Jackie, Janet & Lee

by J. Randy Taraborrelli

  Janet’s head must have been spinning. “Crippling her thinking at this time was the fact that Mummy was still in shock over what had just happened to Bobby a couple weeks earlier,” Jamie continued, “as was I.”

  As a twenty-one-year-old Columbia sophomore, Jamie had great admiration for his sister’s brother-in-law and often saw him and corresponded with him. Because he’d been hired to take photographs of RFK’s California stops, he had been with Bobby right before he was killed. He and his parents attended the funeral together, “and we really hadn’t recovered yet,” he said. “We believed in Bobby. Mummy thought he would end the war in Vietnam, the escalation of which she blamed on Johnson. She was so hopeful about Bobby. We all were. When he was killed, it almost sent Mummy into a nervous breakdown. It was as if her brain just shut down, and she couldn’t cope. She just couldn’t function, she was so much in shock. Therefore, she was in no position to have a big debate with Jackie over Onassis.”

  On August 29, Lee showed up at Hammersmith to spend the week with Janet; she brought along Anthony and Tina, of course. While they all had a wonderful time, Janet felt conflicted the entire week. Should she tell Lee that Jackie was bringing Onassis to Hammersmith in a month? How would Lee react to this news? Janet suspected it would not go well, and she just didn’t have the energy to deal with it. At the end of the week, Jackie called to tell her that she and Ari had finalized their plans; they would be arriving on September 23—for five days. Lee still had two days left at the farm. Now Janet had to wake up on those days and face Lee knowing all the while that she had a big secret. She reasoned that maybe Jackie would change her mind. Why get Lee all worked up without cause?

  The weeks passed quickly, too quickly for Janet’s taste, especially with the promise of five glorious days with Aristotle Onassis. The day before his and Jackie’s arrival, Janet went to Trinity Church to ask a priest for guidance. The details of her consultation with the priest are unknown. However, afterward, Janet tried to contact Onassis at the Pierre in New York, but was told he was in Greece. She then asked Adora Rule to find him in Greece, but Adora had no luck. Time was running out. Soon he would be at her front door. Janet definitely wanted to talk to him in advance of that visit, if only to find out what his intentions were with Jackie. It wasn’t possible, though.

  By the middle of September, again the family secrets mounted. Following Janet’s lead, Jackie didn’t tell Lee she had invited Onassis to Hammersmith. Of course, neither sister knew that Janet had already previously met him. If it seems like Janet had quite a few plates in the air, one of her friends put it this way: “If you think about it, Mrs. A. was actually the only one who had all of the information, certainly more than each of her daughters, so in a sense, knowing her, she probably felt she was still somewhat in control. But also knowing how high-strung she was ordinarily, I would imagine she was probably filled with a lot of anxiety, too.”

  Janet and Ari Reach an Impasse

  Monday, September 23, 1968.

  To truly grasp its peculiar nuances, a person would have had to have been present the moment Jackie Kennedy introduced her mother to Aristotle Onassis for what she thought was the first time. Jamie Auchincloss was standing right there, though, and says that Janet and Ari gave no indication whatsoever that they’d ever before met. Apparently, they were each other’s equal when it came to remaining calm during awkward social situations. In other words, they pulled it off. Other than his knowledge of the time Janet walked in on Onassis in London, Jamie actually wasn’t sure there’d even been a previous meeting. He also wasn’t sure that there hadn’t been one. “In my family, we kept a lot close to the vest,” he would say. “Everyone was polite and welcoming when Aristotle Onassis showed up at our front door at Hammersmith Farm, as was our custom.”

  Jackie came not only with Aristotle, but also with his sister, Artemis Garoufalidis, who was two years older. Lee used to stay with her in Glyfada when Onassis was off with Maria Callas. Though Artemis and Jackie had met in 1963 aboard the Christina, now they had reason to be close. “Unfortunately, his daughter, Christina, was also present,” Jamie recalled. “She had already developed a strong dislike for Jackie, which made things a little uncomfortable. I was put in charge of keeping her occupied. She was seventeen, spoiled, and a real handful. Basically, she just wanted to lie around, complain about her life, and drink plenty of Coca-Cola.”

  As soon as she arrived at Hammersmith, Jackie realized that John Jr. had come down with the measles and would have to be quarantined. Janet Jr. and her husband, Lewis, were also supposed to come to Hammersmith for an extended visit. They had made it as far as New York from Hong Kong when Janet Sr. called to tell them to stay put for a few days. Since Janet Jr. was pregnant, her mother didn’t want her exposed to the measles. In all of the confusion, the guests forgot to sign the guest book. It was really required; Janet enjoyed going back over it to remember who had come to visit and when. She decided to sign the guests in herself, which she did; the guest book, in her own handwriting, has Jackie, Ari, and Christina signed in for their visit, but Janet forgot to sign in Artemis.

  “When she wasn’t seeing to her son, Jackie was trying to encourage conversation between Mummy and Aristotle,” Jamie recalled. “‘He’s so fascinating, Mummy,’ she kept saying. ‘You really should try to get to know him. After all, he won over the Kennedys when I took him to meet them. Rose loved him!’ she said. [Jackie had taken Onassis to the Kennedy compound on July 28 to introduce him to that side of her family on the occasion of her thirty-ninth birthday.] Mummy was surprised to hear this and, given what she knew about the Kennedys’ view of Onassis, didn’t quite believe it. True or not, she would not be so easily swayed.”

  Janet had two issues with Onassis. First of all, he had coaxed one daughter into an extramarital affair. Now he was, apparently, trading her in for the other daughter. No matter how wealthy he was, Janet would never approve of any arrangement that would pit Lee against Jackie. After meeting with Onassis in New York, she actually thought they’d reached some sort of understanding, at least where Lee was concerned. Apparently, this was not the case. More than anything, she now needed another private meeting with him to clarify things. She would get it on Wednesday afternoon, after Ari and Jackie returned from a day at Bailey’s Beach.

  That morning, Onassis cut quite a figure in his tight little swim trunks. Eileen Slocum, sitting in her own cabana, was captivated—and not in a good way. “He was the strangest sight,” she recalled. “He had long, long arms, with short legs and a chest covered with dark hair.” She says she thought to herself, “He resembles a frog.”

  Apparently, according to accounts of Janet’s talk with Ari from numerous sources, Ari told Janet that things had taken a dramatic and unexpected turn since their previous meeting at the Pierre Hotel. Because of RFK’s murder, he said, he now felt a responsibility to Jackie. She needed him more than Lee, he explained. She was worried about her children, he said, and he could take care of them all. His heart had gone out to Jackie, he told Janet, and he wanted to protect her and the kids. In fact, he now felt it was his “duty” to do just that.

  “Just as you took care of my Lee?” Janet asked. “Has Lee ever complained to you about me?” Ari wondered. No, Janet had to admit that Lee had never found fault with him. Then again, Lee hardly ever mentioned him to her. “Then I would say that I have taken care of your Lee,” he concluded.

  Janet said she was certain Lee would never be able to accept Onassis being with Jackie, and that this surprising new relationship was sure to cause problems in the family. Janet was worried about her grandchildren, too, but she just felt there had to be some other way to protect them. She was as clear and as direct about it as possible: “Here’s what’s going to happen, Mr. Onassis,” she finally told him, according to all accounts. “You will stay away from both of my daughters. We all have to heal after what’s happened to Jack and Bobby, and we can’t do that with your interference.”

  The meeting ended wit
h Ari telling Janet that her daughters were grown women and that “they would make their own decisions,” said one source. “It wasn’t just up to him, anyway, he said. Jackie had a mind of her own and, apparently, she wanted to be with him. It would be up to her to work it out with Lee, he said, not him. None of this sat well with Janet. But what could she do? She stated her case. He stated his case. In the end, they reached a sort of impasse. It wasn’t as if they had weeks to work things out. He was leaving in a couple of days! Before the meeting ended, she asked him point-blank, ‘Do you love Jackie?’ He said, ‘Yes. Very much.’ So what could she say?”

  The week just dragged on. Janet noticed that every night after everyone had gone to bed, Onassis spent the evening in the Deck Room listening to cassette tapes of Chopin, Tchaikovsky, Beethoven, and Mozart. At the time, cassette tapes and their players with built-in microphones were just beginning to come into style. Though the technology had been introduced a few years earlier, Janet had never actually seen one. When she walked in on Onassis in the Deck Room on Wednesday morning, he was playing his music on the strange contraption. Onassis explained that the cassettes were quickly taking the place of cumbersome reel-to-reel tapes. He then unplugged the machine from the wall and handed it to her. “Here, for you,” he told her with a smile. “You may have the tapes, too.” Janet reluctantly accepted the gifts.

  “Of course, we later learned that when Onassis visited Rose Kennedy earlier in the summer, he gave her a very expensive brooch,” recalled Jamie Auchincloss. “My mother got a tape recorder that cost about a hundred dollars, if that. She didn’t know how cheap it was, though. It was so revolutionary a device; she actually believed he had given her something quite unique and expensive.”

  On the final day, Saturday, September 28, Janet hosted a buffet luncheon in Jackie and Ari’s honor. During that meal, she couldn’t help but notice that every time Jackie would light a cigarette and start smoking it, Onassis would quickly pluck it from her hand and put it out. Jackie would then just keep talking, as if she hadn’t noticed. Ten minutes later, the same thing would happen. When Janet asked Ari about it, a smile crossed his craggy face and he said, “Women should not be seen smoking, don’t you agree?” Of course she did! She used to do the exact same thing with Jackie’s cigarettes when she was in the White House. So there were moments when she and Onassis seemed somewhat simpatico. They’d also had a reasonable discussion about religion during which she learned that he, too, had a deep and abiding belief in God, went to church every Sunday, and encouraged his children to do the same. However, despite these brief moments of shared views with him, by the time the luncheon was over, she was eager for him—and for Jackie—to just leave.

  “Thank you for giving Ari a chance,” Jackie told her mother after pulling her aside, “even though he told me that you don’t really approve,” she said, with a raised eyebrow. She didn’t seem angry. Of course, she couldn’t have expected five days to be the catalyst for great change in Janet’s opinion. “No matter how hard I try,” she then told her mother, “my thoughts keep going back to him. I hope you can understand that, Mummy.” Janet looked as if she wanted to say something, but since there were other people in the entrance hall getting their things together to leave, she probably didn’t want to cause a scene. She elected not to say anything. Instead, she just embraced her daughter and told her that she loved her.

  Ari then walked over and kissed Janet’s hand. “It’s an honor to meet you,” he told her, still acting as if it was the first time.

  “Yes,” she said with icy reserve. “I imagine it would be.”

  When Ari tried to kiss her hand, Janet pulled it back and recoiled, almost as if bitten by a snake. In the battle for balance of power with her, though, it would certainly seem that Aristotle Onassis had won by simply being vague, reasonable, and noncommittal. An astute businessman, he seemed to understand that, sometimes, the best way to comport oneself in an adversarial situation is with simple complacency. If anything, it does give one’s rival less to oppose, as was the case with Janet Auchincloss. He was surprised, though, that he hadn’t been able to fully win her over, the way he had Rose Kennedy earlier in the summer. There was no victory for Onassis at Hammersmith, just no real casualties.

  After Ari bid Jamie good-bye, his sister, Artemis, kissed everyone on both cheeks. Christina just walked outside without saying anything to anyone. The contingent made its way toward two vehicles that had driven down the long graveled drive and appeared under the house’s wide porte cochere, one for them and one just for their luggage. Hugh pulled up in his shiny blue Bentley, beeped the horn, and waved good-bye to all as he drove off, his destination unknown. As the houseman loaded all of the bags into the one car, Janet bid farewell to her guests. Relieved that the week was over, she then closed the front door very quickly before they had even gotten into their car.

  Janet’s Fiction

  “English Catholic,” Janet Auchincloss stated. “My entire background is English Catholic.” She made the statement in September 1965 while being interviewed for Good Housekeeping. The writer probably couldn’t help but be suspicious of the claim, though. After all, for the last couple of years there’d been a few inconsistencies when it came to pinning down Janet’s heritage. Another rumor was that Janet’s family was full-blooded French. This one actually was started by Janet. Using the French last name of her first husband, Jack Bouvier, helped make it easy for the uninitiated to believe it was true. Of course, it wasn’t. Another story was that the Lees were actually Jewish by some twist of biology. Apparently, this rumor was started by Hugh Auchincloss’s first wife, Maya, for no reason other than that she was jealous of Janet. There was also the more persistent story that Janet’s family, the Lees, were related to the Lees of Maryland, an aristocratic offshoot of the Lees of Virginia—the Robert E. Lees. This was Janet’s favorite fib and one she would go to her grave insisting was true. It wasn’t.

  Actually, it was Irish blood that ran through Janet Lee Bouvier Auchincloss’s veins. However, she believed the Irish were looked down upon, since most had come to America (back in the mid-1840s) to escape a devastating potato blight during which more than a million had perished from starvation. She—like a lot of others of her time—believed that the claiming of Ireland as her homeland would be counterproductive to her goal of moving about high society. There really was no ethnic taint for her to eradicate, no reason for her to be so ashamed of her forebears. In fact, most were smart and industrious people, great successes in the New World.

  Jim Lee’s grandfather—Janet’s great-grandfather—Thomas Lee was born in County Cork, Ireland, in 1810. His wife, Frances, was also of hardy Irish stock. They raised their family in Ireland until 1852, when they moved to the United States in time for the birth of James Lee, Janet’s paternal grandfather. (Another fiction spun by Janet was that James Lee had been born in Maryland and had fought in the Civil War. Actually, he was born in New Jersey in 1852, nine years before the start of the Civil War.) James Lee was well spoken—fluent in German and Italian—college-educated, and interested in the arts. He became not only a fine teacher who went on to hold the position of associate superintendent of schools in New York City, but also a medical doctor with a thriving private practice. James married Mary Theresa Norton in 1875, also the child of Irish immigrants. Two years later, they had their only son, James Thomas Aloysius Lee, who would be Janet’s father, James T. Lee.

  It wasn’t that unusual for people of Janet’s time and place in a class-conscious America to create fictitious lineages. Certainly, the Bouvier side of the family had its own share.

  In 1940, John Bouvier II, Black Jack Bouvier’s father, self-published a book he called Our Forebears. In it, he invented a brand-new biography from whole cloth. He falsely maintained that the Bouviers were “of an ancient house of Fontaine near Grenoble,” and therefore related to a prestigious list of French patriots and other royal aristocrats of noble stock. The truth was that John Bouvier II’s great-grandfather M
ichel Bouvier was a Catholic French immigrant who settled in Philadelphia and made a name for himself as a carpenter and cabinetmaker. He also became wildly successful in the real-estate game, making millions in that venue. He had two sons, Michel and the first John Vernou Bouvier. Both were also successful in real estate, and the Bouvier family’s holdings were valued at more than $40 million by 1914, almost a billion dollars by today’s standards. Once in Manhattan, the Bouviers and their relatives all intermarried into wealthy high society, their names found in the New York Social Register by the early 1900s.

  Despite his family’s amazing success in the New World, John Bouvier II was not content with the truth, which is why he made up his own fantastic history. His inaccurate account of the Bouviers’ story—one in which hardworking shopkeepers became proud nobles—was taken as not only the family’s truth but that of all of those who married into it, and remained so for years. As young girls, Jackie and Lee loved these stories that John Bouvier II read to them right out of his own book. They were romantic, impressive … and untrue. But the girls believed every word, as did most people. In 1961, Mary Van Rensselaer’s authorized biography of Jackie Kennedy quoted liberally from Our Forebears, and—with Jackie’s endorsement—repeated all of the untruths about the Bouviers’ history.

  In the fall of ’68, Janet, now sixty, continued to insist that her family was related to the Lees of Virginia. As a result, she’d become an expert on the life and times of Robert E. Lee, general in chief of the Confederate armies. Because she was able to talk about him in such great detail, she was convincing when it came to her fictional biological relationship to him.