(melancholy piano music) (narrator) On the 22nd of November, 1963, Jacqueline Kennedy stepped off Air Force One in Washington wearing a dress soaked in her husband's blood.

♪ Four and a half hours earlier, President John F. Kennedy had been assassinated.

(reporter) President Kennedy has been assassinated.

The president is dead.

(narrator) And as the bullets hit him, his bleeding head fell into her lap.

The first lady flew with her husband's body back to Washington, but she refused to change out of her suit.

She appeared with JFK's brother, Bobby, and the world looked on in horror.

(Barbara) From that moment, Mrs. Kennedy is cemented in American minds and American history as the tragic figure.

(narrator) How did she find the strength to face the world?

And why did she insist on wearing that blood-spattered outfit for the cameras?

In this film, we reveal two sides to her life: heartbreaking tragedy and a powerful determination to survive.

With never-before-seen letters and brand-new insight, we uncover the private pain of America's most famous first lady.

(Emily) Her elegance, her beauty, her style really captivated people.

(narrator) Beneath the gloss of her public life lay a world of unbearable grief.

(Kate) It was incredibly lonely and heartbreaking.

(narrator) And in the goldfish bowl of the White House, she hid her husband's relentless adultery, using medication to help her cope.

It is speed, it's an amphetamine.

(narrator) She learned to bury her pain beneath a beautiful veneer... (Professor O'Shaughnessy) She was made of steel.

(narrator) ...and emerged as the ultimate image-maker, becoming a powerful asset to the presidency.

She had become a star equal to his own star power.

(narrator) An international icon in her own right.

This is the story of America's first lady of tragedy and queen of survival.

(dramatic music) ♪ (classical music) On the 12th of September, 1953, all of New England high society gathered in Rhode Island for the event of the season: the wedding of picture-perfect couple Jacqueline Bouvier and John Fitzgerald Kennedy.

(reporter) The wedding of Senator John F. Kennedy recalls Newport's one-time social grandeur.

(narrator) The occasion had caused a stir, with 3,000 onlookers gathered to see the newlyweds.

(reporter) Speaker of the House Martin, screen celebrity Marion Davies, and former ambassador and Mrs. Joseph Kennedy, parents of the groom, are among the personalities on hand to make this the top society wedding of the year.

(Tina) The entire state was in a tizzy over this as was really the whole country.

So this was an epic wedding, the sun shining.

The festivities went on for several days before as people came in from all over.

(narrator) The Kennedys, a large and wealthy political dynasty from Massachusetts, were fast becoming America's most celebrated family.

JFK, known as Jack, a senator for only ten months, had ambitions to climb to the very top of the political ladder.

Their wedding was a highly orchestrated bid to boost his career prospects.

It's effectively planned by their parents, particularly Joe Kennedy.

He's insistent that this is going to be a huge, massive social event that he's gonna wring every drop of publicity out of it for his son that he can.

(Carrie) The wedding was more a show wedding for the Kennedy family and for Senator Kennedy's future political ambitions than it was for the bride and groom.

(reporter) All the spectators outside the church, it's a real storybook wedding.

A radiant bride, the former Jacqueline Bouvier, and a handsome groom.

With a pretty wife and politically rising star, the future seems bright for the junior senator from Massachusetts.

It was a photo opportunity for a political candidate.

(narrator) Getting married had not been on Jack's personal agenda.

(Barbara) He was happy being single and playing the field, which is probably an understatement.

(Emily) He's a bachelor.

At some point, that's going to become a liability politically.

He needs to be seen, to be settling down, to be a family man if he's going to go further in politics.

(Barbara) Find a partner, a young woman, a fellow Catholic, someone from high society who had a fine intellect and marry her.

(narrator) In Jacqueline Bouvier, it seemed he had found the perfect match.

(Tina) She was young, she was beautiful, she was educated.

She was also very smart and engaging and could hold a conversation with anyone.

She comported herself well.

So, certainly, she did tick all of those boxes.

(narrator) Behind Jackie's smiles, the wedding turned out to be far from the happiest day of her life.

(Barbara) She really lost control of her entire wedding.

She hated the wedding dress her mother picked for her.

She said it looked like a lampshade.

And it did.

And it wasn't her style at all.

(Keith) It's this huge sort of confection of sort of taffeta and chiffon, and Jackie clearly looked very uncomfortable in it.

(narrator) Jackie wanted her much loved father by her side.

(Barbara) She thought, "Well, maybe the one thing I will have control over is which person can walk me down the aisle," and she wanted her much beloved father to have that honor.

(narrator) But he was not invited to the reception.

This caused huge tension between her parents.

(Emily) He's so upset about it.

He gets terribly drunk and is physically incapable of walking her down the aisle.

And Jackie, you know, has to present herself as the happy blushing bride even though, you know, internally, she was devastated that her father wasn't there.

(narrator) To understand how she found herself here, we need to go back to Jackie's childhood.

(upbeat jazz music) Like the Kennedys, her own family were affluent.

♪ (Kate) Her mother, Janet, was from a very wealthy family.

Her father, who was known as "Black Jack" Bouvier, was a stockbroker.

And they lived a, you know, a very, um, high-class, high-brow lifestyle.

(Tina) Jackie's early years were very much privileged years and, you know, with big homes and staff and so forth, access to riding horses.

(Barbara) She was quite a bookish young girl.

She went to the finest schools for her earliest education.

So, in that sense, she was living an idyllic childhood.

(narrator) Jackie loved her charismatic father.

(Emily) So, her father is this larger-than-life character, and he's besotted with his daughters, with Jackie and Lee, and they adore him.

(Barbara) He looked like a movie star.

He always had a perpetual tan.

He had a Clark Gable moustache.

And Jackie just thought he hung the moon and the stars.

(Bidisha) Jackie's family life was very perfect on the surface, but underneath that there was unhappiness.

(somber music) (reporter) It happened on Wall Street in 1929, and before it was done, the whole world was to feel the impact of the suffering and privation brought on by the blind and futile panic of the stock market crash that shattered the economy of the world.

♪ (narrator) Unlike the Kennedys, her family's fortunes plummeted after the Wall Street crash, leaving Jackie with a lifelong anxiety about money.

(bluesy music) (Tina) She did see her family's fortune evaporate and her father, you know, sort of attempting to come back from financial ruin.

It left an indelible mark on her.

(narrator) Her parents' marriage began to collapse.

(Kate) Jack Bouvier cheated on Janet constantly.

He was kind of a man about town, a philanderer.

The stock market crash had made him a much poorer man.

He drank quite a bit, he was an alcoholic.

All of these things combined made Janet very unhappy.

(Bidisha) At the time, there were plenty of unhappy marriages, I have no doubt, but to actually go for a divorce is very bold.

(narrator) Their very public split made the headlines, leaving Jackie humiliated.

(melancholy piano music) (Barbara) It had to be quite embarrassing not only to know that, in her eyes, her heroic father had these terrible flaws of alcoholism and being a womanizer, but then knowing that her mother did have to divorce him.

It was a real social scandal.

It impacted her deeply, impacted her emotionally.

(Professor O'Shaughnessy) Something at such a vulnerable age as fundamental as that shatters the entire world view.

Suddenly, you realize the world was not as it seemed and there are snakes in the grass.

(narrator) Jackie acquired survival skills that she would rely on for the rest of her life.

(Professor O'Shaughnessy) It changed her personality.

Now she became an introvert as a coping mechanism.

It was very painful, very difficult.

(Emily) She developed that kind of glacial exterior.

She can be in a crowd, but she's also slightly apart from it.

She learned ways to protect herself emotionally from public attention even at that early age.

(narrator) This came in useful at her own wedding.

(Barbara) In the newsreels, it all looks a bit stilted for Jackie.

She does smile on occasion for the camera, but it looks a bit forced.

And she just looks like this is someone who is not the bride at her own wedding.

(narrator) It gave Jackie a foretaste of what lay ahead: a life of putting on a brave public face to hide private pain.

(Keith) Perhaps it's kind of dawning on her at this point of what she's marrying into, this huge family with a very clear agenda.

(Barbara) Like the British royal family, the Kennedys, as American royalty, are like a family business or a firm.

(Professor O'Shaughnessy) What she's thinking is, "I haven't just married a man.

I've married a machine."

The Kennedys were a machine.

Huge, ruthless, rich machine for the achievement and sustenance of power.

And she must have felt terribly vulnerable that she joined a clan, and she probably felt her individuality was draining away.

(narrator) Jackie had married her Prince Charming and been thrust onto the stage.

(Barbara) She was going to have to play the role that they were creating for her in that family business which was politics and which was pointing towards the White House.

(narrator) She was going to need all her strength to survive, and this marriage would be far from happy ever after.

(Kate) She was expected to always take a back seat to her husband, and her needs were always secondary.

(uplifting music) (narrator) At the age of 24, Jacqueline Bouvier had married Senator Jack Kennedy, joining a powerful dynasty.

She was now a political wife.

Her role?

To support her high-profile husband.

This wasn't the life she had dreamed of.

In 1947, she graduated at the top of her class.

In her yearbook, there's a glimpse of the future she wanted.

Under "ambition," she writes: "Not to be a housewife."

(Tina) It's such a telling quote from her yearbook.

Jackie was very smart, and she was independent.

(Professor O'Shaughnessy) I think that's very radical for the 1940s.

And, of course, what is the alternative to being a housewife?

It's having a career.

(narrator) To achieve this aim, Jackie went to college and spent a year in France before graduating.

(moody music) ♪ Her first job was as a journalist.

(whirring) (Bidisha) She's working as a kind of Lois Lane-type girl reporter for Washington newspapers, so she's really enjoying herself.

She's part of Washington society.

It's all going great, and you think, "That's it.

Go, Jackie!"

(Tina) She loved it.

I think she saw that there could be a future for her as a journalist.

It allowed her to both be creative and inquisitive.

♪ (jazz music) (narrator) In May 1952, she went to a dinner party that would change her life.

♪ She met Jack Kennedy.

(Emily) John F. Kennedy, he's a war hero.

He's got his dashing good looks.

His father is, by today's standards, a billionaire.

And he's also a celebrated author.

So, this is a very appealing prospect for any young woman.

(narrator) Jack bore striking similarities to Jackie's major male influence and offered the possibility of a life less ordinary.

Just like her own father, he was charming, knew how to have a good time.

A massive philanderer.

She looks at him and sees ambition and drive but also a kind of exit route.

(Kate) She wanted an interesting life.

She wanted more, and that's what she found in John F. Kennedy.

(narrator) They began dating, and in May 1953, Jack proposed to Jackie.

She accepted, but there was a price to pay.

(Tina) Once she did get engaged, she had to quit her job the very next day at the paper and, you know, I think that was a sign of the times.

You know, you can't really be engaged and about to be married and hold down a job.

(narrator) After the couple were married, however, it was clear that Jack wasn't ready to sacrifice his bachelor lifestyle.

(Barbara) I don't think Jack Kennedy ever wanted to settle down and in many ways, I don't think he did.

He went through the formalities of settling down, but I don't think he ever ended his playboy streak.

(narrator) As the wife of political royalty, Jackie was under pressure to produce a Kennedy baby.

(Kate) Jack always wanted to have a big family.

His brother, Bobby, and his wife, Ethel, already had many children by that point.

I think they were on their seventh or eighth child.

I mean, a huge Irish Catholic family.

That's what you did as a Kennedy wife.

You had lots of children.

It was a way of creating more Kennedys, more people to carry on the torch.

(Bidisha) The Kennedys saw themselves in a royal light and, of course, the woman, the queen, Jackie, has to produce the son and heir.

(narrator) The path to meeting those expectations would be filled with tragedy.

(dramatic music) In 1956, a pregnant Jackie accompanied her husband to the Democratic Convention in Chicago.

♪ (Barbara) There's concern on her part that because she has already lost one child to a miscarriage the year before that she does need to be careful.

So she would be risking her health in very hot conditions with lots of crowds of people around her.

(melancholy music) (narrator) After the convention, Jack went on holiday with friends.

(Barbara) He takes off for a cruise around the Mediterranean.

Jackie goes back to Rhode Island to be with her mother and stepfather as she awaits the arrival of her baby.

(narrator) In Jack's absence, she suffered a tragic loss.

(Barbara) She goes into a premature labor.

She's rushed to the hospital.

The baby, a girl, is born, but it's a stillbirth.

(narrator) Jack didn't come home.

(Barbara) There is Jack sailing around the Mediterranean with some of his Senate cronies, presumably calling on women in every port until, reportedly, one of his Senate colleagues says, "Jack, if you want to preserve your political career, you need to get back to the States and be with Jackie."

I think, even at that time, what man would refuse to get the first plane he could out of Europe to get back to Rhode Island to be with his wife?

(narrator) It was an act of betrayal that must have been hard to forgive.

(Kate) I think it was a very lonely period in her life.

I mean, she was expected to always take a back seat to her husband, and her needs were always secondary.

(narrator) The following year, after two years of heartbreak, a healthy baby arrived.

(soft music) (reporter) In November 1957, a daughter, Caroline, was born to the John F. Kennedys.

Bobby and his wife, Ethel, were the godparents.

♪ (Barbara) They were both just over the moon.

And, so, a one-year-old Caroline made her debut on television with her mother on television campaign spots.

(man) The Kennedys basked in the warmth of new parenthood.

(narrator) Two years later, JFK was picked as the Democratic nominee for president, and the election campaigning began.

(lively music) (vocalists) ♪ Kennedy, Kennedy, Kennedy, Kennedy ♪ ♪ Kennedy, Kennedy, Ken-ne-dy ♪ Kennedy!

(narrator) As the campaign gathered momentum, Jackie would soon have to take a back seat.

(Barbara) She becomes pregnant with John Kennedy Jr., in the midst of that campaign and has to stop most of her appearances.

(narrator) In a TV interview from 1960, Jackie was challenged about her decision to stop campaigning.

Did it seem strange not to be campaigning -with your husband?

-Oh, yes, I miss very much campaigning with my husband in this major endeavor of his life.

I would be if I wasn't expecting a baby.

(narrator) Her husband's aides had doubts about Jackie, fearing her shyness would damage his presidential chances.

(Emily) Unlike a lot of political wives who really kind of threw themselves into that side of their husband's political career, she was a bit more reticent.

(narrator) In this revealing 1960 interview days after the nomination, Jackie shows her true feelings about life in the spotlight.

(man) I understand that at one time you were a roaming photographer in Washington.

-Is that right?

-That's right.

(man) Do you, uh, do you, uh...

Does all of this bother you at all?

I'd rather be on that end of it than this, I think.

(man) Do you expect to meet the senator at the airport Sunday night?

I'd like to.

It depends how many of you will be there.

(laughing) (narrator) Her shy charm won over the press, but JFK's team were not convinced.

(Emily) Kennedy's political advisors did at times feel that she would've been a liability.

She wasn't seen as particularly accessible to the average American woman.

You know, she has this fancy hairdo, she wears these very couture clothes, she speaks all these languages.

She wasn't seen as entirely relatable.

(narrator) Despite her critics, Jackie summoned the strength to continue making public appearances with Jack, and the crowds were captivated.

(Keith) She had impeccable manners, and she could really speak to anyone.

And so she had this innate charm that won everyone over.

The campaign team realized that Jackie was this huge asset to them.

(Professor O'Shaughnessy) Whenever she appears, the crowds are twice as big.

She didn't have to say or do anything.

(Bidisha) She was the model of the political wife that we now absolutely take for granted.

Stylish, intelligent, diplomatic.

An asset to the husband.

(narrator) Far from a liability, it was now clear Jackie was Jack's trump card.

Just before the presidential election, she agreed to a final pitch for the campaign.

(Barbara) Very visibly pregnant, Jacqueline Kennedy took the risk of riding through the canyons of Manhattan, with big buildings on either side and lots of confetti coming down on them in an open convertible with crowds pressing around.

That was the final push towards Election Day.

(narrator) In January 1961, Jack Kennedy became the 35th President of the United States.

The Kennedys ushered in a new era of American politics defined by youth, glamour, and a sense of hope.

(reporter) After a brief rest, President Kennedy and the First Lady venture from the White House to attend a round of no less than five gala inaugural balls.

(Emily) You have this youthful couple entering the White House.

He's incredibly handsome and dashing, and she's beautiful and elegant.

(Keith) They were like a breath of fresh air in the White House.

(reporter) A new era begins under the leadership of President John F. Kennedy.

(Professor O'Shaughnessy) He had a vision about the future where racial barriers would be overcome which had haunted America from the very beginning.

(Bonnie) I think for my family, African American family, the Kennedys were a possibility of doing something different and being something different.

(narrator) Behind the glitz of the inaugural celebrations, Jackie was struggling to cope.

(Emily) Jackie Kennedy had had a baby less than two months previously.

She'd had a cesarean.

You don't recover quickly from that.

And, yet, less than two months later she was expected to participate in this just whirlwind of events.

(narrator) The following night, Jackie was due to attend another ball but found herself exhausted.

The White House doctor offered Jackie something to help her get through the evening's event, a drug called Dexedrine.

It is speed, it's an amphetamine.

And Jackie took it.

She said she'd never taken that kind of medication before, but it did its work.

(narrator) The drug helped Jackie fulfill her role at the ball that night, but when it wore off, she was sent home, leaving Jack to continue celebrating.

(Barbara) He went on to multiple parties that night where he engaged with lots of women.

But by that time, Mrs. Kennedy was back and presumably sound asleep in the White House, her new home.

(narrator) Jackie wasn't alone in relying on medication to cope.

(Emily) There was a kind of prescription drug culture, um, particularly around uppers and downers.

Celebrities, politicians were being prescribed medications quite often to enable them to, you know, do their jobs better as they--as they saw it.

(Barbara) She did take them to some extent to get through her duties, I think, especially in those earliest months in the White House.

(narrator) Jack would often send Jackie on breaks away from the White House which gave him the freedom to continue his favorite pastime.

(Barbara) President Kennedy, apparently, could not stop himself from womanizing.

It appears to have been some kind of obsession.

President Kennedy once told Prime Minister Harold Macmillan that he had to engage in sexual relations every three days or he would have a headache.

(Kate) But it was such a widespread, well-known thing that staff who work in the residence knew not to go up to the second floor, which is where their bedrooms were, when Jackie was out of town.

(narrator) Much of her energy was spent on covering up her husband's adultery, a subject she never spoke about publicly.

But one devastating aside reveals she was fully aware.

(Nancy) At one point, when a visiting dignitary from France comes to the White House and she's showing her around, and there are these two perky, young secretaries in Kennedy's office, she turns to this dignitary and says in French, "Oh, and that woman over there, she's sleeping with my husband."

He supposedly had an affair with an intern, a college intern, who was working in the press office.

He apparently had a long-standing affair with Mrs. Kennedy's press secretary.

(narrator) Jack's conquests were not limited to White House staff.

Most humiliating for Jackie were the rumors of his affair with Hollywood icon Marilyn Monroe.

It seemed Jackie was powerless to stop her husband's philandering.

(Barbara) Jackie had to think that--how unfair this was, that she was offering him everything and he could not do her the honor of obeying the marriage vows.

(narrator) For pride's sake, Jackie would soon take matters into her own hands, becoming a world-famous style icon.

(Tina) He realized that she had become a star equal to his own star power.

(narrator) But her image would become seared on the world's consciousness in a moment of shocking tragedy.

(gunshots) In her opening weeks as first lady, Jackie started an ambitious project that she had imagined many years earlier.

(Emily) So Jackie Kennedy had a really keen interest in the arts, and she decides that her main project as first lady that she's going to try to restore the White House in a sympathetic way that actually brings American history to the fore.

(narrator) As a young girl, Jackie Bouvier had visited her future home.

(Emily) She was really struck by how sort of dark and dingy it felt.

It didn't feel like a welcoming place.

It didn't feel like somewhere really befitting of the presidency.

(Professor O'Shaughnessy) It made her, in other words, probably think of a few ideas about how she could run that place.

(Tina) This was not about changing the colors of the drapes or redecorating.

It was really about instilling pride in the White House and making America understand that this was their home too.

(narrator) Jackie renovated the private quarters to accommodate her family, but it was her restoration of the White House furniture that was way ahead of its time.

(Professor O'Shaughnessy) This whole business of preservation, this was brand new.

No one preserved anything in America.

(Emily) What Jackie had discovered is that, you know, presidents would sell the furniture of the previous administration.

So, what was left in the White House is this kind of hodgepodge of styles and eras.

(narrator) One of the first treasures that Jackie restored was a gift from Queen Victoria to the U.S., the Resolute Desk, placed in the Oval Office where it remains today.

In February 1962, after two years of work, the public were invited in by Jackie herself in a TV broadcast.

(Emily) It was one of the first primetime specials that was really aimed at a female audience, and that audience tuned in.

It was hugely successful.

It was completely revolutionary at the time.

Fifty-six million people tuned in to watch her.

That's how significant it was.

(narrator) The TV tour had shown the nation that Jackie was a trailblazer, but despite her success, the opinion she cared most about was Jack's.

(Kate) He saw the footage and was just blown away by it.

(Tina) I think, in some ways, it was about him understanding and appreciating the fact that she was so smart.

He realized that she had become a star equal to his own star power.

(narrator) She had made a great impact with her work on the White House, but Jackie had another skill that she would use to make her mark.

She would become queen of style.

Before she knew it, she was America's number one fashion icon.

(Nancy) There was no place you could go in America where you wouldn't see somebody with Jackie Kennedy's style.

(narrator) Jackie used fashion to express an image of modernity.

(funky music) (Amber) Jackie's first lady style can really be summarized, I think, as elegant, chic simplicity.

(narrator) Her unique way of dressing was revolutionary, and she became a much copied style icon the world over.

(Amber) There was something to do with the youth of the Kennedy family, and it became incredibly desirable to dress like her.

(Nancy) Her pillbox hat, her hair, and her shoes.

She just had a vast, vast influence on the world.

(narrator) Jackie's style appealed to every generation.

(Keith) Little girls could buy paper dolls.

They could cut out sleeveless shift dresses and put them onto Jackie dolls.

(Bonnie) I had those, and you put on the clothes which was French couture.

You cut 'em out, you put on the different dresses and little things that she had on and her hats.

(Carrie) I wasn't fortunate enough to have the Jackie paper doll set, but one of my girlfriends did, and I was quite jealous.

I bet you adult women were playing with those too.

I'm sure my mother would've liked to have it.

(melancholy music) (narrator) Jackie's global appeal became clear on the couple's first official trip to France in 1961.

♪ (reporter) Jackie, educated at the Sorbonne and fluent in French, accompanied her husband on this important venture into international diplomacy.

(fanfare music) (narrator) During the three-day state visit, Jackie charmed all levels of French society, from the public that turned out to greet her to the president himself.

(Emily) The crowds in France are chanting her name, they're--the French newspapers are obsessing over what outfits she's wearing.

(Professor O'Shaughnessy) Meeting the French, speaking fluently in French, which clasped her to the bosom of France.

There was a deep pent American prejudice.

Jackie kind of melted all of that.

(Carrie) She speaks to de Gaulle in French, and she knows French history.

Not only does she know French history, she's worshiped de Gaulle since she was a little girl because she thought he was so wonderful in the, you know, leading the French Resistance.

(narrator) Winning over the fashion capital of the world, Jackie was using her clothing as a powerful political tool.

Jack basked in her success.

(Kate) You can see in footage he has fun with it.

I think that he truly enjoyed watching her really blossom in this role.

(narrator) Jackie went on to charm dozens of leaders across the globe, strengthening international relations and winning admirers wherever she went.

(speaking foreign language) Viva Mexico.

(Professor O'Shaughnessy) She represented a different kind of American power.

She represented the essence of what today we call "soft power."

(Emily) She was able to connect with audiences in different countries in ways that maybe other first ladies hadn't-- hadn't done previously and in ways that John F. Kennedy wasn't necessarily able to do.

Jackie Kennedy was a huge asset.

(dramatic music) (narrator) Less than two years into her role as first lady, Jackie was now an international star.

But tragedy was never far away.

(somber piano music) In 1963, Jackie was eight months pregnant when she went into labor.

The baby boy they named Patrick died two days later.

(Barbara) The death had a devastating impact on both the president and the first lady.

They bonded over that common tragedy.

When they emerge from the hospital, they're holding hands, which they rarely did in public.

♪ (cheering) (soft music) (narrator) And when Jack kicked off his re-election campaign, Jackie agreed to travel with him to Texas.

He had a clear view on what Jackie should wear for the Texas trip.

(Nancy) The night before, he had told her, "You know, they've come to see you, not me."

She had asked him, "Should I wear this suit or this dress?"

And he said, "Wear the suit.

I want you to teach those Texas millionaire housewives how to dress."

(narrator) In Fort Worth, they were guests at a breakfast event where Jackie, not Jack, was the center of attention.

(man) Now is an event that I know all of you have been waiting for.

(Barbara) Everybody wanted to see her.

So, in she walks in her stunning raspberry-colored suit and her raspberry pillbox hat... (reporter) As you can tell from the reaction, that's Mrs. Kennedy coming in.

(Barbara) ...and marches up to the dais, and the president is standing and applauding her, and there's just great pride in his face.

(Emily) And it's very poignant the suit that Jackie was wearing would come to be so tragically symbolic and iconic of that day.

(President John F. Kennedy) Two years ago, I said that-- introduced myself in Paris by saying that I was the man who had accompanied Mrs. Kennedy to Paris.

I'm getting somewhat that same sensation as I travel around Texas.

And, then, typical of his sharp wit, he added... (President John F. Kennedy) Nobody wonders what Lyndon and I wear.

(laughing) (dramatic music) (narrator) The couple then flew to Dallas and set off in an open-topped motorcade.

(reporter) And here is the President of the United States.

And the crowd is absolutely going wild.

(narrator) Jackie never spoke in public about her experience of that day in Texas.

However, these words are the testimony she gave to the congressional investigation in 1964.

(reporter) The president's car is now turning on to Elm Street and it will be only a matter of minutes before he arrives at the Trade Mart.

♪ (cheering) (gunshot) (narrator) Moments later, shots were fired.

(gunshots) (screaming) (somber music) (reporter) It appears as though something has happened in the motorcade route.

Something, I repeat, has happened in the motorcade route.

(narrator) The president was hit in the upper back and then in the head.

(reporter) Several police officers are rushing up the hill at this time.

Stand by just a moment, please.

♪ (Kate) People have said that, you know, she was trying to collect bits of his brain, you know, that it was...

I mean, it's very, very gory.

(narrator) The president's body was carried back to Washington on Air Force One.

On board, Jackie, still soaked in blood, was offered a clean outfit.

(Barbara) Her face and her hair are covered in blood and brain tissue.

And, so, Mrs. Johnson, now the new first lady, very sweetly asks if Mrs. Kennedy would like to change her clothing because the skirt is covered in blood.

And what she does is obviously clean her face and her hair to present herself.

(narrator) But she refused to change her clothes.

Showing unwavering strength, she stood by the new president, Lyndon B. Johnson, as he was sworn in.

(Barbara) The shock of the horrible situation, the horror, the trauma, is visible on her face.

(narrator) On arrival in Washington, Jackie stepped off the plane with JFK's brother, Bobby, to face a silent crowd of 3,000 onlookers, and an indelible image of tragedy was created.

(Emily) She wanted the American people to see what had happened to her husband.

She wanted that visual image to be seared into people's minds.

(Amber) The fact that she continued to wear the dress shows a really steely resolve and an understanding of the power of images.

It's really quite apt for Jackie, someone who knew the power of clothes, that the clothing itself should be the bearer of this physical trauma.

(narrator) In the immediate aftermath of this unimaginable tragedy, Jackie's mind was already turning to how her husband should be remembered, inspired by another American icon, Abraham Lincoln.

(Kate) They talked to a curator who was at the White House, and she had called him from the plane, and she said, "I want his funeral to be exactly like Lincoln's."

(Emily) Specifically because, you know, this is a great American president who was felled by an assassin's bullet.

(soft music) (narrator) Three days after JFK's assassination, two hundred foreign dignitaries and over a million members of the public came to pay their respects at a funeral choreographed down to the last detail by Jackie.

(Barbara) She already was familiar with the Lincoln funeral and how the White House had been decorated for it with big swags of black cloth over the doorways, through the chandeliers.

(narrator) With crowds lining the route, the carriage brought the flag-draped coffin to the White House, led by a military band and followed by a symbolic riderless horse.

And projecting the ultimate image of survival, in their midst walked Jackie.

(Bidisha) And it was extremely risky because, of course, the Secret Service don't want her and every major head of state walking down the street, but she put her foot down and she absolutely demanded it.

(reporter) Mrs. Kennedy comes forward with Caroline in a tableau that calls for no words.

Its poignancy calls only for tears.

(Bidisha) She's taking ownership of the entire event.

She's saying, "You have not destroyed me."

(narrator) Deep in grief, Jackie moved back to New York City with her children.

She turned to JFK's brother, Bobby Kennedy, for support.

(Professor O'Shaughnessy) They're very, very close.

He looks after her, he guides her.

He becomes surrogate father to her children.

His is the great link with the Kennedy clan.

(narrator) Unbeknown to Jackie, another terrifying tragedy was about to shatter her world again.

(gunshot) (man) Ladies and gentlemen, we have a doctor now.

Will you please clear the room?

(narrator) In the months following her husband's murder, Jackie Kennedy was consumed by grief.

(Kate) She really did break down.

I mean, she drank a lot.

She, um, was incredibly depressed.

She was counseled by a priest.

She talked about killing herself.

(Barbara) She was clearly exhibiting the signs of what we would now call PTSD, post-traumatic stress disorder.

(narrator) Jackie's newly single status drew some attention.

(Carrie) There are many men who wanted to marry Jackie Kennedy when she was a widow.

She certainly had offers.

And I think she enjoyed her freedom as a single mother without the huge responsibilities of public life.

(narrator) She was alleged to have had a short-lived flirtation with Hollywood star Marlon Brando.

But it was JFK's brother, Bobby, that Jackie grew closest to.

It was even rumored that they had a physical relationship.

Following in his brother's footsteps, in 1968, Bobby ran for president, but five years after JFK's assassination, the unthinkable happened.

(gunshot) (Barbara) Called in the middle of the night to be told that he had been shot.

(Emily) One unimaginable tragedy followed by another in quick succession and, understandably, Jackie Kennedy is, you know, plunged into despair once again.

(narrator) Jackie feared for her children's safety.

(Barbara) She was terribly frightened in this country and said, "If they're killing Kennedys, my children are next."

(narrator) Looking for a way out of the U.S., she turned to a powerful and wealthy man to provide her with what she needed.

(Barbara) She had this flirtation and bit of a relationship going with Aristotle Onassis.

(Kate) There were few people in the world who had the money that Onassis did, and what that money could buy her was privacy, you know?

He owned an island, right?

I mean, he was able to kind of keep her safe.

(narrator) Only four months after Bobby's death, she married Onassis in Greece.

He was a man with many familiar attributes.

(Professor O'Shaughnessy) The testosterone ridden, madly ambitious, womanizing, drinking, all of these things, that's what she'd grown up with.

That's what she'd known all her life.

(narrator) Her decision to marry Onassis shocked the nation she'd left behind.

(Emily) She has this status as a kind of perfect widow.

She's elevated onto a stratospheric platform.

And marrying Aristotle Onassis is kind of this fall to Earth.

A lot of people saw it as a huge betrayal, betraying the legacy marrying this foreigner.

He was no John F. Kennedy.

(narrator) Running from her childhood fears of poverty, as Jackie Onassis, she had secured a lifestyle of wealth and safety.

Her time was spent jetting between homes in New York and Greece.

Yet, once again, her marriage was dogged by rumors of her husband's infidelity.

(Tina) He was not a great husband.

He did not treat women well, generally.

She was just his wife.

She was certainly an ornament for him.

(narrator) The couple lived increasingly separate lives.

Then, in 1975, after an illness, Aristotle Onassis died in Greece.

Jackie inherited a sizable sum.

(Professor O'Shaughnessy) She got 25 million in the settlement after Onassis' death.

She could've led a life of comfort and seclusion.

She chose not to do so.

(narrator) Instead, Jackie decided to start a new chapter in New York, and despite the tragedies she had endured, her ambition was undimmed.

(Tina) She is standing on her own two feet not as someone's wife, and she's looking around New York thinking, like, "This is my moment to be who I want to be finally, unattached to a man."

And it's fascinating what she accomplishes.

(narrator) Despite her wealth, Jackie chose to enter the workforce and took a job in publishing, a role that reconnected her to her love of literature.

(Kate) She really did blossom.

She loved working as an editor.

She was very, by all accounts, hands on.

(Professor O'Shaughnessy) It's badly paid, and you have to do a lot of humdrum tasks yourself.

You certainly make your own coffee and fetch the biscuits.

(narrator) Still as passionate about conserving historic buildings as she had been in the White House, in 1975, she became concerned by plans to demolish New York's historic Grand Central Station.

(Tina) Jackie got wind of it and was pretty horrified.

She basically said, you know, "What can I do to help?"

(narrator) Jackie hadn't spoken in public for over a decade, but she was inspired to break her silence to save this historic building.

I think, uh, if we don't care about our past, we can't have very much hope for our future.

And we've all heard that it's too late, or that it has to happen, or that it's inevitable, but I don't think that's true because I think if there is a great effort, even if it's at the 11th hour, you can succeed, and I think and I know that that's what we'll do.

(Tina) Certainly, her star power really changed the city's attitudes then about historic preservation.

(narrator) In the 1980s, she started a relationship with diamond merchant Maurice Templesman.

Emotionally supportive, he enabled her to live life on her own terms.

(Tina) They never married, and I think that that is also important to note.

You know, Jackie reached, I think, a point in her life where she felt like she did not need a man in order to be herself, in order to complete who she was intended to be.

(narrator) Finally able to be her true self, Jackie regained her place in American hearts.

(Tina) She represented a new era in American society.

The idea that anything is possible.

All kinds of hope for the future.

(Emily) She projected an image of elegance and stature that had been missing from the American story in the 20th century, you know, this idea that Americans are kind of rich but brash, maybe even slightly uncouth.

Jackie Kennedy changes all that.

(narrator) Ever resilient, Jackie survived and thrived despite the many tragedies that had scarred her life.

(Professor O'Shaughnessy) Jackie Kennedy was an incredibly strong woman.

If you look at the totality of her life and the trauma she endured, she was made of steel.

(narrator) But in 1994, tragedy struck for the final time.

(Professor O'Shaughnessy) She was out hunting foxes on a horse and fell, and then they found she had lymphoma.

(Barbara) At age 64, she discovered that she had cancer.

It was a true blow to her and her family.

(narrator) Four months after her diagnosis, Jackie Kennedy Onassis lost her final battle.

(somber music) (John F. Kennedy Jr.) Last night, at around 10:15, my mother passed on.

She did it in her own way and on her own terms, and we all feel lucky for that.

(Tina) The fact that she had control of her life, especially at the end, meant so much to her and to her family.

(narrator) Jackie was buried in Arlington National Cemetery in Washington alongside JFK and the two babies they lost.

Frank Sinatra sent two dozen red roses with the message: "You are America's queen."

(Carrie) Certainly, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis was the closest America had to royalty.

(Barbara) The outpouring of affection and love for her was like that that a grateful country might have for their queen.

(narrator) America's first lady of tragedy was a survivor until the very end.

Her steely resilience unparalleled, and her impact is still felt today.

(Emily) I think Jackie Kennedy still presents this iconic image of elegance and grace and intelligence that continues to fascinate and inspire us.

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