New book on Victoria Adams by author Barry Ernest

[Guest Robert Morrow]

This is a nice book to have for anyone searching for truth in the 1963 Coup d'Etat. It came out in late 2010 and is available on Amazon Kindle for $2.99. That ought to be an automatic BUY for most folks: http://www.amazon.com/Girl-Stairs-Missing-Assassination-ebook/dp/B004GNFU9S/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1297435334&sr=1-1

You can put Kindle on your personal computer very easily at Amazon.

http://www.pegasusnews.com/news/2011/feb/11/jfk-historian-barry-ernest-girl-on-stairs-victoria/?refscroll=1533

JFK historian studies “missing witness” who should have seen Oswald

Christopher Means of The Assignment Desk, DFW

The author says the story of Victoria Adams has been ignored. He tells her story.

Theories about the assassination of President Kennedy have lingered in the Dallas area since the event occurred in 1963. The landmark Dealey Plaza is one of the most scrutinized sites in the United States, and details of the assassination have been turned and twisted by researchers desperate to find clues about exactly how a president of the United States was shot and killed in full view of the public.

Barry Ernest, author of The Girl On The StairsThe assassination occurred quickly, but the investigation was large and cumbersome. It was a tapestry woven in haste and with questionable agenda; there have been enough loose ends to encourage lifetimes of examination. The thread that new author Barry Ernest has been pulling at is Victoria Adams.

Since his college days in 1967, Ernest has been studying and examining the assassination of JFK -- and specifically, the Warren Report that concluded its official investigations. He was fascinated by the story of Adams. A lonely woman in the city, an orphan, she happened to be looking out the fourth-floor window of the Texas School Book Depository and saw the president murdered. She was standing in the same stairwell that Oswald himself was concluded to have hurriedly scaled down to make his escape. From the sixth floor, Oswald would have passed right by Adams, who swore she saw no such man.

After 35 years of searching for Adams, Ernest compiled his research in The Girl On The Stairs, a book that looks into the investigation and eventual discrediting of a valuable witness to the assassination of JFK by the Warren Commission.

A witness to a national tragedy, Adams was immediately the attention of authorities who hounded her about when and where she was at that moment. How quickly had she descended the stairs when the shots rang out? Exactly when did she leave the office building? She gave her answers but was quickly moved aside. There were no time tests of her actions, tests that had been done routinely on every other related aspect of Oswald’s escape. Ignored by the Warren Commission, she would eventually go into relative hiding to avoid the suspicious pressures of investigators and police.

The Warren Report would say that if Adams was correct, then she should have seen or heard the fleeing assassin. Because she had not, the report concluded she was wrong and therefore came down the staircase much later than she thought. Her testimony would throw doubt on a theory accepted by the Warren Commission. A national tragedy had to be put to rest and a grieving nation would know someone had paid for treason.

Ernest’s research in The Girl On The Stairs is not a smoking-gun theory of the assassination, but a look into contradictory statements, mishandling of investigations, and the marginalization of a key witness to one of the greatest national tragedies in our nations history. Many have gone looking for her, but only one found her. Now her truth can be heard.

Product Description

On November 22, 1963, a young Victoria Elizabeth Adams stood behind a fourth-floor window of the Texas School Book Depository in Dallas. She watched as John Kennedy was murdered in the streets below. Then, with a co-worker in tow, she ran down the back stairs of the building in order to get outside and determine what had happened.

At that precise moment, her life changed forever.

Unbeknownst to her but certainly in the forefront of the government's thinking was the fact that if Miss Adams was telling the truth, then she had descended those stairs at the same time Lee Oswald would have been on them as he made his escape from the sixth floor sniper's nest.

Yet Miss Adams saw no one.

And even though the stairs were old, wooden, and very creaky under any weight, she heard no one on them.

Her story presented obvious problems for the Warren Commission’s conclusion that Oswald was the sole assassin. When Miss Adams was called to testify before a Commission attorney, she was quickly discredited, humiliated, and eventually branded a xxxx. Behind closed doors she pleaded with the government to conduct time tests of her actions if she wasn’t believed. She begged the government to question her co-workers, particularly the woman who had accompanied her down the stairs, if she was felt to have been inaccurate.

But she was ignored.

And so, knowing the truth of what she had done and now fearing for her life because of it, she went into hiding and became willing to die with that private knowledge.

Intrigued by what little was available about Miss Adams, the author went in search of her. It took him 35 years to eventually find this elusive witness. Along the way, many of the rumors and speculations surrounding the JFK assassination were finally put to rest. And in the end, the truth of what Miss Adams did was discovered.

This is an important story, unique in this mess surrounding the Kennedy assassination and buried for decades. It is an account the government did not want us to hear, and actually went to the extreme of fabricating evidence in order to prevent us from hearing it.

This is more than just another book on the JFK assassination.

[Michael Hogan]

Barry Ernest has a blog and a facebook page: http://mysite.verizon.net/restu5kb/

[Duke Lane]

Barry Ernest has a blog and a facebook page: http://mysite.verizon.net/restu5kb/

Scary. I hope the book's better!

[John Simkin]

Barry Ernest has a blog and a facebook page: http://mysite.verizon.net/restu5kb/

He is also a member of this Forum:

http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=17329

[William Kelly]

Barry Ernest has a blog and a facebook page: http://mysite.verizon.net/restu5kb/

He is also a member of this Forum:

http://educationforu...showtopic=17329

I think he did a good job taking a relatively ignored witness and getting everything he could out of her.

Ernest and Adams demonstrate quite clearly that neither Oswald, nor the Sixth Floor Phantom Snipe, whoever he was, were on the back stairs in the minutes after the assassination,

and that the official story of Oswald descending those stairs in order to meet Baker and Truly in the Second Floor Lunchroom at 12:32 is not the way it happened.

[David Von Pein]

Quote

Ernest and Adams demonstrate quite clearly that neither Oswald, nor the Sixth Floor Phantom Snipe, whoever he was, were on the back stairs in the minutes after the assassination, and that the official story of Oswald descending those stairs in order to meet Baker and Truly in the Second Floor Lunchroom at 12:32 is not the way it happened.

Nonsense, Bill.

With respect to Vickie Adams, the ONLY thing a person needs to accept in order to have Oswald on the back stairs within one to two minutes after the President's assassination is to accept the almost certain fact that Victoria Adams was simply inaccurate in her time estimate about when she and Sandra Styles were on the back staircase.

And if she's off by a mere ONE MINUTE, or even less, then her whole story unravels and it then becomes quite easy to accept the fact that Oswald used the back stairs just after shooting President Kennedy from the sixth floor.

The key to pretty much knowing without a doubt that Adams and Styles were on the stairs only AFTER Lee Oswald used the same stairs is not really Oswald himself--but Roy Truly and Marrion Baker.

Because if Adams was really on the stairs as early as she said she was, she would have had virtually no choice but to have seen (or heard) the two men who we know for a fact WERE on those stairs within about 60 to 75 seconds of the assassination -- Truly and Baker.

Since Adams saw nobody and heard nobody, the very likely solution is that she was mistaken about her timing (which couldn't be a more common error with human beings), and she was on the stairs AFTER all three men (Oswald, Baker, and Truly) had already utilized the same stairs.

http://JFK-Archives.blogspot.com/2010/06/dvp-vs-dieugenio-part-14.html

http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/russ/testimony/adams_v.htm

Edited December 30, 2023 by David Von Pein

[Barry Ernest]

"Since Adams saw nobody and heard nobody, the very likely solution is that she was mistaken about her timing (which couldn't be a more common error with human beings), and she was on the stairs AFTER all three men (Oswald, Baker, and Truly) had already utilized the same stairs."

Perhaps a reading of the book and, in particular, a look at the June 2, 1964, transmittal letter from Martha Joe Stroud to J. Lee Rankin may help clarify your point.

Edited February 14, 2011 by Barry Ernest

[David Von Pein]

This post at another forum should be of interest to Mr. Ernest:

"Sandra Styles mentioned to me that this author [barry Ernest] had contacted her some years ago. She even knew the name of the book (which I hadn't heard of myself).

Sandra claimed she told Ernest what she was now telling me: that she and Victoria Adams did *not* go to the rear stairs anything close to as quickly as Victoria had claimed.

I find it a little worrying that there is no mention of Sandra's counter-version in any of the promotional material linked here." -- Sean Murphy; 1/27/11

[/unquote]

Source post:

http://groups.google.com/group/alt.assassination.jfk/msg/fcffcdcdf3ce66ae

And Murphy is an Oswald-Didn't-Do-It conspiracy fantasist, btw.

Edited February 14, 2011 by David Von Pein

[Barry Ernest]

"Sandra Styles mentioned to me that this author [barry Ernest] had contacted her some years ago. She even knew the name of the book (which I hadn't heard of myself).

Sandra claimed she told Ernest what she was now telling me: that she and Victoria Adams did *not* go to the rear stairs anything close to as quickly as Victoria had claimed.

I find it a little worrying that there is no mention of Sandra's counter-version in any of the promotional material linked here." -- Sean Murphy; 1/27/11

[Barry Ernest]

When I interviewed Sandra Styles in 2002, she said absolutely nothing of the kind to me. What she did say was, she couldn't be sure exactly how quickly she left the window and went down the stairs, but she recalled she did so "rather quickly," in her words, and "when Vicki did," again in her words. Why she would say otherwise now, especially when she said what she did then and added, "Vicki was the more observant one," is beyond me. Again, the Martha Joe Stroud letter can settle the matter.

[David Von Pein]

The Martha Joe Stroud letter can settle the matter.

What Commission Document is the Stroud 6/2/64 letter in, Barry? I'll be able to find it with ease at Mary Ferrell's site if you can give me the CD number (or CE number, if it's part of a Commission Exhibit). Thanks.

Edited February 14, 2011 by David Von Pein

[Barry Ernest]

"What Commission Document is the Stroud 6/2/64 letter in, Barry? I'll be able to find it with ease at Mary Ferrell's site if you can give me the CD number (or CE number, if it's part of a Commission Exhibit). Thanks."

David, the referenced letter was neither a Commission Document nor a Commission Exhibit. It was therefore not a part of the public record. It is not in the Mary Ferrell database either, that I am aware of. A copy of it exists in the Harold Weisberg collection, which is actually a copy that I gave him shortly after discovering it in the National Archives. It was contained within a box of correspondence and other miscellaneous paperwork sent from the DOJ office in Dallas to the WC. It is a June 2, 1964, air mail, registered letter sent by Stroud to Rankin in which she lists several changes Miss Adams requested be made to her testimony, none of which were actually done by the way. The final paragraph, and I will quote this verbatim including the spelling errors, reads:

"Mr. Bellin was questioning Miss Adams about whether or not she saw anyone as she was running down the stairs. Miss Garner, Miss Adams' supervisor, stated this morning that after Miss Adams went downstairs she (Miss Garner) saw Mr. Truly and the policeman come up."

Edited February 15, 2011 by Barry Ernest

[David Von Pein]

Thank you, Barry. That's interesting indeed.

I'll just add this:

The amount of physical and circumstantial evidence that exists to this day against Lee Harvey Oswald for the murders of both President Kennedy and policeman J.D. Tippit is just too massive and comprehensive to be dismissed or ignored or swept under the rug -- even with the kind of information supplied on June 2, 1964, by Dorothy Garner.

And remember to keep asking yourself one important question --

If Lee Oswald wasn't the sixth-floor assassin, then how did the "real killer(s)" manage to remain completely out of the sight of Vickie Adams and Sandra Styles and Dorothy Garner and Roy Truly and Marrion Baker following the assassination of the President?

Did the "real killer" somehow manage to make himself invisible to all of those witnesses right after the shooting? Or did the real killer (if it wasn't Oswald) decide to remain on the sixth floor for many minutes after he shot at JFK, running the fearful risk of being captured on the TSBD floor where Oswald's rifle and the three spent shells were found?

I think even most hardened conspiracy theorists would find that latter option a little hard to swallow.

http://Oswald-Is-Guilty.blogspot.com

Edited February 15, 2011 by David Von Pein

[Greg Parker]

Thank you, Barry. That's interesting indeed.

I'll just add this:

The amount of physical and circumstantial evidence that exists to this day against Lee Harvey Oswald for the murders of both President Kennedy and policeman J.D. Tippit is just too massive and comprehensive to be dismissed or ignored or swept under the rug -- even with the kind of information supplied on June 2, 1964, by Dorothy Garner.

Translation: I have no way of explaining Garner's comment away, so i just that you divert yourself from her and join me in enshrining the WC fairy tale.

And remember to keep asking yourself one important question --

If Lee Oswald wasn't the sixth-floor assassin, then how did the "real killer(s)" manage to remain completely out of the sight of Vickie Adams and Sandra Styles and Dorothy Garner and Roy Truly and Marrion Baker following the assassination of the President?

Since you made a link to the thread, I refer you back to the posts made by Sean Murphy in that thread: the real killer did not escape the notice of Baker and truly. Adams and Styles, in case you forgot in the last nano-second, missed him because they had gone down BEFORE Baker and Truly had gone up (according to Garner). As for Garner herself... who knows? Was she ever asked who else she may have seen?

Did the "real killer" somehow manage to make himself invisible to all of those witnesses right after the shooting? Or did the real killer (if it wasn't Oswald) decide to remain on the sixth floor for many minutes after he shot at JFK, running the fearful risk of being captured on the TSBD floor where Oswald's rifle and the three spent shells were found?

I think even most hardened conspiracy theorists would find that latter option a little hard to swallow.

I think even the most credulous of LNs can see right through your posts.

Edited February 15, 2011 by Greg Parker

[David Von Pein]

Greg Parker, as per all hard-boiled conspiracy theorists who enjoy their fantasies much more than reality, is more than willing (and even eager) to throw away all of the "Oswald Was Here" evidence found on Floor #6 on 11/22. Right, Gregory?

Just chuck all of the evidence straight into the trash, including the rifle and the three shells and Brennan's testimony and LHO's prints which littered the Sniper's Nest. I expect most online conspiracists to pretend that every piece of evidence damning to Oswald was faked. Why should you be different?

Adams and Styles, in case you forgot in the last nano-second, missed him because they had gone down BEFORE Baker and Truly had gone up (according to Garner).

Couldn't have happened. Not in the real world. Not unless Miss Adams and Miss Styles were world-class sprinters. And we know they stayed at the south-side windows for a certain period of time, too. And yet they still supposedly managed to beat Truly and Baker to the stairs?? Hogwash.

In short -- It's a thousand times easier to explain away Garner's 6/2/64 statement provided by Barry Ernest than it is for conspiracists to explain away all of that incredibly incriminating evidence against Lee H. Oswald that was discovered on the sixth floor.

Edited February 15, 2011 by David Von Pein