Clint Hill, the Secret Service agent who leapt onto John F Kennedy’s limousine after he was shot, has died aged 93.
According to his publisher Gallery Books, an imprint of Simon & Schuster, the former security official died on Friday at his home in Belvedere, California.
His wife Lisa McCubbin Hill, a journalist who met Mr Hill while writing 2012’s The Kennedy Detail: JFK’s Secret Service Agents Break Their Silence, said on Instagram: “From the moment we met, there was an undeniable spark between us.
“We had that once-in-a-lifetime love that everyone hopes for – a relationship filled with passion, respect, admiration, and the pure joy of being together.
“I am eternally grateful for every day and every moment of the past 15 years we shared. To us, forever. Rest in Peace my Sweet Prince.”
On 22 November 1963, Mr Hill – part of first lady Jacqueline Kennedy’s security detail on the day of the assassination – leapt from a Secret Service car to the US president’s after Mr Kennedy was shot.
Footage filmed by eyewitness Abraham Zapruder showed the agent grabbing a handle on the limousine’s trunk and pulling himself onto it as the driver accelerated.
He then forced Mrs Kennedy, who had crawled onto the trunk, back into her seat as the limousine sped off.
While Mr Hill was commended for his actions and became the agent in charge of the White House protective detail, he blamed himself for Mr Kennedy’s death and retired from the Secret Service in 1975 – aged 43.
He told Mike Wallace on CBS’ 60 Minutes that year: “If I had reacted just a little bit quicker. And I could have, I guess. And I’ll live with that to my grave.”
Mr Hill was born in 1932 and grew up in Washburn, North Dakota. He then attended Concordia College in Moorhead, Minnesota, served in the Army and worked as a railroad agent before joining the Secret Service in 1958.
He worked in the agency’s Denver office for about a year, before joining the elite group of agents assigned to protect the US president and first family.
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After his retirement, Mr Hill co-authored several books about his time in the Secret Service with Mrs McCubbin Hill. The couple met while writing The Kennedy Detail and married in 2021.
He also became a speaker, and in 2018, was given North Dakota’s highest civilian honor – the Theodore Roosevelt Rough Rider Award.
