The New Yorker, June 8, 1963 P. 136
LETTER FROM MANILA tells about the case of Harry S. Stonehill & his business career in the Philippines. He came to Manila in '45, as a U.S. Army lieutenant. Assigned to the Army real-estate division, he worked a couple of deals for himsel the purchase & resale of 50 surplus Army trucks, packaged Army rations, & the importation of Christmas cards. Hemade $67,000 on the trucks & 10,000 on the Christmas cards. After his discharge he returned to Chicago & tried to persuade his wife to return with him to Manila. She refused & he went back alone. After two years he divorced his wife & married a Philippine girl. After various interprises he decided to manufacture American-style cigarettes, & how he contrived to import, illegally, machinery, tobacco & cigarette paper. Within a short time he held the monopoly on cigarettes in the Philippines. In 1960, the Bureau of Investigation began to look into his affairs and those of his aides notably thos of his partner Robert P. Brooks. The case was broken when Menhart Spielman, who had been hired as general manager of the U.S. Tobacco Corp. took his suspicions of illegal dealings to the investigators. Stonehill & Brooks were arrested. While they were under detention, Speilman disappeared. Eleven men are currently on trial in Manila for the murder of Spielman. Stonehill & Brooks were deported. Stonehill's firms in Manila are still functioning and the Nacionalista claim that he is directing his operations from South America. The Nacionalista insist that the reason Pres. Macpagal allowed Stonehill to leave, was to avoid seeing a number of prominent Liberal Party politicians dragged into the scandal which had already provoked a Cabinet shakeup.
