How Are The Mighty Fallen

[jmenges]

Hi Jeff,

As a "producer" of sorts myself, tho by no degree as professional as you, my tactic in getting Begg and SPE on the same discussion program was to ask once, receive a direct "no", and never ask again. Something about having personal integrity here. Reading your latest posts makes me embarrassed for you. And that you suggest you would charge money for us to view such an unlikely recorded event turns my stomach.

JM

[Simon Wood]

Hi Jonathan,

Yes, it's interesting that the official memorandum [which bears no dated Scotland Yard or Home Office "received" stamps] wasn't amongst the Ripper documents Macnaghten supposedly destroyed.

Hmmn.

Regards,

Simon

[Jonathan H]

My theory is that Christabel Aberconway was torn.

She had found this document which named the 'Drowned Doctor' Super-suspect which her father seemed to believe was the Ripper.

She took it upon herself to preserve it, perhaps to diseeminate to the public somehow, and eventually to showed it to the famous Dan Farson.

But, her father had never named M. J. Druitt in public, and she felt that this was still not appropriate, even in 1959, hence the restriction the TV journo agreed to.

I actually do not think her father ever wanted this document to see the light of day, and that it existed at all was an oversight on his part when he burned what he had on Druitt -- if that is even true.

Its publication, ironically, ruined her father's rep about this mystery, in the long run.

[Simon Wood]

Hi Jonathan,

I've never believed the Aberconway version was a first draft.

It's interesting that Lady Aberconway's notes contain words underscored with a single line. This was the way in which italics were indicated in handwritten or typewritten manuscripts for final typesetting, and to my mind would only have been employed if she was preparing her father's notes for publication in, say, a book or magazine.

To the best of our knowledge this didn't happen, so what might have changed her mind about publication?

Regards,

Simon

[Jonathan H]

Thanks Simon,

I have just read online pages of Odell''s book 'Ripperology' where he mentions his own 1965 book, which is not as good as getting my hands on the original.

Nevertheless, Odell makes a point I have been making, and am glad to see somebody else made 40-odd years ago. That the Aberconway version is probably the adaptation, not a draft [I would add, for Griffiths and Sims]. Though, as per usual, the revelation of Macnaghten's memoirs admitting that the un-named Druitt was not a contemporaneous suspect is missed.

[Simon Wood]

Hi Jonathan,

Sorry, I only have the earlier hardback edition.

Regards,

Simon

[Jonathan H]

Well, well, well -- thanks, that is something I didn't know.

Do you actually have this book?

If you do, does he quote the 'said to be a doctor' version in 1966, presumably comparing it's similarities and differences to the unofficial version?

[Simon Wood]

Hi Jonathan,

I'm certain Robin won't mind me quoting from a recent email of his.

"All files were supposed to be closed until, I think, 1997. I say, supposed, because I did gain access to some of the files in 1965 by unorthodox means. These consisted of two box files with randomly selected contents, much of which was insignificant, but there was one gem. That was the original version of Sir Melville Macnaghten's famous notes. I take the credit (if any is due) for publishing what might be called the 'authorised version' in the paperback version of JtR in F & F in 1966."

Regards,

Simon

[Jonathan H]

You want somebody to say that a top cop was lying?

Fine.

In my opinion, Macnaghten was lying.

But let us be clear on what we are talking about regarding his Report(s)

It is a matter of fact that Dan Farson found the Aberconway version in 1959. Tom Cullen published a section of it in 1965 -- the first to do so, Farson's own book not coming out until 1972.

The Odell book is 1966.

It published what -- exactly?

I presume it was the Aberconway, unofficial version again.

So far as I know, Don Rumbelow first published the official version of the Macnaghten Report in 1975.

[Simon Wood]

Hi Jonathan,

There you go again. Gentlemanly deceit? Poppycock.

Macnaghten's memorandum first saw the light of day in Robin Odell's 1966 paperback version of JtR in Fact and Fiction. Dan Farson must have had a self-serving memory.

Regards,

Simon

[Jonathan H]

Robin Odell in 1965?

Am I missing something here?

I thought that Dan Farson saw the unofficial version of the Macnaghten Report in 1959, and provided his TV audience with a veiled version of Druitt's identity [the name on the death certificate blacked out]

In 1965, by hook or by crook, the American expat journo, Tom Cullen, published this version of the Report for the first time in 'Autumn of Terror'.

I thought that nobody saw the official version of the Macnaghten Report until 1974, when Home Sec. Roy Jenkins allowed access and the following year Don Rumbelow published it in 'The Complete Jack the Ripper'.


As for top cops lying, I think that Macnaghten was consciously involved in gentlemanly deceit, whilst Anderson was sincere but had a poor, though self-serving, memory.

[Phil Carter]

Hi All,

I've lost count of the number of feeble excuses put forward to explain the top police echelon's differences of opinion about the identity of JtR. Faulty memory, confusion, confabulation, old age, doolally tap, bunions . . . the list goes on.

Let's stop pussyfooting around. Somebody was lying.

I'll bet you a Lamborghini to a jelly baby that today's closed-in-perpetuity Special Branch files make no mention of Kosminski, Druitt or Ostrog possibly having been the Ripper. Because if they did, then the all-important Macnaghten Memorandum would be in there too, unknown to us. It wouldn't have been lying around amidst a mass of irrelevant papers in a dusty box file for Robin Odell to discover in 1965.

Regards,

Simon

Hello Simon,

I agree entirely with these comments of yours. Thank you for posting this.

best wishes

Phil

[Simon Wood]

Hi All,

I've lost count of the number of feeble excuses put forward to explain the top police echelon's differences of opinion about the identity of JtR. Faulty memory, confusion, confabulation, old age, doolally tap, bunions . . . the list goes on.

Let's stop pussyfooting around. Somebody was lying.

I'll bet you a Lamborghini to a jelly baby that today's closed-in-perpetuity Special Branch files make no mention of Kosminski, Druitt or Ostrog possibly having been the Ripper. Because if they did, then the all-important Macnaghten Memorandum would be in there too, unknown to us. It wouldn't have been lying around amidst a mass of irrelevant papers in a dusty box file for Robin Odell to discover in 1965.

Regards,

Simon

[Natalie Severn]

Many Thanks for your kind words Jonathan, Best Norma

[Jonathan H]

I am very sorry to hear that and hope you will be ok!