last party was due to her desperation to get Jimi back to the Samarkand to meet this appointment.
Even if Dannemann was innocent of this Jimi was supposed to be at the Cumberland Hotel so skeptics say Jeffery had no way of knowing where Hendrix was. My answer to that is Hendrix was on the FBI's "Security Index" so when he telephoned his New York doctor from the Samarkand earlier about his insomnia CIA knew where he was. So, either way. Perhaps Dannemann was also under Jeffery's employ and simply told Jeffery where Hendrix was. Phone records from a real investigation would have helped.
There was no second mystery drug in Hendrix. The Vesparax sleeping tablet contained short-term Quinalbarbitone along with slower-release brallobarbitone. Since those were the ingredients of the Vesparax sleeping tablets found in Dannemann's flat you can rule-out Devon Wilson as having slipped Jimi a mickey. The ultra-strong Vesparax, however, were most likely a 'mickey' deliberately left within Hendrix's reach as part of the assassination operation. You have to remember that Hendrix's manager, Michael Jeffery, was a member of British MI-5 Intelligence.
Devon Wilson died 5 months after Jimi after being found underneath the 8th floor window of Manhattan's Chelsea Hotel. She had been going around telling people Jeffery had murdered Hendrix.
"Me personally, I'm not unconvinced that Dannemann wasn't an intelligence agency infiltrator from the start since she had a weird background in Germany of only dating black musicians - which would have made her a perfect profile for intelligence operations."
Me personally, thinks Monika (if what you say was true) was a mudshark. Nothing more.
Peter
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