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Jackie Kennedy's funeral

 


Photo courtesy of Alamy


Courtesy of BBC (first draft)

Thirty years ago this week, former First Lady Jackie Kennedy was buried next to her first husband, 35th US President John F Kennedy, who had been assassinated 31 years prior. The grave was a short distance from the resting place of Robert F Kennedy, her friend and former brother-in-law, who was also a victim of a political assassination.


Jackie Kennedy was diagnosed with cancer in 1993, after she fell off a horse and was examined by a doctor who found a lump near her groin. In early 1994, she underwent chemotherapy, but it was soon deemed terminal and she died in her New York apartment on 19 May that year.


As the original BBC radio script shows below, 64-year-old Kennedy had a "simple burial" which lasted 15 minutes and ended "with a hymn sung by a naval choir" – a service which matched "the very private way she led her life".


In the bulletin, radio listeners heard the voice of the then President Bill Clinton, who "paid tribute to [Kennedy's] dignity, grace and commonsense".

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