by Gerald Boerner
“One of your guys did it.”
— Robert Kennedy, about Cuban involvement in the assassination
“There has to be more to it.”
— Edward Kennedy
“We have not been told the truth about Oswald.”
— Richard Russell, Senator & member of Warren Commission
“There’s so much bitterness I thought they would get one of us, but Jack, after all he’d been through, never worried about it.”
— Robert Kennedy
“I’ll tell you something about Kennedy’s murder that will rock you.. Kennedy was trying to get Castro, but Castro got to him first.”
— Lyndon Johnson
“Hoover lied his eyes out to the Commission – on Oswald, on Ruby, on their friends, the bullets, the guns, you name it…”
— Hale Boggs, Majority Leader & member of Warren Commission
“On what basis is it claimed that two shots caused all the wounds?…..It seemed to me that Governor Connally’s statement negates such a conclusion. I could not agree with this statement.”
— John Sherman Cooper, member of Warren Commission
“I’m as certain as one can be that there was no other gun shot… But it’s not silliness to speculate that somebody was behind Oswald… I’d almost bet on the [anti-Castro] Cubans.”
— Nicholas Katzenbach, Asst. Attorney General
“Undoubtedly if word leaked of President Kennedy’s efforts [the Attwood initiative noted below], that might have been exactly the kind of thing to trigger some explosion of fanatical violence. It seems to me a possibility not to be excluded.”
— Arthur Schlesinger, JFK Special Advisor
“I told the FBI what I had heard [two shots from behind the grassy knoll fence], but they said it couldn’t have happened that way and that I must have been imagining things. So I testified the way they wanted me to. I just didn’t want to stir up any more pain and trouble for the family.”
— Ken O’Donnell, Special Assistant to John F. Kennedy
“Why don’t we play the game a bit smarter for a change. They pinned the assassination of Kennedy on the right wing, the Birchers. It was done by a Communist and it was the greatest hoax that has ever been perpetuated. And I respectfully suggest, can’t we pin this on one of theirs?”
— Richard Nixon
“If the CIA did find out what we were doing [talks toward normalizing relations with Cuba], this would have trickled down to the lower echelon of activists, and Cuban exiles, and the more gung-ho CIA people who had been involved since the Bay of Pigs…..I can understand why they would have reacted so violently. This was the end of their dreams of returning to Cuba, and they might have been impelled to take violent action. Such as assassinating the President.”
— William Attwood, Ambassador to the U.N.
The Assassination of John F. Kennedy
The assassination of John F. Kennedy, the thirty-fifth President of the United States, took place on Friday, November 22, 1963, in Dallas, Texas, at 12:30 p.m. Central Standard Time (18:30 UTC) in Dealey Plaza. Kennedy was fatally shot while riding with his wife Jacqueline in a Presidential motorcade. The ten-month investigation of the Warren Commission of 1963–1964, the United States House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) of 1976–1979, and other government investigations concluded that the President was assassinated by Lee Harvey Oswald who himself was murdered before he could stand trial.
Ike Altgens photo of presidential limo
taken between the first and second
shots that hit President Kennedy.
Kennedy’s left hand is at his throat
and Mrs. Kennedy’s left hand is
holding his arm
This conclusion was initially met with support among the American public, but polls conducted from 1966 show as many as 80% of the American public hold beliefs contrary to these findings. The assassination is still the subject of widespread debate and has spawned numerous conspiracy theories and alternative scenarios. In 1979, the House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) found both the original FBI investigation and the Warren Commission Report to be seriously flawed. The HSCA also concluded that there were at least four shots fired and that it was probable that a conspiracy existed. Later studies, including one by the National Academy of Sciences, have called into question the accuracy of the evidence used by the HSCA to support its finding of four shots.
The assassination
Just before 12:30 p.m. CST, Kennedy’s limousine entered Dealey Plaza and slowly approached the Texas School Book Depository. Nellie Connally, then the First Lady of Texas, turned around to Kennedy, who was sitting behind her, and commented, "Mr. President, you can’t say Dallas doesn’t love you," which President Kennedy acknowledged.
The assassination site in 2008.
White arrows indicate the sixth
floor window and the mark on the
road where Kennedy was hit the
second time.
When the Presidential limousine turned and passed the Depository and continued down Elm Street, shots were fired at Kennedy; a clear majority of witnesses recalled hearing three shots. There was hardly any reaction in the crowd to the first shot, many later saying they thought they had heard a firecracker or the exhaust backfire of a vehicle. President Kennedy and Texas Governor John Connally, sitting beside his wife in front of the Kennedys in the limousine, both turned abruptly from looking to their left to looking to their right. Connally immediately recognized the sound of a high-powered rifle. "Oh, no, no, no," he said as he turned further right, and then started to turn left, attempting to see President Kennedy behind him.
Polaroid photo by Mary Moorman
taken a fraction of a second after
the fatal shot
According to the Warren Commission and the House Select Committee on Assassinations, as President Kennedy waved to the crowds on his right with his right arm upraised on the side of the limo, a shot entered his upper back, penetrated his neck, and exited his throat. He raised his clenched fists up to his neck and leaned forward and to his left, as Mrs. Kennedy put her arms around him in concern. Governor Connally also reacted, as the same bullet penetrated his back, chest, right wrist, and left thigh. He said, "My God, they are going to kill us all!"
The final shot took place when the Presidential limousine was passing in front of the John Neely Bryan north pergola concrete structure. As the shot was heard, a fist-size hole exploded out from the right side of President Kennedy’s head, covering the interior of the car and a nearby motorcycle officer with blood and brain tissue. Then Mrs. Kennedy said, "I have his brains in my hand."
Dealey Plaza and Texas School
Book Depository in 1969, looking
much as they did in November,
1963
United States Secret Service agent Clint Hill was riding on the left front running board of the car immediately behind the Presidential limousine. Sometime after the shot that hit the president in the back, Hill jumped off and ran to overtake the limousine. After the president had been shot in the head, Mrs. Kennedy began to climb out on the back of the limousine, though she later had no recollection of doing so. Hill believed she was reaching for something, perhaps a piece of the president’s skull. He jumped onto the back of the limousine while at the same time Mrs. Kennedy returned to her seat, and he clung to the car as it exited Dealey Plaza and sped to Parkland Memorial Hospital.
Lee Harvey Oswald
Lee Harvey Oswald, reported missing to the Dallas police by his supervisor, Roy Truly, at the Depository, was arrested an hour and 20 minutes after the assassination for killing a Dallas police officer, J. D. Tippit, who had spotted Oswald walking along a sidewalk in the residential neighborhood of Oak Cliff. He was captured in a nearby movie theater.
Oswald resisted, attempting to shoot the arresting officer, Maurice N. McDonald, with a pistol, and was forcibly restrained by the police. He was charged with the murders of Tippit and Kennedy later that night. Oswald denied shooting anyone and claimed he was a patsy. Oswald’s case never came to trial because two days later, while being escorted to an armored van for transfer from Dallas Police Headquarters to the Dallas County Jail, he was shot and killed by Dallas nightclub owner Jack Ruby.
Kennedy declared dead in the emergency room
The staff at Parkland Hospital’s Trauma Room 1 who treated Kennedy observed that his condition was "moribund," meaning that he had no chance of survival upon arriving at the hospital. Dr. George Burkley, the President’s personal physician, determined the head wound was the cause of death. Dr. Burkley signed President Kennedy’s death certificate.
A few minutes after 2:00 p.m. CST (20:00 UTC), and after a confrontation between Dallas police and Secret Service agents, Kennedy’s body was placed in a casket and taken from Parkland Hospital and driven to Air Force One. The casket was then loaded aboard the airplane through the rear door, where it remained at the rear of the passenger compartment, in place of a removed row of seats. The body was removed before a forensic examination could be conducted by the Dallas County coroner (Earl Rose), which violated Texas state law (the murder was a state crime and occurred under Texas legal jurisdiction). At that time, it was not a federal offense to kill the President of the United States.
Lyndon B. Johnson is sworn in
as U.S. President aboard Air
Force One in Dallas
Vice-President Johnson (who had been riding two cars behind Kennedy in the motorcade through Dallas and was not injured) became President of the United States upon Kennedy’s initial incapacitation. At 2:38 p.m. Johnson took the oath of office on board Air Force One just before it departed from Love Field.
Warren Commission
The first official investigation of the assassination was established by President Johnson on November 29, 1963, a week after the assassination. The commission was headed by Earl Warren, Chief Justice of the United States and became universally (but unofficially) known as the Warren Commission.
The Warren Commission presents
its report to President Johnson
In late September 1964, after a 10-month investigation, the Warren Commission Report was published. The Commission concluded that it could not find any persuasive evidence of a domestic or foreign conspiracy involving any other person(s), group(s), or country(ies). The Commission found that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone in the murder of Kennedy, and that Jack Ruby acted alone in the murder of Oswald. The theory that Oswald acted alone is informally called the Lone gunman theory. The commission also concluded that only three bullets were fired during the assassination and that Oswald fired all three bullets from the Texas School Book Depository behind the motorcade. The Commission also laid out several scenarios concerning the timing of the shots, but that the three shots were fired in a time period ranging from approximately 4.8 to in excess of 7 seconds.
The commission also concluded that:
-
one shot likely missed the motorcade (it could not determine which of the three),
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the first shot to hit anyone struck Kennedy in the upper back, exited near the front of his neck and likely continued on to cause all of Governor Connally’s injuries, and
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the last shot to hit anyone struck Kennedy in the head, fatally wounding him.
It noted that three empty shells were found in the sixth floor in the book depository, and a rifle identified as the one used in the shooting – Oswald’s Italian military surplus 6.5×52 mm Model 91/38 Carcano – was found hidden nearby. The Commission offered as a likely explanation that the same bullet that wounded Kennedy also caused all of Governor Connally’s wounds. This theory has become known as the "single bullet theory" or the "magic" bullet theory (as it is commonly referred to by its critics and detractors). The Commission also looked into other matters beside who killed the President and criticized weaknesses in security, which has resulted in greatly increased security whenever the President travels.
Other Events on this Day
-
In 1718…
Edward Teach, better known as Blackbeard, is killed off North Carolina’s Outer Banks in a battle with ships sent from Virginia to hunt down the pirate. -
In 1842…
Mount St. Helens in Washington erupts during an active period lasting several years. -
In 1935…
Pan American Airways’ China Clipper begins the first transpacific airmail service, from Alameda, California, to Manila, in the Philippines. -
In 1943…
President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, and Chinese leader Chiang Kai-shek meet in Cairo to discuss World War II in Asia and the Pacific. -
In 1963…
John F. Kennedy is assassinated in Dallas, and Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson is sworn in as the thirty-sixth U.S. president.
Dates and events based on:
William J. Bennett and John Cribb, (2008) The American Patriot’s Almanac Daily Readings on America. (Kindle Edition)
Background information is from Wikipedia articles on:
The John F. Kennedy Assassination that can be found at…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_F._Kennedy_assassination
Also see…
JFK Assassination Quotes by Government Officials…
http://tr.im/Fv1z
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