Jacqueline’s fourth child, Patrick Kennedy, lived only two days during August of 1963. Distraught, and somewhat overwhelmed by the burdens of her station, she took a trip to France, her ancestral homeland, in the early-fall of 1963 to recharge her batteries. She hooked up with her sister, stage actress Lee Bouvier Radziwill, who introduced her to Aristotle Onassis. At his invitation, she hung out with him, mostly aboard his yacht, the Christina, for two weeks, a period of time lasting until the first week of November.
Bruce Roberts asserted that the timing of Jacqueline’s visit was no accident. As the international Mafia kingpin, Onassis had already planned Kennedy’s assassination. But like everyone else, he really dug the First Lady. Through Radziwill, Onassis schemed to save her the trauma of witnessing her husband’s murder first hand, and rescue from a potentially aberrant gunshot that might kill her too by keeping her on The Christina until after the assassination.
As mentioned in the previous post, Onassis’ Mafia planned to murder JFK on November 1, 1963 in Chicago. But the President cancelled the trip. Roberts asserted that when learning of President Ngo Dinh Diem’s assassination in Vietnam that day, Kennedy realized the significance of his cancelled Chicago trip. Kennedy then knew, according to Roberts, that Onassis wanted to murder him too. So he called Jacqueline aboard the Christina, and ordered her to return to Washington immediately, telling her, “Get off Onassis’ yacht if you have to swim.”
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