The men who were laying the new floor had moved a lot of heavy cartons from the west to the east side of the sixth floor. The southeast corner window, in particular, was totally shielded from view because cartons had been stacked around it in a crescent.[10] Lee appeared to be coming from that window.
“Boy, are you going downstairs? It’s near lunchtime,” said Givens.
“No, sir,” Lee said. “And when you get downstairs, close the elevator gate.”[11] The elevator was automatic and would operate only if the gate was closed.
“Okay,” said Givens and rode the elevator down.
There was a good deal of excitement about the motorcade among the men at the book depository. In order to watch, a lot of them took their sandwiches outside and ate in front of the building. Harold Norman and “Junior” Jarman went outside but then decided that they would get a better view from inside. They went to the rear of the building and took an elevator to the fifth floor. Meanwhile, Bonnie Ray Williams had eaten his lunch—chicken, Fritos, and a bottle of Dr. Pepper—by the third or fourth set of windows on the south side of the sixth floor. He could see nothing to the east of him because the cartons were stacked up so high.[12] But he thought there was nobody there, and he wanted someone to watch the motorcade with. He went down a flight of stairs and found Norman and Jarman in the southeast corner windows of the fifth floor. He took a position at a window near theirs. The time was 12:20 P.M.
The presidential motorcade had left Love Field just before noon, and the procession of cars drove rapidly through the thinly populated outskirts of Dallas. The crowds were large and enthusiastic when the motorcade reached the downtown area. The president’s limousine traveled along Main Street, turned right on Houston, and headed toward the intersection of Houston and Elm Streets. The limousine slowed to about eleven miles an hour as it made the sharp left turn into Elm, directly in front of the southeast corner of the faded, orange-brick Book Depository Building. It then began to move slowly downhill away from the building. The time was 12:30 P.M.
Just then, from their lookouts at the southeast corner windows of the fifth floor, Bonnie Ray Williams and Harold Norman saw the president raise his right hand as if to salute or brush back his hair.[13] It was a movement they had seen him make on television. But as he did it, they heard a sound like a shot. “Junior” Jarman and Williams thought it was a motorcycle backfire. Then there was another sound, and out on Dealey Plaza people started dropping to the ground in fright. The president’s car lurched forward, and there was a third sound right after the second. Two of the three men on the fifth floor saw the president slump, or “lean his head,” but they did not see any more.
Bonnie Ray Williams paid no attention to the first shot “because I did not know what was happening.” But he says, “the second shot, it sounded like it was right in the building, the second and third shot. And it sounded—it even shook the building, the side we were on. Cement fell on my head.” The floor above was nothing but bare boards with daylight showing between them, and Norman and Jarman saw dust in Williams’s hair. “You got something on your head,” Norman said. “Yes, man, don’t you brush it out,” Jarman added.[14]
Because of his location in the southeast corner window of the fifth floor, it was Harold Norman who heard the most. He did not hear anybody move above him, no creaking, no human sound. But what he did hear, with the bare floor only 12 or 14 feet overhead acting as a sounding board, was the bolt action of a rifle clicking three times, and the thump, thump, thump of three expended cartridges dropping to the floor. “Man,” he said to the others, “someone is shooting at the president and it’s coming from right over us. It even shook the building.”[15]
Jarman said, “We’d better get the hell out of here.”[16]
All three men knew where the assassin was—he was directly over their heads. None of them was armed. And none of the three wanted to go upstairs for fear of being shot to death. And yet they did a curious thing. They looked out the window and saw everyone, people, policemen, running toward the opposite side of the building where, for some onlookers, the crack of the rifle appeared to have come from. Williams said, “We know the shots came from practically over our head. But since everybody was running, you know, to the west side of the building, towards the railroad tracks, we assumed maybe somebody was down there. And so we all ran that way, the way that the people was running, and we was looking out the window.”[17]
Lee had stationed himself in the southeast corner window of the sixth floor, barricaded inside the crescent of book cartons. No one had seen him that morning as he carried his brown paper package to the window, removed the rifle, assembled and loaded it. No one saw him toss the empty sack into the corner where it was later found. Nor did anyone see him as he arranged a book carton and two smaller cartons as a gun rest in front of the window.
He sat on another carton and waited until the president’s car came into view. He took aim and fired three quick shots. At the moment of the final, farthest shot, President Kennedy was about 88 yards away. Through Lee’s four-power telescopic sight, he appeared to be only 22 yards away.[18] After firing his last shot, Lee moved rapidly from the front to the rear of the sixth floor and crammed the rifle, scope up, on the floor between cartons that were stacked up just before the entrance to the stairway.
A Dallas patrolman, Marrion L. Baker, was on his motorcycle at a point in the motorcade several cars behind the president and was headed straight for the School Book Depository when he heard the first shot. Baker had lately been deer hunting, and he was certain that the shot was from a high-powered rifle. He looked up and saw pigeons scattering from their perches atop the building. He raced his motorcycle to the building, dismounted, and pushed his way to the entrance. There he encountered Roy Truly, who identified himself, and the two men ran for the elevators in back. Finding that both were on an upper floor, they started up the stairs. It was less than two minutes since the last shot had been fired.
When Truly and Baker reached the second-floor landing, Baker caught a glimpse of someone in the lunchroom. Revolver in hand, he rushed to the door and saw a man twenty feet away walking to the far end of the room. The man was empty-handed. Baker ordered him to turn and walk toward him. The man obeyed. He seemed normal and not out of breath. Truly was on his way to the third floor, missed the patrolman, and ran back to see what was delaying him. He found Baker face to face with Lee Oswald, his revolver pointed straight at him. Lee did not look excited; startled, perhaps, but not excited.[19]
“Do you know this man? Does he work here?” Baker asked.
“Yes,” Truly said.
Baker lowered his revolver, and the two men went on with their search.
Mrs. Robert Reid, a clerical supervisor, had watched the motorcade from the front of the building. When she heard the shots, she ran back inside, hoping that none of the employees was going to fall under suspicion. She was entering her office on the second floor when Lee entered from the opposite, or lunchroom side, where there was a Coke machine. He was holding a full bottle of Coca-Cola.
“Oh,” said Mrs. Reid, “the president has been shot, but maybe they didn’t hit him.”
17
Testimony of Bonnie Ray Williams, Vol. 3, p. 175; Testimony of Harold Norman, Vol. 3, p. 192.
18
James A. Zahm, a Marine Corps master sergeant who is expert in rifle training, testified before the Warren Commission (Vol. 11, pp. 306–310) that the four-power scope is ideal for moving targets at ranges up to two hundred yards because it enhances viewing power with a minimum exaggeration of body movements. Zahm added that the fact that Kennedy’s car was moving slowly away from Oswald at a downward grade of three degrees straightened out the line of sight in such a way as to compensate for greater distance between the first (176.9 to 190.8 feet) and last (265.3 feet) shots (15 to 22 yards as seen through the scope).
Robert Oswald was critical of the Warren Commission for its reliance on experts and its failure to consult him about his brother’s capabilities with a rifle, since he taught Oswald to shoot and was familiar with his special qualities as a marksman. Robert states that “Lee had very rapid reflexes” and was “much stronger than he looked,” adding that he had “unusual strength in his hands” and that his forearms were powerful and well developed. (Robert Oswald,
A final point. So far as is known, Oswald never fired his rifle between April 10 and November 22. But Zahm and others have said that Oswald’s dry firing in New Orleans, working the bolt, manipulating the trigger, and aligning the sight, would have been extremely helpful, with the scope aiding him to identify any errors in trigger manipulation.
19
Testimony of Marrion L. Baker, Vol. 3, p. 252; Testimony of Roy S. Truly, Vol. 3, p. 225.