William Ward Pigman (March 5, 1910 – September 30, 1977) was a chairman of the Department of Biochemistry at
New York Medical College
New York Medical College (NYMC or New York Med) is a private medical school in Valhalla, New York. Founded in 1860, it is a member of the Touro College and University System.
NYMC offers advanced degrees through its three schools: the School o ...
, and a suspected
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...
spy as part of the "Karl group" for
Soviet Military Intelligence
The Main Directorate of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, rus, Гла́вное управле́ние Генера́льного шта́ба Вооружённых сил Росси́йской Федера́ци ...
(GRU).
Biography
He was born on March 5, 1910.
He had a Ph.D in chemistry. He worked for the
National Bureau of Standards
The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is an agency of the United States Department of Commerce whose mission is to promote American innovation and industrial competitiveness. NIST's activities are organized into physical sci ...
and the Labor and Public Welfare Committee. Earlier he had been a professor at the
University of Alabama
The University of Alabama (informally known as Alabama, UA, or Bama) is a Public university, public research university in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Established in 1820 and opened to students in 1831, the University of Alabama is the oldest and la ...
.
He supplied documents to
Whittaker Chambers
Whittaker Chambers (born Jay Vivian Chambers; April 1, 1901 – July 9, 1961) was an American writer-editor, who, after early years as a Communist Party member (1925) and Soviet spy (1932–1938), defected from the Soviet underground (1938), ...
and
J. Peters
J. Peters (born Sándor Goldberger; 11 August 1894 – 1990) was the most commonly known pseudonym of a man who last went by the name "Alexander Stevens" in 1949. Peters was a journalist, political activist, and accused Soviet spy who was a leadin ...
for Soviet intelligence as early as 1936.
[ In his book, ''Witness'', ]Whittaker Chambers
Whittaker Chambers (born Jay Vivian Chambers; April 1, 1901 – July 9, 1961) was an American writer-editor, who, after early years as a Communist Party member (1925) and Soviet spy (1932–1938), defected from the Soviet underground (1938), ...
refers to Pigman using the pseudonym "Abel Gross". The Gorsky Memo cites him as "114th".
In 1954, he was at the Department of Biochemistry, of the New York Medical College
New York Medical College (NYMC or New York Med) is a private medical school in Valhalla, New York. Founded in 1860, it is a member of the Touro College and University System.
NYMC offers advanced degrees through its three schools: the School o ...
.
He died on September 30, 1977 in Woods Hole, Massachusetts
Woods Hole is a census-designated place in the town of Falmouth in Barnstable County, Massachusetts, United States. It lies at the extreme southwest corner of Cape Cod, near Martha's Vineyard and the Elizabeth Islands. The population was 781 at ...
from a heart attack
A myocardial infarction (MI), commonly known as a heart attack, occurs when blood flow decreases or stops to the coronary artery of the heart, causing damage to the heart muscle. The most common symptom is chest pain or discomfort which may tr ...
.
Works
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See also
* List of American spies
This is a list of spies who engaged in direct espionage. It includes Americans spying against their own country and people spying on behalf of the United States.
American Revolution era spies
Spied for the Patriots
* Hercules Mulligan
* Abra ...
* John Abt
John Jacob Abt (May 1, 1904 – August 10, 1991) was an American lawyer and politician, who spent most of his career as chief counsel to the Communist Party USA (CPUSA) and was a member of the Communist Party and the Soviet spy network "Ware Gro ...
* Whittaker Chambers
Whittaker Chambers (born Jay Vivian Chambers; April 1, 1901 – July 9, 1961) was an American writer-editor, who, after early years as a Communist Party member (1925) and Soviet spy (1932–1938), defected from the Soviet underground (1938), ...
* Noel Field
Noel Haviland Field (January 23, 1904 – September 12, 1970) was an American communist activist, diplomat and spy for the NKVD, whose activities before and after World War II allowed the Eastern Bloc to use his name as a prosecuting rationale du ...
* Harold Glasser
Harold Glasser (November 24, 1905 – November 16, 1992) was an economist in the United States Department of the Treasury and spokesman on the affairs of the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA) 'throughout its whole ...
* John Herrmann
John Theodore Herrmann (November 9, 1900 – April 9, 1959) was a writer in the 1920s and 1930s and is alleged to have introduced Whittaker Chambers to Alger Hiss.
Biography
Herrmann was born in Lansing, Michigan in 1900. He lived in Paris in ...
* Alger Hiss
Alger Hiss (November 11, 1904 – November 15, 1996) was an American government official accused in 1948 of having spied for the Soviet Union in the 1930s. Statutes of limitations had expired for espionage, but he was convicted of perjury in con ...
* Donald Hiss
Donald Hiss (December 15, 1906 – May 18, 1989), also known as "Donie"
and "Donnie",
was the younger brother of Alger Hiss. Donald Hiss's name was mentioned during the 1948 hearings wherein his more famous and older brother, Alger, was ac ...
* Victor Perlo
Victor Perlo (May 15, 1912December 1, 1999) was an American Marxist economist, government functionary, and a longtime member of the governing National Committee of the Communist Party USA.
Biography
Early years
Victor Perlo was born May 15, 19 ...
* J. Peters
J. Peters (born Sándor Goldberger; 11 August 1894 – 1990) was the most commonly known pseudonym of a man who last went by the name "Alexander Stevens" in 1949. Peters was a journalist, political activist, and accused Soviet spy who was a leadin ...
* Lee Pressman
Lee Pressman (July 1, 1906 – November 20, 1969) was a labor attorney and earlier a US government functionary, publicly alleged in 1948 to have been a spy for Soviet intelligence during the mid-1930s (as a member of the Ware Group), following hi ...
* Vincent Reno Franklin Vincent Reno was a mathematician and civilian employee at the United States Army Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland in the 1930s. Reno was a member of the "Karl group" of Soviet spies which was being handled by Whittaker Chambers until 19 ...
* Julian Wadleigh Julian Wadleigh (1904–1994) was an American economist and a Department of State official in the 1930s and 1940s. He was a key witness in the Alger Hiss trials.
Background
Henry Julian Wadleigh was born in 1904. He went to an English "public" s ...
* Harold Ware
Harold or "Hal" Ware (August 19, 1889 – August 14, 1935) was an American Marxist, regarded as one of the Communist Party's top experts on agriculture.
He was employed by a federal New Deal agency in the 1930s. He is alleged to have been a S ...
* Nathaniel Weyl
Nathaniel Weyl (July 20, 1910 – April 13, 2005) was an American economist and author who wrote on a variety of social issues. A member of the Communist Party of the United States from 1933 until 1939, after leaving the party he became a con ...
* Harry Dexter White
Harry Dexter White (October 29, 1892 – August 16, 1948) was a senior U.S. Treasury department official. Working closely with the Secretary of the Treasury Henry Morgenthau Jr., he helped set American financial policy toward the Allies of World W ...
* Nathan Witt
Nathan Witt (February 11, 1903 – February 16, 1982), born Nathan Wittowsky, was an American lawyer who is best known as being the Secretary of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) from 1937 to 1940. He resigned from the NLRB after his commun ...
References
Further reading
*
* Allen Weinstein, '' Perjury: The Hiss–Chambers Case'' (New York: Random House, 1997).
External links
{{Authority control
20th-century American chemists
American spies for the Soviet Union
Espionage in the United States
University of Alabama faculty
New York Medical College faculty
1910 births
1977 deaths
Scientists from New York (state)