Authors: Lamar Waldron
gunman to his wife, saying he must be a Secret Service agent. This gun-
man was at the far left end of the Book Depository, away from the far
right end that would later be called the sniper’s nest. In the sniper’s nest
window, Rowland saw a man with a dark complexion.6
Also in Dealey Plaza was Carolyn Walther. By the time she glanced
up at the Book Depository, in the area of the sniper’s nest she saw two
men, one with a gun. “I saw this man in a window, and he had a gun in
his hands, pointed downwards. The man evidently was in a kneeling
position, because his forearms were resting on the windowsill. There
was another man standing beside him, but I only saw a portion of his
body because he was standing.” She thought, “Well, they probably have
guards possibly in all the buildings,” so she “didn’t say anything” to
anyone at the time. She observed that “the man behind the partly opened
window had a dark brown suit, and the other man had a whitish-looking
shirt or jacket, dressed more like a workman that did manual labor. It
was the man with the gun that wore white.” She also noticed that one
of the men had a “darker complexion, perhaps a Mexican.”7
Ruby Henderson was also one of the spectators in Dealey Plaza, and
just after 12:24 PM (Central), she looked up at the windows of the high-
est floor of the Book Depository, in which people were visible. As she
later told the FBI, she saw two men, one wearing a white shirt and
one a dark shirt. The man “in the white shirt had dark hair and was
possibly a Mexican, but could have been a Negro as he appeared to be
dark-complexioned.” She couldn’t see the other man very well, but said
both “were standing back from the window and . . . working” on some-
thing, even as they were “looking out the window in anticipation of the
motorcade.”8 In light of Walther’s and Henderson’s accounts, it should
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be noted that Oswald was wearing what was described as a “reddish”
shirt that day at the Depository.9
Meanwhile, Anthony Summers writes that on “the sixth floor of the
Dallas County Jail,” an inmate named John Powell was “in custody on
minor charges.” However, he had “an ideal vantage point for observa-
tion of the [sniper’s nest].” Powell “and his cellmates watched two men
with a gun in the window . . . ‘fooling with the scope’ [on a rifle].” Powell
said that “one of the men appeared to have darker skin.”10
Just down the street from the Depository was the area known as the
“grassy knoll,” topped by a picket fence, behind which was a parking
lot usually used by Dallas deputies (it usually required a key to enter
and leave). Behind the parking lot were a rail yard and a small tower.
Inside the tower, Lee Bowers had noticed unusual activity behind the
picket fence. First, he had seen a dirty 1959 Oldsmobile station wagon
driven by a middle-aged white male enter the parking lot just before
noon. As the vehicle drove slowly around the lot, he noticed it had out-
of-state plates and a GOLDWATER FOR ’64 bumper sticker, but the
car soon left. As Bowers stated later that day to police, “at about 12:15
another car came into the area with a white man about 25 to 35 years old
driving. This car was a 1957 Ford, black, 2-door with Texas license. This
man appeared to have a mike or telephone in the car. Just a few minutes
after this car left at 12:20 PM, another car pulled in. This car was a 1961
Chevrolet Impala . . . white, and dirty up to the windows,” as if it had
driven a long way. “This car also had a GOLDWATER FOR ’64 sticker
[and] was driven by a white male about 25 to 35 years old with long
blond hair. . . . He left the area about 12:25 PM.”11
Two minutes later, a young soldier named Gordon Arnold was walk-
ing behind the picket fence, in the parking lot, when he was confronted
by a man “who showed me a badge and said he was with the Secret
Service, and that he didn’t want anybody up there.”12 However, there
were no Secret Service agents stationed there, or anywhere else in Dealey
Plaza. They were all either in the motorcade or at the Trade Mart, site of
JFK’s upcoming speech.
Just before JFK’s motorcade arrived, Bowers, in the railroad tower,
saw two men behind the picket fence. Summers quotes his description:
“One was ‘middle-aged’ and ‘fairly heavy-set,’ wearing a white shirt
and dark trousers. The other was ‘mid-twenties in either a plaid shirt or
plaid coat. . . . These men were the only strangers in the area. The others
were workers that I knew.’”13 Bowers later told the Warren Commission
that “they were standing within 10 or 15 feet of each other” and were
looking at the approach of JFK’s motorcade, “following the caravan as
it came down” toward the grassy knoll.14
As JFK’s motorcade entered Dealey Plaza, the huge throngs that had
packed downtown Dallas became smaller. Riding in the back seat of
the limo with Jackie, President Kennedy must have felt very pleased
that a city with such a conservative reputation had turned out in such
numbers. John Connally was riding in the limo with his wife, in the
seat ahead of JFK and Jackie, and he later said there had been “a quarter
of a million people on the parade route.” JFK had stopped the motor-
cade twice—once to shake hands with a little girl holding a sign that
said: PRESIDENT KENNEDY . . . WILL YOU SHAKE HANDS WITH
ME? and another time to speak with a nun and her group of schoolchil-
dren.15
William Greer, the driver of JFK’s limo, later said that when they turned
toward the book depository, “he felt relieved. He felt they were in the
clear, the crowds were thinning, and while he didn’t relax, he did
begin to feel relieved.” He then made the turn onto Elm, in front of the
Depository.16
In the limo, Nellie Connally had been delighted by the crowds, and
she told JFK, “Mr. Kennedy, you can’t say Dallas doesn’t love you.” JFK
replied with his last words: “That is very obvious.”17
In, and on the running boards of, the limo directly behind JFK’s were
eight Secret Service agents and two of JFK’s closest aides, Dave Powers
and Kenneth O’Donnell. Powers and O’Donnell are certain the first shot
came from the right front of their limo, from the grassy knoll. Powers
felt they were “riding into an ambush,” so it was quite logical that JFK’s
limo driver, Greer, slowed down. Secret Service Agent Lem Johns, two
cars behind Powers, is also certain the first shot came from the grassy
knoll.18 As the famous Zapruder film shows, JFK emerges from behind
a sign, clutching his throat. The wound, just below his Adam’s apple,
will be described as a small entrance wound by one of the first doctors
to see it.19
John Connally, hearing the first shot, turns to look at JFK, as Con-
nally clutches his Stetson hat in his right hand. Moments later, Connally
himself is hit in the back by a bullet that smashes his fifth right rib, exits
his chest, shatters his right wrist, and buries itself in his left thigh. Dave
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Powers will later stress to us that “the same bullet that hit JFK did
NOT
hit John Connally,” something Connally and his wife will always say
as well.20 According to Connally, “because of the ‘rapidity’ of the shots,
‘the thought immediately passed through my mind that there were two
or three people involved, or more, in this.’”21
Secret Service Agent Glenn Bennett, riding with Powers and
O’Donnell, sees “a nick in the back of President Kennedy’s coat, below
the shoulder. He thought the President had been hit in the back.”22 Agent
Bennett is correct, and JFK’s coat and shirt will be found to have bullet
holes in them almost six inches below the top of the collar.23 A shot is also
fired that completely misses JFK and his limo; it strikes a curb and kicks
up a piece of concrete that hits bystander James Teague.24
Finally, Powers and O’Donnell see the horrible, fatal head shot that
shatters JFK’s skull. Both are certain it came from the grassy knoll, as is
Secret Service Agent Paul Landis, who is in the limo with them. Landis
says he “saw the President’s head split open and pieces of flesh and
blood flying through the air. My reaction at this time was that the shot
came from somewhere toward the front . . . along the right-hand side
of the road.”25
Motorcycle patrolman Bobby Hargis, riding behind and slightly to
the left of JFK’s limo, was splattered with JFK’s blood and brain tissue.
A piece of JFK’s skull, from the back of his head, was thrown onto the
median lawn to the left of Patrolman Hargis. Both the blood splatter on
Hargis and the skull fragment indicate JFK’s fatal head shot came from
JFK’s right front, from the grassy knoll.26 From his vantage point in the
railroad tower, Bowers said that “when the shots were fired at the Presi-
dent, in the vicinity of where the two men I have described were, there
was a flash of light . . . or smoke.”27 In the motorcade, Jackie tried to crawl
back to retrieve a piece of JFK’s brain or skull on the trunk of the limo,
before being pushed back in by Secret Service Agent Clint Hill, who had
sprinted from Powers’s limo to aid her. JFK’s driver finally picked up
speed and began rushing toward Parkland Hospital.
Chapter Ten
The immediate aftermath of JFK’s murder, from the time the shots rang
out in Dealey Plaza until Oswald’s arrest one hour and twenty minutes
later, is one of the most intensely analyzed time spans in recent history.
Hundreds of authors have written about it, government committees
have examined and reenacted the sequence of events, and thousands
of documents about it are among the four million–plus pages of declas-
sified JFK files at the National Archives. The following is not intended
to be a definitive account. Instead, it focuses on credible evidence, most
obtained by government investigators, that was overlooked, ignored,
or suppressed in the rush to solve JFK’s murder in a way that would
avoid a confrontation with the Soviets and not cost the lives of Com-
mander Almeida, his allies, and family—or cost certain officials their
jobs or political futures.
Even as the motorcade’s lead car picked up speed to leave Dealey Plaza,
heading under the railroad bridge of the triple underpass toward the
Stemmons freeway and Parkland Hospital, several of its passengers
focused on the grassy knoll and the rail yards behind its picket fence
and concrete terraces. Secret Service Agent Forrest Sorrels, in charge of
the Dallas office, said that he “looked towards the top of the terrace to
my right, as the sound of the shots seemed to come from that direction.”1
Dallas Police Chief Curry, driving the lead car, radioed to “get a man on
top of that triple underpass and see what happened up there.” Sheriff
Bill Decker, sitting beside Sorrels, sent the order to “move all available
men out of my office [and] into the railroad yard to try to determine
what happened in there.”2
Patrolman Hargis, covered in JFK’s blood, parked his motorcycle and
headed up the grassy knoll.3 Dallas Deputy Sheriff Harold Elkins said he
“immediately ran to the area from which it sounded like the shots had
been fired. This is an area between the railroads and the Texas School
Book Depository,” where the knoll is.4 Dallas Deputy Harry Weatherford
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“heard a loud report, which I thought was a railroad torpedo, as it
sounded as if it came from the railroad yard” and after hearing two
more shots, he began “running towards the railroad yards where the
sound seemed to come from.”5
Just after the shooting, off-duty Dallas policeman Tom Tilson was
driving near the knoll. Journalist Anthony Summers writes that Officer
Tilson “saw a man ‘slipping and sliding’ down the railway embank-
ment from behind the knoll.” The man was “38-40 years, 5’ 8” . . . dark
hair, dark clothing,” and resembled Jack Ruby (whom Tilson, like many
Dallas policemen, knew). The man “had a car parked there, a black car.
He threw something in the back seat and went around the front hur-
riedly and got in the car and took off.” Tilson attempted to follow the
car, but lost it. Shortly after, a car with a stolen Georgia license plate
was reported speeding through downtown Dallas.6 A witness on the
roof of the Terminal Annex Building, J. C. Price, told the sheriff’s office
he saw a man running through the rail yard “after the volley of shots.
This man had a white dress shirt, no tie, and khaki-colored trousers.
His hair appeared to be long and dark and his agility running [meant
he] could be about twenty-five years of age. He had something in his
hand [that] may have been a head piece” or “might have been a gun.”7
Deputy Seymour Weitzman ran to the knoll after hearing the shots. A
railroad worker there told the Deputy he “thought he saw somebody
throw something through a bush,” and pointed out an area of the fence
“where there was a bunch of shrubbery” as the place he thought the