Anderson - More Questions Than Answers

[Robert]

I think Wilhelm Steinitz, the great chess player, during a period of mental illness believed that he could literally phone god up. And beat him at chess giving him odds.

I doubt if the murders were religiously inspired (at least not directly) though the Eddowes murder following so closely on Stride's carries a hint of a task that must be performed (e.g. Stephensonian black magic).

[Natalie Severn]

It sounds to me as though Aaron thought he was in touch with his god.

Yes Robert.And it sounds to me as though he wasnt alone.Anderson had a private "hotline" with his,and was in intense preparation for the Second Coming!

[Robert]

It sounds to me as though Aaron thought he was in touch with his god.

[Natalie Severn]

Well whoever it was these two policeman accuse of being Jack the Ripper,the man Anderson said" died" soon after being caged in an asylum,it is certainly very far fetched and not dealing with the reality of the matter ,to conclude it was "Aaron" Kosminski, a young man freely walking his dog in Cheapside in 1889,a year after the frenzied attack on Mary Kelly.A man not considered dangerous at ANY point either upon his admission to Colney Hatch in 1891 or at any time during his long incarceration ,either there or in Leavesdon and recorded as "not dangerous".A man also recorded as being able to read and write, who appears to have been a bit of a pseudo intellectual,able to describe, for example ,soon after admission in 1891,and in English - not in his mother tongue Yiddish, his auditory hallucinations as," Guidance by a Universal Instinct who knows the movements of all mankind".
This Kosminski was still alive and kicking a year after Anderson himself had died,let alone having died soon after admission to an asylum in 1891.

[Bailey]

But it's just not credible to argue that whenever Anderson and Swanson use the word "Jew", what they really mean is "policeman"!

Were there a lot of "low class Polish policemen" around at the time?

B.

[Chris]

Ap, thanks for your words. So..........it wasnt Aaron who was "confronted"by a witness, but Thomas,and maybe it was by the Mitre Square[beat] PC -or another PC perhaps,at the Policeman"s Seaside Home, around 1891.However when the PC realised the suspect was the nephew of a senior policeman,he declined from continuing with the procedure.

I think we should try to maintain some kind of contact with reality here.

Clearly both Anderson's suspect and Anderson's witness were Jewish. And the Swanson marginalia name the suspect as Kosminski. And the only reason a City PC comes into the equation is that he is mentioned by Macnaghten in the Aberconway draft, and is said to have seen someone who resembled Kosminski.

By all means argue that Anderson's and Swanson's claims are unreliable, and by all means argue the case for Thomas Cutbush, if you think he's a plausible suspect. But it's just not credible to argue that whenever Anderson and Swanson use the word "Jew", what they really mean is "policeman"!

[Jeff Leahy]

All very fancyfull. However we still have McNaughten and Swanson writing the name Kosminski

So back to the drawing board

Pirate

[Natalie Severn]

Ap, thanks for your words. So..........it wasnt Aaron who was "confronted"by a witness, but Thomas,and maybe it was by the Mitre Square[beat] PC -or another PC perhaps,at the Policeman"s Seaside Home, around 1891.However when the PC realised the suspect was the nephew of a senior policeman,he declined from continuing with the procedure.
That scenario might even makes slightly more sense,especially as we know Charles Cutbush was very depressed and took his own life before the century was out.

[Cap'n Jack]

Scott, there was only one asylum that awaited Her Majesty's Pleasure, and that was Broadmoor.

[Cap'n Jack]

That's what I've been trying to say all along, Nats, so thanks for that.
Thanks Simon for the pertinent article.
I don't believe it was possible for a family, or relation, to have someone committed to a public asylum without the authority of two doctors and a justice of the peace; and an offical of the local parish, besides a police officer who had to provide a danger to the public.
This was certainly true in the case of Thomas Cutbush, when he spent time in public asylums before being HMP'd to Broadmoor.

[Scott Nelson]

Broadmoor makes sense, and is exactly where Anderson [NYT March 20th 1910] said Jack the Ripper had been sent "five or six years ago".

Anderson never said this. I believe it was "Vetern Diplomat's" interpretation of what asylum the suspect was sent to based on Anderson's just published Blackwells Magazine articles.

[Natalie Severn]

Thankyou Simon,a very interesting cutting.
Its interesting especially since Ap has just been addressing this very point : that a hospital such as Broadmoor was where a "criminally" insane person such as the Ripper would have been taken , if he had been caught and found to be insane.Aaron ,by contrast,was obviously not considered to be "criminally" insane.
However Thomas Cutbush,the nephew of ,Supt Charles Cutbush had been sent to Broadmoor and had subsequently been named as "Jack the Ripper"by the Sun National Newspaper in 1894.
So did Robert Anderson want his cake and eat it? Did he want his readers to understand that he and other police had known who Jack the Ripper was---but didnt want ,any more than Macnaghten didnt want , in his 1894 memorandum, to come clean and admit it was the nephew of his and Macnaghten"s colleague,a fellow Scotland Yard man, Supt Charles Cutbush,a fellow after Anderson"s heart with his deep distrust of all Catholics ,it was Cutbush"s nephew, who was actually incarcerated,from 1891, in the asylum for the criminally insane,Broadmoor, and that it was Thomas Cutbush who had died there "five or six years before"-not Aaron Kosminski?---but hey-you can"t have "one of your own"- being implicated in the "Crime of the Century" can you? Much better to wheel out the reliable scapegoat,the Jew!

[Simon Wood]

Hi All,

New York Times, March 20th 1910—





Regards,

Simon

[Jeff Leahy]

Your forgetting that the police didn't take Aaron anywhere. His brother, presumably to avoid the police, took him in voluntarily.

I am now curious about the self-abuse. Schizophrenics have low sex drive I need advice.

[Simon Wood]

Hi AP,

Broadmoor makes sense, and is exactly where Anderson [NYT March 20th 1910] said Jack the Ripper had been sent "five or six years ago".

Regards,

Simon