Lee Harvey Oswald: American former marine who assassinated John F. Kennedy

President">U.S. President John F. Kennedy in Dallas, Texas on November 22, 1963.

Lee Harvey Oswald
Oswald at his dallas arrest 1963
Background information
Born	(1939-10-18)October 18, 1939 New Orleans, Louisiana, U.S.
Died	November 24, 1963(1963-11-24) (aged 24) Parkland Memorial Hospital Dallas, Texas, U.S.
Spouse(s)	Marina Prusakova (m. 1961–1963, his death)
Nationality	American

A former U.S. Marine who lived in the Soviet Union for almost 3 years, Oswald was first arrested for the murder of police officer J. D. Tippit (1924-1963), who had been shot on a Dallas street shortly after Kennedy was killed. He was also soon suspected in the death of Kennedy as well.

Soon after he was arrested, Oswald talked to reporters in a hallway. Oswald shouted, "I didn't shoot anybody," and, "They've taken me in because of the fact that I lived in the Soviet Union. I'm just a patsy!" (a scapegoat or someone who is blamed for something someone else actually did). Later, at a press meeting, a reporter asked, "Did you kill the President?" and Oswald answered, "No, I have not been charged with that. In fact, nobody has said that to me yet. The first thing I heard about it was when the newspaper reporters in the hall asked me that question." As he was led from the room the question was called out, "What did you do in Russia?" and, "How did you hurt your eye?"; Oswald answered, "A policeman hit me."

Two days later, while being moved from police headquarters to the county jail, Oswald was shot and mortally wounded by nightclub owner Jack Ruby, in full view of television cameras broadcasting live.

In 1964, the Warren Commission concluded that Oswald acted alone in killing Kennedy, a conclusion reached previously by the FBI and Dallas Police. In 1979, The United States House of Representatives Select Committee on Assassinations agreed that Kennedy was killed by Oswald, but also concluded Kennedy`s death was probably as a result of a conspiracy. The members of this probable conspiracy were not identified.

Oswald had been born in New Orleans, 2 months after his father died, and his mother moved him and 2 brothers to several different towns, while marrying a third husband for 3 years, 1945-48. After attending 12 schools, around Fort Worth, New York City, and New Orleans, Oswald dropped out of 10th grade, at age 16, and worked as an office clerk/messenger. Moving back to Texas in July 1956, Oswald entered 10th grade in Fort Worth, but quit school again, at age 17 in October, to join the U.S. Marines, as had his brother Robert, after their half-brother John Pic joined the U.S. Coast Guard. In 1959, Oswald received a hardship discharge (for mother's health) to quit the Marines, but defected to the Soviet Union, for nearly 3 years. Having married Marina, the daughter of a Soviet security official, he re-defected back to the U.S. with her and their daughter, in June 1962.

 

They settled in Dallas, with his mother and brother Robert. Oswald worked 3 months in a welding company, then worked in a printing shop from October until being fired in April 1963. Oswald was later suspected of the April 10 attempt to shoot General Edwin Walker, using a rifle (and handgun) he received through mail-order in March. Oswald and Marina quickly moved to New Orleans in April, but she returned to Dallas in late September 1963, when he traveled to Mexico with failed plans to go to Cuba and the USSR. Instead, he returned to Dallas and began working at the Texas School Book Depository on October 16, 1963. The FBI was investigating Marina as a possible Soviet spy. That was one month before the shootings of President Kennedy and Officer Tippit.

Later, at an arranged press meeting, a reporter asked, "Did you kill the President?" and Oswald – who by that time had been advised of the charge of murdering Tippit, but had not yet been arraigned in Kennedy's death – answered, his voice breaking, "No, I have not been charged with that. In fact, nobody has said that to me yet. The first thing I heard about it was when the newspaper reporters in the hall asked me that question." A reporter informed Oswald that he had been charged. Oswald reacted shocked.

 

 

 

Jack Ruby about to shoot Oswald; Oswald being shot by Ruby; Jack Ruby mugshot after his arrest

Oswald died on November 24, 1963, from a gunshot wound at close range, by Jack Ruby. As Oswald was led through the basement of Dallas Police Headquarters to be transferred to the county jail, Ruby stepped out of the crowd of onlookers and fired a single shot. Oswald was survived by his wife Marina, 2-year-old daughter June, and 1-month-old daughter Rachel. Oswald cried out as he was shot and slumped to the concrete paving, as his manacled hands clutched at his abdomen and writhing with pain, moaning. The crowd outside the headquarters burst into applause when they heard that Oswald had been shot. a police detective Billy Combest suddenly recognized Ruby and exclaimed: "Jack, you son of a bitch!" A moaning Oswald was carried back into the basement level jail office. Combest asked Oswald, “Do you have anything you want to tell us now?” Oswald shook his head.^{: 184–185} He lost consciousness shortly thereafter.

Researcher Sean Murphy has suggested that a man standing on the Depository front steps in the Dave Wiegman, Jr. and James Darnell films during the assassination, called "Prayer Man", was Oswald and Oswald’s wife, Marina also expressed her belief. The suggestion is that that the official record of Marrion Baker and Roy Truly encountering Oswald in the TSBD second floor lunchroom was false and on the day of the assassination, Truly was overheard by reporter Kent Biffle, informing Dallas Police Captain Will Fritz (chief of homicide) that he had seen Oswald in “a storage room on the first floor”. Occhus Campbell (the vice President of the TSBD) also told the New York Herald Tribune the same day that he saw Oswald “shortly after the shooting” in the first floor storage room. Fritz even wrote that Truly saw Oswald “immediately after the shooting somewhere near the back stairway”. The storage room on the first floor was located under the front stairs. In addition, notes taken down by FBI Special Agent James P. Hosty and Fritz during the first interrogations of Oswald on November 22, indicate that when Oswald was asked to account for himself at the time of the assassination, he claimed that he “went outside to watch P. Parade” (referring to the presidential motorcade), and that he was “out with [William Shelley, a foreman at the depository] in front”. According to postal inspector Harry Holmes, Oswald said that he was at the “front entrance to the first floor” in the first floor vestibule by the front entrance and wanted to see what the “commotion” was when he encountered a policeman who told him to “step aside”.

The Mary Ferrell Foundation featured the book as amongst the most featured and reviewed of 2015. A 2015 podcast praised Murphy's research and concluded that "while it remains a hypothesis, Sean Murphy's incredible deducing manages to make a possible and sound case that the unknown man standing on the steps in the Darnell and Wiegman films can only reasonbly be Lee Oswald." One theorist praised Murphy’s research as "briliant" and "ground breaking" and stated, "...regardless of what one believes Oswald was doing at the time of the assassination, Sean Murphy’s research stands on solid ground, and Stan Dane is to be commended for writing this book". A website had readers call it "A must read for anyone who doesn't believe the official version of the JFK assassination events."

Stan Dane later created a blog promoting his book. Kamp later indicated his support in a 2018 podcast. One theorist scoffed at how "detractors say it is “someone else” or “a stranger” on the steps if not hallucinating completely and calling the figure a woman, an alien, or some species closely related to the unicorn."