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Mother's Day card sent by Lee Harvey Oswald to his mother, Marguerite Oswald, in 1959, measuring 7.25 x 7 open, signed inside in black ballpoint below a preprinted sentiment, “Love, Lee, xx.” Includes the original mailing envelope postmarked at Santa Ana, California, on May 7, 1959, which is hand-addressed by Oswald, who writes, “Mrs. M. Oswald, 313 Templeton Dr., Fort Worth, Texas.” Both items are archivally matted and framed together with a mugshot photo of Oswald, taken on the day after President Kennedy’s assassination, to an overall size of 26.5 x 19.5.
Also included as part of the lot, but unframed, is an original Christmas card sent by Marguerite Oswald to her son in 1956, measuring 9.75 x 6 open, signed inside in ballpoint, “Hi – Your first Xmas away from home. Will miss you but happy to know you are in good hands. Be good. Mother,” who signs again below the printed greeting, “Love, Mother, xxx.” The reverse of the card is marked “Ex 268,” which identifies it as an exhibit in the Warren Commission Report, which ultimately did not publish exhibits 259-269, and a signed and handwritten statement from Marguerite: “A card I sent to Lee in 1956. In his sea-bag that he left at home after leaving the Marine's in Sept 1959. Marguerite C. Oswald.” Lee Harvey Oswald had enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps on October 24, 1956.
Although the frame backing obscures the reverse sides of the Mother's Day card and its accompanying envelope, both bear annotations, either secretarial or in the hand of Marguerite Oswald. The reverse of the Mother’s Day card is marked “Ex 266,” identifying it as an exhibit in the Warren Commission Report, which ultimately did not publish exhibits 259-269; and the reverse of the envelope is annotated by Oswald’s mother, who wrote: “Hon. Jim Wright, Congressman, 12th Dist., House office Bldg," "Hon [blank] Herter, U.S. State Dept, Wash / D.C.,” and, in another hand, “Hon., Lyndon Johnston [sic], U.S. Senator, Washington D.C.” Wright was Mrs. Oswald's Congressman; Christian Herter had become Secretary of State on April 22, 1959; and Lyndon B. Johnson was one of her two U.S. Senators who, coincidentally, succeeded to the presidency after the death of JFK. In overall fine condition.
When he sent this Mother's Day card in 1959, he was assigned to the Marine Corps Air Station at El Toro, California, near Santa Ana. Three months later, on August 17th, he submitted a request for a dependency discharge on the grounds that his mother needed his support. On September 11th, he was released from active duty and transferred to the Marine Corps Reserve. Two days later, Oswald was given an ‘undesirable discharge’ from the Marine Corps Reserve.
Lee returned to his mother's home in Fort. Worth, Texas, and on September 14th, he told her that he planned to leave for New Orleans to resume employment with an import-export company, having worked in that field as a teenager before enlisting. On September 20, 1959, he set sail from New Orleans for France, and on October 16, 1959, he was in Moscow. He wrote to his mother on October 22, 1959. Not hearing from her son for a few months, in March 1960, Mrs. Oswald wrote letters to her Congressman Jim Wright and Secretary of State Christian Herter, trying to locate him. There is no record of her contacting Sen. Lyndon B. Johnson.
Sometimes described as an overbearing and coddling mother, and other times described as negligent and unconcerned, Marguerite Oswald will forever remain an intriguing character in the story of Lee Harvey Oswald. Despite the varying speculation about the nature of their relationship, with many claiming that he left for the Army so young to escape her overly watchful eye, these letters reveal a loving bond between the mother-son pair. The tender card she sent on his first Christmas away from home in 1956 (which was found in his sea-bag three years later, as he left the country), paired with a sweet card he sent for Mother's Day—not forgotten by the affectionate son, despite his Army duties and burgeoning plans to head to the Soviet Union—both made their way into the Warren Commission's investigation just a few years later. Obsessed with her son's innocence in the Kennedy assassination, Marguerite would later cling to 'the Volumes,' as she called the Commission's published findings, pointing out inconsistencies to anyone who would listen. An insightful pairing of items, predating Oswald's life-changing move to Russia.
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