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.