The testimony of Nelson Delgado was taken on April 16, 1964, at the
U.S. Courthouse, Foley Square, New York, N.Y., by Mr. Wesley J.
Liebeler, assistant counsel of the President's Commission.
Nelson Delgado, having been first duly sworn, was examined and
testified as follows:
Mr. LIEBELER. My name is Wesley J. Liebeler. I am a member of the legal
staff of the President's Commission investigating the assassination
of President Kennedy. Staff members have been authorized to take the
testimony of witnesses by the Commission pursuant to authority granted
to the Commission by Executive Order No. 11130, dated November 29,
1963, and Joint Resolution of Congress No. 137.
Under the Commission's rules for the taking of testimony, each witness
is to be provided with a copy of the Executive order and of the joint
resolution, and a copy of the rules that the Commission has adopted
governing the taking of testimony from witnesses.
The Commission will provide you copies of those documents. I cannot
do it at this point because I do not have them with me, but we will
provide you with copies of the documents to which I have referred.
Under the Commission's rules for the taking of testimony, each witness
is entitled to 3 days' notice before he is required to come in and give
testimony. I don't think you had 3 days' notice.
Mr. DELGADO. No.
Mr. LIEBELER. But each witness can waive that notice requirement if he
wishes, and I assume that you would be willing to waive that notice
requirement since you are here; is that correct?
Mr. DELGADO. Yes.
Mr. LIEBELER. We want to inquire of you this morning concerning the
association that the Commission understands you had with Lee Harvey
Oswald during the time that he was a member of the United States Marine
Corps. The Commission has been advised that you also were a member of
the United States Marine Corps and were stationed with Oswald in Santa
Ana, Calif., for a period of time.
Mr. DELGADO. Yes.
Mr. LIEBELER. Before we get into the details of that, would you state
your full name for the record, please?
Mr. DELGADO. Nelson Delgado.
Mr. LIEBELER. You are now in the United States Army; is that correct?
Mr. DELGADO. That is correct.
Mr. LIEBELER. What is your rank?
Mr. DELGADO. Specialist 4.
Mr. LIEBELER. What is your serial number?
Mr. DELGADO. RA282 53 799.
Mr. LIEBELER. Where are you stationed?
Mr. DELGADO. I am stationed at Delta Battery, 4th Missile Battalion,
71st Artillery, in Hazlet, N.J.
Mr. LIEBELER. How long have you been in the Army?
Mr. DELGADO. I joined the Army on November 1, 1960.
Mr. LIEBELER. What kind of work do you do in the Army?
Mr. DELGADO. I am a 94116, which means that I am a cook, with a
linguist digit, which means I can speak and write Spanish fluently.
That is what that last 6 in that digit means.
Mr. LIEBELER. Where did you go into the Army?
Mr. DELGADO. I went into the Army at Fort Ord, Calif.
Mr. LIEBELER. And would you briefly tell us the training that you
received after you went into the Army and the places at which you were
stationed from the time you went into the Army up to the present time?
Mr. DELGADO. Well, in 1960, November 1960, I reported at Fort Ord.
Approximately 15 days after I reported there I received orders for
Germany. I had no basic training because of my Marine Corps basic
training took care of that.
December the 15th, 14th, around there, I left for Germany. And I
arrived in Germany, and I served with Headquarters Battery, 5th Missile
Battalion, 6th Artillery, APO 34, at Baumholder. Germany.
Mr. LIEBELER. How long were you stationed in Germany?
Mr. DELGADO. I was stationed there approximately 2 years and a day.
Mr. LIEBELER. Were you stationed with the same outfit all that time?
Mr. DELGADO. No. Six months of the time I was with them; then I was
transferred to a line battery, C Battery, same missile battalion, same
artillery, and I was for a while the old man's driver, the captain's
driver; and then I was--I asked for a transfer to the messhall so I
could get advanced in my rating, and I was put in the messhall, then
promoted there also, and I have been a cook since then.
Mr. LIEBELER. Did you stay with the C Battery until you left Germany?
Mr. DELGADO. Yes.
Mr. LIEBELER. Approximately when did you leave Germany?
Mr. DELGADO. December the 8th. December the 8th.
Mr. LIEBELER. 1962?
Mr. DELGADO. 1962, right.
Mr. LIEBELER. Where were you stationed after that?
Mr. DELGADO. Fort Hancock, NJ.; and from there I was put in the line
battery, Delta Battery.
Mr. LIEBELER. And that is where you are assigned at the present time?
Mr. DELGADO. That is right.
Mr. LIEBELER. Are you working now as a cook?
Mr. DELGADO. That is right.
Mr. LIEBELER. You are also the mess steward of your messhall; is that
correct?
Mr. DELGADO. No, not mess steward; first cook.
Mr. LIEBELER. First cook?
Mr. DELGADO. Right.
Mr. LIEBELER. So you are not in charge of the messhall?
Mr. DELGADO. No; I am in charge of the personnel that work the day I am
working.
Mr. LIEBELER. You mentioned that your MOS, I believe it is called, your
military occupation specialty, has an indication that you are qualified
to speak Spanish or another language; is that correct?
Mr. DELGADO. Right.
Mr. LIEBELER. Did you take tests while you were in the Army to
establish your proficiency in the Spanish language?
Mr. DELGADO. Yes, I took the language proficiency test, and also the
OCS test, the regular test they give you when you first go into the
service, and I passed them all. It's in my 201 files, my military
records.
Mr. LIEBELER. Did you pass the Spanish proficiency test?
Mr. DELGADO. Yes. In fact I was offered to be sent to Monterey language
school.
Mr. LIEBELER. To continue your studies in connection with the Spanish
language?
Mr. DELGADO. Yes.
Mr. LIEBELER. You took the Spanish proficiency test when you came into
the Army at Fort Ord; is that correct?
Mr. DELGADO. Yes.
Mr. LIEBELER. Where were you born?
Mr. DELGADO. I was born in Brooklyn, N.Y., in 1939.
Mr. LIEBELER. At what address? Where?
Mr. DELGADO. I believe it was Kings County Hospital.
Mr. LIEBELER. Your parents still reside in Brooklyn?
Mr. DELGADO. 303 47th Street. That's what my address was during the
Marine Corps, but right now the neighborhood is tore down, so there's
no record of it now.
Mr. LIEBELER. Your parents reside in Brooklyn?
Mr. DELGADO. No. My parents are divorced. One lives in Puerto Rico, and
my mother lives in California.
Mr. LIEBELER. You lived at the address in Brooklyn that you just gave
me from the time you were born until the time you went into the Marine
Corps; is that correct?
Mr. DELGADO. That's correct.
Mr. LIEBELER. Tell us briefly where you went to school.
Mr. DELGADO. That's pretty hard to keep track of, because I was like
a yo-yo, back and forth from one parent to the other. But I went to
school in P.S. No. 2.
Mr. LIEBELER. In Brooklyn?
Mr. DELGADO. In Brooklyn, until the third grade, and I was transferred.
I went to California with my mother. I was there in the Park Avenue
Grammar School from the third grade to the fifth.
Mr. LIEBELER. What city in California?
Mr. DELGADO. Wilmington, Calif. And then I went back to New York, back
to P.S. No. 2 for the 5th grade to the 6th, graduated from there, went
to public school, Dewey Junior High School--I don't know what P.S. it
is--from the 7th grade to the 8th and then went back to California and
went to Wilmington Junior High School from the 7th to the--about the
11th grade, and the 11th grade I went back to Brooklyn into Manual
Training High School and dropped out after the 11th grade.
Mr. LIEBELER. You have not graduated from high school?
Mr. DELGADO. No. I have my high school graduation through USAFI.
Mr. LIEBELER. That is the United States Armed Forces Institute; is that
correct?
Mr. DELGADO. That's correct.
Mr. LIEBELER. When you dropped out of school here in Brooklyn, did you
then join the Marine Corps?
Mr. DELGADO. No. I held a job for a while at Van Dyk & Reeves, on 42d
Street and 2d Avenue, in Brooklyn, N.Y.
Mr. LIEBELER. What kind of a job was that?
Mr. DELGADO. It was just a regular laborer at an olive factory, making
Maraschino cherries and olives and so forth. And it lasted about 2-1/2
months, and I joined the Marine Corps.
Mr. LIEBELER. Do both of your parents speak Spanish?
Mr. DELGADO. Yes.
Mr. LIEBELER. Are they both from Puerto Rico originally?
Mr. DELGADO. Yes.
Mr. LIEBELER. Approximately when did they come from Puerto Rico?
Mr. DELGADO. My father came when he was roughly 20 years of age. My
mother came when she was about 13.
Mr. LIEBELER. Approximately hold old are your parents now?
Mr. DELGADO. My father is around 48. My mother is about 42.
Mr. LIEBELER. Where did you join the Marine Corps?
Mr. DELGADO. Down at Whitehall Street, in New York City.
Mr. LIEBELER. What training did you receive? Where were you sent?
Mr. DELGADO. Well, when we left New York I was sent to Parris Island,
S.C., for basic training. Upon completion of that, I was sent to Camp
Le Jeune, N.C., for intensive training. Then I received schooling in
electronics school at Jacksonville Naval Air Station, Jacksonville, Fla.
Mr. LIEBELER. Can you remember when you were there at Jacksonville?
Mr. DELGADO. I was there in 19--the the beginning of 1957.
Mr. LIEBELER. What is the exact title of the school that you went to?
Do you remember?
Mr. DELGADO. Electronics school is all I can remember. From there, upon
graduation from there, I received my choice of training, which was
aircraft control and warning, and I was sent to school at Biloxi Air
Force Base, Miss., and there I went to aircraft control and warning
school there, and it lasted about 7 weeks. Upon completion there and
graduation, I received my orders for Marine Air Control Squadron 9,
Santa Ana, Calif.
Mr. LIEBELER. Approximately when did you arrive at Santa Ana?
Mr. DELGADO. The beginning of 1958.
Mr. LIEBELER. Did you make the acquaintance of Lee Harvey Oswald at any
time prior to the time that you arrived at Santa Ana?
Mr. DELGADO. No.
Mr. LIEBELER. You didn't know Oswald while you were in school at Biloxi
or Jacksonville?
Mr. DELGADO. No. He was past that already.
Mr. LIEBELER. Oswald had been to these schools?
Mr. DELGADO. Yes.
Mr. LIEBELER. Did you learn subsequently that Oswald had been in school
in Jacksonville and Biloxi?
Mr. DELGADO. All of us in MOS 6741 knew that he had been there.
Mr. LIEBELER. For the benefit of the record, MOS stands for Military
Occupation Specialty. Is that right?
Mr. DELGADO. Yes.
Mr. LIEBELER. And the MOS number that you have just referred to was
what?
Mr. DELGADO. Airborne electronics operators is about the equivalent, I
guess.
Mr. LIEBELER. Airborne electronics operator?
Mr. DELGADO. Yes; our job was the surveillance of aircraft in distress,
control of intercepts and approaches, and mostly air surveillance and
help of aircraft running into problems.
Mr. LIEBELER. How long were you stationed at Santa Ana?
Mr. DELGADO. From 1958, I would say, until November 2, 1959, when I got
discharged.
Mr. LIEBELER. So you were at Santa Ana after you completed your
training, throughout your entire Marine Corps career?
Mr. DELGADO. That's right.
Mr. LIEBELER. Until the time you were discharged?
Mr. DELGADO. That's right.
Mr. LIEBELER. Did you have access to classified information of any sort
in the course of your work at Santa Ana?
Mr. DELGADO. Yes; we all had access to information, classified
information. I believe it was classified secret. We all had secret
clearances. There was some information there as to different codes and
challenges that we had to give to aircraft and challenges and so on.
Mr. LIEBELER. In other words, if I can understand correctly the nature
of your work, you actually worked in a control room?
Mr. DELGADO. Yes.
Mr. LIEBELER. Observing radar screens?
Mr. DELGADO. That's right.
Mr. LIEBELER. And when the radar screen would pick up an aircraft, you
would then challenge that aircraft?
Mr. DELGADO. Right.
Mr. LIEBELER. And it would have to identify itself?
Mr. DELGADO. That's true.
Mr. LIEBELER. And the code or signals that you sent to the aircraft
requesting it to identify itself were classified information?
Mr. DELGADO. That's right, along with the range capabilities of the
radar sets and their blindspots and so forth and so on. You know, each
site has blindspots, and we know the degrees where our blindspots are
and who covers us and that information. That's considered secret, what
outfit covers us and things like that.