341 An inquiry / Kantor Exhibit / NC Preacher

In early April, Marina gave him a curious memento from Oswald.

From Edward J. Epstein's diary, March 29, 1977:

During that fall De Mohrenschildt also had introduced Oswald to potential employers in the electronics business. He said he wanted to stimulate Oswald to discuss his work in the Minsk factory, which he assumed would be of interest to Moore.

In mid March 1963, De Mohrenschildt got the lucrative Haitian government contract for which he had been waiting. He had assumed that it had been helped along by the work he was doing for Moore.

But it then became apparent to him that he had become a much closer confidant of Oswald than he realized. In early April, Marina gave him a curious memento from Oswald. It was an inscribed photograph showing Oswald dressed in black, holding, in one hand, the radical newspaper The Militant and, in the other, the sniper's rifle with the telescopic sight-- that he had shown De Mohrenschildt the week before. The photograph was signed "For George, Lee Harvey Oswald" and dated April 5th, 1963. Marina had derisively scribbled in Russian "Hunter of Fascists. Ha. Ha." That "Ha Ha" became less a joke to De Mohrenschildt on April 10th when De Mohrenschildt heard on the radio that a sniper had fired a shot at General Walker. Only a few weeks before, in the company of three young geologists, he recalled that he had heard Oswald single out Walker as a "fascist" that should be dealt with, and, when one the geologists egged him by talking of an assassination plot against Hitler, Oswald answered that Hitler should have been shot before he ever achieved power. He thus had a "pretty good suspicion who had taken the potshot" at Walker.

I interrupted. "So you knew Oswald had tried to assassinate Walker, what did you do about it?"

He said he immediately rushed over to Oswald's house to find out what had happened and if Oswald had disposed of the rifle. He recalled being very frightened, as was his wife, Jean. He feared that he could be implicated, and the CIA might cut off support for his Haitian contract. at risk, that night was the last time he ever saw Oswald.

I then asked him whether he had reported the assassination attempt -- and the telltale photograph --to Moore. He said "I spoke to the CIA both before and afterwards. It was what ruined me." If so, the CIA had in its possession information and a photograph identifying Oswald as a potential assassin some six months before Kennedy came to Dallas. But it was a big "if"-- and serious problems with the story he was now telling. Why had De Mohrenschildt not turned over this evidence to the FBI when he was questioned or to the Warren Commission when he testified? Concealing such evidence could be a crime-- especially since it could have shown that De Mohrenschildt and others had prior knowledge about Oswald's assassination potential.