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

Mrs. Oswald. Yes.

Mr. Rankin. When he talked about his service in the Marines, did he tell you much about what he did?

Mrs. Oswald. He didn't talk much about it, because there wasn't very much there of interest to me. But he was satisfied.

Mr. Rankin. Did he indicate that he was unhappy about his service with the Marines?

Mrs. Oswald. No, he had good memories of his service in the Army. He said that the food was good and that sometimes evenings he had a chance to go out.

Mr. Rankin. Did he say anything about his mother during this period of time?

Mrs. Oswald. This was before we were married. I had once asked Lee whether he had a mother, and he said he had no mother. I started to question him as to what had happened, what happened to her, and he said that I should not question him about it.

After we were married, he told me that he had not told me the truth, that he did have a mother, but that he didn't love her very much.

Mr. Rankin. Did he tell you why he didn't love her?

Mrs. Oswald. No.

Mr. Rankin. Do you recall anything more he said about his brother Robert at that time?

Mrs. Oswald. He said that he had a good wife, that he had succeeded fairly well in life, that he was smart and capable.

Mr. Rankin. Did he say anything about having any affection for him?

Mrs. Oswald. Yes, he loved Robert. He said that when Robert married Vada that his mother had been against the marriage and that she had made a scene, and this was one of the reasons he didn't like his mother.

Mr. Rankin. Did he say anything about his half brother, by the name of Pic—I guess the last name was Pic—Robert Pic?

Mrs. Oswald. He said that he had a half brother by the name of Pic from his mother's first marriage, but he didn't enlarge upon the subject. It is only that I knew he had a half brother by that name.

He said that at one time they lived with this John Pic and his wife, but that his wife and the mother frequently had arguments, quarrels. He said it was hard for him to witness these scenes, it was unpleasant.

Mr. Rankin. Did you regard your husband's wage or salary at Minsk as high for the work he was doing?

Mrs. Oswald. No. He received as much as the others in similar jobs.

Mr. Rankin. Did your husband have friends in Minsk when you first met him?

Mrs. Oswald. Yes.

Mr. Rankin. How did he seem to get along with these friends?

Mrs. Oswald. He had a very good relationship with them.

Mr. Rankin. Did he discuss any of them with you?

Mrs. Oswald. Yes.

Mr. Rankin. Will you tell us when you married your husband?

Mrs. Oswald. April 30, 1961.

Mr. Rankin. Was there a marriage ceremony?

Mrs. Oswald. Not in a church, of course. But in the institution called Zags, where we were registered.

Mr. Rankin. Was anyone else present at the ceremony?

Mrs. Oswald. Yes, our friends were there.

Mr. Rankin. Who else was there?

Mrs. Oswald. No one besides my girlfriends and some acquaintances. My uncle and aunt were busy preparing the house, and they were not there for that reason.

Mr. Rankin. After you were married did you go to live in your husband's apartment there?

Mrs. Oswald. Yes.

Mr. Rankin. Did you buy any new furniture?

Mrs. Oswald. Yes.

Mr. Rankin. When was your baby born?

Mrs. Oswald. February 15, 1962.

Mr. Rankin. What is her name?

Mrs. Oswald. June Lee Oswald.

Mr. Rankin. Did you stop working before the birth of the baby?

Mrs. Oswald. Yes.

Mr. Rankin. Did you return to work after the baby was born?

Mrs. Oswald. No.

Mr. Rankin. How did you and your husband get along during the period that you were in Minsk, after you were married?

Mrs. Oswald. We lived well.

Mr. Rankin. Were you a member of the trade union at Minsk?

Mrs. Oswald. Yes.

Mr. Rankin. Did you have a membership booklet?

Mrs. Oswald. Yes, a booklet.

Mr. Rankin. I hand you Exhibit 21 and ask you if that is the trade union booklet that you had there.

Mrs. Oswald. I never have a good photograph.

Mr. Rankin. I offer in evidence Exhibit 21.

The Chairman. It may be admitted and take the next number.

(The document referred to was marked Commission Exhibit No. 21 and received in evidence.)

Mr. Rankin. Did you pay dues to the trade union?

Mrs. Oswald. Yes.

Mr. Rankin. We didn't notice any notation of dues payments in this booklet, Exhibit 21. Do you know why that was?

Mrs. Oswald. I forgot to paste the stamps in.

Mr. Rankin. That is for the period between 1956 and 1959, they don't seem to be in there.

Mrs. Oswald. Yes.

Mr. Rankin. But you made the payments—you just didn't put the stamps in, is that right?

Mrs. Oswald. Yes. Simply because this is not important. I got the stamps, but the stubs remained with the person to whom I made the payment.

Mr. Rankin. We noted that the book shows a birth date of 1940 rather than 1941. Do you know how that happened?

Mrs. Oswald. The girl who prepared this booklet thought that I was older and put down 1940 instead of 1941.

Mr. Rankin. The booklet doesn't seem to show any registration in Minsk. Do you know why that would occur?

Mrs. Oswald. Because the booklet was issued in Leningrad.

Mr. Rankin. Is it the practice to record a registration in a city that you move to, or isn't that a practice that is followed?

Mrs. Oswald. No.

Mr. Rankin. Did your husband engage in any Communist Party activities while he was in the Soviet Union?

Mrs. Oswald. Not at all—absolutely not.

Mr. Rankin. Do you know whether he was a member of any organization there?

Mrs. Oswald. I think that he was also a member of a trade union, as everybody who works belongs to a trade union. Then he had a card from a hunting club, but he never visited it. He joined the club, apparently.

Mr. Rankin. Did he go hunting while he was there?

Mrs. Oswald. We only went once, with him and with my friends.

Mr. Rankin. Was that when he went hunting for squirrels?

Mrs. Oswald. If he marked it down in his notebook that he went hunting for squirrels, he never did. Generally they wanted to kill a squirrel when we went there, or some sort of a bird, in order to boast about it, but they didn't.

Mr. Rankin. Were there any times while he was in the Soviet Union after your marriage that you didn't know where he went?

Mrs. Oswald. No.

Mr. Rankin. When did you first learn that he was planning to try to go back to the United States?

Mrs. Oswald. After we were married, perhaps a month after.

Mr. Rankin. Did you discuss the matter at that time?

Mrs. Oswald. We didn't discuss it—we talked about it—because we didn't make any specific plans.

Mr. Rankin. Do you recall what you said about it then?

Mrs. Oswald. I said, "Well, if we will go, we will go. If we remain, it doesn't make any difference to me. If we go to China, I will also go."

Mr. Rankin. Did you and your husband make a trip to Moscow in connection with your plans to go to the United States?

Mrs. Oswald. Yes. We went to the American Embassy.

Mr. Rankin. Did your husband make a trip to Moscow alone before that? About his passport?

Mrs. Oswald. He didn't go alone. He actually left a day early and the following morning I was to come there.

Mr. Rankin. I understood that he didn't get any permission to make this trip to Moscow away from Minsk. Do you know whether that is true?

Mrs. Oswald. I don't know about this. I know that he bought a ticket and he made the flight.

Mr. Rankin. According to the practice, then, would he be permitted to go to Moscow from Minsk without the permission of the authorities?

Mrs. Oswald. I don't know whether he had the right to go to Moscow. Perhaps he did, because he had a letter requesting him to visit the Embassy. But he could not go to another city without permission of the authorities.