39 Rarely Seen Kennedy Assassination Photos That Capture The Tragedy Of JFK's Last Day

These photos of JFK's assassination taken just before, during, and after the event provide a new perspective on this historic tragedy.

Photos From The Assassination Of President Kennedy

Picture Just After John Kennedy's Assassination

Newspapers Report President Kennedy's Assassination

1 of 40

Texas Governor John Connally and his wife (front) sit with President and Mrs. Kennedy in their limousine just minutes before the assassination took place.Victor Hugo King/Library of Congress

2 of 40

Secret Service agent Clint Hill jumps aboard the presidential limousine to act as a protective shield for President Kennedy and the first lady moments after the shots were fired.Justin Newman/Associated Press/Wikimedia Commons

3 of 40

Fearing that they were in the line of fire, onlookers Bill and Gayle Newman lie on the grass, sheltering their children, mere seconds after the president was shot.Frank Cancellare/Wikimedia Commons

4 of 40

A woman reacts to the news of the president's death on the streets of New York.Stan Wayman/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images

5 of 40

President Kennedy and the first lady arrive at the Love Field airport in Dallas early on the morning of the assassination.Cecil W. Stoughton/John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum

6 of 40

Texas Governor John Connally and his wife sit with President and Mrs. Kennedy in their limousine not long before the assassination took place.National Archives and Records Administration

7 of 40

John F. Kennedy Jr. (who turned three on this day) salutes as the casket of his father as it's carried out of St. Matthew's Cathedral in Washington, D.C. while Jacqueline Kennedy and Robert Kennedy stand behind the boy.

November 25.Bettmann/Contributor/Getty Images

8 of 40

The shirt worn by President Kennedy at the time of his assassination.Bettmann/Contributor/Getty Images

9 of 40

President Kennedy slumps over just after being shot.ullstein bild via Getty Images

10 of 40

New York newspapers report the president's death.

November 23.Bettmann/Contributor/Getty Images

11 of 40

The president's limousine travels down Elm Street immediately after the first shot was fired.

Kennedy, largely obscured by the car's rearview mirror, can be seen with his fist clenched in front of his throat while agents standing on the car behind the limousine look back toward the Texas School Book Depository, the entrance of which is visible just behind the tree.James William "Ike" Altgens/Associated Press/Wikimedia

12 of 40

Just after the assassination, a crowd gathers outside of a radio shop in New York's Greenwich Village in order to hear the latest news from Dallas.Orlando Fernandez/New York World-Telegram and the Sun Newspaper Photograph Collection/Library of Congress

13 of 40

The "magic bullet."

This was the bullet that was found on the stretcher that had carried Governor Connally at Parkland Memorial Hospital.

According to proponents of the single-bullet theory, this one bullet caused seven different wounds in both Governor Connally and President Kennedy while following a trajectory that opponents of the theory believe to be impossible.National Archives and Records Administration

14 of 40

Sunlight streams through the columns of the The Rotunda of the U.S. Capitol and onto the coffin of the late President Kennedy, lying in state before funeral services.

November 24.Bettmann/Contributor/Getty Images

15 of 40

The view from the sixth floor window of the Texas School Book Depository, from which Lee Harvey Oswald is thought to have shot President Kennedy, as seen approximately one hour after the assassination.Hulton Archive/Getty Images

16 of 40

Crowds of people wait for news outside Parkland Memorial Hospital, where President Kennedy had been taken following his assassination.Art Rickerby/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

17 of 40

Policemen on motorcycles speed by while civilians lie on the grass and photographers capture the scene within seconds of the president being shot.New York World-Telegram and the Sun Newspaper Photograph Collection/Library of Congress

18 of 40

Alleged shooter Lee Harvey Oswald poses for his mugshot following the assassination.

November 23.Dallas Police Department/Wikimedia Commons

19 of 40

Jack Ruby moves into position immediately before fatally shooting alleged President Kennedy assassin Lee Harvey Oswald on live television as police transport him through the basement of Dallas Police headquarters on the way to Dallas County Jail.

November 24.Ira Jefferson "Jack" Beers Jr./The Dallas Morning News/Wikimedia Commons

20 of 40

President Kennedy's motorcade passes the Texas School Book Depository just prior to the assassination.© CORBIS/Corbis via Getty Images

21 of 40

Secret Service agents and assorted staff carry the president's casket up the stairs into Air Force One at Love Field Airport.Cecil W. Stoughton/John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum

22 of 40

Mrs. Kennedy leans over the dying president as a Secret Service agent climbs onto the back of the car just after the shooting.ullstein bild/ullstein bild via Getty Images

23 of 40

First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy and her children, Caroline Kennedy and John F. Kennedy, Jr., exit the U.S. Capitol Building where the late President Kennedy lies in state. Walking behind: Patricia Kennedy Lawford (right) and her husband Peter Lawford (left), along with Robert F. Kennedy (center).

Washington, D.C. November 24.Abbie Rowe/John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum

24 of 40

The sniper's perch on the sixth floor of the Texas School Book Depository Building from which Lee Harvey Oswald allegedly shot President Kennedy, as seen within a few hours of the assassination.Bettmann/Contributor/Getty Images

25 of 40

The hearse carrying the body of the president leaves Parkland Memorial Hospital as a crowd of people look on.Art Rickerby/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

26 of 40

Just a few blocks from the assassination site, the Marsalis Street Bus 1213 travels down Elm Street with Lee Harvey Oswald aboard, on his way home just minutes after the shooting.Stuart L. Reed/Wikimedia Commons

27 of 40

The president slumps over approximately one-sixth of a second after the fatal shot was fired.Mary Ann Moorman/Wikimedia Commons

28 of 40

A mortally wounded Lee Harvey Oswald lies on a stretcher on its way toward an ambulance just after he was shot in the basement of Dallas Police headquarters by Jack Ruby. November 24.Three Lions/Getty Images

29 of 40

President Lyndon B. Johnson places a wreath before the flag-draped casket of President Kennedy during funeral services in the Capitol rotunda in Washington, D.C.

November 24.National Archives and Records Administration

30 of 40

The emergency room at Parkland Memorial Hospital where President Kennedy was taken after the shooting.

August 1964.Donald Uhrbrock/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

31 of 40

A Dallas policeman holds up the rifle that Lee Harvey Oswald allegedly used to kill President Kennedy.

November 23.Bettmann/Contributor/Getty Images

32 of 40

Dallas Police escort Jack Ruby to jail soon after questioning him in the shooting of alleged President Kennedy assassin Lee Harvey Oswald at Dallas Police headquarters earlier that day.

November 24.Bettmann/Contributor/Getty Images

33 of 40

An autopsy photograph of the president's body taken at Maryland's Bethesda Naval Hospital.Apic/Getty Images

34 of 40

An unidentified doctor at Parkland Memorial Hospital speaks at a press conference following the assassination of President Kennedy.Art Rickerby/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

35 of 40

A few hours after the assassination, Jacqueline Kennedy and Robert Kennedy get into the Navy ambulance carrying the body of President Kennedy at Andrews Air Force Base, just outside Washington, D.C.

From here, the body of President Kennedy was taken to Bethesda Naval Hospital for an immediate autopsy./AFP/Getty Images

36 of 40

A mortally wounded Lee Harvey Oswald lies on a stretcher just after being shot by Jack Ruby inside Dallas Police headquarters.

November 24.Shel Hershorn/The LIFE Images Collection/Getty Images

37 of 40

38 of 40

Guards stand in the hallway of Maryland's Bethesda Naval Hospital, where President Kennedy's body was prepared for burial.Robert Phillips/The LIFE Images Collection/Getty Images

39 of 40

President Kennedy and the first lady arrive at the Love Field airport in Dallas early on the morning of the assassination.Cecil W. Stoughton/National Archives and Records Administration

40 of 40

Haunting Kennedy Assassination Photos That Most People Have Never Seen Before

View Gallery

In the immediate aftermath of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, countless writers spilled untold amounts of ink in an effort to grapple with a tragedy that had rattled the United States of America to its core.

Many of these writers delivered sweeping statements on the historic weight of this catastrophe or relayed the thoughts and words of the insiders sitting in America's highest corridors of power.

And yet, of everything written in the aftermath of the assassination of JFK, the piece that remains the most well-remembered today is the one that set its sights seemingly much lower — but, in truth, much higher.

Rather than wax tragic about the state of the nation or interview those closest to the president, legendary New York journalist Jimmy Breslin instead spoke with Clifton Pollard, the man tasked with digging Kennedy's grave, and delivered an affecting account of a lowly laborer who'd suddenly found himself in the middle of a historic moment.

In focusing on such an ostensibly unremarkable corner of such an immense episode in American history, Breslin both found an unexpected angle that no other writer was taking and provided the average reader with an emotional entry point into an event that was simply too upsetting to confront head on.

So memorable and moving was Breslin's approach that not only does his piece live on 54 years later, but it's also inspired what's since been called "the gravedigger school of news writing."

Proponents of this approach are always on the lookout for their "gravedigger," the unassuming corner of a story that proves all the more weighty because of just how peripheral it may seem at first.

And as for the Kennedy assassination itself, Breslin certainly didn't find that episode's only "gravedigger." On the contrary, the assassination — from the hours before the shooting to the arrest and murder of the suspect to the president's funeral — is filled with little moments, people, places, and things that illustrate the event's gravitas in ways that a straightforward document of the actual shooting itself (such as, say, the Zapruder film) just can't.

The seldom-seen Kennedy assassination photos above are certainly proof of that.

After seeing these photos the JFK assassination, learn a little about what's inside the secret Kennedy assassination files set to be released by the U.S. government this October. Then, have a look at some of the most incredible John F. Kennedy photos ever taken.