James J. Humes Biography

Commander James J. Humes served as chief autopsy surgeon during the examination of President Kennedy at Bethesda Naval Hospital.

Humes and the other pathologists traced the neck missile along a slight downward path toward the front of Kennedy's throat.

Humes concluded that the large defect on the upper right side of Kennedy's skull represented a wound of exit.

At the time of the autopsy, Humes was senior pathologist and director of laboratories at Bethesda Naval Hospital.

Further examination led Humes and the Bethesda team to reject the idea that a bullet had lodged in Kennedy's back and later fallen out.

Humes agreed that the small, clean-edged wound near the back of Kennedy's neck had the characteristics of an entrance wound.

Humes used the beveling of the skull wound to support the conclusion that the smaller posterior defect was an entrance wound.

Humes determined that the neck missile passed mainly through soft tissue rather than through bone as it crossed Kennedy's neck.

Early on November 23, Humes telephoned Dr. Malcolm Perry and learned that Perry had used the existing throat wound for the tracheotomy incision.

Humes sought confirmation from Parkland Hospital that a tracheotomy had been performed through the wound on the front of Kennedy's neck.

Perry's information confirmed Humes's conclusion that the neck bullet had exited through the front of Kennedy's throat.