RFK Visits Brother’s Grave

May 29, 1965 - President Kennedy would have been 48 years old today. 

Marking the anniversary, members of his family visited the President’s grave at Arlington National Cemetery this morning.

Later, Maj. Gen. Chester Clifton, President Johnson’s military aide, who had served in the same capacity for President Kennedy, arrived with a wreath of flowers from Mr. Johnson, who was in Texas for the weekend. The President sent a telegram to ceremonies in Dallas marking the dedicating of a mental retardation clinic named for President Kennedy.

The slain President’s sister Eunice and her husband, Sargent Shriver, director of the Peace Corps, were among the first to visit the hillside grave overlooking the Potomac and the monumental buildings of Washington.

Shortly afterward, the President’s brother Robert F. Kennedy led his wife, Ethel, and five of their nine children up the west slope to the grave.

Mr. Kennedy, who had been Attorney General in his brother’s Cabinet and who now is a Democratic Senator from New York, knelt inside the white picket fence of the grave. Mrs. Kennedy placed a small wreath at the mound that marks the grave, then she and the children knelt beside the Senator. 

The Kennedys crossed themselves and said a prayer. Barely taking notice of other visitors, they walked back down the slope to their car. 

Meanwhile, the vanguard of what is expected to be a very heavy crowd of visitors to Arlington cemetery on this Memorial Day weekend began streaming past the Kennedy grave. 

Washington is filled with tourists. The Kennedy grave has become, with the Tomb of the Unknowns at Arlington, one of the major places of tourist interest.

After visiting his brother’s grave, Sen. Kennedy flew to Fort Bragg, N.C., to take part in dedication ceremonies for a new headquarters building at the John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center.

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