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Warren Commission Hearings: Vol. IV - Page 128« Previous | Next »

(Testimony of Dr. Charles Francis Gregory)

Mr. Specter.
Dr. GREGORY. These items represent distorted bits of a missile, a jacket in one case, and part of a jacket and a lead core in the other.
These are missiles having the characteristics which I mentioned earlier, which tend to carry organic debris into wounds and tend to create irregular wounds of entry. One of these, it seems to me, could conceivably have produced the injury which the Governor incurred in his wrist.
Mr. Dulles.
In his wrist?
Dr. GREGORY. Yes.
Mr. Dulles.
And in his thigh?
Dr. GREGORY. I don't know about that, sir. It is possible. But the rather remarkably round nature of the wound in the thigh leads me to believe that it was produced by something like the butt end of an intact missile.
Mr. Specter.
I now hand you an exhibit heretofore identified as Commission Exhibit 388, which depicts the artist's drawing of the passage of a bullet through the President's head, and I ask you, first of all, if you have had an opportunity to observe that prior to this moment?
Dr. GREGORY. Yes, I saw this illustration this morning.
Mr. Specter.
Well, if you assume that the trajectory through the President's head was represented by the path of a 6.5-mm. bullet which fragmented upon striking the skull, both the rear and again the top, is it possible that a fragment coming at the rate of 2,000 feet per second from the distance of approximately 160 to 250 feet, could have produced a fragment which then proceeded to strike the Governor's wrist and inflict the damage which you have heretofore described?
Dr. GREGORY. I think it is plausible that the bullet, having struck the President's head, may have broken into more than one fragment. I think you apprised me of the fact that it did, in fact, disperse into a number of fragments, and they took tangential directions from the original path apparently.
Mr. Specter.
Assuming the fact that the autopsy surgeon presented for the record a statement that the fragments moved forward into the vicinity of the President's right eye, as the diagram shows, that there were approximately 40 star-like fragments running on a line through the head on the trajectory, and that there was substantial fragmentation of the bullet as it passed through the head, what is your view about that?
Dr. GREGORY. I think it is possible that a fragment from that particular missile may have escaped and struck the Governor's right arm.
Mr. Specter.
Did you have an opportunity to observe the slides and films commonly referred to as the Zapruder film this morning?
Dr. GREGORY. Yes; I saw those this morning.
Mr. Specter.
Did they shed any light on the conclusions--as to your conclusions with respect to the wounds of the Governor and what you observed in the treatment of the Governor?
Dr. GREGORY. Yes, to this extent. It seemed to me in frames marked 234, 235, and 236, Governor Connally was in a position such that a single missile entered his back, could have passed through his chest, through his right forearm, and struck his thigh. That is a possibility.
I looked at the film very carefully to see if I could relate the position of Governor Connally's right arm to the movement when the missile struck the President's head, presumably the third missile, and I think that the record will show that those are obscured to a degree that the Governor's right arm cannot be seen. In the Governor's own words, he did not realize his right arm had been injured, and he has no idea when it was struck. This is historical fact to us at the time of the initial interview with him.
Mr. Dulles.
Could I ask just one question? If a bullet had merely struck the Governor's arm without previously having struck anything else, is it conceivable that impediment of the bone that it hit there would be consistent with merely a flesh wound on the thigh? Do you follow me?
Dr. GREGORY. Yes; I follow you. I would doubt it on the basis of the kind of wound that the Governor has. Now the kind of wound in the Governor's right forearm is the kind that indicates there was not an excessive amount of energy expended there, which means either that the missile producing it had dissipated much of its energy, either that or there was an impediment to it someplace else along the way.
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