President's Commission on the Assassination of - The Warren Commission (Complete Edition)

But they can give you no blanket—or have not chosen to give you any blanket assurance of the use of the pictures, and have given you completely the choice that if you have any concern about it whatsoever, that you retain the pictures yourself.

The choice they have given you is if you wish to have—to present the pictures to the Commission in the course of your testimony, they will be glad to receive them, they will—there will be copies made of them, the originals, of course, will remain in your custody. Their purposes will be—their use will be the uses of the Commission. But the Commission gives you no assurance whatsoever of the use, and gives you the complete choice of either submitting them or not under those circumstances.

Mrs. Oswald. Well, being a layman, I understand, I think, what you are telling me, in a way. But, on the other hand, being a layman, I feel actually I have no choice.

You have to understand I am not an attorney.

Mr. Doyle. But you do have a choice, because you are not here under subpena. Your materials have not been subpenaed. The Commission has advised you openly here that you may submit them or not as you see fit to do. So there is no force, no legal force at all. This is absolutely up to you.

The only thing that has been expressed to you is that they can give you no assurance or guarantee as to what use the Commission will make of them, that they will make what use they believe in their judgment is required by the Executive order and the purposes of their investigation.

Mrs. Oswald. I understand. And that is why I wanted the Commission to have all pictures that I have.

Now, may I request something? I don't think it is presumptuous of me. Maybe it is.

Could I sign for my rights for these pictures, and then let you have the pictures?

I am afraid that they may get lost.

The Chairman. I think, Mrs. Oswald, if you have any doubt us to whether a misuse will be made of your papers, or if they are as valuable, moneywise, to you as you think they are, then I would suggest to you that you retain them yourself. We, of course, would be interested to see them, and they might be helpful—I don't know, because I don't know what you have there, or what context the pictures will be in.

But as your lawyer has told you, you are not under subpena here, you appeared voluntarily because you requested to testify before us. Those documents are not under subpena. They belong to you. They are in your possession. I have not seen them. You are at liberty to use them in your testimony or not, as you please.

But if you do, the Commission cannot put any limitations on the use that it will make of them.

Mrs. Oswald. Even though you have stated, Chief Justice Warren, just now, that you do not know if they are valuable to the Commission—and yet I have information from Mr. Jenner that they are valuable to the Commission, because they pertain to Lee's life at age 13 to age 16.

The Chairman. Yes, I say they might be. I don't know. I have never seen them.

But the choice is with you, Mrs. Oswald. You may do just as you please. If you wish to testify concerning them, and put them in the hands of the Commission, you may do so.

But the Commission cannot limit itself in the use of its testimony.

Mrs. Oswald. I want the Commission to have this.

Moneywise, it is more important for the Commission to know this boy's life and my life—but also I need to protect myself financially, because I am a widow, and do not have the money. And this will mean—these are valuable pictures.

I am not questioning the integrity of this Commission or the loyalty. What I am questioning is that possibly they may get lost or someone may somehow or other get ahold of these pictures and exploit them, and get money for them, which has happened to some other pictures already, sir, and then——

The Chairman. Not those that you have given to the Commission?

Mrs. Oswald. No, sir—but with another——

The Chairman. Well, I think, Mrs. Oswald, it would serve no purpose for us to debate the matter. I have tried to tell you very frankly, and your lawyer has told you very frankly and correctly, that you have a free choice to do just as you please. And we will abide by that choice that you may make.

Mrs. Oswald. May I confer with my lawyer for about 10 minutes?

The Chairman. Yes. We will take a recess, and you may talk to him.

(Brief recess.)

The Chairman. Come to order, please.

Mrs. Oswald. Last night, Mr. Rankin, I read Lee working at one place after Tujaque. I do not know the name, sir. I think he worked there just a few days. He had the keys to the office. And, as I returned home from work one day, another young man was at the apartment, the door of the apartment, and said that Lee was discharged, and that Lee had the keys to the office, and just then Lee walked up and gave this young man the keys.

Now, I do not know the name of the place. And I believe he just worked there, sir, a few days.

I read that afterwards.

If you will refresh me, I will give you any information I have. But it is hard for me to think of everything.

I believe we have cleared up the business today that we have missed.

I have decided—and maybe I am wrong, because to me money is only good as to its use. However, there have been so many things since the assassination that has not been in my favor, I believe that I am going to keep my personal pictures.

The Chairman. You may do so.

Mrs. Oswald. If at any time in the future that you would like to have these pictures, I will be more than happy to have copies made and give them to the Commission.

There is another matter, Mr. Rankin, that is very important, that you asked me—Governor Connally's letter.

Mr. Rankin. Yes.

Mrs. Oswald. I had read this at the press conference. A letter from Lee Harvey Oswald to John Connally, Secretary of the Navy. This is just written from the newspaper article.

"I have been in the Soviet Union with the full sanction of the U.S. Embassy in Moscow." He asked the Navy Department to take the necessary steps to repair the damage to me and my family. "I shall employ all means to right the gross mistakes or injustices to a bona fide U.S. citizen, an ex-serviceman."

Now, I do not consider this a threat, because I, myself, if I had a dishonorable discharge, and I was a good marine for 3 years, and I felt like it hurt my mother and my children, and my wife, I would make such a statement, because I am a very definite person, as you know by now. I have been testifying for 3 days. And my son is of the same nature. He loved the Marines, and as far as he was concerned, he served his country 3 years. And it was a stigma to me and his children, and he wanted to right the wrong.

So I do not consider this a threat.

He went to Austin. There was an article in the paper—trying to get this rectified, and the young lady gave a very nice report of Lee, said he was very polite.

This is not a threat.

This is just how Lee was tried immediately in a few hours time, newspaper talk, and so on and so forth.

I would state this emphatically more maybe than Lee did, if I had a dishonorable discharge, sir.

Mr. Rankin. Did you ever hear your son say anything against Governor Connally?

Mrs. Oswald. No, sir.

But here is what I have written down. The day at Robert's house, when I came in from the country, I, myself, gave Lee the copy—we had many copies—you showed me the copy—I gave him the copy and told him—I had written him and told him about the dishonorable discharge, but I did not send any papers, because I didn't want the Russians to know.

But when I came, I had a scrapbook, and I gave him a copy, Mr. Rankin, of the reason for dishonorable discharge. He says "Don't worry about it, mother. I can fix that. It is no problem."