On November 25, 1978, one week after the mass deaths in Jonestown \u2013 and a day after the last of the remains had been removed \u2013 Victor Dikeos, a State Department official acting as the Deputy Chief of Mission while Richard Dwyer recovered from his wounds \u2013 walked through the deserted community with a tape recorder to describe what he saw. \u201c[T]his is not meant to be a complete inventory,\u201d he noted in the opening paragraph of his transcript, but it \u201cdoes touch on those major items which I located, and other items which had apparent intrinsic value.\u201d<\/p>\n
Despite its professed limitations, it remains the single most complete description of the Jonestown community.<\/p>\n
This document comes from the records of independent researcher Brian Csuk, who obtained it from the State Department in response to a Freedom of Information Act request. His website on primary government sources related to Peoples Temple where the document originally appeared went offline in 1998.<\/p>\n