Robert Sagar

[Chris]

I finally managed to track down the source of Robert Sagar's "memoirs," quoted in 1946 in an article in Reynolds News by Justin Atholl.

They are contained in this report published soon after Sagar's retirement, in the Morning Leader of 9 January 1905:

[Chris]

Here is another short piece, from the Star of 7 January 1905. The content is copied from the well-known City Press report (which appeared on the same day), and the sketch is clearly based on the photo that accompanied it.

[robhouse]

Well, I for one think it is surprising that no one has yet commented on this new find... so I might as well be the first. I assume, Chris, that you are concluding that this article is the "memoirs" mentioned in the Atholl article. This seems very reasonable to me. I think I had been assuming that Sagar wrote something along the lines of a book-length memoir that had gone unpublished. Correct me if I am wrong, but this was, I believe, the general assumption, correct?

It is also interesting to note here again, another mention of the police constable encountering a man of Jewish appearance rushing out of Mitre Square just before the discovery of Eddowes body. The other articles describe this man as either a "well-known" Jewish man or a "well dressed" Jewish man. And the whole story about the police chasing after the sound of footsteps until they reached King's block (http://forum.casebook.org/showthread.php?t=2507&page=5)

It is unclear to me whether this mention of a man of Jewish appearance is based on something that actually happened, or if it is a garbled confusion of the Lawende sighting combined with a recollection of the Goulston St graffito being discovered after the Eddowes murder.

Anyway, a great find Chris.

Rob H

[Casebook Wiki Editor]

Terrific sleuthing, Chris. Thank you.

I finally managed to track down the source of Robert Sagar's "memoirs," quoted in 1946 in an article in Reynolds News by Justin Atholl.

They are contained in this report published soon after Sagar's retirement, in the Morning Leader of 9 January 1905:

[ATTACH]11461[/ATTACH]

[ATTACH]11462[/ATTACH]

[Tom_Wescott]

I was going to comment yesterday, but I wanted to be able to say more than 'great job!', which I know Chris hears all the time. LOL. The name George Johnson rings a bell and I think he was an accomplice of Charles Le Grand in a bank forgery case. I intended to check my notes on this last night and forgot.

Regarding the probably imaginary City P.C. witness in Mitre Square, it is intriguing this has popped up in different sources. In the off chance (and I mean OFF chance) there's anything to this, we do have one PC who emerges outside the official sources to place himself early on the scene in the Eddowes case, and this is PC Amos Simpson of 'Eddowes' shawl' fame. But wasn't he actually a Met constable?

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[The Good Michael]

Wow! A very important piece here is Sagar's mis-remembering of the graffiti, but his remembering of what he thought the intent of it was; that it seemed to be the writing of a Jew saying not to blame them for what happened. That interpretation is the exact reason the graffiti was removed, despite the actual words.

Cheers,

Mike

[Chris]

Well, I for one think it is surprising that no one has yet commented on this new find... so I might as well be the first. I assume, Chris, that you are concluding that this article is the "memoirs" mentioned in the Atholl article. This seems very reasonable to me. I think I had been assuming that Sagar wrote something along the lines of a book-length memoir that had gone unpublished. Correct me if I am wrong, but this was, I believe, the general assumption, correct?

I think that's been one assumption, though people have also done quite a lot of searching for some published memoirs along the lines of Harry Cox's - mainly in weekly newspapers, I think.

I've thought for some time that Atholl must have been quoting something that had appeared in one newspaper or another. Given the two similar reports that have been found in online newspaper archives in the last few months (one of which has yet to be traced to an English source) I thought it would be worth checking all the London daily papers for a week or so after Sagar's retirement.

Obviously this has a lot in common with the other reports that appeared around the same time. To my mind they seem too similar to be completely independent, but too different to have simply been copied from one another. What I've been wondering is whether some journalists were invited to a retirement party, and compiled these reports on the basis of what was said there about Sagar's career. Perhaps this is what the Daily News report was referring to when it said "Last Wednesday he bade farewell to his colleagues," as Sagar officially retired on Thursday 5 January. I think this would be consistent with the repeated references in the reports to Sagar's personal popularity, and particularly the conclusion of the City Press report ("Into his retirement he carries with him the good wishes of all who enjoy his friendship ...").

I think the police constable's encounter with the Jewish man near Mitre Square is the most interesting new detail to emerge from these reports. The explanation is anyone's guess but, as I said above, the mention of the "retreating footsteps" suggests to me that the stories about Ernest Thompson's discovery of the body of Frances Coles are somehow related:

http://forum.casebook.org/showpost.php?p=162295&postcount=53

One other point. I suspect that, despite the different location, there is another echo of the same story in the claim of a "well-known Scotland Yard detective" reported by the Sunday Chronicle later the same year:
"His description agreed with that of a man seen in Dorset-street, Whitechapel, on the night when Mary Jane Kelly was cut to pieces, and at that time he was very near to actual arrest by a policeman."

[Chris]

The name George Johnson rings a bell and I think he was an accomplice of Charles Le Grand in a bank forgery case. I intended to check my notes on this last night and forgot.

I don't know whether there was any connection with Le Grand, but this was a forgery case in 1890. It's mentioned in several of these articles on Sagar, and also in Cox's memoirs. Both Sagar (as 'Sager') and Cox gave evidence at the trial:

http://www.oldbaileyonline.org/browse.jsp?id=t18901124-38&div=t18901124-38

[mariab]

Many thanks to Chris Phillips for the Old Bailey link to George Johnson's forgery case. From the newspaper report posted here by Chris it appears that the Barmash gang was also active/arrested in the same time frame, around 1890? Does anyone know details about the Barmash gang's activities with forgery? Did they operate mainly in London? (I did a casebook search for them with no results. I'll look them up in the Old Bailey and the newspapers in a couple weeks, when less busy.)

[lynn cates]

very nice

Hello Chris. Very nice. This is an excellent find. Sagar is a really interesting character.

(Forgive my late response but one of my positions has annoyingly kept me unduly occupied of late.)

Cheers.
LC

[robhouse]

I do agree that it seems entirely possible that the Coles PC Thompson story somehow got mixed up here with Sagar's tale of retreating footsteps. It is, however, oddly specific with the mention of King's block. I guess I am leaning toward two possibilities:

1. Sagar confused and combined several memories: PC Thompson's hearing footsteps at the Coles murder, a witness (of the Mitre Sq. murder) identifying a Jewish suspect, and a City PC (Harvey) just missing the Ripper at Mitre Square. This possibility is interesting, since Sagar apparently thought the suspect in any case was Jewish, and said "I feel sure we knew the man, but we could prove nothing. Eventually we got him incarcerated in a lunatic asylum, and the series of murders came to an end."

2. The other possibility is that there was a sighting of a man leaving Mitre Square by a City PC, probably Harvey. The more I think about it, the more this seems like a real possibility to me. Harvey had a long stretch of his beat down Bevis Marks/Duke Street, and if the Ripper had left the square via St James Place, he would probably have seen him. The only time he would have missed him (given the timing) was the brief time he was in Church Passage. It has been suggested that the Ripper may have actually been in Mitre Square when Harvey looked into it. Perhaps a more likely scenario is that Harvey was somewhere along Duke Street when he heard footsteps and looked to see a man crossing the street and continuing down Stoney Lane. If Harvey was not very close to Stoney Lane, he is not likely to have got a good look at this person at all. For example, Harvey may have been as far away as Church Passage, or even further. In such a scenario, his "sighting" would have been worthless in the sense of identifying the suspect, and the fact that he was Jewish in appearance may have been withheld simply because of fears it would inflame anti-Semitism. In short, his "sighting" may have been left out of the inquest altogether.

Just throwing some ideas out there.

RH

[Chris]

Perhaps a more likely scenario is that Harvey was somewhere along Duke Street when he heard footsteps and looked to see a man crossing the street and continuing down Stoney Lane. If Harvey was not very close to Stoney Lane, he is not likely to have got a good look at this person at all. For example, Harvey may have been as far away as Church Passage, or even further. In such a scenario, his "sighting" would have been worthless in the sense of identifying the suspect, and the fact that he was Jewish in appearance may have been withheld simply because of fears it would inflame anti-Semitism. In short, his "sighting" may have been left out of the inquest altogether.

I think the problem with this idea is that it wouldn't just have been left out of his evidence, but he would have perjured himself to conceal it, as he's reported as testifying that "He saw no suspicious person about while on his beat." And if the police had attached enough importance to such a sighting to suppress it in this way, wouldn't it have been mentioned in the internal police documents such as Swanson's report?

[robhouse]

Yes, those are both very good points. It is however certainly odd to me to think that Harvey would not have seen anyone. I remember Sugden speculated that the Ripper may have been actually in the square at the time Harvey looked into it. This fits with the timing of course, but it also seems possible that the Ripper exited the square when Harvey was not in Church passage. He must have been on Duke Street for at least 4 or 5 minutes in total. And I think almost anywhere along that stretch he would have been able to see (or hear footsteps) of a man crossing Duke street at Stoney Lane. But as you say, it would have showed up in Swanson's report.

The only other possibility is that the Police went to extraordinary lengths to keep it out of the papers, even to the extent of not including it in Swanson's report. The police did after all go to quite extraordinary lengths to prevent riots against the Jews, the erasing of the graffito being the prime example. I don't see perjury being so much of a problem, necessarily, if they really wanted to keep information from the press and public.

But again, your points are entirely valid, and are probably correct. It is just that there are so many references to this elusive City PC who caught a glimpse of the Ripper that it is hard for me to accept that there is no truth to it. But again, my hunch is probably wrong.

RH

[Phil Carter]

He must have been on Duke Street for at least 4 or 5 minutes in total. And I think almost anywhere along that stretch he would have been able to see (or hear footsteps) of a man crossing Duke street at Stoney Lane.

Hello Rob, Chris,

Just as a sidenote and a hunch from my side here..and perhaps this too is involved in this somewhere, our friend Morris heard nothing coming from Mitre Square either. Now that is in a surrounded built up and enclosed, small area where footsteps could be heard in the dead of the night. Indeed, Morris testified that he heard the PC every night on his beat, yet heard no footsteps of two other people (the killer and the victim), who presumably walked through the square itself. That in itself is odd.

Now the reason I say this, is in connection with your posting (in it's entirety) and again the problem of what had already been given as a statement by all parties. Re. perjury. So I ask, in all innocence, if the entire episode of witness/police testimony connected to the Mitre Square murder does indeed have the same surround attached to it. Is there a common link there? I do not know, but like you, see Chris' thoughts as possibly plausible. And yours too, Rob, by the way.

best wishes

Phil

[Monty]

Hey Rob,

Perjury would have been a huge issue is securing a conviction, assuming Jack was sane enough to stand trial.

I see no reason why should information would have been witheld.

Smith and Lewande to name but two were called to inquest and gave written testimony.

Monty