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- , CONFIDENTIAL CG 176-31 ; no ed, not advocate or participate in any violent demonstrations, and, in fact, was discouraged with the demonstrations very early and soon wanted to go home. “ Concerning his own observations during this time, . tf Said that he arrived in Grant Park in downtown Chicago ne at the bandshei] sometime on Wednesday aiternoon, August 28, 1968. He recalls Seeing someone taking the American Flag down from the flagpole causing the police, about 10 or so, to go into the crowd of demonstrators apparently to arrest the individual who took down the Flag. At that time, some people in the crowd threw missiles at the police but aS not close enough to observe whether anyone was n jured or to see who was throwing the missiles. aid that possibly as many as 10,000 people were assembled in the area of the bandshell] and he thought there were perhaps 25 policemen on hand there that he could ——. | see, At this time, a number of Speakers were addressing the , crowd. He remembers these speakers as follows: a NORMAN MAILER spoke to the crowd and said he did 7 not intend to go on any march with the crowd since he did not want to get arrested. DICK GREGORY also spoke on this occasion. He recalls that GREGORY said that the young people - ; in America represent what is pood about this country. GREGORY ; said that long hair iS not bad and Spoke against police actions i against demonstrators. GREGORY went on, however, to caution | the crowd not to hate the police. He said the policemen were only following their orders and the problem was with the superiors of the ordinary policemen. GREGORY said that white people are now finding out what Negroes have always known about the police and about how it feels to be mistreated by the police. GREGORY made some jokes but at no time did he make any inflammatory remarks or any remarks advocating violence. In fact, GREGORY was always just the opposite in his speeches; that is, he was always conciliatory and always asking the crowd to obey the police orders and to avoid violence. oe seat CONFIDERITIAL