Mentor's Response to Anderson, "A more wicked assertion to put into print

[Cap'n Jack]

Sam, best thing is to ask the Jews.
I have, and perhaps you should do so as well.

[Sam Flynn]

Sam, best thing is to ask the Jews.
I have, and perhaps you should do so as well.

In the absence of any living witnesses, AP, I've confined myself to Jewish authors and historians - no joy there, I'm afraid. At least not in terms of yer average Shlomo being hassled by an institutionalised Victorian bobby for wearing the Jewish equivalent of a "wobbly tea-cosy-like thing" on his head.

[Observer]

Chris:"I don"t think applying for a job in the police force would have been an obvious career choice for the newly arrived Jewish population for example"


Why Not? If the police force was such an open, non-discriminatory institution full of scrupulously non-racist and community minded men ,a hundred years ahead of their time,the Jewish community would have been queuing up in huge numbers to join.
I wonder why that was not the case.........?

Could it be that the new arrivals were wary of police forces throughout Europe? One of the reasons they fled their homeland was to escape police brutality,was it not? I coudn't see any of them going anywhere near a police station, let alone enter one to apply to join the force.

Bearing this in mind, I can understand why Anderson stated that there was a certain class of Jew who wouldn't turn in one of their own kind to gentile justice. Most of the poor souls were terrified of police activity, had suffered under the hand of corrupt governments, you can't blame them for keeping well clear of the police

all the best

Observer

[Natalie Severn]

Yes, Observer,I can see your point but I do not agree that a community with such strength and pride as the Jewish Community judging by at least three accounts to my knowledge-ie various by Fishman, together with Jerry White ,Clive Bloom- would NOT have tolerated a mass murderer in its midst,as asserted by Robert Anderson in his memoirs.
The newly arrived Jewish communities of the East End in 1888 - particularly the more recently arrived were political Radicals whose activities have been thoroughly researched by Fishman and feature significantly in the writings of William Morris.They were NOT at all of a "victim" mentality but were a ferment of radicals ready to join forces with other radicals where a great big storm was brewing against deplorable working conditions,sweating shop conditions,starvation wages or no wage at all because of no jobs etc etc .These people were talking about "the Brotherhood of All-" and did not have the ghetto mentality that some suggest .
The state in fact, was absolutely terrified of this threat at the time ,-read Warren for example- and used every arm to suppress and repress,obviously including the police and in 1887 the army as well in Trafalgar Square.

[Chris]

I suspect it may be better to let sleeping dogs lie, but I think it should be pointed out that A. P. Wolf's bizarre claim - that in 1888 the Times reported the murders of babies and prostitutes by Polish Jews - is quite untrue.

I presume this is a fuddled reference to the well-known incident in October 1888, in which the Times printed a report by a correspondent in Vienna, referring to the trials of Moses Ritter for murder in Galicia a few years before. The report made it clear that Ritter was innocent, but referred to allegations of a Jewish superstition that "intimacy" with a Christian woman could be atoned for by her murder, saying these allegations were "never wholly disproved".

Naturally this provoked strong criticism from the Jewish community. One can only imagine what the reaction would have been if the Times had really reported anything like what A. P. Wolf claimed.

I think we should all bear in mind the fact that the modern antisemites have already latched on to one of Rob's articles, and give some thought to what use could be made of what we post here.

[Cap'n Jack]

Sam, talk to Rob:

'A wave of hostility and anti-Semitism swept through London before, during, and after the trial of Israel Lipski. Everything from high unemployment to housing shortages was blamed on the Jews. On 24 August 1887, the Evening News expressed a prevailing sentiment when it stated: 'The low class of Polish Jews which Lipski belonged to are the pariahs of modern European life... In the districts blighted by their presence the standard of living and morality alike is lowered... For the man one may feel sorrow, but one cannot look with equanimity on this social cancer which is spreading in our midst, and is so baneful to all human progress.' 12

[Sam Flynn]

AP - I don't doubt that antisemitism was heightened amongst many of the working classes. What I very much doubt is whether the police back then discriminated and maltreated the Jews, to an extent equal to or exceeding the alleged "institutionalised" racist behaviour of their counterparts today. I've seen absolutely no evidence that supports that assertion.

[Observer]

Hi Natalie

Yes I'm aware of the radical element, truth is though those individuals mistrusted the police even more than the ordinary Jew in the street. Lets not forget the Jewish gangs that roamed the streets, terrorising and exhorting money from their own kind their victims terrified to inform on those hooligans. Imagine now a Jewish murderer of the magnitude of Jack the Ripper in their midst, not only was there a general mistrust of the police, can you imagine the implications if such a killer was found to be a Jew? I think if someone knew who the Ripper was, (i.e. a fellow Jew)they would certainly think twice about turning him in.

all the best

Observer

[claire]

To add to that, it's probably a little inaccurate to refer to 'the Jewish community' as if it were some homogenous unit. There were rough seas and arid lands between some of the different Jewish groups...further, let's presume, for a moment, that we had a Jewish killer, and one of his associates or family members suspected him of the crimes. Who's to say if that person or persons even knew how to go about turning them in...who's to say if they spoke English themselves, and (as alluded to here), who's to say that they would trust the police enough to believe that they wouldn't get into trouble themselves, because of their experiences at home?

What I'm getting at is that we needn't argue the presence of institutionalised anti-semitism within the police, let alone the knowledge of that, to suppose that such a situation could arise. Time and again, (even) now, we see migrants not reporting crime because they don't know how to, feel that they speak insufficient English, or they fear the consequences of doing so.

Lastly, to respond to Norma's question about why the police didn't set up recruitment stands at the docks--I don't suppose it ever occurred to them. I think, in some ways, it's understandable and forgiveable: how do you train and oversee staff with whom you cannot reliably communicate? Further, I suspect this might be one of those times where we are trying to see the past through the eyes of the present...representative policing is still, in many places, just a policy objective...Not having it, though, doesn't necessitate discrimination.

[Cap'n Jack]

Sam, I have always seen a direct connective thread between the 'Miss Cass' case, the 'Lipski' case and the Whitechapel Murders... not because they are connected by any form of criminality, but rather connected by the way and manner in which the Metropolitan Police dealt with them.
With clear prejudice against a marginalised minority with whom the force had regular problems.
In the first case a prostitute was persecuted for not being a prostitute when the Met thought she was; in the second case a non-English speaking Polish Jew was hung for murder without being offered adequate translation services for his defence; and in the third case a Polish Jew did it because he couldn't speak for himself, and allowed the Metropolitan Force to speak for him.
Obviously all three were guilty, in your book.
I will not buy that book.

[Chris]

Sam, I have always seen a direct connective thread between the 'Miss Cass' case, the 'Lipski' case and the Whitechapel Murders...
...
In the first case a prostitute was persecuted for not being a prostitute when the Met thought she was; in the second case a non-English speaking Polish Jew was hung for murder without being offered adequate translation services for his defence; and in the third case a Polish Jew did it because he couldn't speak for himself, and allowed the Metropolitan Force to speak for him.
Obviously all three were guilty, in your book.

Please do us a favour and don't assume that anyone who asks you to back up your assertions about "institutional racism [antisemitism]" in the Victorian police force must believe "a Polish Jew did it"!

Coincidentally I have just finished "The Trials of Israel Lipski" by Martin Friedland, which I would thoroughly recommend to anyone interested in the background to the Whitechapel Murders.

While the inadequacy of the interpreter used in court was remarked on, I didn't see any suggestion of Lipski being denied "translation services for his defence". Actually, I can't work out what that means. It's not as though the defence didn't have access to - and active assistance from - plenty of people who were bilingual in Yiddish and English.

In fact one thing that struck me was the absence of any indication of "institutional" antisemitism relating to the case, whether in the police force, the legal system, the civil service or the government. To be sure, there were clearly some antisemitic politicians (not in government), some antisemitic journalists and some antisemitic local inhabitants. But that's not the same thing at all.

[Natalie Severn]

Claire,
I will get back to you tomorrow but think "irony" re the setting up of recruitment booths at the docks.
Chris,
again will get back to you on it but numbers of Jewish commentators and writers such as William Fishman have expressed,like Ap, their fears about the way that case was handled-in particular the reasons how the door was locked ,it being in a very poor condition, but also how a confession was made by Lipski - he was hanged the following day very unfortunate because it was just as public opinion was turning in favour of him due to the crusading campaigns of the journalist,WT Stead.

[Sam Flynn]

Sam, I have always seen a direct connective thread between the 'Miss Cass' case, the 'Lipski' case and the Whitechapel Murders... by the way and manner in which the Metropolitan Police dealt with them.

I wasn't aware that Liz Cass was Jewish, AP. Assuming she wasn't, then I've clearly been under a misapprehension that the Victorian Met treated working-class gentiles with the utmost fair play.

[Jeff Leahy]

I’ve been following this thread with some interest, So many thanks for the various views and critiques given within. However where I am confused, is that at no point has any evidence been given that SRA was in any way or acted in an anti-Semitic manor.

Could you Natalie, supply any direct evidence that shows Anderson as a Racist..

As far as I can see, nothing exists to support this theory

Pirate

[Chris]

again will get back to you on it but numbers of Jewish commentators and writers such as William Fishman have expressed,like Ap, their fears about the way that case was handled-in particular the reasons how the door was locked ,it being in a very poor condition, but also how a confession was made by Lipski - he was hanged the following day very unfortunate because it was just as public opinion was turning in favour of him due to the crusading campaigns of the journalist,WT Stead.

Please be aware that I am not saying that the conduct of the trial was acceptable, or even that I'm convinced Lipski was guilty. Friedland's conclusion - if I understand correctly - is that Lipski wasn't fairly tried, and that his guilt wasn't proved beyond reasonable doubt.

But that's not the same as saying that this was because of "institutional racism". As I said, I don't see any indication of that in Friedland's book.

The problem with interpretation seems to have arisen not out of any deliberate prejudice against Lipski, but because it seems to have been assumed that fluency in German would be a qualification for interpreting Yiddish. In fact on this basis Henry Matthews himself acted as an interpreter when one witness was examined during the post-trial deliberations about whether the sentence of death should be commuted.

I think this fact has an implication for some of the evidence about Jewish witnesses of the Whitechapel Murders - Schwartz springs to mind, if the language he spoke was Yiddish rather than "Hungarian".

Another striking feature is that Sir James Stephen, the judge, acknowledged that the conduct of the defence and his own summing up were not what they should have been, and in consequence bent over backwards to ensure that the possibility of a reprieve was fairly considered. Matthews postponed the execution for a week on Stephen's recommendation, to allow more time for consideration. Friedland prints evidence to show that both men were heartily relieved by the news that Lipski had confessed, because they found the decision such a difficult one.