OPINION OF THE COURT
ALDISERT, Circuit Judge.
For the second time, we are called upon to review the conviction of Murray Dickerson for the murder of a Philadelphia housing project guard in 1958. As before, at issue is the admissibility of a statement given to the police at a time when Dickerson was without legal counsel and incarcerated by order of a committing magistrate. In order to evaluate the assertions of Fifth and Sixth Amendment deprivations, it is necessary to review the history of the extensive legal proceedings which have preceded this appeal.
Dickerson was convicted of murder by a Pennsylvania jury in 1960. He unsuccessfully appealed this conviction to the state supreme court which held in Commonwealth v. Dickerson, 406 Pa. 102, 176 A.2d 421 (1962), that the voluntariness vel non of the statement given to the police rested finally with the jury and would not be disturbed on review. This position was reiterated in a subsequent denial of state habeas corpus relief in Commonwealth ex rel. Dickerson v. Rundle, 411 Pa. 651, 192 A.2d 347, cert. den. 375 U.S. 915, 84 S.Ct. 214, 11 L.Ed.2d 154 (1963).
Resorting to federal habeas action, however, Dickerson was successful in overturning his conviction on two grounds. In United States ex rel. Dickerson v. Rundle, 238 F.Supp. 218 (E.D. Pa.1965), Judge Wood ruled that Jackson v. Denno, 378 U.S. 368, 84 S.Ct. 1774, 12 L.Ed.2d 908 (1964) required a separate hearing on the voluntariness of the statements, and Escobedo v. Illinois, 378 U.S. 478, 84 S.Ct. 1758, 12 L.Ed.2d 977 (1964) and Massiah v. United States, 377 U.S. 201, 84 S.Ct. 1199, 12 [464]*464L.Ed.2d 246 (1964), rendered the statements inadmissible as a matter of law due to the absence of counsel. It should be emphasized that all these Supreme Court decisions had been announced subsequent to the Pennsylvania state courts’ review of the conviction.
On appeal, however, this court rejected the contention that Dickerson's statement was inadmissible “merely because it was given at a time when he was without the assistance of counsel.” United States ex rel. Dickerson v. Rundle, 363 F.2d 126, 129 (3 Cir. 1966), cert. den. Dickerson v. Rundle, 386 U.S. 916, 87 S.Ct. 880, 17 L.Ed.2d 790 (1967). Instead, we remanded the case to the state courts solely for the purpose of conducting a Jackson v. Denno hearing on the issue of voluntariness.
On remand, the state trial court determined that the statement was voluntarily given. By agreement of the parties, this finding was made on the basis of the testimony presented in the federal proceedings before Judge Wood. This holding was affirmed by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court for the third time in Commonwealth v. Dickerson, 428 Pa. 564, 237 A.2d 229 (1968), with Justice Roberts dissenting on the grounds that the police violated the defendant’s right to counsel when they obtained a “bring-up order” authorizing interrogation without affording or advising the defendant of his right to counsel.
Returning to the federal courts, Dickerson reiterated his arguments on volun-tariness and the right-to-counsel. Based on the same record which the state courts had reviewed, the district court concluded that the statement was involuntary. In issuing the writ, the court requested, if an appeal ensued, that we reconsider our prior decision which rejected the Sixth Amendment claim. After argument before a panel and two separate rehearings en banc, we have concluded that the writ should not issue.
The Voluntariness of the Statement
Section 2254(d) of Title 28 provides that in federal habeas corpus applications, state adjudications “shall be presumed to be correct.” It is only where “such factual determination is not fairly supported by the record” that a federal court is authorized to reject the state findings. Notwithstanding this admonition, the district court rejected the state finding of voluntariness on the basis of the identical evidence reviewed by the state courts. Having examined this record ourselves, we conclude that the state adjudication is more than fairly supported and should have been accepted by the district court.
The record shows that Dickerson voluntarily surrendered to the police three days after the housing guard was killed. There followed a period of interrogation from 5:20 p.m. to 9:18 p.m. on August 19, 1958. A preliminary hearing was held on the morning of August 20 for Dickerson and a co-suspect, Spencer Broaddus,1 after which both men were held for the grand jury. Within a few hours after the defendants were committed to the county prison, the detective bureau requested and obtained from a state quarter sessions judge a “bring-up order” which authorized removal of the defendants from prison for further police interrogation. A second round of questioning followed from 3:16 p.m. to 9:41 p.m. on August 20, at the conclusion of which Dickerson gave the statement which he attacks as involuntary. The interrogations of both Dickerson and Broaddus were apparently conducted by five police officers who at times employed the “Mutt and Jeff” technique of friendship and hostility. A lie detector test was also administered during the course of the second interrogation, following which the police accused Dickerson of lying. At the time these events transpired, Dickerson was 21 years old with nine years of formal education.
[465]*465We experience difficulty in equating these circumstances with those in eases such as Cicenia v. Lagay, 357 U.S. 504, 78 S.Ct. 1297, 2 L.Ed.2d 1523 (1958); Crooker v. California, 357 U.S. 433, 78 S.Ct. 1287, 2 L.Ed.2d 1448 (1958); Spano v. New York, 360 U.S. 315, 79 S.Ct. 1202, 3 L.Ed.2d 1265 (1969); Culombe v. Connecticut, 367 U.S. 568, 81 S.Ct. 1860, 6 L.Ed.2d 1037 (1961); Haynes v. Washington, 373 U.S. 503, 83 S.Ct. 1336, 10 L.Ed.2d 513 (1963) and Davis v. North Carolina, 384 U.S. 737, 86 S.Ct. 1761, 16 L.Ed.2d 895 (1966), relied on by Dickerson to establish his claim pf involuntariness. Certainly the facts here in no way approach those in Culombe, where the accused was a “moron or imbecile” who was subjected to five days of interrogation; or Davis, where sixteen days of incommunicado interrogation finally resulted in the extraction of a confession from an illiterate of very low mentality; or Crooker, where the accused was interrogated through the night with no opportunity for sleep; or Spano, where the intervention of a “friend” who was in fact a police officer resulted in a confession after eight hours of continuous interrogation into the middle of the night.
In contrast to these cases, the factual construct here is too frail to overturn the state adjudication that the confession was voluntary. There is nothing in Dickerson’s age, intelligence, or background which might indicate any great susceptibility to psychological coercion. And the question of the use of physical force is not even raised.
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OPINION OF THE COURT
ALDISERT, Circuit Judge.
For the second time, we are called upon to review the conviction of Murray Dickerson for the murder of a Philadelphia housing project guard in 1958. As before, at issue is the admissibility of a statement given to the police at a time when Dickerson was without legal counsel and incarcerated by order of a committing magistrate. In order to evaluate the assertions of Fifth and Sixth Amendment deprivations, it is necessary to review the history of the extensive legal proceedings which have preceded this appeal.
Dickerson was convicted of murder by a Pennsylvania jury in 1960. He unsuccessfully appealed this conviction to the state supreme court which held in Commonwealth v. Dickerson, 406 Pa. 102, 176 A.2d 421 (1962), that the voluntariness vel non of the statement given to the police rested finally with the jury and would not be disturbed on review. This position was reiterated in a subsequent denial of state habeas corpus relief in Commonwealth ex rel. Dickerson v. Rundle, 411 Pa. 651, 192 A.2d 347, cert. den. 375 U.S. 915, 84 S.Ct. 214, 11 L.Ed.2d 154 (1963).
Resorting to federal habeas action, however, Dickerson was successful in overturning his conviction on two grounds. In United States ex rel. Dickerson v. Rundle, 238 F.Supp. 218 (E.D. Pa.1965), Judge Wood ruled that Jackson v. Denno, 378 U.S. 368, 84 S.Ct. 1774, 12 L.Ed.2d 908 (1964) required a separate hearing on the voluntariness of the statements, and Escobedo v. Illinois, 378 U.S. 478, 84 S.Ct. 1758, 12 L.Ed.2d 977 (1964) and Massiah v. United States, 377 U.S. 201, 84 S.Ct. 1199, 12 [464]*464L.Ed.2d 246 (1964), rendered the statements inadmissible as a matter of law due to the absence of counsel. It should be emphasized that all these Supreme Court decisions had been announced subsequent to the Pennsylvania state courts’ review of the conviction.
On appeal, however, this court rejected the contention that Dickerson's statement was inadmissible “merely because it was given at a time when he was without the assistance of counsel.” United States ex rel. Dickerson v. Rundle, 363 F.2d 126, 129 (3 Cir. 1966), cert. den. Dickerson v. Rundle, 386 U.S. 916, 87 S.Ct. 880, 17 L.Ed.2d 790 (1967). Instead, we remanded the case to the state courts solely for the purpose of conducting a Jackson v. Denno hearing on the issue of voluntariness.
On remand, the state trial court determined that the statement was voluntarily given. By agreement of the parties, this finding was made on the basis of the testimony presented in the federal proceedings before Judge Wood. This holding was affirmed by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court for the third time in Commonwealth v. Dickerson, 428 Pa. 564, 237 A.2d 229 (1968), with Justice Roberts dissenting on the grounds that the police violated the defendant’s right to counsel when they obtained a “bring-up order” authorizing interrogation without affording or advising the defendant of his right to counsel.
Returning to the federal courts, Dickerson reiterated his arguments on volun-tariness and the right-to-counsel. Based on the same record which the state courts had reviewed, the district court concluded that the statement was involuntary. In issuing the writ, the court requested, if an appeal ensued, that we reconsider our prior decision which rejected the Sixth Amendment claim. After argument before a panel and two separate rehearings en banc, we have concluded that the writ should not issue.
The Voluntariness of the Statement
Section 2254(d) of Title 28 provides that in federal habeas corpus applications, state adjudications “shall be presumed to be correct.” It is only where “such factual determination is not fairly supported by the record” that a federal court is authorized to reject the state findings. Notwithstanding this admonition, the district court rejected the state finding of voluntariness on the basis of the identical evidence reviewed by the state courts. Having examined this record ourselves, we conclude that the state adjudication is more than fairly supported and should have been accepted by the district court.
The record shows that Dickerson voluntarily surrendered to the police three days after the housing guard was killed. There followed a period of interrogation from 5:20 p.m. to 9:18 p.m. on August 19, 1958. A preliminary hearing was held on the morning of August 20 for Dickerson and a co-suspect, Spencer Broaddus,1 after which both men were held for the grand jury. Within a few hours after the defendants were committed to the county prison, the detective bureau requested and obtained from a state quarter sessions judge a “bring-up order” which authorized removal of the defendants from prison for further police interrogation. A second round of questioning followed from 3:16 p.m. to 9:41 p.m. on August 20, at the conclusion of which Dickerson gave the statement which he attacks as involuntary. The interrogations of both Dickerson and Broaddus were apparently conducted by five police officers who at times employed the “Mutt and Jeff” technique of friendship and hostility. A lie detector test was also administered during the course of the second interrogation, following which the police accused Dickerson of lying. At the time these events transpired, Dickerson was 21 years old with nine years of formal education.
[465]*465We experience difficulty in equating these circumstances with those in eases such as Cicenia v. Lagay, 357 U.S. 504, 78 S.Ct. 1297, 2 L.Ed.2d 1523 (1958); Crooker v. California, 357 U.S. 433, 78 S.Ct. 1287, 2 L.Ed.2d 1448 (1958); Spano v. New York, 360 U.S. 315, 79 S.Ct. 1202, 3 L.Ed.2d 1265 (1969); Culombe v. Connecticut, 367 U.S. 568, 81 S.Ct. 1860, 6 L.Ed.2d 1037 (1961); Haynes v. Washington, 373 U.S. 503, 83 S.Ct. 1336, 10 L.Ed.2d 513 (1963) and Davis v. North Carolina, 384 U.S. 737, 86 S.Ct. 1761, 16 L.Ed.2d 895 (1966), relied on by Dickerson to establish his claim pf involuntariness. Certainly the facts here in no way approach those in Culombe, where the accused was a “moron or imbecile” who was subjected to five days of interrogation; or Davis, where sixteen days of incommunicado interrogation finally resulted in the extraction of a confession from an illiterate of very low mentality; or Crooker, where the accused was interrogated through the night with no opportunity for sleep; or Spano, where the intervention of a “friend” who was in fact a police officer resulted in a confession after eight hours of continuous interrogation into the middle of the night.
In contrast to these cases, the factual construct here is too frail to overturn the state adjudication that the confession was voluntary. There is nothing in Dickerson’s age, intelligence, or background which might indicate any great susceptibility to psychological coercion. And the question of the use of physical force is not even raised. Nowhere is it suggested that ample time for eating, sleeping, or resting was not afforded in the long interim between the two interrogations on August 19 and 20, or even during the interrogations themselves. And although it is true that the police did not give Dickerson what has become known as the Miranda warning, it should be emphasized that the presence of this factor does not justify a finding of coercion absent a convincing factual array. In virtually every case relied upon by Dickerson in support of the involuntariness claim — Davis, Haynes, Cu-lombe, Spano, Cicenia, and Crooker — the failure to caution the accused of his rights or an outright refusal to honor a request for counsel was but one factor in a blend of ingredients from which a conclusion of coercion was extracted. We find no such blend here; absent this, the state adjudication of voluntariness should stand.
The Bight to Counsel
As noted previously, when this case was last before us we rejected the contention that Dickerson’s statement was inadmissible because it was obtained when he was without counsel. In adopting a contrary position, the district court relied on the authority of two decisions: Escobedo v. Illinois, 378 U.S. 478, 84 S.Ct. 1758, 12 L.Ed.2d 977 (1964) and Massiah v. United States, 377 U.S. 201, 84 S.Ct. 1199, 12 L.Ed.2d 246 (1964). Both these decisions have since been declared non-retroactive in application. Escobedo in Johnson v. New Jersey, 384 U.S. 719, 86 S.Ct. 1772, 16 L.Ed.2d 882 (1966), and Massiah, by this Circuit last year, in United States ex rel. Allison v. New Jersey, 418 F.2d 332 (3 Cir. 1969). Consequently, if Dickerson’s 1960 conviction is to be reversed because he was denied the right to counsel, it must be on the basis of some other decisional law.
We stress that we are confronted here with the issue of the retroactive application of certain constitutional principles to an interrogation which occurred in 1958 — eight years before the Escobedo and Massiah decisions. Were we reviewing an interrogation which post-dated these cases, there is no question that Dickerson’s post-preliminary hearing interrogation could not have been effected without at least prior warnings of his constitutional rights. The authority of Escobedo, or Massiah, and the later case of Miranda would dictate such a result. Where the question of retroactivity is concerned, however, different considerations apply. First and foremost, it is essential that we determine by what de-
[466]*466cisional authority this appeal is governed. Dickerson urges the application of White v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 59, 83 S.Ct. 1050, 10 L.Ed.2d 193 (1963), retroactively applied in Arsenault v. Massachusetts, 393 U.S. 5, 89 S.Ct. 35, 21 L.Ed. 2d 5 (1968). In White, the Supreme Court held that the Sixth Amendment required the assistance of counsel at a preliminary hearing where a plea of guilty was entered. It is Dickerson’s position that the right to counsel recognized in White applies to all judicial proceedings, and in this case required the presence of defense counsel at the time the application for the “bring-up order” was presented to the quarter sessions judge.
The doctrines of White v. Maryland, supra, Hamilton v. Alabama, 368 U.S. 52, 82 S.Ct. 157, 7 L.Ed.2d 114 (1961), and Massiah v. United States, supra, are judicially crafted benchmarks which delineate particular phases in criminal proceedings when the right to counsel attaches absolutely under the Sixth Amendment. But this right attaches not so much by the chronology of proceedings or even by the interposition of ancillary judicial proceedings as it does by the accumulation of a circumstantial complex which heightens the probability that there will be violence to the constitutional rights of one whom the authorities are prosecuting. Thus, simply appearing at the preliminary hearing, without being required to testify or plead, is not such a critical period as to require the presence of counsel. United States ex rel. Budd v. Maroney, 398 F.2d 806 (3 Cir. 1968), citing Commonwealth ex rel. Parker v. Myers, 414 Pa. 427, 200 A.2d 770 (1964).
Similarly, the judicial proceedings designed to cause a “bring-up order” to issue was not a critical proceeding. The issuance of the “bring-up order” for Dickerson was not a judicial inquiry into the guilt vel non of the defendant; it was an administrative procedure authorizing the transfer of the prisoner from the county prison to police headquarters to make him available for questioning. Prior to the preliminary hearing, the prisoner could have been moved from one police lockup to another stationhouse or to detective headquarters without the necessity of any court order. Such movement, in and of itself, would not create a situation in which there would be a right to counsel. The issuance of a court order which accomplished, after a preliminary hearing, that which could have been effected before the hearing without such an order does not, in our view, constitute the critical event in the chain of proceedings. What is significant about the experience of Dickerson was not his temporary release from the prison by means of the “bring-up order,” but his incarceration in that prison as a result of the preliminary judicial proceeding. Certainly, if after the preliminary hearing there had been police interrogation of Dickerson at the prison, without the intervention of a court order bringing him up to police headquarters, the critical nature of the proceedings would not have been diluted. Such an interrogation at that time — under any circumstances, inside or outside the prison, with or without a “bring-up order”— would not have thrust the prisoner beyond the pale of Sixth Amendment protection.
The predicate to the “critical stage” here was the committing magistrate’s action at the preliminary hearing. It is the decision of the judicial officer to hold an accused for court to await grand jury action which affixes the label of “defendant” upon a person who hitherto was only a suspect in the police investigative process; once that label attaches, the absolute right of counsel also attaches in any situation where prejudice may result to the accused. And the right of counsel attaches at this time precisely for the same reasons it attaches following the formal rendition of an indictment by a grand jury. Massiah v. United States, supra; United States ex rel. O’Connor v. New Jersey, 405 F.2d 632 (3 Cir. 1969).
The root question thus relates not to his being questioned during a [467]*467“critical period,” but to what was the generating source of the “period.” Upon this determination hangs the question of retroactivity which is the controlling issue in this case.
As we have heretofore indicated, we do not believe that the routine request for the bring-up order and the subsequent signing of such an order by the judge generated the “critical period.” Instead, it is our view that the significant event in this case was the action taken in the earlier preliminary hearing. Accordingly, we believe that after the preliminary hearing Dickerson stood in the same legal shoes as did the defendant in Massiah for exactly the same reasons, and, therefore, it is the doctrine of Massiah and not White which must control this case. This dictinction is crucial because, as noted above, the full ret-roactivity afforded White by Arsenault has been denied Massiah by the holding of this court in United States ex rel. Allison v. New Jersey, supra.
In both Massiah and Allison the defendant was interrogated after indictment without counsel. Having denied retroactive relief to Allison, who relied on the authority of Massiah, it would be incongruous to afford relief to Dickerson whose interrogation occurred at an earlier and, conceivably, more formal stage in the proceedings. Surely Allison’s interrogation occurred at a stage equally as critical as Dickerson’s.
Assuming that this Circuit and the others which have confronted the application of Massiah have acted correctly in denying it retroactivity, United States ex rel. Romano v. Fay, 360 F.2d 389 (2 Cir. 1966); Lyles v. Beto, 363 F.2d 503 (5 Cir. 1966); United States ex rel. Long v. Pate, 418 F.2d 1028 (7 Cir., Nov. 18, 1969), the conclusion appears inescapable that White, insofar as the issue of retroactivity is concerned, must be confined to its facts, that is, the recognition of the right to counsel at formal judicial proceedings at which the defendant, by action or inaction, may lose substantial rights. Police interrogations cannot readily be included in this category. Furthermore, such a construction of the holding in White is thoroughly consistent with the retroactivity which was afforded in right-to-counsel cases such as Gideon v. Wainwright and Hamilton v. Alabama, while being consonant with the denial of retro-activity in decision such as Wade v. Gilbert and Massiah, which are also bottomed on the Sixth Amendment. The former group of cases involves the right to counsel at formal adversary proceedings where an “adjudication” made without legal assistance must be conclusively presumed to infect the very integrity of the proceedings. See McConnell v. Rhay, 393 U.S. 2, 89 S.Ct. 32, 21 L.Ed.2d 2 (1968). The latter group, while concerned that convictions not be obtained through extra-judicial methods deemed constitutionally infirm, recognizes that the absence of counsel at certain police proceedings does not foreclose the defendant from effectively and ultimately attacking, in a judicial setting with the assistance of counsel, the evidence obtained in violation of fundamental due process. Thus, interrogations can still be attacked as coercive, and lineups as unduly suggestive.
What has assisted the courts in differentiating the two groups of cases has been a calculated judgment, succinctly expressed in Johnson v. New Jersey, supra: “We are thus concerned with a question of probabilities and must take account, among other factors, of the extent to which other safeguards are available to protect the integrity of the truth-determining process at trial.” 384 U.S. at 729, 86 S.Ct. at 1779. Indeed, Johnson, although concerning itself directly with the retroactivity of Escobedo and Miranda and denying the extension of these doctrines, nonetheless presented a factual complex identical in relevant detail to the one portrayed here:
The police took petitioner Johnson into custody in Newark, New Jersey, at 5 p.m. on January 29, 1958, for the same crime as Cassidy. He was taken to detective headquarters and was booked. Later in the evening the po[468]*468lice brought him before a magistrate for a brief preliminary hearing. The record is unclear as to what transpired there. Both before and after the appearance in court, he was questioned in a routine manner. At 2 a.m. the police drove Johnson by auto to Camden, the scene of the homicide, 80 miles from Newark. During the auto ride he was again interrogated about the crime. Upon arrival in Camden at about 4:30 a.m., the police took him directly to detective headquarters and brought him before the chief detective, three other police officers, and a court stenographer. * * * The police then interrogated him until 6:20 a.m., a period of about one and one-half hours. During the course of the questioning, he made a full confession to the crime of felony murder.
Id. at 723, 86 S.Ct. at 1775.
Against the factual background of this landmark case which has denied ret-roactivity to Escobedo and Miranda, we cannot say that the Supreme Court was oblivious to the fact that the interrogation took place following the preliminary hearing. The denial of relief in Johnson can easily be construed as a silent rejection of the applicability of the rule of White v. Maryland to cases such as the one presented by this appeal.
Moreover, there is abundant justification for the denial of retroactivity in such cases. The practice of holding post-preliminary hearing interrogations without counsel has undoubtedly been a wide-spread practice in many states. In fact, the “bring-up order” involved here was printed on a standard form, and was so much a matter of routine that the orders were not made a part of the court’s record. To void interrogations made under the authority of White would create a hurricane of habeas corpus applications on an already overburdened judiciary, both state and federal. Irrespective of the philosophical difference which might be used to distinguish the various decisions, this final factor alone is weighty reason to deny retroac-tivity.
In conclusion, we reiterate that we do not consider White, Gideon, Hamilton, Wade or Massiah as stating separate and distinguishable rules of law, but rather as separate enunciations of the same principle: the Sixth Amendment right to counsel. Thus, where only the prospective application of this principle is concerned, we hold that the authority of any and all of these decisions establishes the right to counsel at interrogation following judicial proceedings at which an accused is formally charged with a criminal violation.
Where the question of retroactivity is concerned, however, we are compelled to conclude that (1) White and Hamilton cannot be applied to factual situations different from those presented in those cases, i.e. they must be confined to those situations where substantial rights may be lost by defendant’s action or inaction at formal judicial proceedings, and (2) the decision and rationale of this court in Allison must be applied to the case at bar.
Although Dickerson’s interrogation took place at a “critical stage” of the proceedings, as did the defendant’s in Massiah, logic and sound > judicial precedent compel us to reject Dickerson’s right to counsel claim solely on the basis of retroactivity considerations.
The opinion of the court was written prior to the Supreme Court’s recent decision in Coleman v. Alabama, 399 U.S. 1, 90 S.Ct. 1999, 26 L.Ed.2d 387 (June, 1970). Members of the court who join in the majority opinion do not consider that Coleman compels a different result here.
Accordingly, the judgment of the district court will be reversed.