On an airstrip in Key West, Florida, on May 17, 1967, a newly purchased Cessna 150 plane sat on the airstrip. The tower had given the plane a go ahead 45 minutes before for a sightseeing flight that would have lasted about an hour. Instead of immediately taking off, the owner of the plane sat on the strip, to the confusion of the tower. Finally, U.S. Army Major Richard Harwood Pearce, 36, and his 4-year-old son took off in the small plane.
Their intention, however, was not a small sightseeing flight during Pearce’s 12-day vacation. Pearce, who, according to The Washington Evening Star, had “an unblemished Army record as well as access to top-secret information,” changed course after take off and directed his plane to the capital of the Communist government of Cuba, Havana.
Years earlier, in the fall of 1960, Pearce was a captain assigned to the Greenbrier Military School to teach military science and tactics. He was remembered as a man who “used to walk three to four miles to school each day, winter or summer, [despite the fact] he had a car.” Students remembered him as a guy hard to get to know.
“The portrait painted by associates at the military school, friends and by his landlady depicts Pearce as a strikingly handsome family man, enthused about his military career, proud of his country, … and confused about his religious beliefs,” reads an article taken from The West Virginia Daily News in May 1967. “[However], one co-worker said Pearce was not particularly cooperative. Several things that he did the school administration disagreed with. He was not inclined to take suggestions whatsoever.”
Sandra Mitchell was a student at the women’s exclusive Greenbrier College at the time. She met Pearce, they fell in love, and they married in secret so Mitchell could graduate unimpeded from college. It was only a year before their first child, Richard Jr., was born. L.L. Lee, the landlady of their Fairlea home, said the child was “the center of their life.”
“In January the next winter Richard was born, the captain was so wrapped up in that baby,” said Lee. “We all were. He would come home from school and take him on his shoulders out in the yard. The three of them sometimes would sit out under the trees for hours playing with Richard, … I was very much attached to them. They were much like a family to me, especially the baby.”
In the spring of 1963, Pearce was reassigned to be a ranking aide to Lt. Gen. Thomas Dunn, commandant of the 4th Army at Fort Sam Houston, San Antonio, Texas, and had to move from the Greenbrier Valley, taking his wife and new son with him. Not long after, however, Pearce was deployed to Vietnam.
“I remember his letters from Vietnam, He missed his family terribly,” Lee said.
Letters received from Pearce described Vietnam as a “dirty, filthy country” and that he “considered it just the opposite of Greenbrier County,” but never indicated that he was resentful. He served as an aide to the commander of the 4th Army.
His new marriage, however, was suffering as a result of his deployment. One instructor at GMS remained in contact with Pearce during his deployment, receiving several letters commenting on his struggling marriage. Not long after, the couple divorced, and Mitchell remarried.
On May 12, 1967, Pearce had obtained a 12-day leave from his deployment, leaving from Fort Sam for the residence where his ex-wife and son lived. Mitchell was surprised to see her ex-husband, who asked to take his son with him during his leave. She agreed, and Richard Jr. left with his father.
“He told me they were going on vacation,” said Mitchell. “They were to be back in a week. He didn’t say where they were going or anything.”
It was days later, on May 24, when Mitchell and the U.S. Army learned what Pearce had done from a government-controlled radio broadcast from Havana.
“The revolutionary government decided to concede asylum to the major of the United States Army, Richard Harwood Pearce, or the facilities appropriate to go to another country, according to his request,” announced Havana Radio. “[Pearce is] accompanied by his son … arrived at Liberty Airport close to Havana [May 21, 1967] at noon piloting a Cessna plane, M-8546 J.”
Days later, the Swiss ambassador to Cuba confirmed that he had met Pearce and his son in Havana, confirming Pearce as one of the highest ranking defectors during the Cold War. The ambassador confirmed that Pearce was “safe and sound” and was acting of his own free will, according to The New York Times.
“I have decided to part from my country in the company of my 4-and-a-half year old son for reason of conscience and the request of Cuban authorities to grant us asylum or authorization to proceed to another country of my choice,” Pearce reportedly told the Cuban Communist newspaper Granma. However, months later, he would tell two reporters in Havana that he had left for “strictly personal reasons,” reported The New York Times.
“My son is no defector,” said William M. Pearce, a retired official of the U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare and Richard Pearce’s father. “He did this for love of his son and no other reason.”
The 11-year struggle to be reunited with her son began then for Mitchell, who would repeatedly ask the State Department to work for his return.
“I know nothing about their disappearance, I only know I want my child back,” Mitchell said.
Pearce and his son would take up residence in the Havana Libre Hotel, a favorite showcase of Fidel Castro. The U.S. Army, however, reacted quickly, creating a list of all of the possible documents the top-secret clearance allowed Pearce to view.
“U.S. officials said there was no way of knowing what secrets he might have possessed in view of his clearance, but they added that all classified documents to which he had access have been inventoried and accounted for,” reads The Washington Evening Star in May 1967.
According to The New York Times, it would be 12 years before Pearce would voluntarily come back to the United States. On November 21, 1979, a then 49-year-old Pearce flew back to Miami, FL, surrendered to Army authorities, and was then flown to Fort Bragg, North Carolina, where “the disposition of his case” would be determined by the Army. A year before, Richard Jr. had been reunited with his mother in Texas.
On January 31, 1980, Pearce would plead guilty to a charge of desertion during his court-martial. He was also accused of commandeering a plane and flying it to Cuba.
Pearce was sentenced to one year in prison, dismissal from service, and a forfeiture of more than $200,000 in pay and allowances. However, Lieutenant General Thomas H. Tackaberry would overturn the one-year prison sentence in February 1980, leaving Pearce with his discharge and a $200,000 fine.
“I never heard him say one thing detrimental toward his government or country and that’s why I think this thing (defection) is more domestic than political,” said Pearce’s co-worker at the time of his defection. “A man certainly couldn’t take a [five-year-old] boy to Cuba unless he was trying to get back at someone.”
Read more in the Wednesday, January 31, edition of The West Virginia Daily News.
