JFK Jr. and Carolyn Bessette’s Wedding: Everything to Know

Nearly three decades ago, John F. Kennedy Jr. and Carolyn Bessette Kennedy exchanged vows in an elegant, intimate wedding.

On Sept. 21, 1996, the couple, surrounded by 40 of their closest friends and family, got married at the First African Baptist Church on Cumberland Island, a mile off the coast of Georgia.

The church held just eight wooden pews and had no air conditioning. Its remote setting was central to JFK Jr. and Bessette’s effort to keep the event hidden from the press.

It took six months of meticulous planning to pull off the quiet nuptials, requiring “the skill of James Bond and the whole CIA,” Letitia Baldrige, former White House chief of staff to JFK. Jr.’s late mother, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, told PEOPLE at the time.

Here’s everything to know about JFK Jr. and Carolyn Bessette’s wedding.

They quietly wed in 1996

JFK Jr. and Bessette exchanged vows during an ultra-private wedding ceremony on Sept. 21, 1996, on Georgia’s Cumberland Island, where more wild horses roam than people.

“They couldn’t have chosen a more obscure place,” Chris McLean, a builder living in nearby Fernandina Beach, Fla., told PEOPLE at the time.

As the wedding drew closer, locals started to notice guests and staff arriving by plane and ferry. Still, the couple’s plans remained largely under wraps — helped by confidentiality agreements signed by attendees and workers. As PEOPLE noted at the time, there was a shared feeling among island residents that the son of a beloved president and his bride were entitled to a private celebration.

JFK Jr. and Bessette got married at the First African Baptist Church in Georgia

The ceremony was held at the First African Baptist Church. Rev. Charles J. O’Byrne of Manhattan’s Church of St. Ignatius Loyola, where Onassis’ funeral mass was held in 1994, led the brief Catholic service, reading by flashlight in the dim, candlelit church.

While speaking to Vanity Fair in September 2021, photographer Denis Reggie recalled the moment his camera captured the newlyweds as they left the church.

“It was an incredibly magical moment,” he said of taking a photograph that later landed on the cover of PEOPLE. “I saw it as it was unfolding, almost in silhouette. It was virtually dark outside. John reached for the hand of Carolyn; she was caught off guard. I’m walking backwards in the light rain at dusk, and John does this amazing gesture, taking her hand and bringing it to his lips.”

Reggie continued, “I was really moved by it and Carolyn’s surprise. I adored her expression — it says it all. The way she flowed in her beautiful dress, moving at full pace, coming down the steps. It was happening in real time and not in any way posed or arranged. It was a really special photograph.”

The Greyfield Inn, a nine-bedroom mansion, was the location of the rehearsal dinner — where the groom toasted the woman who made him the “happiest man alive” — and the reception.

Highlights of the post-ceremony celebration included a three-tier white wedding cake, a first dance to Prince’s “Forever in My Life” and Sen. Ted Kennedy’s toast, which brought everyone to tears, his spokeswoman Melody Miller told PEOPLE at the time.

Only 40 people attended their wedding

On Sept. 21, just 40 guests gathered inside the church. Among them was Onassis’ nephew, Anthony Radziwill, who served as best man.

Also in attendance was Onassis’ longtime companion, financier Maurice Tempelsman. JFK. Jr.’s sister, Caroline Kennedy, arrived with her husband, architect-planner Edwin Schlossberg, and their three children. Rose and Tatiana were flower girls, and Jack was the ring bearer.

From the bride’s side, Bessette’s mother, Ann Messina Freeman, attended along with her sister, Lisa Ann Bessette, and brother-in-law Michael Roman.

Onassis’ presence was certainly felt by the bride and groom at their wedding. Her friend Rachel “Bunny” Mellon, who designed the White House Rose Garden, selected the flowers for the bridal party. Meanwhile, Onassis’ longtime butler, Efigenio Pinheiro, arranged the greenery in the church’s altar area.

Bessette wore a custom Narcisco Rodriguez gown down the aisle

Bessette’s wedding gown was designed by Narciso Rodriguez, a friend from her days as a Calvin Klein publicist. A year after she wore his custom creation — a timeless, pearl-colored silk crepe floor-length gown, a hand-rolled tulle silk veil and long silk gloves — the designer launched his own label.

“It was a great moment in my career but also a beautiful moment in my personal life,” Rodriguez told Vogue in September 2018. “Someone I loved very much asked me to make the most important dress of her life.”

The simplicity and elegance of the $40,000 dress made a lasting impression on the fashion world. Former Harper’s Bazaar editor-in-chief Kate Betts, who worked at Vogue at the time of the wedding, described the dress as “revolutionary.”

“Vera Wang and Carolina Herrera were simplifying their designs, but not as simple as a slip dress,” Betts told Vanity Fair in 2021. “It crystallized that trend [minimalism] in fashion. That was her aesthetic, and her wedding dress was a very, very bold expression of that minimalism.”

Style expert and former What Not to Wear co-host Stacy London also spoke with the outlet, saying, “What struck me about the dress is it was so bare — no ornamentation, no rhinestones or sequins or even embroidery. She was just one of those women who understood how to make fashion work for her, not the other way around.”