Wastemoreland, who also had the more conventional na of Tom Dunphy, was an almost legendary figure in the peace movement at demonstrations and in general. With his partner, General Hershey Bar, they had done much to ridicule war. General Hershey Bar was an old vaudeville comedian who had worked up most of the material for their acts. Wastemoreland was well under thirty, and had gotten into the "business" after being kicked out of the Catholic seminary where he was studying to become a priest. Since then, it seems that he has done better work as a general.

The General, as he preferred to be called, carried around a bunch of newspapers with fake headlines, which fit into his monologue. Examples: LSD DECLARED A DRUG, NIXON DECLARED A DOPE; MANSON SAYS NIXON GUILTY OF MURDER; and THE SILENT MAJORITY ISN'T SILENT, NIXON IS DEAF. With this he had a little line of patter, "There's a bill in Congress now I want you all to support. This bill says that no soldier could go to Vietnam unaccompanied by his parents. That's right, because the family that slays together stays together. Can't you see it? Here's Mommy and Daddy and Sonny, crawling through the mud and barbed wire," and "This year, instead of sending Bob Hope over to visit the troops, let's bring the troops home to visit Bob Hope."

The General was funny, at least the first couple of times, but more than that he was immensely human. I couldn't even speculate on the kind of mentality that would choose to do what Wastemoreland had turned into an unpaid profession, but he was real, more real than most of the people on the Caravan. When he stepped out of his General role, he revealed himself as intensely caring about what happened to the world, and not in a neurotic way. His was an optimistic care, a care that reveled in the possibilities of the future rather than the injustices of the past.

Arriving at the airport, the General had gone through his whole act, but the customs officials hadn't even cracked a smile. He was a little worried about the adaptability of his act to the British humor. On Sunday, we headed to Hyde Park Corner to take on the famous crowds there.

The General was magnificent. Although the English didn't understand some of his jokes, they caught the general drift and the spirit and gathered in alarming numbers. Wastemoreland easily outdrew the old-time professional haranguers.

And when some Germans came up, he did his act in German. He could also do it in French and several other languages, we found out. From Hyde Park, we went to Buckingham Palace, where the General wanted to visit Prince Philip. He went up to the guard at the door.

"I would like to see Prince Philip. We've corresponded [they had] and he told me to come see him if I came to England,"
"Prince Philip is away at the country."
"I see. Is the Queen in?" The guard did not see fit to answer.