Oswald in New York

In 1952 Marguerite Claverie Oswald sold her house in Fort Worth and drove
with her son Lee to New York, allegedly to be near her oldest son John
Pic at 325 East 92nd Street in Manhattan. However, Pic told the Warren
Commission in 1964 that neither he nor his half brother Robert Oswald
could get along with Marguerite. In fact, Pic said they both joined the
service to get out from under "the yoke of oppression from my mother."
Why then did Marguerite move to New York with Lee? (1) Pic sure didn't
know -- he thought she was coming to visit (2).

"While in New York, Mrs. Oswald, although allegedly quite poor, hired
Louise Robertson as a housekeeper" (3). Marguerite told Mrs. Robertson
that she had brought Lee to New York to have some unspecified mental
tests done at the Jacobi Hospital (4). Warren Commission attorney Albert
Jenner questioned John Pic about this.


Mr. JENNER. Did you hear anything to the effect that the reason why your
mother and Lee had come to New York had anything to do with Lee's being
given some sort of mental tests?

Mr. PIC. No, sir (5).


Marguerite had already been asked about this by General Counsel J. Lee
Rankin.


Mr. RANKIN. Before you left New York, did you ever tell anybody that you
took Lee Oswald to New York so he could have mental tests at the Jacobi
Hospital?

Mrs. OSWALD. No, sir; never. My child was a normal child -- and while in
New York, I explained to you he had a dog with puppies. He had a bicycle.
There was nothing abnormal about Lee Oswald (6).


"Mental tests would not of necessity be aimed at discerning abnormal
psychology. Marguerite avoided the broader implications of the question",
and the subject was dropped (7).

John Armstrong writes, "During the year and a half Lee Oswald resided in
New York, there are few records of his activities. The available records
are often contradictory and incomplete. His New York school records,
found in the Warren Commission volumes, contradict New York court records
and the testimony of John Pic. The school records tell us Oswald first
entered Trinity Evangelical School in the Bronx in September 1952" (8).
The Warren Commission had no problem with this: "While they [Marguerite
and Lee] were still at the Pics', he had been enrolled at the Trinity
Evangelical Lutheran School on Watson Avenue" (9).

"Trinity in the Bronx is many miles from the Pic residence in Manhattan.
When asked for copies of Oswald's school records, the Trinity School
allegedly told the FBI they did not maintain records until 1957 (10).
This is nonsense. Whoever heard of a school that did not keep records? If
the school did not maintain records, how were the dates of his attendance
at Trinity obtained? How did the FBI know he even attended Trinity? And
why would 12-year-old Oswald be enrolled and attending a junior high
school in the Bronx, many miles from the Pic apartment in Manhattan, when
there were numerous junior high schools close by? In fact, one was within
a few blocks of the Pic apartment (11).

"John Pic remembers Lee's school enrollment differently. Pic told the
Warren Commission that the first school Lee attended in New York was two
blocks from his Manhattan apartment, not the Trinity School in the Bronx"
(12). Pic was certain that Lee went there because he and Lee had
specifically discussed this school. Yet there is no record of Lee's
attendance at any school near Pic's apartment (13).

After the incident in which Lee threatened Mrs. Pic with a pocketknife,
Marguerite and Lee moved -- perhaps coincidentally -- to the Bronx, at
1455 Sheridan Avenue. The move to the Bronx certainly wasn't to be closer
to Trinity: Lee "was withdrawn [from Trinity] on September 26, after
several weeks of irregular attendance, and 4 days later enrolled in the
seventh grade of Public School 117, a junior high school. Mrs. Oswald
found a job at one of the Lerner Shops, a chain of dress shops for which
she had worked briefly in Fort Worth several years before. In January
they moved again, to 825 East 179th Street, and a few weeks later, she
left the employ of Lerner Shops. In April she was working at Martin's
Department Store in Brooklyn . . . in May, she went to work for a chain
of hosiery shops, with which she remained until December. Lee was
registered at Public School 117 until January 16, 1953, although the move
to 179th Street, which took him out of the school district, probably took
place before that date. He had been at Public School 117 for 64
schooldays, out of which he had been present on 15 full and 2 half days;
he had received failing grades in most of his courses" (14).

"From September of 1952 through January of 1953, Warren Commission
records show Oswald attended only 24 days of school. His truancy brought
him to the attention of the Board of Attendance. On the last Friday in
March of 1953, a probation officer brought Oswald to the office of Dr.
Milton Kurian, a psychiatrist employed by the Domestic Relations Court of
New York. Dr. Kurian visited with Oswald and read the probation officer's
file. The file contained information on Oswald's recent stay at the Youth
House. Dr. Kurian noted that Oswald was quite small for his age. Dr.
Kurian himself was only 5'7" tall and estimated Oswald's height at 4'6".
Oswald discussed his background with Dr. Kurian and said his mother had
been married five times, even though she had been married three times.
Oswald told Kurian he had numerous stepfathers and was close to only one
of them. But Oswald had only one stepfather, Edwin Ekdahl, and only in
1945-47. After interviewing Oswald for 45 minutes, Dr. Kurian described
the Oswald he met as the most paranoid individual he ever interviewed.
However, Dr. Kurian is not mentioned anywhere in the Warren Report or the
26 volumes of Hearings and Exhibits. The only psychiatrist Oswald was
supposed to have seen was Dr. Renatus Hartogs, on May 1, 1953 (15).

Armstrong continues, "A comparison of Dr. Kurian's interview with the
Oswald of the Warren Commission discloses several inconsistencies. First,
Dr. Kurian described Oswald as being 4'6" tall in March of 1953 (16). Yet
by May of 1953, Lee Oswald in Fort Worth, Texas, measured 5'4" (17). Even
in 1952, Oswald was described as being tall. In 1952 in Fort Worth,
Texas, 12-year-old Lee Oswald was in the sixth grade. He and classmate
Richard Garrett were attending Ridglea West Elementary School. Garrett
told Life magazine, 'Lee was the tallest, most dominant member of our
group' (18). A sixth grade photo, captioned 'Tall at 12' (19), shows
Oswald to be the tall, well-built kid described by Garrett. His height
was again measured at 5'4" four months later -- tall for a 13-year-old
boy (20). Dick Russell and I spoke with Dr. Kurian in February 1997. When
I informed Dr. Kurian of Oswald's height as listed on the New York school
records (21), Dr. Kurian stated, 'Those records must be wrong. I
interviewed Oswald at that time and he was a little fellow. He was no
taller than the middle of my chest, perhaps 4'6" tall' (22).

"The most curious discrepancy concerns the date Dr. Kurian met with
Oswald. He interviewed Oswald on March 27, 1953. He recalls it because it
was his very last day of employment with the court system. Oswald's file
showed previous confinement at the Youth House (23). But Warren
Commission records tell us that Oswald's first and only placement at the
Youth House was from April 16, 1953, until May 7, 1953 -- three weeks
after Dr. Kurian saw Oswald (24).

"Warren Commission records show Oswald attended only 24 days of school
through May 7, 1953 (25). Why then do New York school records show him
attending 109 days of school at that same time? (28) The court and school
records are both Warren Commission exhibits. Which are we to believe? Did
he attend 24 days of school and wind up in the Youth House, or did he
attend 109 days of school in the seventh grade? Or could these be records
for two different "Oswalds" who both somehow happened to end up at Youth
House? (29)

Dr. Renatus Hartogs examined someone named Lee Harvey Oswald at Youth
House from April 16, 1953 to May 7, 1953 (30) in his report of 1953 and
his Warren Commission testimony, at no time does he seem cognizant that
he is not the first psychologist to study the young man at Youth House.
In fact, it would appear that he was. Unlike Dr. Kurian, who knew Lee
Harvey Oswald as a small boy of around 4'6". This is not the boy Dr.
Hartogs observed:

"This 13-year-old WELL BUILT boy [emphasis added] has superior mental
resources and functions only slightly below his capacity level in spite
of chronic truancy from school. No finding of neurological impairment or
psychotic mental changes could be made. Oswald has to be diagnosed as
personality pattern disturbance with schizoid features and
passive-aggressive tendencies. He has to be seen as an emotionally quite
disturbed youngster . . . The root of his problem which produced warning
signals seems to be his relationship with his mother. . . . He feels that
his mother rejects him and really has never cared very much for him. . .
. He expressed the similar feeling with regard to his brothers, who live
pretty much on their own without showing any brotherly interest in him"
(31). Hartogs recommended that Oswald be placed on probation with
outpatient psychiatric therapy. He suggested that Oswald be treated by a
male psychiatrist who could serve as a substitute father figure (32).

To read Dr. Hartogs' full report on Lee Harvey Oswald, please click here.
Link 2

"While Oswald was in the Youth House, Marguerite met with his probation
officer, John Carro. Carro's interview of her appears in the Warren
Commission evidence. The number of simple errors Marguerite makes in that
interview is astounding. Some examples . . . Marguerite gives Lee
Oswald's father's name as Robert Lee Harvey; yet his real name was Robert
Edward Lee Oswald. She said Lee's father died at age 45, but we know he
was 41 years old when he died. She gave her marriage date as July 19,
1929, but she married Robert E. Lee Oswald in 1933. She gave her sister's
married name as Lillian Sigouerette, when her sister's name was Lillian
Murret. She said she formerly owned a house in Corning, Texas; yet there
is not and never has been a 'Corning,' Texas. She gave Lee Harvey
Oswald's birth date as October 19, 1939, when the correct date is October
18. She said Lee was baptized at the Trinity Lutheran Church in New
Orleans, but the records show he was baptized at the Redeemer Lutheran
Church in New Orleans. When she was asked whether Lee's father was right
or left handed, she replied, 'I do not remember, sir'" (33).

"There is no reason for a 45-year-old woman to make these kind of
mistakes concerning her background. Would you, the reader, make any of
them? Errors of this type are unexplainable, and yet they are found in
her Warren Commission testimony as well as in news articles and
interviews" (34). For example, she repeatedly confuses the names of
Robert E. Lee Oswald and Edwin Ekdahl, her second and third husbands
(35). "The continual errors tend to make one suspicious of Marguerite
Oswald and her background. Had she forgotten these simple things? Was she
lying? Or was this person not truly Lee's mother?" (36)

To read John Carro's full 1954 report on Lee Harvey Oswald,  please click
here. Link 3


In a Warren Commission executive session of December 16, 1963, this
unusual exchange took place on the subject of Lee Harvey Oswald:

Mr. MC CLOY. What are the forebearers [sic] of Oswald, what generation
American is he, where were his grandparents born?

Rep. BOGGS. He was born in New York. Lived there most of his life. His
mother, I notice in that report, I think has a French name.

Mr. DULLES. On his passport instead of his mother as the person you
notify in case something happens he had his aunt, not his mother (37).


"Assistant FBI Director John Malone, who was in charge of the New York
FBI office, reviewed the court file on Oswald, which included his school
records. Malone filed an eight-page report and stated that when Oswald
left the Youth House on May 7, 1953, he entered Public School #44 in the
ninth grade. The ninth grade? Oswald entered the seventh grade the
previous September and attended only 24 days of school. How could he have
skipped from the seventh to the ninth grade? (38)

"One set of school records shows Oswald to be truant while another set
shows him to be attending school full-time. Dr. Kurian interviewed Oswald
in March of 1953, yet the Warren Commission says Oswald was first
interviewed by a psychiatrist two months later. Dr. Kurian says Oswald
was in the Youth House prior to that time, yet the Warren Commission says
Oswald was only confined to Youth House once -- a month after speaking to
Kurian. Dr. Kurian says Oswald was 4'6" tall, yet New York school records
list his height only a month later as 5'4" (39).

"These discrepancies suggest there were two different people -- both
apparently named Lee Harvey Oswald -- in New York in the spring of 1953.
This would explain the testimony of Oswald's half brother John Pic when
the Warren Commission showed him a series of photographs from the
February 21, 1964, issue of Life magazine of Lee Oswald as a youth. Pic
identified photographs of Oswald from ages two through twelve" (40).

But when Warren Commission attorney Albert Jenner showed Pic a photo-
graph of a 13-year-old Oswald standing in front of the Bronx Zoo (41), and
asked, "Do you recognize that photo?" John Pic replied, "Sir, from that
picture, I could not recognize that that is Lee Harvey Oswald." Attorney
Jenner prompted him: ". . . [T]hat young fellow is shown here, he doesn't
look like you recall Lee looked in 1952 and 1953 when you saw him in New
York City?" John Pic replied, "No, sir." This is the only known
photograph taken during Oswald's year-and-a-half stay in New York. Robert
Oswald testified that the boy in the picture was Lee Harvey Oswald, and
he himself had taken the picture. John Pic, who testified months later,
said he would never know it was Lee Harvey Oswald (42).

Because of the FBI and the Warren Commission's silence, we do not know
the identities of any acquaintances young Lee had in New York. We know he
had at least one friend, however. Marguerite mentions that "they assigned
a Big Brother to Lee . . . this man came out to the apartment on several
occasions . . . I do not know the name of the Big Brother. But from the
newspaper accounts, they know the name" (43). The Commission apparently
did not knock itself out trying to locate him.

In the summer of 1953, Lee Oswald was living in the Bronx with his
mother. According to employment records obtained by the FBI, Marguerite
worked at Lady Orva Hosiery from May 9 through December 20, 1953. Lee,
of course, was in New York with Marguerite throughout this entire period,
as would be expected, and as she testified to the Warren Commission (44).