Dismantling the Single Bullet Theory Pt 4

[James R Gordon]

The Role Of Commander Humes In Giving Authority To The SBT

Towards the end of his presentation on the Single Bullet Theory, Dale Myers comments:

“So it is not a Magic Bullet at all. It is not even a Single Bullet theory, in my opinion. It is a Single Bullet fact.”

To a very large extent, the reason many consider the SBT to be a “fact”, is in due in no small part to the contribution of Commander James Humes. In what is close to fifty years since the assassination, during that time Commander Humes has been the subject of considerable criticism; much of it, in my opinion, undeserved. I do not see him as an active participant in the cover-up like Douglas Horne sees him. I tend to agree with David Lifton that he was someone caught up in a situation that was way over his head. I think Lifton is right when he suggests that Humes tried, on occasions, to send signals that would lead to the truth. On a number of occasions he suggests that the actual photographs taken at the autopsy might be more accurate than the three drawings he brings. WCH Vol 2 P. 369 + WCH Vol 2 P. 371 + WCH Vol 2 P. 372

However, whatever his reasons may have been, that does not erase the part he played in ensuring that this “theory” would be seen by all as a “fact.” And for that he is solely and totally responsible.

Commander Humes was, first and foremost, a surgeon and most of all he was the surgeon who carried out the autopsy on President Kennedy. He knew very well the condition of the throat and the position of all the veins and arteries therein, because he had examined them and pronounced them to be intact. WCH Vol 2 P. 363 It did not help that he had also not traced the throat wound because he was unaware there was even one there at all. And unable to own up to that he wrote into the Autopsy Report, a report that declares the had indeed thoroughly examined the body. Like it or not, that is now the official autopsy record. It does not matter that Commander Humes did not examine the throat wound, the report says he did. And that is now the official document of the autopsy of President Kennedy.

Commander Humes, better than anyone else, clearly knew what difficulties any bullet would have had to traverse if it had, indeed, travelled from the back to the front of the body. Knowing, and declaring, that there was no damage to the upper arteries of the body he will have known how unlikely it was that any bullet could have travelled through that area of body from back to front and yet cause no damage.

Although it was Harold Rydberg who drew the drawings for the Warren Commission, it was Commander Humes who gave him all the data. Although Commander Humes had no part in the actual drawing, the finished drawings were as much his drawings, just as though he had drawn them himself. No data got on these drawings that had not been supplied to Rydberg by Commander Humes himself. That includes the position of the right lung. When asked about the data that was provided to Harold Rydberg, Humes said “We had made certain physical measurements of the wounds, and of their position on the body of the late President, and we provided these and supervised directly Mr. Rydberg in making these drawings.” (emphasis added) WCH Vol 2 P. 350 So he suggests that what we see in CE 385 is a careful replication of what was seen on the body of the president. Re-positioning the lung was crucial. It had already been noted in the autopsy as having been damaged and if that could not be explained by the SBT, then it meant something else had to have caused it. That is why CE 385 has a cutaway: to explain not just the path of the bullet, but how the lung could have been damaged.

The line of trajectory, in CE 385, is the only one that Commander Humes could create that would allow a bullet to strike the back and exit between the 3rd and 4th trachea rings. And here is the problem about the lung. In its natural position this bullet’s trajectory would not have come in contact with the right lung. If it is essential to the SBT that the lung is bruised, and it is, then that is why the lung had to be moved up from its normal position. But since, in its natural position, the lung could not have been damaged then that means that whatever did damage the lung, it was not the SBT.

In addition, CE 385 does not illustrate the numerous veins and arteries that are in this bullet’s path. The “lie” of CE 385 is that this bullet had no obstacles to overcome as it makes its way from the back to the front. When in fact it has significant and impossible obstacles to overcome. The exclusion of this data was the responsibility of Commander Humes. Nothing got into these drawings or was omitted from these drawing that had not first been decided by Commander Humes. In that sense Commander Humes had total ownership of these drawings.

And this is the criticism of Commander Humes. When these drawings were presented to the Commission and taken into evidence on Monday 14th March 1964, Commander Humes knew that he had moved the position of the lung in order to ensure that it could be damaged by the bullet as it passed through the body. He knew if the SBT was not responsible for this damage, then something else was. And that would have to be explained. He also knew that, by excluding the circulatory structure from the diagram he was hiding the impossibility of the SBT. Had any of the Commission seen the vein and artery structures in that part of the throat they would have been bound to comment on it. And those questions and comments would have led to the downfall of The Single Bullet Theory.

And so with these drawings, especially CE 385, Commander Humes is responsible for creating the “lie” of the Single Bullet Theory. A lie, that many years later, Dale Myers was able to refer to as a “fact.”