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Partly-printed United States military "Application for Enlistment and Individual Data Card," signed “Lee Harvey Oswald,” one page both sides, 8 x 5, with an acceptance date of October 24, 1956. Oswald's application for enlistment in the United States Marine Corps, filled out in type with personal information including his date of birth ("18 October 1939"), place of birth ("New Orleans"), religion ("Lutheran"), height ("5 ft. 8 in."), weight ("135 lbs."), and home address ("4936 Collinwood St., Fort Worth"). The application also documents his AFQT score, mental group, and profile; on the reverse, it lists a series of internal checks and family data, including the signature of his brother, "Robert E. Lee Oswald," acting as his guardian. At the conclusion, it notes: "Applicant was enlisted in USMC on 24 Oct 56 for a period of (3) three years, appointed a pvt and was transferred to SDiego for Recruit Training." In fine condition, with light creasing and a small tear to the bottom edge.
This Marine Corps enlistment application dates to a formative moment in the early life of Lee Harvey Oswald, who enlisted in the United States Marine Corps on October 24, 1956, just one week after his seventeenth birthday. Because he was underage, the enlistment required the consent of his older brother, Robert Oswald, Jr., who signs as his legal guardian.
Oswald's enlistment marked an attempt to escape a troubled home life and assert independence, motivations later attested to by family members. His stepbrother, John Pic, testified before the Warren Commission that Lee was wanted 'to get from out and under…the yoke of oppression from my mother.'
Two days later, on October 26, 1956, Oswald reported for duty at the Marine Corps Recruit Depot in San Diego, where he was assigned to the Second Recruit Training Battalion and began training in, among other things, the use of the M-1 rifle. His practice scores were reportedly not very good, but when his company fired for a record on December 21, he scored 212, two points above the score necessary to qualify as a sharpshooter (with the classification scale ranging from marksman to sharpshooter to expert).
Over the next three years, his skill seemingly declined; a Marine in the same unit as Oswald in 1958 reported that he was frequently given the red flag in qualification firing, indicating a complete miss of the target, and when re-tested in May of 1959, Oswald qualified only as a marksman.
It has been frequently argued that even an expert marksman would struggle to duplicate Oswald's alleged feat in the assassination of Kennedy, hitting a moving target three times in less than nine seconds (the time has been heavily disputed, ranging from 5.6 to 8.3 seconds).
As one of the earliest official records of Oswald’s adult life, this application provides critical context for understanding the personal, military, and psychological background of the man who would become central to one of the most consequential events in American history.
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