As early as June 13, 1974 the US Embassy here was reporting to Washington that the People’s Temple Agricultural Mission in the north west appeared well organised and had a leasing arrangement with the Guyana Government.
The People’s Temple would later be described as the Jim Jones-led cult which engineered the mass suicide in November, 1978 of over 900 mostly Americans at its Jonestown site, Port Kaituma.
In a cable from the US Embassy here to the US State Department, US Ambassador Max V Krebs in response to Washington’s interest and that of the Caracas mission, stated that the multi-racial People’s Temple mission comprised nine Americans operating an agricultural settlement three miles from Port Kaituma and approximately 25 miles from the Venezuelan border. Krebs said that the mission had recently purchased a trawler from a US shrimping company and expected to supplement agricultural work with fishing. He added that members of the People’s Temple were “favorably known” to the embassy and had told consular officers that they expected an additional 20 to 25 settlers in the next two months. He added that they declined to speculate on the eventual size but pointed out that sponsoring churches in California had a total membership of approximately 10,000 though only a small amount would be potential settlers in Guyana.
Krebs also referred to another group of Americans known as the Shalom Co-operative, also multi-racial, and located eight miles from Port Kaituma. However, Krebs said that this group was not well organised, were inexperienced, didn’t have a firm leasing arrangement with the Guyana Government and had recently run out of money.
Krebs concluded: “Embassy believes these are only groups of Americans settled near Venezuelan border. We perceive no threat to Venezuelan security in their activities nor is there evidence they are involved in Guyanese politics”.
