Letter from Peter Barnicle to Conor Cruise O'Brien (Dublin)

Dear Conor:
Enclosed are clippings from New York newspapers of this morning giving the story of Sir Basil's arrival here.

I was at the airport and by using my old press card managed to crack the line of detectives, State Dept. men and other assorted security forces to get aboard the plane for the press conference. It was very perfunctory and the questions about Partition were cut off by Gransden.¹

However, Sir Basil still has to face a formal press conference and many of the boys have been given questions to ask him. We can only hope that they get the chance to get them in.

Regardless of who is getting the publicity - Sir Basil or us - the whole visit serves to highlight the problem of Partition and bring it to the attention of more people.