EVIDENCE FOR HARVEY AND LEE (Please debate the specifics right here. Don't just claim someone else has debunked it!)

[Jim Hargrove]

All right, just for the record, I’d like to emphatically deny the vicious accusation by William Manchester that I, as a child, employed Mysterious Marge® as some kind of “nurse” at the time JFK was assassinated.  Just look at what this scurrilous scrivener had to say in his wretched door-stopper called Death of a President.

[John Butler]

1 hour ago, Jim Hargrove said:

Mysterious Marge® apparently took offense when William Manchester called her a “shifter of bodies and bedpans” in his recently published book, The Death of a President.  Marge, according to UPI, said she was a “practical nurse,” which she described as a “high calling.” My bet, same as DJ, is that she wasn’t licensed by anyone.  It would require too much background information. From the 1/25/67 UPI story: 

 

Yeah, that makes my question considerably more relevant than prior.  Where did she get her training and certification to be a practical nurse which in Louisiana required training at a nurse's school, certification, and a license.  The same goes for Texas.  Can it be assumed she was a practical nurse or a trained nurse of some sort. 

The only character we have in the Claverie/Oswald family is Aminthe Voitier who worked as a nurse and since she did must have had the training and license.

I just received my copy of Pat Shannan's book The JFK Assassination and the Uncesored Story of the Two Oswalds.  The book is on par with Doppelganger as far as being an easy read.  He gives John Armstrong much praise for the Harvey and Lee story and sticks pretty much to Armstrong's facts.  There are a few deviations.  I would give both about the same kind of recommendation.  Good.

Here is something interesting from page 52:

Aminthe Voitier was born in 1894 and her sister Jeanne was born in 1895.  In 1963 Aminthe would be 69 or so and Jeanne 68.  Aminthe is a better candidate for Mysterious Marge than Margaret Keating.  As far as I know Margaet Keating had no training as a nurse and did not work as nurse.

The age discrepancy between Mysterious Marge and Aminthe Voitier is still hard to reconcile.  A good 10 years. Shannan indicates that the same people who knew Lee's mother at age 50 in 1959 and 1960 did not recognize her in 1963.  They indicated she looked much older by about 15 years.  If this was true then that makes looking at Aminthe Voitier more realistic. 

The closeness if any the appearance of Mysterious Marge and Real Marge's looks may be related to being 2nd cousins.  (Wife says 1st cousins once removed.)

I didn't see this, but I could be wrong looking at the later photo of M. Marge.  They do resemble somewhat, but on the age I am not sure.   

Edited April 22, 2020 by John Butler

[John Butler]

24 minutes ago, Jim Hargrove said:

All right, just for the record, I’d like to emphatically deny the vicious accusation by William Manchester that I, as a child, employed Mysterious Marge® as some kind of “nurse” at the time JFK was assassinated.  Just look at what this scurrilous scrivener had to say in his wretched door-stopper called Death of a President.

Well, it seems more than one person believes M. Marge was a practical nurse.  If she sued anyone over her nursing abilities and status she would have had to provide info on her training, certification history.  She didn't sue, just threatened. 

There ought to be some info somewhere about looks and aging that one could find.  This could give more credence to the Margaret Keating / Adminthe Voitier notion of being M. Marge.

"wretched door-stopper"  Good one.

Edited April 22, 2020 by John Butler

[Jim Hargrove]

3 hours ago, John Butler said:

The age discrepancy between Mysterious Marge and Aminthe Voitier is still hard to reconcile.  A good 10 years. Shannan indicates that the same people who knew Lee's mother at age 50 in 1959 and 1960 did not recognize her in 1963.  They indicated she looked much older by about 15 years.  If this was true then that makes looking at Aminthe Voitier more realistic. 

That's EXACTLY what Marguerite's best friends, Myrtle and Julian Evans, found hard to reconcile.

Of course Mr. and Mrs. Evans didn't realize the enormity of what CIA accountant James Wilcott called "the Oswald Project," but they clearly didn't recognize their long-time friend "Marguerite." Myrtle Evans and her husband Julian were friends with the real Marguerite Oswald for nearly three decades. Included in Julian Evans' April 7, 1964 WC testimony was this exchange with Jenner (emphasis added):  

Mr. JENNER - Give me your impression of Marguerite Oswald.
Mr. EVANS - Marguerite?
Mr. JENNER - Yes.
Mr. EVANS - I think she's a fine woman, myself, a fine woman; intelligent, very soft spoken - a beautiful woman, with black hair streaked with a little gray, but when you saw her on television since this thing happened, she really looked awful; nothing at all like she used to look. She has really aged. She looked like a charwoman, compared to what she used to look like. She used to be a fashion plate. She dressed beautifully, but when we saw her on television just recently, after all this happened, she looked awful. There's no way to describe it, the change that has come over her. You wouldn't have recognized her if they hadn't told you who she was; she looked that different. Where her hair used to be black, now it's entirely gray, and she really looks Old
Mr. JENNER - Well, she's 57, I believe.
Mr. EVANS - That's right; she's the same age as my wife, but she looks about 70 now. That's about all I can remember about her, and then I saw this thing on television when the President was assassinated, and when it showed her picture, we just couldn't believe it was Marguerite.

His wife Myrtle Evans testified on the same day:

Mrs. EVANS - A very good housekeeper, very tasty; she could take anything and make something out of it, and something beautiful. She had a lot of natural talent that way, and she was not lazy. She would work with things by the hour for her children, and she kept a very neat house, and she was always so lovely herself. That's why, when I saw her on TV, after all of this happened, she looked so old and haggard, and I said, "That couldn't be Margie," but of course it was, but if you had known Margie before all this happened, you would see what I mean. She was beautiful. She had beautiful wavy hair.

Mrs. Evans added this:

Mrs. EVANS - As far as I could see, they were very happy, very closely knit, very much in love with each other, and these boys knew that their mother was putting them through school, and giving them what they needed, as best she could. She was a very good provider for her children, and a very decent woman. I mean, she wasn't a loose woman at all. She was very decent, a very fine woman. 

Does that sound like the "Marguerite Oswald" we all heard about?

Mr. and Mrs. Evans both testified that the Lee Harvey Oswald they knew was loud and boisterous, with a "foghorn voice."  This is certainly not the quiet, withdrawn, passive-aggressive kid described by the Warren Commission.

Item #361 on the Warren Commission's list of source materials is entitled "Biographic Information on Mrs. Oswald and her relatives." The report on Mrs. Oswald's background, not surprisingly, was prepared by the CIA.

 

[John Butler]

3 hours ago, Jim Hargrove said:

That's EXACTLY what Marguerite's best friends, Myrtle and Julian Evans, found hard to reconcile

Nanny Winfrey (Nancy Winfrey) was the best candidate for Nancy Oswald.  Aminthe Voitier now seems the best candidate for Mysterious Marge.  But, still you can not come out and say either one is this who we might think they might be. 

If we keep kicking this around something might show up.  I might stumble upon something that could link to this.  You, David, and John K. might come up with something.  In other words it is not time to walk away and say well, this does not appear to be solvable.

I haven't seen the CIA doc.  Is there a link to Item #361 handy?

[Jim Hargrove]

Agree totally with your assessment of Mysterious Marge.

Please note that my description of the Agency doc above was incorrect.  It is really a 31-page study of Marina, not Marguerite.  If you're interested, though, you can start reading it here:

https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=96209#relPageId=1&tab=page

Here is an interesting excerpt from page 19:

"She said later that upon hearing of the assassination, she had fearfully gone to see if his blanket-wrapped rifle was still in its place--which it appeared to be.  Then when the police came and asked her if OSWALD had a gun, she (probably gladly) admitted it and led them to it.  Witnesses stated that she appeared really surprised when the rifle's shape in the blanket turned out to be empty.  She also cooperated with the police by giving them a picture of her husband holding such a rifle."

That about settles it, eh?

[John Butler]

4 hours ago, Jim Hargrove said:

That about settles it, eh?

The Soviet Spy Princess.  Russian female spies were notorious for using sex to entrap their target.  Marina, the Soviet Spy, turns double agent to be near and convince Harvey Oswald (here I disagree and think both Lee and Harvey were there) that she wanted so desperately to get to the US that she was willing to become a double agent and be with in my count 3 Oswalds, Harvey and Lee and whoever is on the bridge with her.  There is very little proof of 3 Oswalds in Russia.  Just one photo of Marina hugging a man, definitely not Harvey, assumed to be Lee Oswald.  The other is the short Oswald on the bridge.  There are other photos of an Oswald figure that doesn't look like Harvey, but these are debatable.  One other thing, Harvey has his suicide scar on the wrong wrist in a Dallas photo leading to conjecture that he cut both wrists (no evidence of this in Russian documents) or the photo was not properly prepared and the arms and figure are reversed.  If not then what's going on?

Then Miss Marina gets to be a triple agent, either for the Russians (what she says is more than likely what the Russians would want her to say), or for US agencies, FBI, CIA, Secret Service, etc.

Marina has many reasons to say what she says after the assassination.  Either as a Soviet spy or a woman desperately trying to keep herself and her children out of Russia. 

Later:

I noticed something that might be strange in this doc.  On page 6 and 7 there are 23 of Marina's relatives listed.  Only two of the 23 are deceased.  That is probably below normal mortality rates.  From 1919 to 1950 millions and millions of Russians died due to revolution, war, and the effects of both.  Some estimate 100 million.  As with most things with memory today I checked on this and couldn't find the answer with Google. Lets say 10s of millions and that might be better. 

Edited April 23, 2020 by John Butler

[John Butler]

1 hour ago, John Butler said:

Marina has many reasons to say what she says after the assassination.  Either as a Soviet spy or a woman desperately trying to keep herself and her children out of Russia. 

Marina was born in Severodvinsk, Russia in July, 1941.  This is before the US entered WWII.  Severodvinsk is a port city on the White Sea, a part of the Artic Ocean,  in Artic Siberia  about 495 miles from St. Petersburg.  Then, as an infant moved to Arkhangelsk which is further to the south but still about 450 miles north of St. Petersburg.  This is Artic Siberia.  No wonder she did not want to return to someplace like this in Russia.

WWII action with the Germans missed this area except for convoys.  Wikipedia has this to say:

"The Arctic convoys of World War II were oceangoing convoys which sailed from the United Kingdom, Iceland, and North America to northern ports in the Soviet Union – primarily Arkhangelsk (Archangel) and Murmansk in Russia. There were 78 convoys between August 1941 and May 1945,^[1] sailing via several seas of the Atlantic and Arctic oceans, with two gaps with no sailings between July and September 1942, and March and November 1943."

Arkhagelsk is not a port, but Severodvinsk is.

Looking at the info generated a random thought.  Could the US be involved with spying in this area once Lend Lease convoys began voyaging to the port of Sevrodvinsk and others.  I would suppose so, but this doesn't mean their was contact between the OSS and Marina's family.  Just a far-fetched could be.

Of the 23 relatives of Marina only a few are male.  It could be there were others who vanished into the Russian Western Front against the Germans.  

Marina, prior to 1952 is alleged to have went to school for 4 years at Zguritza, Russia before moving to Leningrad (St. Petersburg).  Google Earth can't find Zguritza.  A google search can't find it either.  That's a bit strange.  She goes to an indentified area for 4 years of schooling at age 7 to 11 years.  Spy school for young girls?    

Edited April 23, 2020 by John Butler

[John Butler]

Over in another thread the conversation about Prayer Man is starting up again.  Bart Kamp posted about Oswald and I picked this out of the WC testimony of Geneva Hines.

"Miss HINE. One day I said to Mr. Shelley, "Who is that queer duck you have working down here" and I said that Just as a matter of slang because I've known Mr. Shelley for a long time and I was just talking to him, you see, and usually, all the boys that work down there speak to me because I have to go down here to pick up the little "comp" or gift slips on my desk. Every time I went by him I would speak to him, say "Good morning" and he would never catch or meet my gaze so I just made that remark to Mr. Shelley because I had spoken to him so many times and he never answered.
Mr. BALL. What did Shelley say?"

394

---

Miss HINE. He said that was just his way."

This with other examples fits my notion that both Oswalds were working the TSBD at the same time.  Not continuously, but from time to time so that one Oswald could step into the shoes of the other when necessary in their work.

We had heard this before from others and IMO this could mean that the voices of the two Oswalds were different.  One loud and boisterous and the other quiet and reserved.  It might have to do with regional accents also.  Actually, this is a more northern pattern of behavior then southern.  Is that meaningful.  I don't know. 

Not reacting and not speaking to people that spoke to you would be a good way to avoid people and for people to not pay attention to which Oswald was present.  By inducing people to not pay attention to you would be a good way for the two Oswalds to avoid people noticing they really did look identical.  So, someone not paying that much attention would shrug off the thought that that particular Oswald wasn't as remembered.  It has to be Lee Harvey, uh, who else could it be and walk off.  This is a company of roughly 70 people who are basically strangers to the new hires in for the beginning of the school year.

Geneva noticed that Oswald was odd,  but never really give it a second thought once she had talked to Shelley.  It seems Shelley was the goto guy for problems or information.  Perfect for keeping the cover of Oswald or Oswalds.  Shelley, his old buddy from the Trade Mart days in NO, La.

Edited April 23, 2020 by John Butler

[Pete Mellor]

5 hours ago, John Butler said:

Marina was born in Severodvinsk, Russia in July, 1941.  This is before the US entered WWII.  Severodvinsk is a port city on the White Sea, a part of the Artic Ocean,  in Artic Siberia  about 495 miles from St. Petersburg.  Then, as an infant moved to Arkhangelsk which is further to the south but still about 450 miles north of St. Petersburg.  This is Artic Siberia.  No wonder she did not want to return to someplace like this in Russia.

WWII action with the Germans missed this area except for convoys.  Wikipedia has this to say:

"The Arctic convoys of World War II were oceangoing convoys which sailed from the United Kingdom, Iceland, and North America to northern ports in the Soviet Union – primarily Arkhangelsk (Archangel) and Murmansk in Russia. There were 78 convoys between August 1941 and May 1945,^[1] sailing via several seas of the Atlantic and Arctic oceans, with two gaps with no sailings between July and September 1942, and March and November 1943."

Arkhagelsk is not a port, but Severodvinsk is.

Looking at the info generated a random thought.  Could the US be involved with spying in this area once Lend Lease convoys began voyaging to the port of Sevrodvinsk and others.  I would suppose so, but this doesn't mean their was contact between the OSS and Marina's family.  Just a far-fetched could be.

Of the 23 relatives of Marina only a few are male.  It could be there were others who vanished into the Russian Western Front against the Germans.  

Marina, prior to 1952 is alleged to have went to school for 4 years at Zguritza, Russia before moving to Leningrad (St. Petersburg).  Google Earth can't find Zguritza.  A google search can't find it either.  That's a bit strange.  She goes to an indentified area for 4 years of schooling at age 7 to 11 years.  Spy school for young girls?    

In Romanian it is called Zguritza. This was a Jewish settlement in northern Bessarabia, located 20 km from the capital Soroka. It was established in 1853 on leased agricultural land.

[John Butler]

18 hours ago, Pete Mellor said:

In Romanian it is called Zguritza. This was a Jewish settlement in northern Bessarabia, located 20 km from the capital Soroka. It was established in 1853 on leased agricultural land.

Thanks for pointing that out.  I misread what was said in the doc.  After doing a google search, I dimissed this thinking Zguritza was in northern Russian.  I couldn't make the connection to the Black Sea area and Zgurita, Moldova.  I would guess that Marina's step-father would have been assigned to that area in Moldova as part of this duties.  Further reading says that they returned to Leningrad (St. Petersburg).  There is roughly 1200 miles between Arkhangelsk and Zgurita, Moldavia.

 

Edited April 24, 2020 by John Butler

[John Butler]

Somewhere I read that the teeth of the woman we call Real Marge (Marguerite Claverie) and the woman we call Mysterious Marge (unknown) were different.  So, here is this research comparison:

Mysterious Marge at the left (screen right) has a right upper central incisor(?) (screen left) that appears to be two teeth.  Or, more realistically her upper right incisor is tiny and narrower than the left upper central incisor.  The tooth next to the small narrow central incisor is the right lateral incisor.  This gives the appearance of one split tooth. 

On the other hand Real Marge has two large upper central incisors that appear normal and the same size as other folk's teeth appear.  So, when in doubt whether this Marge is that Marge or not one can use this tooth characteristic to help identify whose who.  Real Marge seems to smile widely in photos.  This characteristic can be useful when in doubt:

This photo of Marguerite Claverie is readily identified as Marguerite Claverie by her teeth.  As is the next:

However, Mysterious Marge does not smile widely showing her teeth.  Perhaps a habit to hide her abnormal incisors developed as a younger person.

In a lot of photos I have trouble identifying whose who.  This helps quite a bit with the real Marguerite Claverie and not so much with her doppleganger.

 

   

Edited April 24, 2020 by John Butler

[John Butler]

"Those are photos of the Marguerite imposter according to Armstrong. BTW, the one and only Marguerite reported her height on a passport from 1965 as 5' 2 and 1/2 inches. People shrink as they age but only about an inch or so. That means at her tallest she was 5' 4'' (being generous)."  Tracy Parnell.

The passport of Marguerite Claverie Oswald is Mysterious Marge not the one and only Marguerite:

This is Mysterious Marge by age, height, glasses of a particular style, toothhless smile or expression, and mole under the right eye.  The next set of photos clearly show their age differences.

 

Another characteristic of Mysterious Marge is the mole under her right eve visible in the center photo.  Real Marge at screen left does not have this mole.

A third characteristic would be there age difference.  The real Marguerite Claverie would be 53 in 1960.  And, she appears to be in that age group.  In 1963 Real marge would be 56 and the two photos for the imposter for this same year appears to show a much older woman.

Mysterious Marge is still an unknown.  The best candidate for M. Marge is Aminthe Voitier.  Are there any photos available for Aminthe Voitier?

 

[Jim Hargrove]

On 4/23/2020 at 9:22 AM, John Butler said:

The Soviet Spy Princess.  Russian female spies were notorious for using sex to entrap their target.  Marina, the Soviet Spy, turns double agent to be near and convince Harvey Oswald (here I disagree and think both Lee and Harvey were there) that she wanted so desperately to get to the US that she was willing to become a double agent and be with in my count 3 Oswalds, Harvey and Lee and whoever is on the bridge with her.  There is very little proof of 3 Oswalds in Russia.  Just one photo of Marina hugging a man, definitely not Harvey, assumed to be Lee Oswald.  The other is the short Oswald on the bridge.  There are other photos of an Oswald figure that doesn't look like Harvey, but these are debatable.  One other thing, Harvey has his suicide scar on the wrong wrist in a Dallas photo leading to conjecture that he cut both wrists (no evidence of this in Russian documents) or the photo was not properly prepared and the arms and figure are reversed.  If not then what's going on?

John,

Neither of us trusts the photographic record, but I wondered what your thoughts are about the images below.  They are most of the Oswald mugshots allegedly from the USSR included in the “Evolution of LHO” poster Jack White and John A. made.  (Sorry about the quality.  I used my phone to photograph parts of the poster hanging on my office wall.)

Do you think these photos all show the same person?

 

[David Josephs]

On 4/24/2020 at 10:04 AM, John Butler said:

Somewhere I read that the teeth of the woman we call Real Marge (Marguerite Claverie) and the woman we call Mysterious Marge (unknown) were different.  So, here is this research comparison:

That woulda been me... lol

 

I'm going to need to focus on these Claverie/Winfrey/Voitier relationships and do some thinking on it....  I'll get back to y'all on that...

n the mean time....

I also have this 1967 letter from a MISS MARGARET M OSWALD... referring to Garrison and is to CDR ERLICHER, her boss.
You mention "M" coming from MOORE... and I've only seen her sign with a "C" middle initial. and she usually spells her name MARGUERITE, not Margaret.

That's her driver's license signature on top.  I'm wondering if Miss M M Oswald is not REAL MARGE...???

 

"Nancy Moore Winfrey married Edward Louis Sweeney on June 10, 1963.  Nannie or Nancy Winfrey is Nancy M. Sweeney.  The middle name Moore comes from her father Andrew Jackson Winfrey.  Moore was his mother’s name which was Nanny Moore Fawbush"

 

You think this is the same LEON VOITIER?  yet it says 1868...  

 

 

 

 

Edited April 21, 2022 by David Josephs