Watergate Documents & White House Audio Tape | U.S. National Archives Vault

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On June 17, 1972, five men were arrested at the Democratic National Committee headquarters in the Watergate complex in Washington DC, while President Nixon was away in the Bahamas and White House Chief of Staff H.R. Haldeman was in Cuba. Just three days later, on June 20, the first recorded conversation between Nixon and Haldeman regarding the scandal occurred, captured on audio tapes that are now part of the National Archives collection. During these meetings, Haldeman took extensive notes on yellow paper, which have since become a critical piece of evidence in understanding the early stages of the cover-up. The transcript reveals how the conversation initially focused on unrelated matters, such as a letter to the governor of South Dakota, before abruptly shifting to Watergate, indicating the immediate and serious nature of the crisis facing the administration. A significant mystery emerged when researchers discovered that only two pages of notes survived from this specific meeting, despite the expectation that an hour-and-a-half session would generate five or six pages. Phil Melinger, an amateur historian, noticed multiple staple holes on these surviving pages, suggesting that intervening sheets had been deliberately removed to hide their contents. To investigate whether information remained hidden within the paper fibers, forensic experts employed impression analysis at the Library of Congress and the Treasury Department's lab. This process involved placing a thin plastic sheet over the notes, using a vacuum to adhere it to any indentations, applying electrostatic charge, dusting with toner-like material, and then peeling off the image to reveal hidden writing. The forensic examination yielded mixed results; while indented writing was found on page two, it appeared to be a signature that was illegible, offering no new insight into the meeting's content. However, a surprising discovery was made regarding the ink used: the date on page one and the number "2" on page two were written in a different ink than the main body of the notes, hinting at possible tampering or later additions to the document. Although the forensic team hoped to uncover the topics discussed between Nixon and Haldeman, they were ultimately unable to recover any additional information regarding the specific content of that meeting. These findings highlight the lengths to which the administration went to protect their inner circle and underscore the limitations of current forensic techniques in fully reconstructing the historical record from damaged or altered documents.

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On June 17th, 1972, five men are arrested in the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee in the Watergate office complex in Washington DC. President Nixon is in the Bahamas. White House chief of staff HR Bob Halden is in Cubiscane. June 20, 1972, three days later, was the first time that President Nixon and Haldderman talked about Watergate around the microphones. >> Mr. Mr. Alderman took copious notes of his meetings with the president. Um, in the Nixon's materials, uh, Nixon library, there are probably 300 boxes of his notes on yellow paper. >> You can follow Haldderman's notes. The president is talking about a letter he wants to send to the governor of South Dakota. And suddenly conversation shifts from South Dakota to Watergate. You can see that in the notes and gap begins. Since there is a gap in the tape, the notes would then be the backup to that. However, there is very little in the notes about the uh meeting itself. >> I'm Phil Melinger. I'm an amateur historian that's been doing some Watergate research for the past uh five or six years. I knew there were two pages of notes from the meeting and I talked to the the the archivist and and he was very kind and pulled out the notes and showed them to me and when I looked at them it immediately hit me that this couldn't have been the complete set of notes from the meeting. In a typical oval or executive office building meeting for an hour and a half, there could be as many as five or six pages of notes, more than obviously than two pages. >> And I knew from reading Holdman's diaries that Nixon's inner court had gone through their files and made sure they were clean. >> One thing people noticed right away with these these two pages is the multiple staple holes here, which indicate obviously staple removed, staple removed, staple removed. It occurred to me that I we could actually do impression analysis on the remaining pages. >> Mr. Melinger brought forth the idea that uh modern forensic technology might be able to produce be able to reveal indented writing here on page two that would have been what was on any intervening pages. For the uh forensic work done on the notes, we first went to the Library of Congress where images were taken of of the two pages of notes front and back under varying spectrums of light. We then went to Inspector General Internal Revenue Treasury Department's lab. The paper is applied to a vacuum table and a very thin sheet of plastic is placed over it. The vacuum sucks the plastic in such a way that it adheres to every indentation in the paper. Then electrostatic charge is put to the plastic. Material very similar to toner from an ink cartridge is put over that. And then another sheet of plastic is put over there. An image then adheres to the the second sheet of plastic which can get peeled off which should reveal any indented writing on that sheet of plastic. >> I don't have any expectations. My hope is that the forensics will show the topics that were discussed in the meeting. >> After our testing with the method suggested by Mr. Melinger, um we determined that there was indented writing on page two, but it looks like a signature and is illeible. A surprising finding was that at the upper left of page one is a date written and on the upper left of page two is a number two. These two bits of information were written in a different ink from the main body of the notes. Future historians will have to determine the significance of ink differences and possibly in the future additional work can be done on the tape itself. We were unable to recover any additional information regarding the content of the meeting between uh Mr. Nixon and Mr. Haldivan.