Bare-Faced Messiah (PDF) - Apologetics Index

Of the four Hubbard children on the ship, only Diana had so far been appointed an officer in the Sea
Org. She was a 'lieutenant commander' at the age of sixteen and wore a uniform with a mini-skirt
and a peaked hat, habitually perched on the back of her head in order not to muss her long auburn
hair. Quentin, who was 14, was supposed to be an auditor but could summon up little interest
compared to his teenage passion for aeroplanes: he was often to be seen walking along the deck
with both arms outstretched, wheeling and diving in some imaginary dogfight, lips vibrating to
simulate appropriate engine noises. Suzette and Arthur, who were thirteen and ten respectively,
seemed perfectly content to make the best of their strange lives and enjoy the influence their name
bestowed.
Diana was perhaps the least liked of the Hubbard children, certainly as far as John McMaster was
concerned. McMaster, still working as a galley hand, was overboarded five times on the Apollo and
nursed a deep resentment against Hubbard and his officious daughter. 'The last time someone
called down and said, "John, you're wanted on the poop deck, the Commodore wants to give you a
special award." I had some misgivings, but I went up anyway and when I stepped on to the poop
deck I realized it was all a nasty little trick. The whole crew was marshalled there and up on the
promenade deck there was Fatty and the royal family and all the upstart lieutenants. Hubbard was
leaning over the railings with a sorrowful, I've-been-betrayed-again look on his face.
'I began to seethe. I was made to stand immediately below the "royal family" and Diana comes
down and stands in front of me and reads out a list of my crimes, things like trying to take over and
undermining this and that. It was all lies. I was so mad I nearly picked her up and threw her
overboard. Then she chants, "We cast your sins and errors to the waves and hope you will arise a
better thetan."
'I nearly said, "Go and fetch that fat bastard up there! He's the dishonest one! Throw him overboard."
I should have done; I wish I had, it would have broken the spell they were all under. I was grabbed
by these four big thugs and flung over and I started laughing and laughing. I thought, "Jesus, I'm
going to get off this floating insanity even if I have to swim to Yugoslavia."' [10] He left the ship
several months later.
It was predictable that a 'school ship' which tossed its students overboard every morning would
attract a certain amount of attention. Corfiot dock workers could hardly believe their eyes when the
first people went over the side of Apollo, although they soon treated the whole business as a huge
joke and regularly gathered to watch the fun. But interest was also stirred in other quarters.
The Nomarch (mayor) of Corfu asked Major John Forte, the honorary British vice-consul on the
island, what he knew about this strange ship. Forte, a retired army officer who had made his home
on Corfu, knew a lot. He had reported the arrival of the Royal Scotman in Corfu to the Foreign Office
in London, correctly deducing that it was, in his words, the 'sinister Scientology ship'. Subsequently
he had been instructed to deliver a letter to Hubbard to inform him that he had been declared
persona non grata in Britain. It had proved to be far from easy.
'I was met at the gangway', the major reported, 'by a small boy aged about twelve with a very intent
but far off expression on his face who politely but firmly inquired my business. I asked where I could
find the Captain. In all seriousness, the lad insisted, "I am the Captain." Apparently the children
take it in turns to act the role of different officers on the ship and are indoctrinated into actually
believing they really are the character they happen to be portraying. After an interesting conversation
with the lad, I was whisked away by one of the staff to the dirty and evil-smelling bowels of the ship
where I was introduced to an outsize female character known as "supercargo", who looked as if
she might have been a wardress in a Dickensian reformatory in a bygone age. "Supercargo"