Snape at Godrics Hollow

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 120780


Snow wrote:
> I agree with most everything you had to say to this point but 
> envisioned a little different scenario: where James was aware that 
> Snape was Dumbledore's informant about the Potter's being in danger. 
> Could you just imagine James face when Dumbledore tells him that he 
> now trusts Snape, no specific details as to why, and reveals the 
> information that Snape had divulged to him. Continuing, Dumbledore 
> announces that, under the circumstances, they should hide under the 
> Fidelius charm and that he should be secret keeper. James would be a 
> little skeptical about the source of the information coming from a 
> known death-eater whether Dumbledore trusted him or not. <snip>

Carol responds:
Potioncat has already pointed out that Sirius didn't know that Snape
had been a DE. For that reason, I don't think that James did, either,
or he would have told Sirius.

Moreover, Snape is not a "known Death Eater." We know from the
Pensieve that he was charged with being a DE but that the charges were
dismissed, not because he claimed to be Imperio'd like the DEs whose
names were published in the Daily Prophet and elsewhere (Malfoy,
Crabbe, Goyle, Avery, Nott, et al.) but because he was a spy for
Dumbledore whose identity as a seemingly still loyal DE could not be
released to the general public without jeopardizing his mission and
his life. AFWK, the only people besides Snape and a handful of DEs who
know that Snape was a DE are those who attended Karkaroff's hearing,
and they appear to have been silenced in some way. Clearly his DE past
is not public knowledge or three-quarters of the parents at Hogwarts
would protest. (The Slytherins, in contrast, presumably think he's
still a loyal and active DE--or did, up until the end of OoP. JKR only
knows what they think now that Lucius Malfoy and company have been
arrested.)

Carol, who is very curious about Snape's activities between OoP and
HBP and wonders if we'll somehow find out about them