The Handwritten Letter Compared With The Typed One, Et Cetera

[Chris Newton]

14 minutes ago, Thomas Graves said:

If that's a radio on top of it, it makes sense that it was always in the kitchen.  Nice perch for it, perfect location.  

 

Ah, that would be convenient but Ruth is very specific:

https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=43#relPageId=420&tab=page

[Chris Newton]

37 minutes ago, Thomas Graves said:

What I've read is that the authorities couldn't find any letters, etc, in Ruth's possession that had been typed on that particular machine.  I don't know if they found any that had been typed on a different one.

Tommy,

I still don't know why they wouldn't have taken the typewriter ribbon on 11/23/63 when she allegedly told Hosty about the letter and turned over his draft. I mean this is not rocket science, the FBI had been dealing with typewriters in investigations since day one of the FBI existence.

[Thomas Graves]

Seein' as how the handwritten draft is so hard to read, I thought I'd post an official(?) HSCA transcript of it here, including the changes that were made in it while it was being written.

"[A]mong the documents turned over to the United States by the Soviet Union after the assassination of the President, included in the file purporting to be the entire correspondence between the Oswalds and the Soviet Embassy in Washington, D.C ., was the following letter dated November 9, 1963 :

 

"DEAR Sirs : This is to inform you of recent events since my meetings with comrade hostin in the Embassy of the Soviet Union, Mexico City, Mexico. "I was unable to remain in Mexico indefinitely because of my Mexican visa restrictions which was for 15 days only. I could not take a chance on requesting a new visa unless I used my real name, so I returned to the United States. "I had not planned to contact the Soviet Embassy in Mexico so they were unprepared, had I been able to reach the Soviet Embassy in Havana as planned, the embassy there would have bad time to complete our business . "Of course the Soviet Embassy was not at fault, they were, as I say unprepared, the Cuban consulate was guilty of a gross breach of regulations, I am glad he has since been replaced. "The Federal Bureau of Investigation is not now interested in my activities in the progressive organization `Fair Play for Cuba Committee,' of which I was secretary in New Orleans (State Louisiana) since I no longer reside in that State. However, the FBI has visited us here in Dallas, Tex., on November 1. Agent James P. Hasty [sic] warned me that if I engaged in FPCO activities in Texas the FBI will again take an `interest' in me. "This agent also `suggested' to Marina Nichilayeva that she could remain in the United States under FBI 'protection,' that is, she could defect from the Soviet Union, of cours, I and my wife strongly protested these tactics by the notorious FBI. "Please inform us of the arrival of our Soviet entrance visas's [sic] as soon as they come. "Also, this is to inform you of the birth on October 20, 1963, of a daughter, Audrey Marina Oswald in Dallas, Tex., to my wife. "Respectfully, (s) LEE H. OSWALD"

 

The envelope bears a postmark which seems to be November 12. Marina has testified that Oswald made many drafts of this letter before it was finally sent.

A piece of paper which was probably one of these drafts was found among Oswald's effects and reads as follows : (Words crossed out by Oswald have been put in parentheses.)

 

"Dear Sirs : This is to inform you of (re) events since my interviews with comrade Kostine in the Embassy of the Soviet Union, Mexico City, Mexico. "I was unable to remain in Mexico City (because I considered useless) indefinity because of my (visa) Mexican visa restrictions which was for 15 days only. (I had a) I could not take a chance applying for an extension (si) unless I used my real name so I returned to the United States. "I and Marina Nicholeyeva are now living in Dallas, Tex., (you already ha) "The FBI is not now interested in my activities in the progressive organization FPCC of which I was secretary in New Orleans (La) Louisiana since (mn) no longer (connected with) that State. (However the however) the FBI has visited us here in Texas on November 1, agent of the FBI James P. Hasty [sic] warned me that if I attempt to engage in FPCC activities in Texas the FBI will again take an "Interest" in me. This agent also "suggested" that my wife could "remain in the United States under FBI protection," that is, she could defect from the (refuse to return to the) Soviet Union. Of course I and my wife strongly protested these tactics by the notorious F.B .I. "(It was unfortunate that the Soviet Embassy was unable to aid me in Mexico City but) I had not planned to contact the Mexican City Embassy at all so of course they were unprepared for me. Had I been able to reach Havana as planned (I could have contacted the Soviet Embassy there for the completion of rapid have been able to help me get the neceary [sic] documents I required assist me.) would have had time to assist me but of course the (stuip) stuip Cuban Consule [sic?] was at fault here, I'm glad he had since been replaced by another ." "

 

http://aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/hsca/reportvols/vol11/pdf/HSCA_Vol11_WC_3E1_Slawson.pdf (on pages 155 and 156)

--  Tommy

PS:  "Mexican City" for "Mexico City" ?  Sounds like Oswald all right.

Edited December 15, 2016 by Thomas Graves

[Chris Newton]

looks like Ruth's copy is at Swarthmore College in box 2 of her collection:

http://www.swarthmore.edu/library/friends/ead/5109pain.xml

 

[Thomas Graves]

6 minutes ago, Chris Newton said:

 

looks like Ruth's copy is at Swarthmore College in box 2 of her collection:

 

This one?

"Original letter written by Lee Harvey Oswald, and transcription by Ruth Paine"

--  Tommy

[Chris Newton]

Yes but that's got to be a photocopy of Oswald's letter not the original.

[Chris Newton]

I might have some friends or family that could try and get a copy at Swarthmore. It's my old stomping grounds.

[Ray Mitcham]

6 hours ago, Chris Newton said:

Ruth Paine's story is that Lee asked to use her typewriter on Saturday, 11/9 or Sunday 11/10 and that she let him use it at the dining table, which was the only table in the house.

At one point she went to put one of the children in a high chair and Lee shielded her from see what he was writing.

Later she noticed that Lee had left the rough draft on top of her desk secretary, which was located in the living room. She described the draft document as a one page handwritten draft on 8x10 standard size paper folded in half.

At some point Sunday afternoon she made her own handwritten copy of the draft.

That evening she asked Michael and Lee to move some furniture, swapping the locations of her desk secretary and her living room couch.

When she noticed that the original draft was still on her desk secretary she hid it inside and closed it.

Later that evening she showed it (doesn't state which document she showed) to her husband Michael and they discussed it briefly.

Monday she took Lee down to the DMV but it was closed for Veteran's Day.

Monday night she sat on the living room couch with Lee while he watched his "spy show" ("Espionage" Premiere on NBC?) and Lee asked if she was troubled by her upcoming Lawyer appointment to find out about divorcing Michael.

According to the County Clerk she filed for Divorce on 11/13/63.

"At some point Sunday afternoon she made her own handwritten copy of the draft."

What a charming thing for a committed Quaker to do.

 

[Mark Knight]

7 hours ago, Thomas Graves said:

FWIW, Monday the 11th was Veteran's Day.

Edit:  Maybe he asked her to mail it for him.  lol

-- Tommy

OK, let's get serious about when the letter MAY have been mailed.  Did the post office in Irving pick up mail from deposit boxes [such as the ones found outside post offices] on Sundays in 1963?  IF NOT, since November 11th was Veterans Day and the Post office was closed, that letter could have been mailed in Irving anytime between Saturday evening November 9th after the last mail collection, and Tuesday morning November 12th.

So if LHO was in Irving the entire weekend, he could have walked to the post office and mailed the letter anytime after Saturday evening.  OR, if he was riding with Frazier, he could have even had Frazier take him past the Irving post office on Tuesday morning on their way to work.

THAT is the framework we have to work with.  The letter didn't necessarily have to be mailed during postal working hours on Tuesday the 12th.

[Steve Thomas]

2 hours ago, Mark Knight said:

OK, let's get serious about when the letter MAY have been mailed.  Did the post office in Irving pick up mail from deposit boxes [such as the ones found outside post offices] on Sundays in 1963?  IF NOT, since November 11th was Veterans Day and the Post office was closed, that letter could have been mailed in Irving anytime between Saturday evening November 9th after the last mail collection, and Tuesday morning November 12th.

So if LHO was in Irving the entire weekend, he could have walked to the post office and mailed the letter anytime after Saturday evening.  OR, if he was riding with Frazier, he could have even had Frazier take him past the Irving post office on Tuesday morning on their way to work.

THAT is the framework we have to work with.  The letter didn't necessarily have to be mailed during postal working hours on Tuesday the 12th.

Ruth Paine testified that LHO didn't come to her house in Irving the weekend of the 12th because she was having a birthday party. LHO stayed in Dallas. He supposedly told Marina that he had gone to the license bureau on Saturday morning to take a driver's test, but they closed at noon and he didn't have time to wait around. The bureau closed at noon and didn't open on Monday the 11th. He supposedly filled out an application, but the application wasn't dated.

It's CE 426

 

So, if the letter was mailed from Irivng on the 12th, Lee didn't mail it.

If the letter is dated the 9th, supposedly LHO wasn't at the Paine's to type it.

 

Paine said that she wasn't familiar enough with Oswald's "printing", to definitively say that the printing on the driver's license application was his.

 

Are you familiar sufficiently with the handwriting or handprinting of Lee Harvey Oswald to be able to tell us whether the writing and handprinting on that document is or is not Lee Harvey Oswald's?
Mrs. PAINE - I am not sufficiently familiar. I can simply compare it with m only other thing I have seen in his printing which is what he wrote down in my diary.

 

Does this cover his hand "writing" as well?

 

Steve Thomas

[Mark Knight]

I'm re-reading the testimony of Ruth Paine to the WC.  In it, she says that on Veterans Day. "...I was away from 9 or so in the morning until about 2 in the afternoon and this was a day that Lee was at home or at the Fifth Street address at my home."

Apparently Paine claims that LHO was at her home the weekend of November 9-11:

Mr. JENNER - Do you recall doing some shopping on the morning of the 9th after you had gone to the driver's license bureau and found it closed?
Mrs. PAINE - Yes, we shopped at a dime store immediately adjacent, or in the same shopping center as the driver's license bureau.
Mr. JENNER - And some few small articles were purchased?
Mrs. PAINE - That is right.
Mr. JENNER - And you arrived home when--about noon?
Mrs. PAINE - For a late lunch, I would say. I might say Lee was as gay as I have ever seen him in the car riding back to the house. He sang, he joked, he made puns, or he made up songs mutilating the Russian language, which tickled and pained, Marina, both at once.
Mr. JENNER - What did he do that afternoon, if you recall?
Mrs. PAINE - I don't recall.
Mr. JENNER - Did he look at television?
Mrs. PAINE - My guess is that he certainly looked at television.
Mr. JENNER - Did you leave your home late that afternoon?
Mrs. PAINE - I went to vote. This would be a trip of perhaps 20 minutes.
Mr. JENNER - And he was at home when you left? And was he at home when you returned?
Mrs. PAINE - Yes.
Mr. JENNER - Now, at any time during that morning drive did you by any chance stop by a car dealers?
Mrs. PAINE - No.
Mr. JENNER - Either going to or from the driver's license bureau?
Mrs. PAINE - No, we did not stop at a car dealers.
Mr. JENNER - What is your opinion as to whether Lee Oswald could have been at the Lincoln-Mercury dealership in downtown Dallas on that day?
Mrs. PAINE - I think he could not have been.
Mr. JENNER - Was he out of your sight other than the period of time it took you to go to the polls to vote that day?
Mrs. PAINE - It is entirely possible that I made a short trip to the grocery store in the afternoon. But I would say he was not out of my sight for any length of time.
Mr. JENNER - In any event, you were conscious of his being in your home or within your general presence all day.
Mrs. PAINE - The entire day. Shall I give what recollections I have for activities of the 10th?
Mr. JENNER - Yes, please.
Mrs. PAINE - It is my best recollection that this lesson in parking to which I have referred occurred on the 10th, late in the afternoon.
Mr. JENNER - That is Sunday afternoon?
Mrs. PAINE - On Sunday afternoon. I would guess that he had watched pro football on the television in the afternoon. It was early evening after supper, and my recollection is that Michael Paine was also at the home. I cannot recall whether he had had supper with us, but I would guess so. Then I asked the two men, Lee and Michael, to help me in rearranging the furniture in the living room. And as I have already said, in reference to my testimony regarding the note, Commission Exhibit 103, the note referring to Mexico City--I will add to that testimony here--I remembered suddenly that this note was still on the top of my secretary desk in the living room, preceded the two men into the room, and put it into my desk. This is the folding front, you know. I just opened it, put it in and closed it. And then we moved all the furniture in the room around.
Mr. JENNER - The two men were Lee Oswald and your husband?
Mrs. PAINE - That is right
Mr. JENNER - And on that occasion, you took the note, which is Commission Exhibit 103, which I call the Mexico note, and you put it inside the secretary.
Mrs. PAINE - Yes.
Mr. JENNER - And----
Mrs. PAINE - After having left it on my desk for 2 full days, waiting for it to be picked up.
Mr. JENNER - You had left it in the same place it was when you first noticed it?
Mrs. PAINE - That's right.
Mr. JENNER - And that was out in the open.
Mrs. PAINE - That's right.
Mr. JENNER - Have you recounted all that occurs to you as pertinent to that weekend?
Mrs. PAINE - Yes.

 

And again:

Representative FORD - On these subsequent occasions did he ask you to help him or did he take the keys and do it on his own initiative?
Mrs. PAINE - No, he never took the keys. I offered to give him--give Lee lessons on Sunday afternoons and we managed to do it a few Sunday afternoons, I think three altogether and there were a couple of weekends when we didn't get the lesson in, something intervened.
Representative FORD - This was in October of 1963?
Mrs. PAINE - October and November. I think the last lesson was November 10, being the last Sunday.
Mr. DULLES - What progress did he make over that period?
Mrs. PAINE - Considerable.
Mr. DULLES - Reasonable progress?
Mrs. PAINE - Very reasonable progress. I thought he learned well, as I have said, both backing and to make a right-angle turn, and really began to understand the feeling of parking.
Representative FORD - Did he indicate to you when he might apply for a driver's license?
Mrs. PAINE - Yes. Oh, yes. Thank you. It is a whole new section.
Mr. JENNER - I was about to go into that.
Mr. DULLES - There was some testimony on that point, I believe.
Mrs. PAINE - Yes.
Representative FORD - Mr. Frazier testified that Oswald mentioned to him that he was going to or had, I am not sure which, and I was wondering whether he mentioned it to you?
Mr. DULLES - Got in line.
Mrs. PAINE - Yes, on November 9, which was election day, Saturday, in Texas.
Mr. JENNER - This was the weekend he was home?
Mrs. PAINE - This was the weekend that he was home, which was the last weekend he was home, don't call it home though.
Mr. JENNER - I am sorry. It was the last weekend that he was at your home?
Mrs. PAINE - That is correct.
Mr. JENNER - And he arrived the previous day, evening or late afternoon?
Mrs. PAINE - That is correct.
Mr. JENNER - Now starting with that Friday afternoon, please relate the course of events?
Mrs. PAINE - Well, I will say that we went Saturday morning to a station in Dallas where you can take the written test and eye test that permits you to get a learner's permit, but when we got there that is all of us, children, Lee, Marina and myself, driving in my car to Oak Cliff--when we got there it was closed, being election day. I hadn't thought, realized that this would mean it would be closed. So we returned. The next weekend---
Mr. JENNER - Excuse me, before you reach that.
Mrs. PAINE - Right.
Mr. JENNER - Are you reasonably certain that he came home or came to Irving the previous afternoon?
Mrs. PAINE - Certainly.
Mr. JENNER - Perhaps to refresh your recollection, do you remember a weekend in which Lee Harvey Oswald called from Dallas and said to Marina that he would not be in that Friday afternoon because he was going to do some job hunting the next morning, and that he would come the next day? Could it be that this was that weekend?
Mrs. PAINE - Well, he had already had 'a job that weekend, didn't he? So he wouldn't have been job hunting. I recall he was there in the morning, Saturday morning.
Mr. JENNER - Looking for another job?
Mrs. PAINE - Oh, Well, no.
Mr. JENNER - You don't recall any discussion of his being dissatisfied with the job at the Texas School Book Depository?
Mrs. PAINE - No.
Mr. JENNER - And was undertaking to look for another job?
Mrs. PAINE - No.
Mr. JENNER - There is no discussion?
Mrs. PAINE - There is one Saturday that he came out later but that was still in October. It was the second weekend that he came out, altogether he came out on the weekend of the 4th, so he would have come out on October 12, Saturday. It doesn't check with my recollection.
Mr. JENNER - So just to make sure, it is your present recollection that you can recall no occasion when you were advised by Marina or directly that Lee Harvey Oswald called and said he would not be in on that particular Friday but would come the next day?
Mrs. PAINE - I would be quite certain it was not that weekend. It is possible that this happened, I don't recall any discussion, nor did I have any idea that there had been any occasion when he had to look for a different job.
Mr. JENNER - Never any discussion on that subject?
Mrs. PAINE - Never.
Just to complete the discussion of automobile driving, I will go on to the next weekend then when he did not come out to my house, but I----
Representative FORD - That would be the weekend of the 18th?
Mrs. PAINE - Just prior to the assassination. The 16th I was having a birthday party for my little girl and said I couldn't possibly take him again to this place so he could take a test. But that he didn't need a car. This was news to him. He thought he needed a car for his initial test, learner's permit. I said he could go himself from Dallas.

 

So Mrs. Payne TWICE testified that LHO WAS at her home in Irving on the weekend of November 9-11. And she testified that the birthday party was the following weekend, when LHO did NOT come to Irving.

[Chris Newton]

All Lee had to do was drop the letter in the mailbox which was mounted next to the front door and it would have been picked up by the mailman and postmarked on 11/12/63, no?

Could Ruth have just taken it out anytime before the pickup and copied the letter?

The original draft could then have been retrieved along with the other drafts on 11/22-11/23 and the story about how she made the copy developed?

As Ray pointed out, it wouldn't do for Ruth to be snooping through stuff is she were simply an innocent housewife.

Edited December 15, 2016 by Chris Newton
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[Steve Thomas]

10 hours ago, Thomas Graves said:

"I was unable to remain in Mexico indefinitely because of my Mexican visa restrictions which was for 15 days only. I could not take a chance on requesting a new visa unless I used my real name, so I returned to the United States.

Thomas,

 

This part has always confused me. It implies that his original visa was in a fake name. Has a visa ever turned up for Oswald in a fake name, and what was the name he used? Would he have had fake documents to prove who he said he was?

 

Steve Thomas

[Chris Newton]

9 minutes ago, Steve Thomas said:

This part has always confused me. It implies that his original visa was in a fake name. Has a visa ever turned up for Oswald in a fake name, and what was the name he used? Would he have had fake documents to prove who he said he was?

Hosty claimed the Visa was in the name Lee, Harvey Oswald, i.e. "Harvey Oswald Lee". I've not found a document for that.

[Steve Thomas]

1 hour ago, Mark Knight said:

So Mrs. Payne TWICE testified that LHO WAS at her home in Irving on the weekend of November 9-11. And she testified that the birthday party was the following weekend, when LHO did NOT come to Irving.

Mark,

 

I guess you're right. I find her testimony confusing at times.

 

Steve Thomas