Secret societies of Americas elite.pdf

CONTENTS

Acknowledgments ix

Introduction: Born in Blood 1

PART ONE

Piracy: A Merry and a Short Life 9

Chapter 1 The New World Order 12

Chapter 2 Brothers to Pirates and Corsairs 32

Chapter 3 Under a Black Flag 48

Chapter 4. Skeletons in the Closet 68

PART TWO

The Lodge and the Revolution 91

Chapter 5 Smugglers, Patriots, and Masons 100

Chapter 6 Franklin and the Masonic Underground 122

Chapter 7 The Merchants of War 136

Chapter 8 The Bribe That Won the War 153

Chapter 9 One Nation Under the Great Architect 169

PART THREE

From the Sacred to the Profane 111

Chapter 10 The Slave Traders 179

Chapter 11 Red Cross and Black Cargo 188

Chapter 12 Master Masons and Their Slaves 206

Chapter 13 The Masonic Betrayal 228

Chapter 14 The Opium Brotherhood 238

Chapter 15 Opium: From the Lodge to the Den 259

Chapter 16 Wealth: The Legacy of the Opium Trade 276

Chapter 17 The Power of the New Skull and Bones 290

Notes 305

Index 317

Introduction

BORN IN BLOOD

lite and secret societies have shaped history since the beginning of

civilization. From the time of the Crusades to the twenty-first

century, a handful of families have controlled the course of world events

and have built their own status and wealth through collective efforts and

intermarriage.

The greatest elite society was that of the Knights Templar.

Admission to the organization often required breeding and wealth that

were the privilege of a select few. Outside the core a larger force was

needed both to fight wars and to maintain the organization's far-flung

assets. These forces would grow to include an army, a navy, various real

estate (including agricultural properties), and a banking empire.

Admission standards changed over time to the degree necessary to

maintain the needed personnel, but the elite core was always in control.

When the massive Templar organization was suddenly outlawed by

the avarice of the French king, it did not die; it simply moved under-

ground. The survival of the underground Templars has been touched

upon by several authors, but only recently has more in-depth research

brought the Templars' survival to light.

The Templars survived militarily. By pledging themselves to various

powers, the military orders survived their open attack by both state and

church and the mass executions and imprisonments of the fourteenth

century. The Knights of Christ, the Teutonic Knights, the Swiss Guard,

and the Scots Guard, as well as several small but powerful military

orders, outlived those who persecuted them. Hydralike, the orders

Introduction

survived, prospered, and multiplied. Several are alive and well in the

new millennium.

The Templar organization survived and regrouped financially. The

massive Templar, Incorporated that would bring banking to its modern

form survived by moving to Switzerland, where a handful of bankers

maintained and often controlled the massive wealth of the European

elite. The Swiss cantons, often flying flags only slightly different from

the Templar flags, protected by the Alpine passes and the Swiss Guard,

took the role of the Templar preceptory. The neutral status and the

preservation of secrecy would attract the funds of Europe from the

fourteenth century to the twenty-first.

The Templar ideal of commitment to learning, discovery, and broth-

erhood greatly affected the world over the subsequent centuries. For

example, neo-Templar organizations were responsible for advances in

various sciences. Prince Henry, the grand master of the Knights of Christ,

made advancements in the art of navigation and funded the voyages of

discovery. And various members of the Royal Society progressed in

astronomy, in medical arts, and even in the transmutation of metals, and

their accomplishments frequently became the foundation of modern sci-

ences. Until the early 1300s, learning and experimentation were consid-

ered heretical and could easily place a scientist under the control of the

Inquisition. Later post-Templar organizations understood the value of

secrecy to avoid religious persecution for philosophical and scientific dis-

cussion.

The Masonic brotherhood created in post-Templar Scotland was

largely responsible for influencing the American concepts of liberty,

freedom, due process, and democracy. The concept of the "military

lodge"—in which a non-permanent lodge traveled with soldiers—

brought to America by the fighting units of Europe would further the

ideals and fight the war for independence. Secretive groups such as

those meeting at Saint Andrews Lodge in Boston would instigate the

Boston Tea Party, and they spread like wildfire throughout the colonies.

The Caucus Club, the Loyall Nine, and the Sons of Liberty would grow

into the Committees of Correspondence, the Continental Congress,

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