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

Now, that is my story there. I am not even guilty of that divorce, as you see. This can be proved by my son John Edward Pic because he was a witness, sir.

I do not think I am going—I am not going to speculate but give my thoughts to anyone who would immediately make a statement that he had represented the mother of the accused assassin as an attorney years ago, and that I nagged Mr. Ekdahl and so on and so forth.

That was publicly announced about 2 days after my son was shot, sir.

Now, the name then, of course, he probably knew the name Oswald, but the name then was Ekdahl that I would say would stick in his mind more.

I will try to get to the very beginning of my life, Chief Justice.

The Chairman. Any time. Just take your time.

Mrs. Oswald. My mother died when I was quite young and my father raised us with housekeepers. My aunt lived in the neighborhood and I had a lot of cousins and a lot of aunts. My father was French, his name was Claverie, and my mother was German, the name is Stucke. All of my father's folks spoke French and my father spoke French to his sisters. I was a child of one parent, and yet I have had a normal life, a very hard normal life that I had been able to combat all by myself, sir, without much help from anyone.

I am saying that in reference to Lee being alone; there have been so many psychiatrists saying he was by himself and he had a father image and that is why he did the shooting. There are many, many children with one parent who are perfectly normal children and I happen to be one myself.

I had a very happy childhood. I sang. I sang from the kindergarten at grammar school, and all through grammar school I was the lead singer. I was one of the most popular young ladies in the school. I also play piano by ear. I don't know a note. I used to play the marching school song for the school children.

At my grammar school graduation I had the honor of wearing a pink dress instead of a white dress and sang the song "Little Pink Roses." So I had a very happy childhood and a very full childhood. I played the piano. We had house parties in those days and a lot of gatherings and it was everything Marguerite—and I also played a ukulele, so I have a very full happy childhood.

At the age of 17, I am ahead of my story—I have had 1 year high school education. I know that on my applications I had that I had completed high school but that is almost necessary to get a job.

But I had 1 year of high school education is all that I had, sir.

I then went to work at age 17, not quite 17, for one of the biggest corporation lawyers in New Orleans, La. The name then was DuFour, Rosen, Wolff, and Kammer. Mr. DuFour died while I was there and Mr. Kammer, I believe, is still living but they were corporation attorneys for that firm plus 4 or 5 other attorneys that handled divorce cases and similar cases and I was receptionist in the outer office.

So, everybody who came into the office had to state their business to me, because the attorneys were very busy, and if it was a particular case I had to know who to refer the party to this particular man.

So, naturally, I got a very large education, let's say, by doing this, and the mayor and everybody in the town, these are the largest attorneys, corporation attorneys in New Orleans, sir, and they were attorneys representing the New Orleans Public Service and big things of that sort, and the mayor and all used to call me the boss. When the mayor came in he had an appointment but I still had to ring the phone to see if the men were ready to see him. So they called me the boss.

I was also a maid in one of the carnival balls. I am a very poor young lady but a very, let's say, popular young lady.

My early childhood. We lived on the Phillips Street in New Orleans which was a very poor neighborhood. My father was one of the very first streetcar conductors and stayed on the very same line all these years until he retired and they gave him a citation because he was on the same line all those years from retirement, and we lived in a mixed neighborhood of Negroes and white, and my childhood I played with Negroes, sir, right next door to me was a lovely family that I grew up with this Negro family.

I married Mr. Edward John Pic, Jr., while working at the law firm. I was married to Mr. Pic two and a half years when I became with child, and he did not want any children. His family and my family tried to talk to him, and, well, his family almost beat him up to say, but nobody could do anything with him.

So, at 3 months I left Mr. Pic. Mr. Pic did not divorce me, and you have the records there of me divorcing Mr. Pic, contrary to all other stories, sir.

This child, John Edward Pic then I bore alone, without a husband. I was 3 months pregnant. I had 6 more months to go, and I had this child without a husband.

So, I have had two children without a husband present, Lee and the first child.

Mr. Oswald was an insurance agent, and he used to collect insurance at my sister's house, and the day that I left Mr. Pic he helped move my furniture, the things that I was going to take.

I didn't see Mr. Ekdahl for some time and——

The Chairman. Ekdahl or Oswald.

Mrs. Oswald. Mr. Oswald, sir, I am sorry.

John Edward and I were coming from the park one day, and Mr. Ekdahl picked—Mr. Oswald picked me up, and he was separated from his wife, however, not divorced but had been separated for a number of years, and I started dating Mr. Ekdahl and we decided to marry and he divorced his wife.

Mr. Rankin. You said Ekdahl again.

Mrs. Oswald. Oswald, I am sorry, and then he got the divorce proceeding. He was separated for a long time but never had been divorced from his wife but when we knew he was going to marry, and I also then got the divorce from Mr. Pic. I was not divorced there from Mr. Pic, either. We were legally separated but I was not divorced from him.

So, Mr. Oswald and I married and of that marriage Robert was born 9 months later, and as you know consequently Lee, 2 months after his father had died.

Now, Mr. Oswald was a very good man. There was the only happy part of my life. When he died hardly anybody knew that John Edward Pic was not his son. He wanted to adopt John Edward, but because his father was supporting him which I think was only $18 a month, I explained to Lee that I thought we should save this money for the boys' education and let his own father support him and naturally we would educate and do all we could do but that was no more than right. So that is why he did not adopt John Edward.

Now, that is the story of my three marriages. I have been married approximately 9 years in the three times that I have been married, sir, and I would say, I am probably guilty of a lot of things but the initial guilt has never been mine in any of these marriages, the first marriage I had explained, the second marriage was death, and the third marriage was Mr. Ekdahl.

I think then you know the rest of the story, how I lived with my children and tried to support my children.

I have often held two jobs trying to support my children. I have a whole file that the Commission has copies of jobs that I have worked, and I have also worked for these places twice, and have gone back. I have wonderful recommendations. I think I have been fired about five times in my life, and I have had much, much employment, and the reason for that is finances, in other words, I have always had a very low salary, and I am a very aggressive sales person, as these papers say, and I always produce for my people and I was in demand actually.

They would come to me and offer me 20, 25 dollars more, believe me, gentlemen. I would quit the job where I was and quit the new job because 25 dollars paid my light and heat bill and gave my children some clothes and that is mostly the reason for all of this employment, and also I used to quit my job as much as possible in the summer time when the children were little in order to be home with them.