Jeb Stuart Magruder

Jeb Stuart Magruder (November 5, 1934 – May 11, 2014) was an American businessman and high-level political operative in the Republican Party who served time in prison for his role in the Watergate scandal.

In the late 1950s, Magruder moved to Kansas City with Jewel Tea, in a transfer for work.

He later earned a Bachelor of Arts in political science in 1958 from Williams College, where he competed on the varsity swimming team and set several regional records.

Magruder started at IBM after college, but dropped out of its training program after only a few days.

He went to California and married a Berkeley student, Gail Barnes Nicholas, then took a job with the Crown Zellerbach, selling paper goods in Kansas City.

Later, he started his own consumer products company.

Later, he earned a Master of Business Administration degree from the University of Chicago.

He married Gail Barnes Nicholas on October 17, 1959, in Brentwood, California.

The couple had four children.

He became involved there as a campaign manager for the Republican Party during the 1960 election campaign, working as chairman of an urban ward.

Magruder moved to Chicago for his MBA studies.

Afterward he shifted from IBM to the consulting firm Booz Allen Hamilton.

In Chicago, he again, was involved with the Republican Party.

Magruder was a ward chairman, for Donald Rumsfeld's 1962 Illinois's 13th congressional district United States House of Representatives Republican primary campaign.

Rumsfeld won the primary and the seat in Congress.

In 1962 Magruder moved from Booz Allen Hamilton to Jewel, a regional grocery firm.

During his nearly four years with them, he was promoted to merchandise manager.

Magruder became involved with the Illinois organization of the Barry Goldwater presidential campaign in late 1963, but became disillusioned with Goldwater's political views.

He worked briefly as campaign manager for Richard Ogilvie's 1966 campaign for president of the Cook County Board of Supervisors.

The political workload, combined with work pressures, caused Magruder to end employment with Jewel.

In mid-1966, he returned to California, to begin a job with the Broadway Stores.

In mid-1967, he served as Southern California coordinator for the Richard Nixon presidential campaign.

He left early in 1968 due to internal organizational problems.

He served President Richard Nixon in various capacities, including acting as special assistant to the President for domestic policy development, and later as deputy director of the president's 1972 re-election campaign, Committee for the Re-Election of the President (CRP).

In August 1973, Magruder pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to wiretap, obstruct justice and defraud the United States.

He served seven months in federal prison.

Magruder later attended Princeton Theological Seminary and was ordained as a Presbyterian minister.

He spoke publicly about ethics and his role in the Watergate scandal.

They were divorced in 1984.

Magruder married Patricia Newton on February 28, 1987, in Columbus, Ohio.

In the 1990s and early 2000s, he gave interviews in which he changed his accounts of actions by various participants in the Watergate coverup, including claiming that Nixon ordered the break-ins.

Jeb Stuart Magruder was born and grew up on Staten Island, New York.

His father, a Civil War buff, named him for Confederate general J.E.B. Stuart.

His great-grandfather smuggled shoes for the Civil War Confederate States of America.

His grandfather was convicted of bank fraud related to the construction of WWI cargo ships.

He was an honor student at Curtis High School.

Magruder was an excellent junior tennis player and swimmer, among the best in the greater New York area.

After two years at Williams College, he served in the U.S. Army, but was kicked out of Officer Candidate School of the United States Army, only weeks before graduation, for going AWOL by not going to class so as to take the daughter of a colonel out in a new Chevrolet.

He was then stationed in South Korea.

They were divorced in May 2003.