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Warren Commission Hearings: Vol. II - Page 367« Previous | Next »

(Testimony of Comdr. James J. Humes)

Mr. Specter.
two layers of the shirt is a superficial tear of the outer layer only of the fabric of this tie which, I believe, could have been caused by a glancing blow to this portion of the tie by a missile.
Mr. Specter.
Mr. Chief Justice, I move at this time for the admission into evidence of Exhibits 393 through Exhibit 396, the three articles of clothing and the photograph which we have just used.
The Chairman.
They may be admitted.
(Exhibits Nos. 393 through 3.96 were received in evidence and may be found in the Commission files.)
Mr. Mccloy.
Commander, did you say left or right?
Commander HUMES. No, sir. In fact, the way this bow is tied now it would appear to be on the left of this tie, but it is kind of twisted out of shape.
Mr. Mccloy.
Yes. It is twisted. It is not too clear.

` Commander HUMES. It is not too clear, it is not clear how that might have been in position with the shirt, sir.
Mr. Specter.
Now, Doctor Humes, at one point in your examination of the President, did you make an effort to probe the point of entry with your finger?
Commander HUMES. Yes, sir; I did.
Mr. Specter.
And at or about that time when you were trying to ascertain, as you previously testified, whether there was any missile in the body of the President, did someone from the Secret Service call your attention to the fact that a bullet had been found on a stretcher at Parkland Hospital?
Commander HUMES. Yes, sir; they did.
Mr. Specter.
And in that posture of your examination, having just learned of the presence of a bullet on a stretcher, did that call to your mind any tentative explanatory theory of the point of entry or exit of the bullet which you have described as entering at Point "C" on Exhibit 385?
Commander HUMES. Yes, sir. We were able to ascertain with absolute certainty that the bullet had passed by the apical portion of the right lung producing the injury which we mentioned.
I did not at that point have the information from Doctor Perry about the wound in the anterior neck, and while that was a possible explanation for the point of exit, we also had to consider the possibility that the missile in some rather inexplicable fashion had been stopped in its path through the President's body and, in fact, then had fallen from the body onto the stretcher.
Mr. Specter.
And what theory did you think possible, at that juncture, to explain the passing of the bullet back out the point of entry; or had you been provided with the fact that external heart massage had been performed on the President?
Commander HUMES. Yes, sir; we had, and we considered the possibility that some of the physical maneuvering performed by the doctors might have in some way caused this event to take place.
Mr. Specter.
Now, have you since discounted that possibility, Doctor Humes?
Commander HUMES. Yes; in essence we have. When examining the wounds in the base of the President's neck anteriorly, the region of the tracheotomy performed at Parkland Hospital, we noted and we noted in our record, some contusion and bruising of the muscles of the neck of the President. We noted that at the time of the postmortem examination.
Now, we also made note of the types of wounds which I mentioned to you before in this testimony on the chest which were going to be used by the doctors there to place chest tubes. They also made other wounds. one on the left arm, and a wound on the ankle of the President with the idea of administering intravenous. blood and other fluids in hope of replacing the blood which the President had lost from his extensive wounds.
Those wounds showed no evidence of bruising or contusion or physical violence, which made us reach the conclusion that they were performed during the agonal moments of the late president, and when the circulation was, in essence, very seriously embarrassed, if not nonfunctional. So that these wounds, the wound of the chest and the wound of the arm and of the ankle were performed about the same time as the tracheotomy wound because only a very few moments of time elapsed when all this was going on.
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