Jackie Kennedy's Secret Service Agent Announces Book of Rare Photos and Stories from Their Travels

"At the White House, she was more buttoned-down. But once we got away, she was more open, carefree, enjoying life," Clint Hill tells PEOPLE

My Travels with Mrs. Kennedy by Clint Hill
Photo: Gallery Books

It was the discovery of an old trunk buried away in the basement of Clint Hill's home in Alexandria, Virginia, that sparked the idea for his latest book.

The 90-year-old former Secret Service agent had forgotten about the trove of gifts, letters and a long-lost diary that he'd packed away from his world travels with First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy.

But as Hill rediscovered the contents, the memories came flooding back: Columbia, Croatia, India, Mexico, Pakistan, Venezuela. Antigua, Greece, Morocco, Paris.

And, as he recalls, "three glorious weeks in Ravello" on the shores of the Tyrrhenian Sea.

Hill got to work — and on Wednesday announced the cover and title of My Travels with Mrs. Kennedy, slated for publication later this year.

The book, to published on Oct. 25 by the Gallery imprint of Simon & Schuster, features a cover photo of President John F. Kennedy's wife shot by Mark Shaw aboard the yacht of Italian Fiat magnate Gianni Agnelli off the Amalfi Coast.

According to Hill and co-writer Lisa McCubbin Hill — who previously worked together on 2012's Mrs. Kennedy and Me, a New York Times bestseller, and other projects — the new book will feature personal stories and more than 200 rare or never-before-seen photos.

"When you travel with someone, you experience things that can't fully be appreciated by anyone who wasn't there," Hill tells PEOPLE.

Jackie Kennedy, Clint Hill
Clint Hill with Jackie Kennedy. Getty

"At the White House, she was more buttoned-down. But once we got away, she was more open, carefree, enjoying life," Hill says of Mrs. Kennedy, who enjoyed international celebrity and weathered darkest tragedy while in Washington, D.C.

Hill was her dedicated agent and saw a side of the first lady — who could be very private, despite her fame — that was available to few others.

Hill was in the motorcade on that fateful November day in 1963 and risked his life in an attempt to save President Kennedy and his wife after the first shots rang out from Kennedy's assassin.

Hill was so traumatized by the loss that he didn't speak about the assassination for more than 40 years. (The widowed first lady eventually remarried, to Aristotle Onassis.)

It was only in the last decade that Hill began to share his stories — both historical and personal — in bestsellers like Five Days in November and Five Presidents, co-written with McCubbin-Hill, whom he married last year.

Jackie Kennedy, Clint Hill
Clint Hill (left) in 2016. Gary Miller/Getty

RELATED VIDEO: Remembering Jackie Kennedy's Intensely Private White House Trip with Her Kids After JFK's Assassination

"This book takes you on this journey, back to that time through the eyes of Clint and Mrs. Kennedy," says McCubbin-Hill. "It's very uplifting. It provides history but also shows what a great ambassador she was as first lady for America. And there's the very sweet story of the great relationship she and Clint had. You feel the magic and the bond that develops along these travels."

Plus, McCubbin-Hill adds, "The world could use a little bit of 'Camelot' right now."

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