Dead on Arrival: President John F. Kennedy's Assassination in Dallas, Texas

By Raymond C. Wilson

The assassination of President Kennedy in November 1963 still captures the world's attention, even after the passage of 60 years. People can't forget the images of America's young president riding in a motorcade in Dallas, his life ended by Lee Harvey Oswald. But did Oswald act alone? That's what we hope to find out. One big reason that Kennedy assassination conspiracy theories still persist is because not all of the files pertaining to this fateful day have been made available by the U.S. government. All of them were supposed to be released by 2017, but the release date has been postponed multiple times during the Trump and Biden administrations. What are they hiding?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Raymond C. Wilson
• Release date: Dec 1, 2023
• ISBN: 9798215510803

Raymond C. Wilson

Raymond C. Wilson is a military historian, filmmaker, and amateur genealogist. During his military career as an enlisted soldier, warrant officer, and commissioned officer in the U.S. Army for twenty-one years, Wilson served in a number of interesting assignments both stateside and overseas. He had the honor of serving as Administrative Assistant to Brigadier General George S. Patton (son of famed WWII general) at the Armor School; Administrative Assistant to General of the Army Omar Nelson Bradley at the Pentagon; and Military Assistant to the Civilian Aide to the Secretary of the Army at the Pentagon. In 1984, Wilson was nominated by the U.S. Army Adjutant General Branch to serve as a White House Fellow in Washington, D.C. While on active duty, Wilson authored numerous Army regulations as well as articles for professional journals including 1775 (Adjutant General Corps Regimental Association magazine), Program Manager (Journal of the Defense Systems Management College), and Army Trainer magazine. He also wrote, directed, and produced three training films for Army-wide distribution. He is an associate member of the Military Writers Society of America. Following his retirement from the U.S. Army in 1992, Wilson made a career change to the education field. He served as Vice President of Admissions and Development at Florida Air Academy; Vice President of Admissions and Community Relations at Oak Ridge Military Academy; Adjunct Professor of Corresponding Studies at U.S. Army Command and General Staff College; and Senior Academic Advisor at Eastern Florida State College. While working at Florida Air Academy, Wilson wrote articles for several popular publications including the Vincent Curtis Educational Register and the South Florida Parenting Magazine. At Oak Ridge Military Academy, Wilson co-wrote and co-directed two teen reality shows that appeared on national television (Nickelodeon & ABC Family Channel). As an Adjunct Professor at U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, Wilson taught effective communications and military history for eighteen years. At Eastern Florida State College, Wilson wrote, directed, and produced a documentary entitled "Wounded Warriors - Their Struggle for Independence" for the Chi Nu chapter of Phi Theta Kappa. Since retiring from Eastern Florida State College, Wilson has devoted countless hours working on book manuscripts.

Book preview

DEAD ON ARRIVAL

PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY’S

ASSASSINATION IN DALLAS, TEXAS

Written by

RAYMOND C. WILSON

DEAD ON ARRIVAL

PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY’S

ASSASSINATION IN DALLAS, TEXAS

Published by Raymond C. Wilson at Smashwords

Copyright 2023 Raymond C. Wilson

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

Thank you for downloading this ebook. This book remains the copyrighted property of

the author, and may not be redistributed to others for commercial or non-commercial

purposes. If you enjoyed this book, please encourage your friends to download their own

copy from their favorite authorized retailer. Thank you for your support.

Also by Raymond C. Wilson

Commander in Chief

The Hessians Are Coming

Martyr of the Race Course

America’s Five-Star Warriors

Boy Generals of the Civil War

All about Space Flight for Kids

The Men Who Saved West Point

Neil Armstrong: American Pioneer

Plane Went Down in Gander Town

Elvis Presley: His Music and Movies

The Men Who Saved the Liberty Bell

Elvis Presley: You’re in the Army Now

Whether or Not It’s a Weather Balloon?

Sleepy Hollow: Facts Behind the Fiction

The King and I: My Family Ties to Elvis

Lance of Longinus: The Spear of Destiny

Family Trees of the American Presidents

Janet Stewart: Royal Daughter & Mistress

POTUS & FLOTUS: Washington to Biden

Washington’s Life Guards: Conquer or Die

Game On: History of Video Games for Kids

Tecumseh’s Revenge: The Curse of Tippecanoe

Pennsylvania Bucktails: Civil War Sharpshooters

Gone Squatchin': In Search of the Elusive Bigfoot

Wounded Warriors - Their Struggle for Independence

George Smith Patton: Four Men Who Shared the Name

McKee Family of Pennsylvania: Loyalists and Patriots

European Royal Bloodlines of the American Presidents

24th Infantry Division (Mechanized) - Point of the Spear

Pass in Review - Military School Celebrities (Volume One)

Pass in Review - Military School Celebrities (Volume Two)

Pass in Review - Military School Celebrities (Volume Three)

Pass in Review - Military School Celebrities (Volume Four)

The Making of Patton - An Academy Award Winning Movie

‘Twas Whose Night Before Christmas? Moore Vs. Livingston

If These Walls Could Talk: Huling Hotel and Pack Horse Inn

George Armstrong Custer and the Royal Buffalo Hunt of 1872

Beyond the Bighorn: The Afterlife of George Armstrong Custer

George Armstrong Custer and the Pennypackers of Pennsylvania

Kennedy Family of Pennsylvania and Their Native American Kin

Pass in Review - Military School Celebrities (Presidential Edition)

14th Cavalry Group in World War II - Story of Cavalryman Bill Null

Patton: Soldier Who Saved His Life and the One Who Caused His Death

Custer’s Luck Has Run Out: George Armstrong Custer’s Changing Image

Space Pioneers: Animals That Paved the Way for Human Space Exploration

Out of Necessity: George Washington’s Surrender of Fort Necessity to the French

Table of Contents

Prologue

Introduction

Tour of Texas

Assassination in Dallas

The Alleged Assassin

Chaos at Parkland Hospital

Final Flight from Dallas

The Autopsy

The Funeral

Conspiracy Theories

Afterword

Appendix A: Warren Commission Report

Appendix B: HSCA Report

Appendix C: Whatever Happened To … ?

Bibliography

About Raymond C. Wilson

Prologue

Before President John F. Kennedy departed for the ‘Lone Star State’ in November 1963, he received several warnings urging him not to go to Texas.

U.S. Senator J. William Fulbright advised Kennedy against the trip, calling Texas dangerous.

President Kennedy's Press Secretary Pierre Salinger also received a letter from a Dallas resident with the same warning: Don't let the President go to Texas. Texas is too dangerous.

President Kennedy ignored the dire warnings and flew to Texas on 21 November 1963.

While traveling in the Presidential limousine in Dallas, Nellie Connally, wife of then-Texas Governor John Connally, elicited what would be President Kennedy's last words, as reported by the New York Daily News.

Mr. President, you can't say Dallas doesn't love you! the first lady of Texas told the president.

That is very obvious, the president replied. A moment later, shots rang out killing President Kennedy and wounding Governor Connally.

Some people feared that President Kennedy would be ‘dead on arrival’ in Dallas, the city of hate. Their fear became reality when the president was assassinated on 22 November 1963.

Newspapers announce the death of President Kennedy

Introduction

It didn’t matter that day in November 1963 whether you were a Democrat or Republican, since everyone was united in their grief. President John F. Kennedy’s assassination in Dallas, Texas, 60 years ago ultimately marked the end of America’s innocence and the inception of a dubious future for the nation and its people.

I was 14 years old in November 1963 and Kennedy’s assassination remains one of my most vivid childhood memories. Anyone who was old enough remembers where they were and what they were doing when they heard the tragic news of the president’s death on 22 November 1963. I was in the library at Dickinson High School in Dickinson, North Dakota when I heard the news of President Kennedy’s assassination that took place 1,216 miles south in Dallas, Texas.

While news from Kennedy’s assassination rippled across America, it also seared into the American psyche. Today, virtually all Americans old enough to remember 22 November 1963, still remember it vividly.

According to a September 2011 Pew Research survey, 95% of Americans born in 1955 or earlier said they could recall exactly where they were or what they were doing when Kennedy was killed. That compares with 81% of adults asked in 2011 who remember those details when Osama bin Laden was killed in 2011, and 72% when Martin Luther King, Jr. was killed in 1968, according to the same survey. The only other event that weighed on American consciousness to such an extent was the 9/11 terrorist attacks (97%). (Survey questions were filtered to people who were at least eight years of age at the time of each historical event.)

Yet, while memories of JFK’s assassination tend to linger in individuals, the number of people bearing those memories is inevitably declining. As of July 2012, 90.63 million people in the U.S. – or 28.9% of the total population – were of an age in 1963 to be able to retrieve a personal memory. (According to development psychologists, the typical age from which an adult can retrieve a personal memory is between 3 and 4 years old.)

The assassination of President Kennedy is among the most influential events in the history of the United States, along the same line as the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, the American Revolution, the creation of the atomic bomb, the Vietnam War, the Civil War and the attack on the World Trade Center.

John F. Kennedy stands out among presidents, in part because he was a cultural phenomenon in his time and because he remains popular today. Asked how Kennedy will go down in history, 74% of Americans today said Kennedy will be remembered as an outstanding or above average president, the highest rating among the 11 most recent presidents.

Over the whole of his presidency, Kennedy averaged a 70.1 percent approval rating, comfortably the highest of any post-World War II president. By comparison, the average for all presidents between 1938 and 2012 is 54 percent.

The following chart depicts a side-by-side comparison of each president from Harry S. Truman to George W. Bush. This chart does not reflect Barack Obama’s average approval rating of 48 percent or Donald Trump’s average approval rating of 41 percent.

Counterintuitively, the highest point of President Kennedy’s approval ratings in 1961 came in the wake of the his most serious foreign policy stumble: the Bay of Pigs. Despite the embarrassing admissions the White House was forced to make about American involvement in the botched invasion, Kennedy received a bounce in the wake of that episode. Aside from that spike, though, Kennedy’s approval rating was falling. Kennedy had assumed the presidency a mostly unknown figure, which was reflected in the relatively high no opinion rate at the start of his term. Over the course of 1961, many of those undecideds formed an opinion. And many of those formed a negative opinion.

Bay of Pigs Invasion was failed attempt by U.S. trained Cuban refugees to overthrow Castro

After a solid start to his second year in office, President Kennedy’s approval rating slid steadily through the summer and early fall of 1962, with a commensurate increase in his disapproval rating. Federal government intervention in civil rights confrontations led to regional divides. The Cuban missile crisis of mid- to late-October 1962 led to a large bump on the eve of the midterm elections. But while many at the time, and certainly many Republicans, credited Kennedy’s performance during the missile crisis with helping Democrats, scholars have subsequently challenged that contemporary judgment.

Cuban Missile Crisis was showdown between US and Soviet Union to remove missiles from Cuba

President Kennedy started the year 1963 still enjoying the post-Cuban missile crisis bounce, but the numbers had started to slip. By September 1963, his approval rating had slid to the mid-50s, the lowest of his presidency. A small rebound of 2 points in the following months did not establish a strong pattern. Significantly, the disapproval rating climbed steadily throughout the year.

By the fall of 1963, President Kennedy and his political advisers were preparing for the next presidential campaign. Although he had not formally announced his candidacy, it was clear that Kennedy was going to run and he seemed confident about his chances for re-election.

At the end of September 1963, the president traveled west, speaking in nine different states in less than a week. The trip was meant to put a spotlight on natural resources and conservation efforts. But Kennedy also used it to sound out themes -- such as education, national security, and world peace -- for his run in 1964.

A month later, the president addressed Democratic gatherings in Boston and Philadelphia. Then, on 12 November 1963, Kennedy held the first important political planning session for