Home office report

[Jeff Leahy]

The Ripper mystery-within-a-mystery, far from being a sideshow is the second main feature.

Agreed that there are many mysteries. Some are simply the result of time and viewing he case with twentieth century vision.

But to dismiss Anderson and Swanson as gerryatric wishful thinkers, without any evidence, is not history.

Pirate

[Jonathan H]

No, its better to try and come up with an explanation for everything.

But there is no reason why opposing explanations for everything cannot compete with each other.

The Ripper mystery-within-a-mystery, far from being a sideshow is the second main feature.

[Jeff Leahy]

The theory of a fading, self-serving memory muddle on the part of Anderson and/or Swanson is not mine -- I wish it was! It is originally that of Cullen, Farson, regarding Pizer, and then developed to a much greater sophistication by Evans and Rumbelow in 2006, regarding Kosminski, Lawende and Sadler.

Yes I'm aware of that.

And as I have stated before the memory is poor on detail and facts. Dates, times even names.

However what there is no evidence for is that the memory deteriates to any great extent as we get older. Emotions, experiences and stories we remember very well.

The other problem is assuming that because we cant make the information we have tally with what we know, that a mistake was made in the first place.

Surely better to leave the blanks with 'We just dont know' than trying to create an explination for everything?

Pirate

[Jonathan H]

Fair enough, Raoul.

We will just have to agree to disagree.

I subscribe to the theory that Druitt was nothing to do with the police Ripper investigation -- ever.

But he came to Mac's private attention, via the Old Boy Net, and he kept it to himself and later disseminated a fictional version to the public, via credulous cronies from the Crimes Club.

I would just say this to Pirate and others.

By all means, tell me if I am wrong, but no secondary source ever noticed that Griffiths had changed 'family' into 'friends', and Mac did not correct Sims when he did the same.

Therefore, we can see the fictionalizing of elements of the Druitt story for public consumption. It's a fact, not a theory. The question is: to what extent and how conscious was Mac of this process of turning fact into fiction?

How do we know that Macnaghten had not already started this process eg. 'said to be a doctor ...' which means might be a doctor or might not. As in, if he's not a doctor then my source must have been mistaken ...

To Pirate

The theory of a fading, self-serving memory muddle on the part of Anderson and/or Swanson is not mine -- I wish it was! It is originally that of Cullen, Farson, regarding Pizer, and then developed to a much greater sophistication by Evans and Rumbelow in 2006, regarding Kosminski, Lawende and Sadler.

[Raoul's Obsession]

Jonathan, thanks for the detailed reply.

I'm happy with your answer to my second question but I'd like to push a little further on the first. I certainly remember (and I am working from memory here - just like MM) the police looking into the case of people recently admitted to asylums follow murders or recently released prior to the murders suggesting that the 'madman as Ripper' theory wasn't an invention of MM. Based on this, it is hard to see how the case of any suicides with notes suggesting they may be mentally unwell just after any murder would not be investigated.

You make an interesting point about the series not being thought complete after Kelly. However, this doesn't preclude investigating a suspect found after this murder. At the point of finding Druitt in the river they had no way of knowing that the series was not complete. It was only when a body was found 6 months later that this thought may have arisen. Certainly the police went to great lengths to determine whether the injuries on Alice McK. were consistent with previous murders and of course used a witness to attempt an identification of Sadler suggesting that later murders were given Ripper consideration. But none of this implies that at the time Druitt wasn't chief suspect or at least A suspect. Though not a very good one in my humble opinion.

Raoul

[Jonathan H]

To Phil H

You never laid a glove on it, mate.

History is based on supposition, if there are gaps which there always are.

We have the murders, at one end, then at the other end we have Macnaghten's certainty in the only public document for which he appended his distinguished name. Historical methodology tries to fill in the veiled middle.

From other documents by the same source we know that suspicion of Druitt originated with his own family. There was a go-between and his name is with-held. A 'private source' who somehow bypasses the field detectives.

Guess who ...?

The connection of Druitt to the East End, of being 'sexually insane', of being a Ripper suspect, comes from the circles in which Druitt moved in Dorset which predates the first version of the Mac Report in 1894.

[Phil H]

I can see where you are coming from JH, but as i said earlier, the unfortunate thing is that you cite hardly any evidence and even that tends to be internal (ie analysis of documents) or comparative (between documents).

As far as I am aware we have no EVIDENCE that MM and the MP knew each other, met, discussed this etc. It is all circumstantial and suppositional.

The errors MM and the inquest reporter made are best interpreted as mistakes.

And even your theory can be countered by other explanations of cover-up - "political ones, for instance, that seem to me at least, more likely.

On the whole though, I think MJD a dead-duck as far as being JtR is concerned - no evidence of him as sexually deviant, in the East End or any link to the killings AT ALL.

Thanks for yuor thoughtful response,

Phil

[Jonathan H]

1)

The very question reveals a misconception about the case; that Kelly was seen as the final murder at the time, or that anybody who could do that to a fellow human being must be ga ga and about to kill themselves. These are all mythical amplifications of the tale provided by Macnaghten.

Acually, Frances Coles murdered on Feb 13th 1891, was thought by press and public and police to be the last victim until Macanghten, via Griffiths, locked in the five, ending with Kelly. He did this because of the inconvenient timing of Druitt's death, the embarrassing factor which Mac concealed from the Liberal govt and his own cronies, and thus the public, until his memoirs -- and they were ignored.

No, I do not think that in 1888 Scotland Yard and/or the Home Office made any connection, whatsoever, between the tragic -- but not suspicious -- death of a mentally unbalanced barrister/respectable gentleman from Blackheath with, of all things, the 'Jack the Ripper' murders.

2)

I do not yet have the resources to check everything that Macnaghten wrote in 'Days of My Years' against other sources, which is why I am dissatisfied with my own book/manuscript.

On the other hand, I would say that other researchers, Chris Phillips and Debra Arif for example, have dug up really interesting stuff about the Elizabeth Camp murder of 1897 which Mac mentions in a chapter called 'Railway Murders'.

From my point of view -- and not Arif and Phillips I stress -- it shows that Macnaghten could fuse together suspects in another case in order to hide a [fellow English gentleman] suspect, in this case an innocent one. I have an article coming out, the third in my Macnaghten trilogy, which goes into more detail for those interested.

Furthermore, in Mac's preface -- in which he suggestively juxtaposes cricket-Ripper-errors -- he claims that he is writing from memory alone; a pre-emptive and humble apology from a man known for his extraodinary powers of recall.

The point is, that chapter on the Ripper is not written from memory at all. He used 'Aberconway' right at his elbow. In fact he adapted it as he saw fit (eg. no witness, the sidekick suspects dumped) as this was going to be the only document with his knighted name on it for the public record. In effect it is the defacto 'third' version of the Mac Report, and I would argue the definitive one as the police chief saw it.

For example, unlike the other two versions where Druitt seems to have been a contemporaneous suspect to the 1888 investigation (for that's how both Griffiths and Sims interpreted the hyped-up version they were privy too) the deceased fiend is revealed to have only been discovered from information received 'some years after' he topped himself.

This source, the Mac memoirs from 1914 and the defacto third version of his report, perfectly dovetails with the 'West of England' MP source of Feb 11th 1891 -- eg. some years after.

[Raoul's Obsession]

My appologies Phil, the above post was actually meant to be directed to Jonathon.

[Raoul's Obsession]

Phil,

A couple of questions...
1) Do you think it likely that the police did not investigate the circumstances of a dead body found in the Thames mere weeks after the murder of Kelly (especially given a suicide note that talks about a mental disorder)? Not having records currently existing is not the same as suggesting that they were never there - Tumblety for example is not in the files either.

2) I think your point about taking all sources into account a valid one - hence my next questions. Are there many errors in MM's memoirs relating to other crimes or aspects of his life outside of the ripper investigation. As I see it, an argument that rests on some degree of deliberate fabrication (without suggesting he was simply becoming forgetful) implies that we should see 'errors' in the ripper section but not in the rest of the document. On the other hand, if there are numerous mistakes throughout, doesn't the suggestion of faulty memory seem more likely?

please excuse me if I have your theory all upside down.

[Jonathan H]

Thanks Roy

A poster on this thread asked about the 'Home Office Report' and I provided an argument as to what it meant.

I know anything about Druitt is very touchy.

Pirate

I m not saying Mac had a poor memory, quite the opposite.

[Jeff Leahy]

Jonathan I like your work which makes me think. Your last article about Mcnaghten, his boyish side, cricket, that his peers respected him, several things there.

It's all good.

Roy

No ones denying its amusing Roy...

Its just that the people JH is accusing of being forgetful, ageing, jerry-atrics

are actually several years younger than the ripperologists he's seeking support from

But dont tell anyone I ever said that

Pirate

[Roy Corduroy]

Jonathan I like your work which makes me think. Your last article about Mcnaghten, his boyish side, cricket, that his peers respected him, several things there.

It's all good.

Roy

[Jeff Leahy]

Well, you'd know Pirate.

Yo Ho ten years at least

But your entire theory does base itself on almost everybody foregetting almost everything other than there own name

And there is no evidence for that..

But good luck

Pirate

[Jonathan H]

Well, you'd know Pirate.