To what extent can we rely on newspaper reports?

[curious4]

Newspapers

Hello,

The thread title should have been longer but the Casebook gov'nors made me shorten it. So - here's the other half. Which papers can we most rely on? Times, Telegraph with better resources would probably have the better stenographers and therefore give a more accurate accounts of inquests, but perhaps the Daily News etc would chase the story better, interviewing more of the residents but perhaps giving a little more colour to the stories than was accurate.

I suppose the only way is to compare reports. Same facts in several newspapers and they are most probably correct.

Best wishes,
C4

[Wickerman]

Hello,

The thread title should have been longer but the Casebook gov'nors made me shorten it. So - here's the other half. Which papers can we most rely on? Times, Telegraph with better resources would probably have the better stenographers and therefore give a more accurate accounts of inquests, but perhaps the Daily News etc would chase the story better, interviewing more of the residents but perhaps giving a little more colour to the stories than was accurate.

I suppose the only way is to compare reports. Same facts in several newspapers and they are most probably correct.

Best wishes,
C4

Hi Gwyneth.

There is no short answer to the question you pose. The reliability of press reports throughout the span of the Whitechapel murders is a study in itself.

Press opinion was not devoid of bias, many of the major players published stories from a political point of view. For instance, some of the most reliable press sources like The Morning Post or The Standard, had a decidedly Conservative outlook reflecting the fact their principal investors were Conservatives.
These might praise Commissioner Warren and the pursuit of law and order (Cons. bias), but at the same time castigate Matthews at the Home Office because he represented the Liberal Gov't.

Then you have the Daily News and Daily Chronicle who find their financial support among Liberal sources who might take a polar opposite point of view.
The Times, Daily Telegraph, Morning Advertiser, Evening Post, etc., tend to occupy a middle ground, presenting their stories with less of an obvious political bias.

Then there is the issue of accuracy. I don't know if you are aware but many of the stories published across a number of these newspapers actually originated from the four or five press agencies who sold their stories by telegraph.
A mistake within an agency story will be published by any number of papers, which sadly was quite often the case. So when you raise the question of accuracy with respect to the Times or Daily Telegraph, we must allow for the fact the story may not have originated with these newspapers in the first place.

It is only the stories which originate with the paper itself that we can judge for accuracy.
Then at the bottom of the barrel we have the Radical Press who promoted their own brand of 'New Journalism' - like Pall Mall Gazette & The Star, the 19th century equivalent of our modern day tabloid journalism.

[Wickerman]

The question at the top of this thread is 'To what extent can we rely on newspaper reports'. In this case the answer has to be 'not very far'.

In general this is probably correct.

It all really depends on what the subject matter is, Sugden's opinion might help you out here:

"And except in the context of Coroner's inquiries, they were not made privy to the details of police investigations. It cannot be emphasized too strongly, therefore, that however valuable the newspapers might be as sources of contemporary comment and for information on the public aspects of the subject like inquest hearings or street scenes they are not credible sources for the details of the crimes themselves and should not be used as such" (p.112)

Then one author who made a specific study on this question:

"Besides the issue of propriety, reporters had to contend with the persistent refusal of Scotland Yard to divulge the details of their hunt for the killer. Lack of cooperation from the police greatly hampered the efforts of journalists to cover the entire story and forced them to rely on the testimony of police surgeons and other witnesses at each inquest."
Jack the Ripper and the London Press, Curtis, pp.116-7.

Here is another opinion from a dissertation on Casebook:

"First of all, they were never granted access to the crime scenes. All of the information they printed came either second or third hand from the hearsay of neighbors, witnesses and others, or from their own imagination. More important, however, was that the police did not officially reveal any aspects of any part of their investigations to the press. The only way the press was able to get this information is by publishing coroner inquests where police officials and doctors testified. Police officials, though, were loathe in providing such details to the inquests as well. The policy of the Metropolitan Police on the matter of the press was crystal clear: under no circumstances were facts about the investigation, witnesses or suspects to be shared with the press in any case where the identity of the perpetrator was not already established."

http://www.casebook.org/dissertations/schoeneman-crisis.html

It is necessary that we know the limited sources available to the press to prevent us buying into a particular story, especially an unreferenced one.

The press are a source of opinion, not fact.

[curious4]

Newspapers

Hi Gwyneth.

There is no short answer to the question you pose. The reliability of press reports throughout the span of the Whitechapel murders is a study in itself.

Press opinion was not devoid of bias, many of the major players published stories from a political point of view. For instance, some of the most reliable press sources like The Morning Post or The Standard, had a decidedly Conservative outlook reflecting the fact their principal investors were Conservatives.
These might praise Commissioner Warren and the pursuit of law and order (Cons. bias), but at the same time castigate Matthews at the Home Office because he represented the Liberal Gov't.

Then you have the Daily News and Daily Chronicle who find their financial support among Liberal sources who might take a polar opposite point of view.
The Times, Daily Telegraph, Morning Advertiser, Evening Post, etc., tend to occupy a middle ground, presenting their stories with less of an obvious political bias.

Then there is the issue of accuracy. I don't know if you are aware but many of the stories published across a number of these newspapers actually originated from the four or five press agencies who sold their stories by telegraph.
A mistake within an agency story will be published by any number of papers, which sadly was quite often the case. So when you raise the question of accuracy with respect to the Times or Daily Telegraph, we must allow for the fact the story may not have originated with these newspapers in the first place.

It is only the stories which originate with the paper itself that we can judge for accuracy.
Then at the bottom of the barrel we have the Radical Press who promoted their own brand of 'New Journalism' - like Pall Mall Gazette & The Star, the 19th century equivalent of our modern day tabloid journalism.

Hello Jon,

Thank you. Exactly what I wanted to know. The curse of this study, and also the blessing is that you are constantly tempted down new roads of enquiry! When I am finished with the workhouse (provided I'm not in one) I may take a stroll down the newspaper road. That's when I've read all the books I've been recommended of course!

All good wishes,

Gwyneth

[HelenaWojtczak]

This is a great question and a very important one.

In my own experience of reading every press report on George Chapman that I could lay eyes upon, I would say we cannot rely on them without external supporting material.

For example, I read many press reports that stated outrageous things about Chapman that are simply not true (for example that he was Jewish, that he had beheaded his first wife in Poland, that he was in Holloway Prison...)

It's a minefield and we have to be extremely wary of believing anything that we read. As a rule of thumb, the more sensationalist and popular the paper, the less likely it is to be accurate. Having said that, I've also seen nonsense written in The Times, etc.

Helena

[Wickerman]

Hello Jon,

Thank you. Exactly what I wanted to know. The curse of this study, and also the blessing is that you are constantly tempted down new roads of enquiry! When I am finished with the workhouse (provided I'm not in one) I may take a stroll down the newspaper road. That's when I've read all the books I've been recommended of course!

All good wishes,

Gwyneth

Hi Gwyneth.

For a fair intro to the subject you might want to download this principal source. Curtis does not try to divide the press into "Good guys/Bad guys", but does offer an honest overview of the press coverage and its pitfalls.

http://yalepress.yale.edu/yupbooks/pdf/0300088728.pdf

[Wickerman]

In my own experience of reading every press report on George Chapman that I could lay eyes upon, I would say we cannot rely on them without external supporting material.

Hi Helena.

You raise an important point, the need to verify the story by external means. Not always possible in the Ripper case, but all the more reason to treat reports with caution.

It's a minefield and we have to be extremely wary of believing anything that we read.

The press may provide a valuable contribution with respect to the social atmosphere and detailed descriptions of the local environment. They may even provide truthful, or semi-truthful statements given to them by witnesses. What the press cannot do is provide accurate opinions on the direction of the inquiry or even inside knowledge about the investigation.

Given that it should be comparatively simple to describe Millers Court, we may be bemused to find inconsistencies in various press descriptions of the layout.
How can they make mistakes on so obvious a subject?
Interestingly, more than one paper offered a description of the layout of Mary Kelly's room, yet none of them agree!

Then we have the press reporting statements given to them by witnesses, for the most part these cannot be verified by independent means. Yet, in the two instances that survive (Schwartz/Hutchinson) we can see differences between what these witnesses told the press and what they told the police.

Were the press embellishing their accounts just a tad?

Caveat emptor!

[curious4]

Newspapers

Hi Gwyneth.

For a fair intro to the subject you might want to download this principal source. Curtis does not try to divide the press into "Good guys/Bad guys", but does offer an honest overview of the press coverage and its pitfalls.
http://yalepress.yale.edu/yupbooks/pdf/0300088728.pdf

Hello Jon,

Many thanks.

Gwyneth

[Wickerman]

Hello Jon,

Many thanks.

Gwyneth

Hi Gwyneth.

This just came to mind, a direct charge by a police surgeon that the Star are inventing stories.

Chief Comm. Monro (who replaced Warren) wrote to the Chief Police surgeon Mackellar concerning an alleged interview given by Dr Brownfield to a Star reporter in the following issue:

http://www.casebook.org/press_reports/star/s881224.html

Brownfield was obliged to respond to his superior Mackellar on the matter, where he writes:
"With regard to the Star reporter, I hope you do not think me responsible for their reporters articles."

A clear implication that the Star are inventing stories.

[GUT]

G'Day Jon

What a shock!

The press making up stories. OR

A leak denying the he was the source.

I don't know what would shock me more.

GUT

[Wickerman]

G'Day Jon

What a shock!

The press making up stories. OR

A leak denying the he was the source.

I don't know what would shock me more.

GUT

G'day sport.

You should, if you knew anything about how the Star operated.

[GUT]

Sorry Jon

I should what? Be shocked.

GUT

[Wickerman]

You should be more shocked if Dr Brownfield was 'leaking' stories to police, you should not be shocked at a Star reporter 'inventing' a story to make 'copy'.

[Wickerman]

It isn't often that we have examples of both sides of a story.

In the case of the murder of Martha Tabram, we read an opinion in the press that a suspect refused to give an account of himself to police.
This claim alone should be sufficient to raise eyebrows, could a suspect really blatantly defy police?

"At a parade of soldiers which took place at the Tower, Barrett identified the man whom he had accosted, but the soldier refused to give any account of himself."

The above likely came through a press agency as the complete paragraph from which that line came is worded the same in different newspapers.


We are fortunate to have Inspector Reid's own report on the matter which tells a different story.

"The two men that the P.C. pointed out were then taken to the orderly room, and the others dismissed. On arriving at the orderly room the P. C. stated that he had made a mistake in pointing out the man with medals who was allowed to leave the room at once without his name being taken, and the other gave the name of John Leary. He was asked by me to account for his time on the night of the 6th. He at once stated that he and private Law went on leave in the evening and went to Brixton they stopped there until the Public Houses closed then he (Leary) went to the rear and when he returned he missed Law he looked about for him and not finding him started off to Battersea, and Chelsea, came along past Charing Cross into the Strand, where he met Law about 4.30 am, they both walked along until they got to Billingsgate where they had a drink and came into barracks at 6. Private Law was then sent for, and on his being questioned as to his movements on the night of the 6th he made a statement which agreed in every particular with that which had been made by Private Leary. They were unable to give me the name of any person to whom I could refer. I felt certain in my own mind that P. C. had made a great mistake and I allowed the men to leave the orderly room..."

It is quite clear that the man identified by PC Barrett did not refuse to help police.

The extent that we can rely on press reports concerning any murder case is limited to what any reporter could pick up off the street, either after interviewing witnesses themselves, or following detectives around in order to guess what direction the investigation was going.

[Sunbury]

Missing aircraft and the media.

The high quality of Journalism standards is on current display with the story of the missing Malaysian Jet.

Nothing changes, just the mediums used to convey "information." With JtR, we just had "newspapers" whose goal was to sell newspapers/advertising space. With the missing Jet, we have internet.TV, print, radio whose goal is to sell advertising space.

Every thought, every utterance from "unnamed sources" is presented as fact and "experts" employed to present fluff pieces to try and attract viewers/readers.

Isn't the Journalistic motto "Never let facts get in the way of a good story."