Prayer Man

In part 1 of  Lovelady’s HSCA interview (originally posted by Richard Gilbride at the ROKC website) we skip to around the 24:50 mark where the talk is about the front steps of the TSBD, its occupants (he names Frazier, Shelley and Stanton and some ladies from the offices inside the building).

His position was the 2^nd or 3^rd step sitting and eating his lunch and having a coke (which he purchased in the second floor lunchroom).

He is asked whether he saw Oswald on those steps and he answers this with a “No.”.

The follow-up question whether it could have been possible that Oswald could have been on those steps and him not noticing is answered with: “Could have.”

Just after the 29:00 mark he talks about a lady who ran up to them (without any indication as to where “they” were-B.K.) and say that The President had been hit and  he identifies her as Gloria Calvery. He then says after  Gloria Calvery says that The President had been hit they leave for the rail road yard and then make their way back in through one of the side entrances of the TSBD.

Then he describes the situation inside the building after they got back in (31:20) wondering whether they should go back to work. And at 31:40  the  roll call is discussed.

In part 2 (better quality audio) Lovelady describes at first that Truly and the police officer (Baker) had run up the steps, and connects this with shots being fired from the 6th floor and those two on their way investigating this. He does declare that he did nit know the reason for their ascend at that time, only later. Then Secret Service and others come in and want to get up to the top floor so Lovelady takes about ten to fifteen of them up in one of the freight elevators.

After taking them the 7th and the 5th floor he takes them to the 6th floor and while he is standing near the freight elevator he states he was present when they found the shells. He did not see them, he also states that he saw the rifle being found from about a distance of 50 feet. It did have a sling attached to it. He times these finds at about 20-25 minutes after his arrival back inside the TSBD.

Around the 08:20 mark he states that the first time he spoke with a law enforcement official and had his primary statement taken was at 13:30, one hour after the assassination. The second time is in the evening and he confirms it’s him in Altgens6 when FBI agents show up at his house at 18:00.

After that he is shown a still of him on the front steps of the Martin film, with his 5 o’clock shadow and he confirms it is him. A voice in the background (Robert Groden.) says that this was shot between 8-15 minutes after the assassination. Lovelady sees this image for the first time. Lovelady’s wife is present as well and recognises him in that image. This part is interesting due to the interaction of the interviewer and Lovelady. Sean Murphy posts about Billy Lovelady at the Education Forum in 2013 (Prayer Man: Out of the Shadows and Into the Light, Chapter 9):

In the first part of his HSCA interview Billy Lovelady Lovelady is shown an image he has never seen before: a frame from the John Martin film showing him (Lovelady) standing over by the east side of the entrance some 15 minutes post-assassination. Lovelady identifies himself immediately.

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HSCA: If a movie camera showed you farther in the center of the doorway than that person there [i.e. Lovelady in Altgens, who appears, due to the deceptive angle, to be well over to the left/west of the entrance] would you still identify that person as being yourself?

LOVELADY: Sure would. I would say the other picture was not taken at the split second as the one to the left is.

HSCA: Okay, alright. If it showed two figures in that doorway at the same time, and you could positively identify one as yourself, would that have any bearing on your identification of that other figure?

LOVELADY: No, that’s still me at the left [of the] doorway.

Whether knowingly (i.e., with knowledge of the Prayer Man figure in Wiegman) or unknowingly (i.e., by pure speculation), the HSCA interviewer noticed  Two Lovelady-resembling men caught on film at the time of the assassination, one over on the west (“left”) side of the entrance and the other more towards the center.

The interviewer could have been getting some information from Richard E. Sprague regarding this discovery, since he was already well informed on the sighting of that man on the west side of the TSBD steps in the shadow.

From thereon the convo steers into the shirt matter, when the FBI ask him to come so he can be photographed as a comparison to Altgens6. No one tells him to wear the same shirt so he does NOT wear it while his pix are taken.

Lovelady also mentions that Joseph Ball contacted him before he was to testify in front of the Warren Commission (27:10). Ball discusses that he will be interviewing him about the actions around the assassination about him around the building. He is also asked whether he was coached by Ball or if anyone else from any agency tried anything, and to both he replies “No.”

But the biggest revelation is saved to the very last, at 29:20 when he says that it took 20-25 minutes before he got back in the building, so while captured by Martin and Hughes he still had not regained entry back into the building, which makes you wonder how he got back in through the side of the TSBD along with Shelley?