The 'Suckered!' Trilogy

[David Orsam]

He arrived in the face of the worst blizzard of the season. Trains were delayed. He spent two nights at the Windsor Hotel on Dominion Square.

Can you give me any actual evidence that trains were being delayed out of Montreal on 20 or 21 December? I found a report dated 18 December from Montreal saying that some trains were being delayed due to bad weather during the previous night but can you provide some evidence that delays were continuing out of Montreal two or three days later?

On 22nd December he took the 7.55 am train from Montreal, arriving in Halifax late the following day, 23rd December.

Okay so what is the evidence that he caught the 7.55am train out of Montreal on 22 December? It is strange that you haven't posted this if you have any.

How might Andrews have contrived to sail aboard the Sarnia on 22nd December?

See above. He might have contrived to sail aboard the Sarnia on 22 December if he left Montreal on 20 December and the trains were all back to normal after the snowstorm which occurred during the night of 17/18 December.

[Simon Wood]

Hi David,

Let me try to understand this.

Everything I have cited is wrong; and everything you have suggested might be right.

I could ask what evidence you have that Andrews did not spend two nights at the Windsor Hotel and left Montreal on 20th December, the day he arrived, but I fear you could not give me an answer.

And if you can't answer—hey, what difference does it make whether Andrews caught the Sarnia or the Peruvian? Either way he would have spent New Year's Eve on the Atlantic or the Irish Sea.

Unless, of course, you're suggesting Andrews might have missed both liners and spent New Year's Eve in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

Regards,

Simon

[David Orsam]

Simon,

We were doing so well, with you actually answering my questions, and then I ask you to substantiate one crucial fact - something you categorically stated was true - and it all falls apart, with an evasive response from you.

So I can take it that there is no evidence at all that Andrews caught the 7.55am train on 22 December, right?

As for what you did say to me....

Hi David,

Let me try to understand this.

Everything I have cited is wrong; and everything you have suggested might be right.

No, you have misunderstood.

I am saying that the evidence (i.e. a contemporaneous report from Montreal) suggests that Andrews departed Montreal on the evening of 20 December.

I don't know what ship Andrews caught but I am saying he might have caught the Sarnia on 22 December because there is no solid evidence to the contrary.

I could ask what evidence you have that Andrews did not spend two nights at the Windsor Hotel and left Montreal on 20th December, the day he arrived, but I fear you could not give me an answer.

Well the evidence is the newspaper report from Montreal cited above which says that Andrews left Montreal on 20 December and I note that Wolf agrees with me on this one. Thus he says in his Ripper Notes article of 24 October 2005 (p.41):

"Inspector Andrews left Montreal on the 20th December only hours after he reached it..."

hey, what difference does it make whether Andrews caught the Sarnia or the Peruvian? Either way he would have spent New Year's Eve on the Atlantic.

I agree with you that he probably did spend New Year's Eve on the Atlantic but my point was that there is no solid evidence that he caught the Sarnia OR the Peruvian. He could have spent a month travelling around Canada for all I know. The only reason I raised this is because I was puzzled (a) how you could tell Mike Hawley that Andrews was definitely on the Atlantic on New Year's Eve and (b) why Mike never asked you what the evidence was for that statement.

I'm not saying it makes any difference. I am enquiring from the point of view of a historian trying to get at the truth of the matter.

Unless, of course, you're suggesting Andrews might have missed both liners and spent New Year's Eve in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

I'm not suggesting it, I don't think it at all likely that this happened but it is theoretically possible that he decided to spend New Year's Eve in Canada. I don't like loose ends and wanted to know if there was any evidence I as unaware of because you seemed so certain.

[mklhawley]

Hi David,

I just saw your rebuttal, but I'll be gone a few days. I will definitely give it the credit it deserves. I see you've focused upon the 'Andrews going to New York' part, which is really only a side point, irrelevant to Anderson's mission in America to investigate Francis Tumblety.

Quickly, with New York less than thirty miles away from Montreal, his mission could easily have been to the New York border (losing no time to Halifax), whether he crossed the border or the New York based detectives crossed it into Canada, I see no issue, although this would allow for the claim Andrews did not step on US soil. I also agree he would not have gone to New York City, since there was no reason to.

My point is this Montreal report, especially the headline, is credible. Headlines are not formed by newspapers (such as the New York World and the St. Louis Republic) out of thin air. Cooperating newspapers will either reproduce the exact headline or change it a bit. The version of the report that you emphasize was merely a snippet paragraph of a larger two-column report, i.e., it had no headline of its own and not all of the facts were presented. The intension of that particular article was not to give the full story (just like all the dozen-plus snippet stories in that article), but was brevity. I may be wrong, but it sounds like you're claiming the Montreal article you preferred is more accurate, since it stuck just to specific facts. If true, I reject this. In view of the article being in the 'one paragraph per story' column, I suggest the newspaper didn't even have one of its reporters at Central Station, but merely took the story as the New York World and St. Louis Republic did.

Sorry for the quick response, and I'll give it a better read in a few days.

Sincerely,

Mike

[mklhawley]

He then gives two examples, of Sadler (1891) and Cream (1891). However, in the absence of any other examples, it obviously was unprecedented for Scotland Yard to investigate the history of a suspect to gain useful information! If it had never happened before, it was unprecedented. I think what Mike might be trying to say is that Scotland Yard researching Tumblety wasn't unique, which might make this more of a semantic point, but, nevertheless, if he can't come up with any earlier examples then we need to be careful because what Mike is suggesting would have been far from standard practice for Scotland Yard but the very first time they had ever attempted such a thing.

Your argument is strange, David; the fact that there are two other cases Scotland Yard did so, means it certainly is a possibility. How many examples are you looking for?

1.1 Leaving aside for the moment the basic implausibility of the Montreal Police announcing to the press that three Scotland Yard officers were on a mission (supposedly a secret one) to find the Jack the Ripper in America, this so-called announcement was, on Mike Hawley's own case, absolutely untrue because he tells us that Andrews was on no such mission. He was, according to Mike, either conducting background information or, at best, retrieving documents. Why did the Montreal Police put out false information about Andrews's mission? Mike does not tell us.

At the time of this report, David, Tumblety was nowhere to be found. They certainly did follow him to New York, but he sneaked off only to resurface a month later. Point; you're incorrect. If Andrews was part of Anderson's mission, his particular task did not have to be following his trail, but following up on Canadian leads and collecting information. It still works.

1.2 Further, the number of officers cited causes some difficulty for Mike and his case becomes confused. He cites a report in the New York World of 4 December 1888 in which a bar keeper is reported as saying that he spoke to an English detective who told him he had "come over" to get Tumblety. Mike assumes that this English detective must have come from Scotland Yard, although it could quite easily have been an English private detective, but clearly whoever it was, if he even existed, must have been in very hot pursuit of Tumblety indeed because he must have left England on about 25 of 26 November (i.e. a day or two after Tumblety fled) in order to have got to New York in time to be featured in a report on 4 December.

How on earth could the English detective have been from a private detective agency when no one but Scotland Yard knew Tumblety jumped bail until December 1? Check the newspaper reports. No one knew Tumblety jumpled bail, but Inspector Byrnes did "a week ago", and he clearly got his info from Scotland Yard. The man stated he came over, obviously on a ten day cruise, which means he left for New York just after Tumblety left on November 24. Scotland Yard knew darn well Tumblety boarded from La Havre, and Scotland Yard could easily have put someone on a transatlantic vessel from Liverpool in ample amount of time.

What is, "if he even existed"? Are you serious? The reports of this man were first-hand accounts. Did the paper lie?

1.3 But one Scotland Yard detective is not enough for Mike. The Montreal Police "announcement" spoke of three Scotland Yard detectives who had come to find JTR and Mike is one short. How can he get around this problem?

I'll have to stop you there, David. This is a strawman argument. Your setting it up to make the reader believe this is why I discussed the Chicago Daily Tribune article, then you dismantle my argument that you created. It's actually ridiculous. There was never a need to get around a problem, because there was never a problem in the first place.

One detective following Tumblety across this Atlantic IS good enough, since the United States clearly has others stationed here.

1.4 I would argue that the report of the so-called announcement from Montreal of three Scotland Yard detectives being on a mission in America to hunt Jack the Ripper is untrue - because the Montreal Police would have had no business making such an announcement and only one reporter claims to have heard it - and arose from the earlier reports of "Inspectors" Jarvis and Shore being in America which led the New York Evening World Reporter to come to the erroneous conclusion that Jarvis, Shore and Andrews must all have come across the Atlantic to find the Whitechapel Murderer.

You don't know that only one reporter claims to have heard it. This is a case of absence of evidence is evidence for absence. I would argue that when it was reported, "It was announced today," that it was indeed announced.

2.1 In respect of the Daily Telegraph report of Inspector Andrews having arrived in New York, Mike accepts that the report is almost entirely a reproduction of earlier newspaper reports. Thus, he says, "The correspondent certainly did repackage the story out of Montreal, as evidenced by nearly identical information, but the first sentence is different”. This first sentence is the statement that "Inspector Andrews has arrived in New York from Montreal".

It's much more sound that you supporting your argument with an abbreviated article snippet, then not informing your readers of this.

2.3 It is evident that the New York correspondent of the Daily Telegraph was repackaging stories from the New York papers for the benefit of readers in England. There was no obvious journalism involved on his part. The chances of this journalist having read that Andrews was coming to New York, then rushed to the train station see him arrive before doing no more than adding a single sentence to a report, simply stating that Andrews had arrived, are minimal in the extreme.

David, you're not supporting this with facts, but conjecture and biased opinion.

3.1. What of the "missing" two days? Here is how Mike tells it (with bold added):

"Curiously, Andrews was reported to have boarded a ship to England a full four days after his Montreal meeting with the chief of police."

So the source of Mike's point appears to be a newspaper report. But which one? Mike does not say but it is possible that he is referring to a report in the Boston Sunday Globe of 23 December 1888 which suggested that Andrews was to sail on the Peruvian the following day. If this is the case then there were no reports that Andrews boarded a ship on 24 December as Mike claims, only that he was going to board a ship on 24 December. Moreover, the Boston Sunday Globe report of 23 December is a very unreliable report (being the one I have suggested should be consigned to the garbage) so it might well be wrong about Andrews getting the Peruvian.

3.2 While it is quite possible that Andrews did board the Peruvian (as I have said in the Trilogy) this is not, to my knowledge, a confirmed fact and it is equally possible that he caught the Sarnia which departed on 22 December. He could equally have boarded any other later ship but we simply don't know.

Kind of a ridiculous argument when you state not a "confirmed fact" and "we simply don't know". Since you have no evidence he took the Sarnia, then your argument falls upon deaf ears.

3.3 At one point in his article, Mike says: "Recall, Andrews did not show up to Halifax until the day of his departure". What is the evidence of this? It seems to be a report in the Morning Herald of 22 March 1889 which said that Andrews was spoken to by a reporter "as he stepped from the train at the deep water terminus and on board the steamer Oregon.” Mike seems to take this literally to mean that Andrews stepped off the train and onto the steamer, all presumably within a few minutes and certainly on the same day. But there is a serious problem in relying on this report because it refers to the Oregon which did not leave Halifax for Liverpool until 5 January 1889. If true, there would be a wonderful 12 "missing" days for Mike to speculate about but it seems he is only interested in two.

David, it's interesting when you encounter something from the papers that doesn't seem to fit you suggest the reporter got it ALL wrong. Interestingly, the Oregon arrived in Halifax on December 24. Quite the coincidental date and in the same harbor! Could it be the reporter did indeed speak to Andrews and mere wrote down the wrong ship, and a ship that was probably moored next to Andrews' ship.

By the way, your last statement is quite condescending.

Andrews was not in the United States at all. There was have it. He was never in the United States so he never went to New York. It is official. This was a briefing note from the Assistant Commissioner to the Home Secretary for the Home Secretary to use in answering questions in the House of Commons. It had to be 100% accurate to avoid the Home Secretary misleading the House.

So. He could easily have collected it at the border. It's still irrelevant to my whole point. The Montreal article is quite credible.

Now, I'll be back in a few days.

Sincerely,

Mike

[David Orsam]

Hi Mike,

You have amused me with your response on this "side issue". In particular, I note with amusement your concession - clearly in response to the Anderson briefing note - that Andrews might never have gone to New York at all, as if this still fits in with your theory. Moreover, that you don't even believe he ever went to New York City "since there was no reason to". So what are we supposed to make of your reliance on the report of the New York Correspondent of the Daily Telegraph? From your Ripperologist article:

"The New York Correspondent wrote the statement as if he had knowledge of Inspector Andrews arriving in New York City from Montreal."

You go on to say that there are only two possibilities either he "actually did have knowledge of Andrew's arrival "in this city", or he lied". So you are saying he lied, right? Or did I convince you as to the possibility of a mistake?

I suspect you would regard it as condescending of me to tell you to look up the word "unprecedented" but as you don't seem to understand my point about this, and ask me how many examples I am looking for, perhaps you should. Basically I am looking for a single example of Scotland Yard researching a suspect prior to 1888. Both the examples you have given are after 1888. If there are no examples before 1888 then this means that in 1888 it WAS unprecedented to carry out background research into a suspect because it had never happened before. I was helping you out by suggesting you must have meant "unique".

Dealing with your other points:

1. On the Montreal Police "announcement", you have not yet told me why the police put out what on your case must have been a false announcement. And, furthermore, if all that Andrews did was spend a couple of days in background research or collecting documents at the tail end of his visit to North America, why was that even announced at all? (By the way, I don't understand your point about the headline at all. Are you trying to say that the headline was giving additional information to what was in the actual report?)

2. You ask me whether the newspaper lied in saying that an English detective had come over from England as if a individual person has never lied to a newspaper before. So I ask you: Could the bar keeper not have been lying? Or simply mistaken? You invite me to speculate as to who could have hired a private detective to follow Tumblety and that is an easy one. It could have been one of his sureties who would, presumably, have been spoken to by officers as soon as it was discovered he had fled, with that surety wanting to hunt down Tumblety to get his money, which he was about to forfeit, back.

3. On the issue of the two phantom Scotland Yard detectives, are you able to tell me who they are? Did they have a cover story, or a "vehicle", like Andrews is supposed to have had to get him to Toronto? If not, why not?

4. With regard the Daily Telegraph report, there is not much point me responding to your points on this as you seem to have abandoned any reliance on it yourself.

5. On the date of Andrews' departure, I have to ask you the same question as I asked Simon. What is the evidence that Andrews left on the 24th as opposed to the 22nd? Are you seriously saying that because the Montreal Herald said three months later that he boarded the Oregon that this is somehow evidence that Andrews took the Peruvian?

[Hunter]

This is 1888, but before the arrest of Tumblety - Abberline's communications with the Bremen police about "Mary" the hairdresser.

[mklhawley]

You have amused me with your response on this "side issue". In particular, I note with amusement your concession - clearly in response to the Anderson briefing note - that Andrews might never have gone to New York at all, as if this still fits in with your theory. Moreover, that you don't even believe he ever went to New York City "since there was no reason to". So what are we supposed to make of your reliance on the report of the New York Correspondent of the Daily Telegraph?

David, I can tell you work for lawyers, using their tricks of the trade; in this case the strawman argument. My lawyer friend always tells me the goal is not the truth, but to win for your client. It's the jury's job (or the judge) to glean out the truth. That's the true adversarial system of justice. Building up strawman arguments is a powerful tool. I have given no concessions. My side issue comment is exactly that, since it has no bearing upon the main arguments of my article.

Dealing with your other points:

1. On the Montreal Police "announcement", you have not yet told me why the police put out what on your case must have been a false announcement.

They didn't give a false announcement. You merely assume this by the phrase the reporter used. The announcement may even have been a general announcement to their own police force and someone relayed this to the reporters, or this is how the reporter phrased it.

And, furthermore, if all that Andrews did was spend a couple of days in background research or collecting documents at the tail end of his visit to North America, why was that even announced at all?

Another strawman. When did I ever say this was the only thing he was doing?

It was announced at Police Headquarters to-day that Andrews has a commission, in connection with two other Scotland Yard men, to find the murderer in America. His inaction for so long a time, and the fact that a man suspected of knowing considerable about the murders left England for this side three weeks ago, makes the London police believe Jack has left that country for this.

I can see why you are trying 'with tooth and nail' to discredit this by nitpicking. Boy, does this scream Francis Tumblety, doesn't it!

2. You ask me whether the newspaper lied in saying that an English detective had come over from England as if a individual person has never lied to a newspaper before. So I ask you: Could the bar keeper not have been lying? Or simply mistaken?

…It was just as this story was being furnished to the press that a new character appeared on the scene, and it was not long before he completely absorbed the attention of every one. He was a little man with enormous red side whiskers and a smoothly shaven chin. He was dressed in an English tweed suit and wore an enormous pair of boots with soles an inch thick. He could not be mistaken in his mission. There was an elaborate attempt at concealment and mystery which could not be possibly misunderstood. Everything about him told of his business. From his little billycock hat, alternately set jauntilly on the side of his head and pulled lowering over his eyes, down to the very bottom of his thick boots, he was a typical English detective. If he had been put on a stage just as he paraded up and down Fourth avenue and Tenth street yesterday he would have been called a caricature.
First he would assume his heavy villain appearance. Then his hat would be pulled down over his eyes and he would walk up and down in front of No. 79 staring intently into the windows as he passed, to the intense dismay of Mrs. McNamara, who was peering out behind the blinds at him with ever-increasing alarm. Then his mood changed. His hat was pushed back in a devil-may-care way and he marched to No. 79 with a swagger, whistling gayly, convinced that his disguise was complete and that no one could possibly recognize him.
His headquarters was a saloon on the corner, where he held long and mysterious conversations with the barkeeper always ending in both of them drinking together. The barkeeper epitomized the conversations by saying:"He wanted to know about a feller named Tumblety , and I sez I didn't know nothing at all about him; and he says he wuz an English detective and he told me all about them Whitechapel murders, and how he came over to get the chap that did it."

Be my guest and read the above. Sorry David, I don't buy it.

You invite me to speculate as to who could have hired a private detective to follow Tumblety and that is an easy one. It could have been one of his sureties who would, presumably, have been spoken to by officers as soon as it was discovered he had fled, with that surety wanting to hunt down Tumblety to get his money, which he was about to forfeit, back.

Per Chief Inspector Littlechild, we know Scotland Yard discovered he was in France just before he left on the La Bretagne. ...and you're saying Scotland Yard spent the time to contact Tumblety's sureties in order for them. The sureties then quickly contacted a private detective agency, spending an amazing amount of money on a detective to sail across the Atlantic then stay there to... watch him? Tumblety was there and he certainly did jump bail. The sureties spent a ton of money on the detective, so why didn't they pursue it? They now have wasted the money on Tumblety AND the money on this detective.

...or it was indeed a Scotland Yard detective, who couldn't arrest him because he had no authority to, so he staked his residence out.

David, your comment about this man being a private detective doesn't fit, but it does show an attempt to minimalize. That's not an honest search for truth.

3. On the issue of the two phantom Scotland Yard detectives, are you able to tell me who they are? Did they have a cover story, or a "vehicle", like Andrews is supposed to have had to get him to Toronto? If not, why not?

David, why did you use the word, phantom? Was this word used by a contemporary source? This word sound like a type of word used to convince a juror. Who cares if I don't know the names of these detectives.

4. With regard the Daily Telegraph report, there is not much point me responding to your points on this as you seem to have abandoned any reliance on it yourself.

A continuance of a strawman argument.

5. On the date of Andrews' departure, I have to ask you the same question as I asked Simon. What is the evidence that Andrews left on the 24th as opposed to the 22nd? Are you seriously saying that because the Montreal Herald said three months later that he boarded the Oregon that this is somehow evidence that Andrews took the Peruvian?

Another lawyer's trick, mixed with some red herring - The 'absence of evidence is evidence for absence' fallacy. In the case of the Montreal Herald some three months later, it looks like you're assuming they used their failing memory to report the story, thus not credible. That's not how reporting worked.

Sincerely,

Mike

[David Orsam]

This is 1888, but before the arrest of Tumblety - Abberline's communications with the Bremen police about "Mary" the hairdresser.

Hi Hunter, if these communications were in writing then that supports the point I have been making that any enquiries into Tumblety's background could have been done by cable or post and that there was no need for an officer to go to Canada. I probably could have expressed it better but the research I was referring to (and I think that Mike was referring to) was research being done by an officer in person in a foreign country. That type of research was - unless someone can come up with a prior example - unprecedented as at November 1888.

[Hunter]

It was by cable.

[David Orsam]

Mike,

My occupation is irrelevant to the way I think and write. I could be a dustbin man. I'm not a lawyer and I don't have any clients to win for on this board. I'm much more of a historian and I'm only interested in the truth, having absolutely no bias in this matter.

You keep talking about a "strawman" argument and I have absolutely no idea what you mean. Your Ripperologist article is very clear in making a case that Andrews went to New York. Indeed, it seems to be one of the central arguments of that article. I have no problem in you making a concession that he did not go to New York - and think it is a very good think to find such a concession being made - but if there is a "strawman" argument here it is one that you have put forward yourself because I quoted your own words showing your own reliance on the New York correspondent of the Daily Telegraph.

So having abandoned the Daily Telegraph your focus is on the so-called Montreal "announcement". You now tell us that the report of the announcement was false because what you seem to be saying is that the Montreal Police must actually have said that Andrews had a commission to carry out research into a JTR suspect and collect documents etc. which was twisted by the reporter into wrongly saying that he was there to "find" JTR.

Well, Mike, if we are going down that road then I would suggest that a far more likely scenario is that a reporter, believing that Jarvis and Shore were also in the United States hunting for JTR, put two and two together to make five, asked someone in Police HQ if Andrews was joining these two officers in the hunt, to which the Canadian police officer gave some kind of non-committal but nevertheless encouraging speculative response which the reporter thought was good enough to label an "announcement".

I mean, really, Mike, the Montreal Police were announcing to the press what Scotland Yard detectives were doing? Is it likely? Is it plausible?

I mean, I don't disagree with you at all that it does "scream Francis Tumblety" but to me this is because the reporter was putting it all together and thought that Andrews was going to New York to find and arrest Tumblety.

And then what of poor Logan in all of this? Not only did he get it wrong in saying that Andrews went to America to search for Jack the Ripper but completely missed the big story that, within a day or two of the prime suspect leaving England for the United States, ANOTHER detective went out to the States in hot pursuit!!!! So, on your own account of events, Logan identified the wrong detective.

And you can quote that newspaper story as many times as you like with its unidentified barkeeper but until you identify the Scotland Yard detective being referred to it's never going to get you anywhere. I call him a phantom for that reason - he was like a ghost, slipping in an out of New York without any record in any Home Office correspondence, and no-one knowing who he is.

As for my speculation about the identity of the client of the private detective, you invited me to speculate and I did. Now you don't like it. You have no idea when Scotland Yard first contacted Tumblety's sureties and if it was immediately after they learnt of Tumblety's flight then one of those sureties might immediately have sent a private detective out to America to locate Tumblety in order to get his money back, plus the expenses involved in the chase. It's no more speculative than you saying that Scotland Yard sent an officer over to New York who had no power of arrest.

One of your comments to me about my post was: "Another strawman. When did I ever say this was the only thing he was doing?". As far as I know, research and collecting documents are the only things you have told us that Andrews was doing. if you think there was anything else he was doing while prowling the Canadian/US border please do let us know.

Finally, on the issue of the date of Andrews leaving Halifax you might as well adopt the Montreal Herald report and say that he left on the Oregon on 5 January 1889, leaving Andrews over a week to carry out whatever it was you think he was doing. We've established (with Simon's help) that there is no solid evidence to the contrary. There is just as much good reason to say the 5 January as the 24 December bearing in mind it is also quite possible that he left on 22 December, meaning that there are no "missing" days at all, which would rather spoil your argument.

[mklhawley]

Hi David,

I'm going to give you the last say, here. Life just got busy.

Take care,

Mike

[David Orsam]

In which case Mike I will take it.

To put it all in a nutshell, the argument in your Ripperologist article about Anderson's (or Andrews') "furtive mission" in North America was based on two key newspaper reports: (i) a report saying that, from Montreal, Andrews was heading to New York and (ii) a further report saying that Andrews had arrived in New York.

From that starting point you drew attention to two supposedly "missing" days between the time Andrews should have arrived at Halifax after departing Montreal on 20 December.

To explain what Andrews was doing in New York for those two missing days you pointed to a report of an announcement by Montreal police in a newspaper that Andrews and two other Scotland Yard detectives had been commissioned to find Jack the Ripper.

You then speculated about what precisely Andrews was doing in respect of JTR for those two "missing" days in New York which led you to believe he was doing something or other related to Francis Tumblety (but not actually speaking to him or looking for him).

Now that I have drawn your attention to Anderson's briefing note to the Home Secretary that Andrews never went into the United States on his visit to North America, you have effectively abandoned your argument that Andrews went to New York. But that means you have also discarded the two key newspaper reports that said he was going to New York and had arrived there. Absent those reports, where was Andrews going from Montreal? We have the answer from other newspaper reports that Andrews was going back to England.

If he was going back to England then he was off to Halifax. I have offered you a number of options as to what then happened. Andrews either boarded the Sarnia on 22 December or arrived at Halifax on 22 December but too late for the Sarnia meaning that he had to wait at Halifax for the next ship to England which appears to have been the Peruvian on 24 December, or arrived in Halifax on 23 December as a result of rail delays due to bad weather. If one of these is what happened then there were no "missing" days at all and your failure to establish that any days were in fact "missing" is a crucial one.

So we are left with Andrews not going to New York and there quite possibly not being any missing days to explain. You are then left with this supposed Montreal police announcement, made right at the end of Andrews' stay in North America, that he was commissioned, with two other Scotland Yard detectives, to find Jack the Ripper. The "announcement" which only appears to have been heard by a single reporter goes hand in glove with the report that he was off to New York. If he was on his way back to England, as other reports stated, then he clearly had no commission at all.

Further, you have been unable to identify the two other Scotland Yard detectives who were also said to have been commissioned to find Jack the Ripper. You point to an uncorroborated newspaper report containing a quote from an unidentified barkeeper referring to an unidentified English detective who the barkeeper supposedly spoke to but it is clear that if I were to produce a sworn affidavit from that barkeeper saying he made it all up you would not bat an eye nor skip a heartbeat. For you have told me that there was already one other Scotland Yard detective in the United States who joined up with this other detective in the hunt for JTR. Well Mike, if you can tell me without evidence that there was already one Scotland Yard detective in the States then you might as well go the whole hog and say there were already two Scotland Yard detectives in the States and that these were the two detectives being referred to in the Montreal Police "announcement". If you can invent one detective you can invent two.

There is simply no evidence for this third detective and so your argument fails.

The chances are, as I have said, that the two detectives being referred to were Jarvis and Shore who were believed by many people at the time to be in the United States on Parnell business and the reporter has decided that they were, instead, probably there to hunt JTR.

The only sensible conclusion is that, after his mission to accompany Roland Barnett back to Toronto was complete, and Barnett was committed for trial, Inspector Andrews made his way back to Halifax, via Montreal, and thence to England, on the first ship departing from Halifax following his arrival there.

[Tom_Wescott]

With all due respect to him, if you are relying on Tom to support one of your arguments you have lost it already.

Now that's just rude.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[David Orsam]

An observation prompted by my view of the quality of your posts in this thread, Tom, and no ruder, I think, than you describing my trilogy as a "73 page revenge post" (#329) containing "mean-spirited comments" (#25) and "personal attacks" which serve "no purpose other than perhaps as catharsis for David" while falsely stating that I called the work of Simon Wood and Wolf Vanderlinden "garbage" (#22), an allegation which I have demonstrated is false but which you not only have never retracted or apologised for but in fact repeated (in #307) while also falsely suggesting that I "have a grudge against Simon."