Report of the President's Commission on the Assassination of President John F. Kennedy

by United States. Warren Commission

PRIOR ATTEMPT TO KILL

The Attempt on the Life of Maj. Gen. Edwin A. Walker

At approximately 9 p.m., on April 10, 1963, in Dallas, Tex., Maj. Gen. Edwin A. Walker, an active and controversial figure on the American political scene since his resignation from the U.S. Army in 1961, narrowly escaped death when a rifle bullet fired from outside his home passed near his head as he was seated at his desk.[C4-700] There were no eyewitnesses, although a 14-year-old boy in a neighboring house claimed that immediately after the shooting he saw two men, in separate cars, drive out of a church parking lot adjacent to Walker’s home.[C4-701] A friend of Walker’s testified that two nights before the shooting he saw “two men around the house peeking in windows.”[C4-702] General Walker gave this information to the police before the shooting, but it did not help solve the crime. Although the bullet was recovered from Walker’s house (see app. X, [p. 562]), in the absence of a weapon it was of little investigatory value. General Walker hired two investigators to determine whether a former employee might have been involved in the shooting.[C4-703] Their results were negative. Until December 3, 1963, the Walker shooting remained unsolved.

The Commission evaluated the following evidence in considering whether Lee Harvey Oswald fired the shot which almost killed General Walker: (1) A note which Oswald left for his wife on the evening of the shooting, (2) photographs found among Oswald’s possessions after the assassination of President Kennedy, (3) firearm identification of the bullet found in Walker’s home, and (4) admissions and other statements made to Marina Oswald by Oswald concerning the shooting.

Note left by Oswald.—On December 2, 1963, Mrs. Ruth Paine turned over to the police some of the Oswalds’ belongings, including a Russian volume entitled “Book of Useful Advice.”[C4-704] In this book was an undated note written in Russian. In translation, the note read as follows:

1. This is the key to the mailbox which is located in the main post office in the city on Ervay Street. This is the same street where the drugstore, in which you always waited is located. You will find the mailbox in the post office which is located 4 blocks from the drugstore on that street. I paid for the box last month so don’t worry about it.

2. Send the information as to what has happened to me to the Embassy and include newspaper clippings (should there be anything about me in the newspapers). I believe that the Embassy will come quickly to your assistance on learning everything.

3. I paid the house rent on the 2d so don’t worry about it.

4. Recently I also paid for water and gas.

5. The money from work will possibly be coming. The money will be sent to our post office box. Go to the bank and cash the check.

6. You can either throw out or give my clothing, etc. away. Do not keep these. However, I prefer that you hold on to my personal papers (military, civil, etc.).

7. Certain of my documents are in the small blue valise.

8. The address book can be found on my table in the study should need same.

9. We have friends here. The Red Cross also will help you. (Red Cross in English). [sic]

10. I left you as much money as I could, $60 on the second of the month. You and the baby [apparently] can live for another 2 months using $10 per week.

11. If I am alive and taken prisoner, the city jail is located at the end of the bridge through which we always passed on going to the city (right in the beginning of the city after crossing the bridge).[C4-705]

James C. Cadigan, FBI handwriting expert, testified that this note was written by Lee Harvey Oswald.[C4-706]

Prior to the Walker shooting on April 10, Oswald had been attending typing classes on Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday evenings. He had quit these classes at least a week before the shooting, which occurred on a Wednesday night.[C4-707] According to Marina Oswald’s testimony, on the night of the Walker shooting, her husband left their apartment on Neely Street shortly after dinner. She thought he was attending a class or was “on his own business.”[C4-708] When he failed to return by 10 or 10:30 p.m., Marina Oswald went to his room and discovered the note. She testified: “When he came back I asked him what had happened. He was very pale. I don’t remember the exact time, but it was very late. And he told me not to ask him any questions. He only told me he had shot at General Walker.”[C4-709] Oswald told his wife that he did not know whether he had hit Walker; according to Marina Oswald when he learned on the radio and in the newspapers the next day that he had missed, he said that he “was very sorry that he had not hit him.”[C4-710] Marina Oswald’s testimony was fully supported by the note itself which appeared to be the work of a man expecting to be killed, or imprisoned, or to disappear. The last paragraph directed her to the jail and the other paragraphs instructed her on the disposal of Oswald’s personal effects and the management of her affairs if he should not return.

It is clear that the note was written while the Oswalds were living in Dallas before they moved to New Orleans in the spring of 1963. The references to house rent and payments for water and gas indicated that the note was written when they were living in a rented apartment; therefore it could not have been written while Marina Oswald was living with the Paines. Moreover, the reference in paragraph 3 to paying “the house rent on the 2d” would be consistent with the period when the Oswalds were living on Neely Street since the apartment was rented on March 3, 1963. Oswald had paid the first month’s rent in advance on March 2, 1963, and the second month’s rent was paid on either April 2 or April 3.[C4-711] The main post office “on Ervay Street” refers to the post office where Oswald rented box 2915 from October 9, 1962, to May 14, 1963.[C4-712] Another statement which limits the time when it could have been written is the reference “you and the baby,” which would indicate that it was probably written before the birth of Oswald’s second child on October 20, 1963.

Oswald had apparently mistaken the county jail for the city jail. From Neely Street the Oswalds would have traveled downtown on the Beckley bus, across the Commerce Street viaduct and into downtown Dallas through the Triple Underpass.[C4-713] Either the viaduct or the underpass might have been the “bridge” mentioned in the last paragraph of the note. The county jail is at the corner of Houston and Main Streets “right in the beginning of the city” after one travels through the underpass.

Photographs.—In her testimony before the Commission in February 1964, Marina Oswald stated that when Oswald returned home on the night of the Walker shooting, he told her that he had been planning the attempt for 2 months. He showed her a notebook 3 days later containing photographs of General Walker’s home and a map of the area where the house was located.[C4-714] Although Oswald destroyed the notebook,[C4-715] three photographs found among Oswald’s possessions after the assassination were identified by Marina Oswald as photographs of General Walker’s house.[C4-716] Two of these photographs were taken from the rear of Walker’s house.[C4-717] The Commission confirmed, by comparison with other photographs, that these were, indeed, photographs of the rear of Walker’s house.[C4-718] An examination of the window at the rear of the house, the wall through which the bullet passed, and the fence behind the house indicated that the bullet was fired from a position near the point where one of the photographs was taken.[C4-719]

The third photograph identified by Marina Oswald depicts the entrance to General Walker’s driveway from a back alley.[C4-720] Also seen in the picture is the fence on which Walker’s assailant apparently rested the rifle.[C4-721] An examination of certain construction work appearing in the background of this photograph revealed that the picture was taken between March 8 and 12, 1963, and most probably on either March 9 or March 10.[C4-722] Oswald purchased the money order for the rifle on March 12, the rifle was shipped on March 20,[C4-723] and the shooting occurred on April 10. A photography expert with the FBI was able to determine that this picture was taken with the Imperial Reflex camera owned by Lee Harvey Oswald.[C4-724] (See app. X, [p. 596].)

A fourth photograph, showing a stretch of railroad tracks, was also identified by Marina Oswald as having been taken by her husband, presumably in connection with the Walker shooting.[C4-725] Investigation determined that this photograph was taken approximately seven-tenths of a mile from Walker’s house.[C4-726] Another photograph of railroad tracks found among Oswald’s possessions was not identified by his wife, but investigation revealed that it was taken from a point slightly less than half a mile from General Walker’s house.[C4-727] Marina Oswald stated that when she asked her husband what he had done with the rifle, he replied that he had buried it in the ground or hidden it in some bushes and that he also mentioned a railroad track in this connection. She testified that several days later Oswald recovered his rifle and brought it back to their apartment.[C4-728]

Firearms identification.—In the room beyond the one in which General Walker was sitting on the night of the shooting the Dallas police recovered a badly mutilated bullet which had come to rest on a stack of paper.[C4-729] The Dallas City-County Investigation Laboratory tried to determine the type of weapon which fired the bullet. The oral report was negative because of the battered condition of the bullet.[C4-730] On November 30, 1963, the FBI requested the bullet for ballistics examination; the Dallas Police Department forwarded it on December 2, 1963.[C4-731]

Robert A. Frazier, an FBI ballistics identification expert, testified that he was “unable to reach a conclusion” as to whether or not the bullet recovered from Walker’s house had been fired from the rifle found on the sixth floor of the Texas School Book Depository Building. He concluded that “the general rifling characteristics of the rifle * * * are of the same type as those found on the bullet * * * and, further, on this basis * * * the bullet could have been fired from the rifle on the basis of its land and groove impressions.”[C4-732] Frazier testified further that the FBI avoids the category of “probable” identification. Unless the missile or cartridge case can be identified as coming from a particular weapon to the exclusion of all others, the FBI refuses to draw any conclusion as to probability.[C4-733] Frazier testified, however, that he found no microscopic characteristics or other evidence which would indicate that the bullet was not fired from the Mannlicher-Carcano rifle owned by Lee Harvey Oswald. It was a 6.5-millimeter bullet and, according to Frazier, “relatively few” types of rifles could produce the characteristics found on the bullet.[C4-734]

Joseph D. Nicol, superintendent of the Illinois Bureau of Criminal Identification and Investigation, conducted an independent examination of this bullet and concluded “that there is a fair probability” that the bullet was fired from the rifle used in the assassination of President Kennedy.[C4-735] In explaining the difference between his policy and that of the FBI on the matter of probable identification, Nicol said:

I am aware of their position. This is not, I am sure, arrived at without careful consideration. However, to say that because one does not find sufficient marks for identification that it is a negative, I think is going overboard in the other direction. And for purposes of probative value, for whatever it might be worth, in the absence of very definite negative evidence, I think it is permissible to say that in an exhibit such as 573 there is enough on it to say that it could have come, and even perhaps a little stronger, to say that it probably came from this, without going so far as to say to the exclusion of all other guns. This I could not do.[C4-736]

Although the Commission recognizes that neither expert was able to state that the bullet which missed General Walker was fired from Oswald’s rifle to the exclusion of all others, this testimony was considered probative when combined with the other testimony linking Oswald to the shooting.

Additional corroborative evidence.—The admissions made to Marina Oswald by her husband are an important element in the evidence that Lee Harvey Oswald fired the shot at General Walker. As shown above, the note and the photographs of Walker’s house and of the nearby railroad tracks provide important corroboration for her account of the incident. Other details described by Marina Oswald coincide with facts developed independently of her statements. She testified that her husband had postponed his attempt to kill Walker until that Wednesday because he had heard that there was to be a gathering at the church next door to Walker’s house on that evening. He indicated that he wanted more people in the vicinity at the time of the attempt so that his arrival and departure would not attract great attention.[C4-737] An official of this church told FBI agents that services are held every Wednesday at the church except during the month of August.[C4-738] Marina Oswald also testified that her husband had used a bus to return home.[C4-739] A study of the bus routes indicates that Oswald could have taken any one of several different buses to Walker’s house or to a point near the railroad tracks where he may have concealed the rifle.[C4-740] It would have been possible for him to take different routes in approaching and leaving the scene of the shooting.

Conclusion.—Based on (1) the contents of the note which Oswald left for his wife on April 10, 1963, (2) the photographs found among Oswald’s possessions, (3) the testimony of firearms identification experts, and (4) the testimony of Marina Oswald, the Commission has concluded that Lee Harvey Oswald attempted to take the life of Maj. Gen. Edwin A. Walker (Resigned, U.S. Army) on April 10, 1963. The finding that Lee Harvey Oswald attempted to murder a public figure in April 1963 was considered of probative value in this investigation, although the Commission’s conclusion concerning the identity of the assassin was based on evidence independent of the finding that Oswald attempted to kill General Walker.

Richard M. Nixon Incident

Another alleged threat by Oswald against a public figure involved former Vice President Richard M. Nixon. In January 1964, Marina Oswald and her business manager, James Martin, told Robert Oswald, Lee Harvey Oswald’s brother, that Oswald had once threatened to shoot former Vice President Richard M. Nixon.[C4-741] When Marina Oswald testified before the Commission on February 3-6, 1964, she had failed to mention the incident when she was asked whether Oswald had ever expressed any hostility toward any official of the United States.[C4-742] The Commission first learned of this incident when Robert Oswald related it to FBI agents on February 19, 1964,[C4-743] and to the Commission on February 21.[C4-744]

Marina Oswald appeared before the Commission again on June 11, 1964, and testified that a few days before her husband’s departure from Dallas to New Orleans on April 24, 1963, he finished reading a morning newspaper “* * * and put on a good suit. I saw that he took a pistol. I asked him where he was going, and why he was getting dressed. He answered ‘Nixon is coming. I want to go and have a look.’” He also said that he would use the pistol if the opportunity arose.[C4-745] She reminded him that after the Walker shooting he had promised never to repeat such an act. Marina Oswald related the events which followed:

I called him into the bathroom and I closed the door and I wanted to prevent him and then I started to cry. And I told him that he shouldn’t do this, and that he had promised me.

* * * * *

I remember that I held him. We actually struggled for several minutes and then he quieted down.[C4-746]

She stated that it was not physical force which kept him from leaving the house. “I couldn’t keep him from going out if he really wanted to.”[C4-747] After further questioning she stated that she might have been confused about shutting him in the bathroom, but that “there is no doubt that he got dressed and got a gun.”[C4-748]

Oswald’s revolver was shipped from Los Angeles on March 20, 1963,[C4-749] and he left for New Orleans on April 24, 1963.[C4-750] No edition of either Dallas newspaper during the period January 1, 1963, to May 15, 1963, mentioned any proposed visit by Mr. Nixon to Dallas.[C4-751] Mr. Nixon advised the Commission that the only time he was in Dallas in 1963 was on November 20-21, 1963.[C4-752] An investigation failed to reveal any invitation extended to Mr. Nixon during the period when Oswald’s threat reportedly occurred.[C4-753] The Commission has concluded, therefore, that regardless of what Oswald may have said to his wife he was not actually planning to shoot Mr. Nixon at that time in Dallas.

On April 23, 1963, Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson was in Dallas for a visit which had been publicized in the Dallas newspapers throughout April.[C4-754] The Commission asked Marina Oswald whether she might have misunderstood the object of her husband’s threat. She stated, “there is no question that in this incident it was a question of Mr. Nixon.”[C4-755] When asked later whether it might have been Mr. Johnson, she said, “Yes, no. I am getting a little confused with so many questions. I was absolutely convinced it was Nixon and now after all these questions I wonder if I am right in my mind.”[C4-756] She stated further that Oswald had only mentioned Nixon’s name once during the incident.[C4-757] Marina Oswald might have misunderstood her husband. Mr. Johnson was the then Vice President and his visit took place on April 23d.[C4-758] This was 1 day before Oswald left for New Orleans and Marina appeared certain that the Nixon incident “wasn’t the day before. Perhaps 3 days before.”[C4-759]

Marina Oswald speculated that the incident may have been unrelated to an actual threat. She said,

* * * It might have been that he was just trying to test me. He was the kind of person who could try and wound somebody in that way. Possibly he didn’t want to go out at all but was just doing this all as a sort of joke, not really as a joke but rather to simply wound me, to make me feel bad.[C4-760]

In the absence of other evidence that Oswald actually intended to shoot someone at this time, the Commission concluded that the incident, as described by Marina Oswald, was of no probative value in the Commission’s decision concerning the identity of the assassin of President Kennedy.