The Three Magic Bullets

[Thomas H. Purvis]

Pat,

You seem to favour the idea that the injury to James Tague was caused by a fragment from the bullet that struck Kennedy in the head. However, could such a fragment have enough energy to do this? A bullet smashing through a skull and breaking apart will loose a lot of kinetic energy. The front and back ends of the bullet lost so much energy they could only reach the front part of the limousine and drop to the floor without penetrating any surfaces. The 'baloney' fragment and dozens of tiny fragments lacked the energy to exit the skull. For your idea to work, from somewhere in the middle of the bullet a fragment would have to emerge with sufficient kinetic energy to travel about 260 feet. It would have to retain enough energy to knock of a piece of concrete and impart enough energy into that fragment so that it could travel a few feet and strike Tague on the cheek with enough force to make his skin bleed.

Is it really possible for a fragment to have that much energy?

While I have spent much of the last year reading Sturdivan's book, and catching mistakes, I think his and Ken Rahn's work on this fragment makes sense. They are so incredibly Rahng about the NAA one should hope they'd be right about something. (There is a whole section on this fragment in Rahn's book-length defense of the NAA, available on his site.) When I realized that the bullet at 313 did not travel through Kennedy's skull, but broke up on the outside (as proven by the x-rays) and when I realized that the trajectory for the Tague fragment passed within a foot or so of the trajectory for the fragment striking the windhshield, I became convinced that they were correct. The base of the bullet found by Kellerman's door was void of lead. The fragment striking the curb by Tague was made entirely of lead, as near as can be determined. A bit of a coincidence, to my thinking.

A most excellent response Pat.

The "naysayers" continue to expouse the virtual impossibility of a fragment from this shot having the energy to travel the distance and create the chip to the curb.

Yet, to date I have yet to see even one who has explained exactly how the penetration through the skull and subsequent exit resulted in the fragmented bullet.

When this is done, then one has little difficulty in recognizing that fragments from the Z313 headshot left the head of JFK at different points of encounter with skull bone, and thus left at varying degrees of velocity.

And, just as the lead fragment which left JFK's head and struck the wrist of JBC, thereby having adequate velocity and energy to completely break the wrist bone, other fragments also possessed the same energy.

When one also takes the time and effort to recognize exactly what caused this WCC copper-jacketed bullet to behave and fragment in the manner that it did, then a better understanding of the wounds and skull damage to JFK is understood, as well as the varying degrees of energy/velocity which fragments exiting the skull had.

At minimum, fragments left the head of JFK at three completely different degrees of velocity due to the manner in which the bullet behaved, fragmented, and these fragments left the skull of JFK.

And, a good look at Z312 and the manner in which JBC is holding his forearm/wrist in a position which is slightly elevated above horizontal will explain how the Z313 fragment was able to strike the back side of the wrist and go through the wrist of JBC on it's tangent nature.

[Thomas H. Purvis]

An excellent summary, Tony. While the Badens, Lattmers and Posners of the world have focused on "is it possible?" those who have focused on "is it likely?" have come up with entirely different results. None of the three bullets you describe was "likely" to behave as purported in the "official" line of nonsense.

As someone who calls it as he sees it, however, I must admit I believe there are rational, non-conspiratorial explanations for some of the mysteries. Much of the confusion revolving around the Tague fragment comes from his insistence that the fragment did not come from the final shot. People incorrectly take this to mean the head shot. But, as Tom has long insisted, and as I hope to soon demonstrate, the head shot was the second of the three shots heard by most in the Plaza. As a result it seems likely that the Tague fragment was the missing piece of the bullet striking Kennedy at 313.

The other mystery which has a rational explanation is the "slice" of bullet purportedly on the back of Kennedy's head. I feel entirely confident that this "slice" was in fact the large fragment found during the autopsy above and behind Kennedy's right eye. In my online presentation, available at the link below, in the X-ray section, on the Believing is Seeing and The Fragment Fragment slides, I demonstrate the actual location of this fragment on the lateral x-ray, and explain the difficulties men have had in matching up the x-rays. I "debuted" this conclusion at JFK Lancer last year, and took my findings to an online radiology forum earlier this year, and have yet to receive any real disagreement on this point.

As most here will certainly attest, it is quite irrelevant as to what "Tom has long insisted".

What is relevant is the accurate and reliable testimony of those such as Nellie Connally, James Altgens, Kellerman; etc; etc; etc; who have in one way, shape, or form, all told us the sequencing of the shots fired.

Now!

If we want to talk the "Cowlick" entry which severely fragmented and grazed across the upper portion of the brain, then we can talk the Z312/313 shot.

However, if we want to talk the EOP entry, we must talk about the one down in front of James Altgens position, when JFK was leaning leftwards with his head rolled downward and to the left side , exposing the right rear of his neckline to the sixth floor window of the TSDB.

Of which the bullet pretty well passed through the mid-brain and exited in the frontal lobe, quite intact.

Of course, at risk of being redundant, the bullet had to pass through the edge of the coat collar, and thereafter "tunnel" upwards/(downwards) through the fleshy part of the neck from the hairline entry, prior to encountering the skull in the EOP region, prior to this passing through the mid-brain.

And then of course:

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"I reached over & pulled him to me & tried to get us both down in the car"

"Then came a third shot"---"I did not see the third shot hit--but I felt something falling all over me. My sensation was of spent buckshot. My eyes saw bloody matter in tiny bits all over the car."

Handwritten notes of Nellie Connally, written 10 days after the assassination.

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Mr. ALTGENS

He wasn't upright. He was at an angle but when it hit him, it seemed to have just lodged--it seemed as if he were hung up on a seat button or something like that. It knocked him just enough forward that he came right on down. There was flesh particles that flew out of the side of his head in my direction from where I was standing, so much so that it indicated to me that the shot came out of the left side of his head.

I was prepared to make a picture at the very instant the President was shot. I had refocused to 15 feet because I wanted a good closeup of the President and Mrs. Kennedy, and that's why I know that it would be right at 15 feet, because I had prefocused in that area, and I had my camera almost to my eye when it happened and that's as far as I got with my camera.

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There was flesh particles that flew out of the side of his head in my direction from where I was standing,

so much so that it indicated to me that the shot came out of the left side of his head.

James Altgens

So much for any problems with a skull fragment landing at the feet of Mr. Altgens.

[Bill Charleston]

"I reached over & pulled him to me & tried to get us both down in the car"

"Then came a third shot"---"I did not see the third shot hit--but I felt something falling all over me. My sensation was of spent buckshot. My eyes saw bloody matter in tiny bits all over the car."

Handwritten notes of Nellie Connally, written 10 days after the assassination.

Both John and Nellie Connally got this part clearly wrong. John in several interviews says essentially the same thing.

[Pat Speer]

"I reached over & pulled him to me & tried to get us both down in the car"

"Then came a third shot"---"I did not see the third shot hit--but I felt something falling all over me. My sensation was of spent buckshot. My eyes saw bloody matter in tiny bits all over the car."

Handwritten notes of Nellie Connally, written 10 days after the assassination.

Both John and Nellie Connally got this part clearly wrong. John in several interviews says essentially the same thing.

Bill, I recently went through the eyewitness statements and examined them quite closely. The only close-by witnesses to hear three shots and not note that one of the shots was within a split second of the head shot were Nellie Connally and Gayle Newman. When one reads their statements closely one realizes they were both in rapid movement at the time and were not looking directly at the president after the head shot. I believe their rapid movements blurred the sound of the last two shots into the sound of one shot. They also were the only witnesses to hear two EARLY shots. This is not a coincidence. Gayle Newman was looking directly at the President and Connally when the first two shots struck. She saw responses to both shots. Nellie Connally was also aware of two separate shots. Both women seem to have matched the sounds they heard to match the responses they observed. The governor on the other hand acknowledged he did not hear the shot that struck him. While the WC and the mainstream media was quick to jump on the "he was in shock" excuse, they overlooked that NO ONE else, outside his wife and Gayle Newman, "heard" this shot. As a result, I feel 99.9% confident that the impacts on Kennedy and Connally at frame 224 were from a silenced weapon. LNers who cite the blurs on the Z-film after 160 and 224 fail to notice that the blur after 190 is much much greater, so much so that the HSCA's William Hartmann said that the only two blurs he felt sure were from gun shots was the one after 190 and the one after 313 (not having studied the eyewitness testimony he failed to realize there were two shots after Z-312, with separate and quite evident responses by Zapruder.)

Edited October 23, 2006 by Pat Speer

[John Dolva]

"What is the answer to this question posed by Tony re kinetic energy? Who has looked at it in detail. Some thoughts. This fragment would have to rise over the crossbar/windscreen which is a change in direction. Energy is lost there. Then the fragnment must change direction again to move down to hit the curb. IOW the energy it has when going over the screen is low enough so it will drop sufficiently to hit the curb. And then at the curb, which it strikes at a tangent, it has enough energy to gouge a hole in the curb and send fragments some meters away sufficient to break skin.. Take something sharp outside and give the curb a whack and see how much damage you do. If the fragment had that much energy when striking the curb, would it have had such a trajectory as it must have had if it came from the head shot. Did it happen at all? It seems to be automativally assumed so. A shot from the TSBD is sometimes seen as proven by the existence of the 'Tague shot'. Walthers himself is a bit of a shady character. What irrefutable proof is there the Tague shot ever occurred? There's a mark on the curb, and there is a somewhat coached realisation of a bit of blood on a freshly shaved cheek. What else? A barely noticed sting? Very hazy contained testimony."

Here's a site that attempts to deal with this.

http://www.jfkhistory.com/k/answers.html

(image)

This Tague shot is a thorn in many scenarios. In a way it's a shot that shouldn't be. Is it an event that focused attention on the TSBD? Resarchers seems unsure of which cheek was hit. Photo's are presented upside down and rotated in various ways. The one from the FBI has the curb upside down with no clearly visible mark. And they didn't seem interested enough to do anything about the curb mark for months. Seems like another of those mixed up things this assassination is so full of.

http://www.jfkhistory.com/k/answers.html

[Pat Speer]

John, the Tague fragment is not nearly the mystery it seems to be, once one realizes that it was a fragment from the head shot and not a sepaqate bullet strike. Sturdivan and Rahn have a whole section on this on Rahn's website. Sturdivan maintains that fragments exit skulls at hundreds of feet per second and that a large enough fragment--more than a third of the head shot bullet was never found--would have enough energy to travel to Tague and damage the curb. He performs a series of calculations demonstrating this. It made sense to me at the time. If you take a look and find something wrong with their thinking on this point please let me know.

[John Dolva]

Ok, I'm looking at it. I wonder if Tom could post the elevation above sea level for the curb strike position? I think one should be able to do a calculation ackwards from there tosee what velocity a fragment would have had to have to rise from Kennedys head over obstacles and descend to the curb at that point. I imagine it would be possible to be quite precise about that. Maybe not? If so one can then speculate about if that would be sufficiet to tangentially strike concrete, cause the damage it did and chips break skin 20 feet away.

[Cliff Varnell]

Ok, I'm looking at it. I wonder if Tom could post the elevation above sea level for the curb strike position? I think one should be able to do a calculation ackwards from there tosee what velocity a fragment would have had to have to rise from Kennedys head over obstacles and descend to the curb at that point. I imagine it would be possible to be quite precise about that. Maybe not? If so one can then speculate about if that would be sufficiet to tangentially strike concrete, cause the damage it did and chips break skin 20 feet away.

John, while you're at it, take a look at this frame of the Muchmore film...

[scroll down a bit]

http://spot.acorn.net/jfkplace/09/fp.back_...ue/beverly.html

Note the position of the bottom of Mary Moorman's and Jean Hill's coats.

There was a stiff breeze blowing from the southwest at the moment of the head shot.

Meanwhile, up on the corner of Houston and Elm, motorcycle cop Marrion Baker was

almost knocked over by a stiff wind from the north.

James Tague stood 90 yards southwest of the limo at the moment of the head shot.

There was a hard, swirling wind blowing in Dealey Plaza, and yet we are to buy the

notion that a 3g bullet fragment could maintain a near-straight-line trajectory into

the teeth of this hard, swirling wind over the course of some 85 yards?

The notion is absurd on its face, no?

[Thomas H. Purvis]

"I reached over & pulled him to me & tried to get us both down in the car"

"Then came a third shot"---"I did not see the third shot hit--but I felt something falling all over me. My sensation was of spent buckshot. My eyes saw bloody matter in tiny bits all over the car."

Handwritten notes of Nellie Connally, written 10 days after the assassination.

Both John and Nellie Connally got this part clearly wrong. John in several interviews says essentially the same thing.

Perhaps your crystal ball informs you that those persons who experienced the event did not know what they were talking about.

However, I seldom rely on crystal balls and fortune tellers, and prefer those statements and testimony of the events as they occurred, by the persons who experienced the events, such as that of Mr. Altgens, which happens to clearly substantiate this testimony.

Along with considerable others who have always told/informed us that Z313 was the second shot.

The true "magic" bullet is the one down at the Altgens position!

[John Dolva]

It would seem so, Cliff. So far, while looking for the levels, I've looked at some tables of 50 grain (a bit over 3 grams) at around 800 fps muzzle velocity. The trajectory over 90 yards is variance in the order of a foot max. So for it to have dropped to the curb (and not drifted off line) would indicate a much lower strike speed. Perhaps a good sling shot could duplicate it. Would that then chip concrete? Particularly at a tangential strike? I don't know.

The sinewave scratches* show that a wheel hitting the curb is not an unusual event.

(image)

A lead weight (wheel balance) is a possible source of the lead the FBI found.

This photo of Tague seems to show him with a little patch on a shave cut.

He said (contrary to what some assume) that the scratch on his left cheek is old and that the sting he remembered after Walthers pointed out the blood droplets on his cheek was on the right cheek. Sothere is no proof that he was hit by anything.

so dare one say: no Tague shot at all?

If so, what role has the Tague shot played? Does it's non existence (if my reasoning is correct here, please demolish) free one from considering some scenarios that depend on it? Did it serve to focus attention on the TSBD at that moment in time?

EDIT:: *the wheel size, sine waves etc are merely illustrative of a sinewave scribed by a point on a circle as it rolls along. I suspect the tyre was flat and various parts of the hubcap and rim scratched the concrete and that a similar event caused the 'curb strike'. Perhaps Tague was a bit attracted to center stage and once the ball was rolling didn't back out. In the mean time he became convinced that what was theorised as happening actually was what did happen.

Subtract the Tague fragment/wounding/shot whatever, gone is a recurring 'but, what about the Tague shot'.... simple: It never happened. There's nothing in it to bother explaining.

Edited October 24, 2006 by John Dolva

[Pat Speer]

EDIT:: *the wheel size, sine waves etc are merely illustrative of a sinewave scribed by a point on a circle as it rolls along. I suspect the tyre was flat and various parts of the hubcap and rim scratched the concrete and that a similar event caused the 'curb strike'. Perhaps Tague was a bit attracted to center stage and once the ball was rolling didn't back out. In the mean time he became convinced that what was theorised as happening actually was what did happen.

Subtract the Tague fragment/wounding/shot whatever, gone is a recurring 'but, what about the Tague shot'.... simple: It never happened. There's nothing in it to bother explaining.

John, the Tague strike almost certainly occurred. It was reported at the time. The FBI ignored it, the WC ignored it, and then Tague himself brought attention to it, and the WC had to take notice. He initially thought the shots came from the fence, so he wasn't pushing the lone-gunman from the TSBD angle. After the WC report came out, like most Americans, he believed it. Later, as he read more about it, and befriended Harold Weisberg, he came to believe there was a conspiracy. Tague was a successful businessman, and, until recent years, never sought to capitalize on his unique connection to history. If he and Walthers faked the strike for attention, it would be quite a coincidence that Tague just so happened to have been stuck in traffic and just so happened to have been in a direct line with the limousine and TSBD at 313. As a result I find him quite credible. As you said, the missing fragment could very well have been as large as a .22. A .22 traveling at 4-500 fps in a stiff breeze will be deflected quite a bit, the fragment even more so since it wasn't completely round. BUT the amount of this deflection would be in the order of yards. If I remember correctly the Tague location was several yards to the right of the 313 trajectory. As a result his location lines up perfectly if one assumes the fragment striking the curb came from the head shot bullet. If one tries to state the shot came at any other time, and was a miss, one is forced to submit that either the assassin/assassins were horrible shots, or something totally idiotic like Posner's "twig" theory occurred, in which a metal-jacketed bullet fired sharply downwards from above struck a twig and separated, with the bulk of its lead interior drastically changing course and striking the ground some 400 feet away.

Edited October 24, 2006 by Pat Speer

[John Dolva]

You may be right Pat, but I think there's good reason to doubt your certainty in this.

I understand the sequence of events was

Tague went towards where Walthers was poking in the grass. Not to announce he thought a bullet or fragment hit him or the curb. He had no idea about it until

Walthers looked at Tague and said he had blood on his cheek.

Tague remembered feeling a sting.

Walthers looked over there and saw the curb damage.

Connecting the sting with the damage and a particular trajectory was an idea or assumption. Not a direct experience. There's a simple reason that explains the lead and damage on the curb. It happens all the time. The proof it does is scratched on that piece of curb.

There is a photo of Tague with what looks like piece of tissue on his cheek. On the left cheek. There is a scar on the left cheek. It's a week or so old. He felt the sting on the right cheek.

I think that over ninety meters the 46 grain fragment would have to drop much more than what the trajectory of it should have been. What I'm saying is that the velocity assumed by the previous calculations is such that the drp could not be the amount necessary. That has nothing to do with wind. The only way it could drop that much is if it had less energy ie slower. Less energy means it is more subject to wind deflection and as it slows it drops AND slows and drops. And drifts.

What amount of energy would be necessary to chip concrete? Concrete has a hardness factor. It strikes at a tangent, IOW the energy direction is not directly at the concrete or not absorbed fully by the concrete. Could this fragment by this time have sufficient energy to do what is suggested it did? The wind reduces the energy. The tangential strike deflects it. Take a 3gram piece of lead and propel it in some way onto a curb like that at that angle and see what speed is necessary to chip it and send those chips 20 feet at skin breaking speed/energy. I don't know what it would be but I wouldn't be surprised if it is isufficient.

_____________

"If one tries to state the shot came at any other time, and was a miss, one is forced to submit that either the assassin/assassins were horrible shots,"

Or the shot was a near miss from the lower floors of TSBD or Daltex

[Thomas H. Purvis]

It would seem so, Cliff. So far, while looking for the levels, I've looked at some tables of 50 grain (a bit over 3 grams) at around 800 fps muzzle velocity. The trajectory over 90 yards is variance in the order of a foot max. So for it to have dropped to the curb (and not drifted off line) would indicate a much lower strike speed. Perhaps a good sling shot could duplicate it. Would that then chip concrete? Particularly at a tangential strike? I don't know.

The sinewave scratches* show that a wheel hitting the curb is not an unusual event.

(image)

A lead weight (wheel balance) is a possible source of the lead the FBI found.

This photo of Tague seems to show him with a little patch on a shave cut.

He said (contrary to what some assume) that the scratch on his left cheek is old and that the sting he remembered after Walthers pointed out the blood droplets on his cheek was on the right cheek. Sothere is no proof that he was hit by anything.

so dare one say: no Tague shot at all?

If so, what role has the Tague shot played? Does it's non existence (if my reasoning is correct here, please demolish) free one from considering some scenarios that depend on it? Did it serve to focus attention on the TSBD at that moment in time?

EDIT:: *the wheel size, sine waves etc are merely illustrative of a sinewave scribed by a point on a circle as it rolls along. I suspect the tyre was flat and various parts of the hubcap and rim scratched the concrete and that a similar event caused the 'curb strike'. Perhaps Tague was a bit attracted to center stage and once the ball was rolling didn't back out. In the mean time he became convinced that what was theorised as happening actually was what did happen.

Subtract the Tague fragment/wounding/shot whatever, gone is a recurring 'but, what about the Tague shot'.... simple: It never happened. There's nothing in it to bother explaining.

A most excellent "alternative possibility" to the Tague hit concrete damage.

I must admit, having not placed a lot of emphasis/research into this, that I never even considered the possibility that a tire rim with the wheel balancing weights which are installed along the outer edge of the rim, and of which are made of lead, could have easily created the damage just as you have indicated.

Since that portion of the wheel balancing weight which clips it onto the tire rim is in fact steel, it could easily create a "chip" in the concrete and remain intact and on the wheel, while the actual lead portion of the weight rubbed downwards against the concrete, thus leaving a small brushing of lead/smear onto the exposed damage.

It would of course take considerable further examination of the area along each side of the chipped area to expand on the potential for validity to this alternative answer.

[John Dolva]

Thank you for acknowledging this, Tom. It's an alternative. Quite a reasonable one.

Here's a photo taken at the time. By manipulating values and doing an edgedetection (IA) it's possible to see a number of arcs on the concrete face.

The top portion here is a circle (grey) with red green blue yellow dots at different distances from the centre and the type of curves they scribe as the circle rolls along. The sharper the bottom part is the further away from the centre of the wheel. I think I'm wrong to call them sine waves. There must be a formula which describes this perfectly and can be sed to deduce the diameter of the wheel creating the scratches.

______________

OK so lets say this is indeed what happened. What role did the "tague shot" play over the past 43 years, but particularly in the first few days, hours? I can imagine there would be a number of conversations that led things back to the rear shots by 'but what about the Tague shot' and avenues therefore closed.

Pat possibly one reason Tague never made anything of it until much later is because he knew in his heart that there was real doubt within himself and things had gotten out of hand and he just laid low.

Edited October 25, 2006 by John Dolva

[John Dolva]

here's a check on scaling using a photo of a 60's wheel with a lead weight.

The various images of the curb damaged are generally misrepresenting the damage by such things as presenting it upside down (see A) and roatated incorrectly. The FBI exhibit shows the whole curb cut out photographed upside down. It seems all aimed at supporting the idea that a shot came from the rear of the limousine. In fact as this shows a wheel balance weight and its steel clip neatly explains the damage and the lead smear. There was never a Tague fragment to consider at all. It needs to be dropped from all considerations.