Access to Scotland Yard Files

[robhouse]

Hello Rob,

As there are written annotations beside the heading "Jack the Ripper" in the known snippets we have from the Special Branch Ledgers, which are catalogued both alphabetically and also by date, we cannot assume that Special Branch were NOT actively involved in the investigation at some level.

Can you direct me to a source for this? I was not under the impression that there was any kind of heading for Jack the Ripper with entries under it. My impression was that the SB occasionally came across references to JTR in the course of its investigations into Fenians, etc... Tumblety being an example of this. Of course, the SB shared info with the MET etc, but investigating the Ripper was not in their department.

I also draw your attention to the Littlechild letter, indicating that Special Branch were involved in the hunt for Tumblety, and the added point that there may have been, at some stage, a file on the man. If one is to consider Tumblety as a Jack the Ripper suspect, it isn't necessarily a given that the supposed file on Tumblety in the Special Branch files related to just any Fenian involvement or linkage on his part either.

Same comment as above... If the SB was looking into Tumblety, and came across some stuff that implicated him in the Ripper crimes, they would have shared this info with the MET, obviously. But investigating the Ripper was not their job. Someone can correct me if I am wrong here.

RH

[John Malcolm]

Yes, and who was the Macnaghten Memorandum written for?

That's a question I've never heard a satisfactory answer for. And it brings up another question- would it not have been Macnaghten's boss who instigated the "memorandum"? It seems strange to me that Macnaghten would have taken it upon himself to address the Cutbush issue in an official capacity otherwise. Help.

[Monty]

Can you direct me to a source for this? I was not under the impression that there was any kind of heading for Jack the Ripper with entries under it. My impression was that the SB occasionally came across references to JTR in the course of its investigations into Fenians, etc... Tumblety being an example of this. Of course, the SB shared info with the MET etc, but investigating the Ripper was not in their department.




Same comment as above... If the SB was looking into Tumblety, and came across some stuff that implicated him in the Ripper crimes, they would have shared this info with the MET, obviously. But investigating the Ripper was not their job. Someone can correct me if I am wrong here.

RH

You aren't wrong Robert,

Monty

[GUT]

G'day Scott

Yes, and who was the Macnaghten Memorandum written for?

There is a mention in one book that a copy was in the home office files. At the moment I cannot find the actual reference but to the best of my recollection the comment was made by another police official.

This supports to hypothesis that it was written for the Home Secretary in case questions were asked in Parliament about Cutbush.

[GUT]

Found what I was looking for it was Inspector Abberline in the Pall Mall Gazette where he said:


"I Know all about that story. .... A report was made to the Home Office about the matter ... "

I think it is clear that he was referencing the MM.

[Phil Carter]

Found what I was looking for it was Inspector Abberline in the Pall Mall Gazette where he said:


"I Know all about that story. .... A report was made to the Home Office about the matter ... "

I think it is clear that he was referencing the MM.

Hello GUT,


The MM is NOT, and has never been, an OFFICIAL police statement nor letter to anybody. It is

a) not headed nor addressed to anyone, individual or department.

b) it never was, and has never been officially endorsed into the Met Police archive or files pertaining to the Whitechapel murders. There is no stamp, no date, no counter signature of recievership and unlike every other piece of material in the files, was NOT catalogued under such stringent regulations the department set up for all files.

Any guess as to what the meaning was, or the intention for whom the recipient was, is pure guesswork and the reference to the Home Office is merely conjecture without a shadow of proof.

What are we left with?.. A private, personal set of notes? That simple?

OK... we are told by the authors of the A-Z that the writer (MM) was clearly writing from memory, and not using the files he had at his immediate disposition at his place of work (and the case was still ongoing it may be added). This accounts, we are told, for it's anomelies, mistakes and suchlike.

Well, one of these (many...and there are many) mistakes is the comment about Mary Kelly. "a photo" was taken, it reads. "A"...as in singular. There are apparently two photographs (if one counts the MJK1 and 2 as basically the same photo) of Mary Kelly, if one includes the MJK3 photo. Slip of the handwritten tongue?.. I personally doubt it.. as we are also told that Sir MM kept the victims photographs safely "locked away" in his desk. Strange that a man who was writing from memory in 1894, whilst still in office, whilst still sitting at that very same desk, whilst the case was still open, whilst the photographs were immediately in front of his body, should get the quantity wrong... as well as all sorts of other mistakes on the matter. No doubt some genius will now tell us that the actual intention of writing "a photo" was referencing to only MJK1... whilst I would have thought that MJK3 was equally applicable to the meaning of the sentence MM wrote.


So do we presume he was writing the memoranda from home?... This may explain why he used work notepaper yet it is not addressed to anybody imparticular. Most people who have worked in an office have used headed paper at home. Likelyhood is that these private notes MAY have been intended for an OFFICIAL "answer" to the Sun newspaper via the Home Office.. but there is no way of knowing nor guessing it to be the case, for IF the Home Office were to recieve such papers, they would most certainly have been headed and adressed to the department and the person concerned. But this is all, as said, total conjecture.

As is the following..

Paul Begg has previously mentioned the possibility that the Memoranda was written for H.H.Asquith ( not by name,but he was the sitting Home Secretary in 1894) incase Parliamentary questions arose regarding to the WM caused to the February 1894 article in the Sun newspaper. Speculation of course.

Stewart Evans remains convinced that the memoranda was a confidential internal police report not intended for publication. This seems entirely feasable for it fits with police procedure...however it is not adressed to any individual imparticular in any department, and two, it is an awfully long report...over 1700 words I believe.

So I am left with the personal feeling that it is a personally written set of papers...done from home.

Anything else....that included even, is pure speculation. We just do not know for certain.

Phil

[Phil Carter]

Can you direct me to a source for this? I was not under the impression that there was any kind of heading for Jack the Ripper with entries under it. My impression was that the SB occasionally came across references to JTR in the course of its investigations into Fenians, etc... Tumblety being an example of this. Of course, the SB shared info with the MET etc, but investigating the Ripper was not in their department.




Same comment as above... If the SB was looking into Tumblety, and came across some stuff that implicated him in the Ripper crimes, they would have shared this info with the MET, obviously. But investigating the Ripper was not their job. Someone can correct me if I am wrong here.

RH

Hello Rob,

I believe you will find reference to it somewhere on CB. Respectfully, I haven't got the time to look for you.

However...

Under a specific entry titled “Jack the Ripper” the entry reads “The name given to Wilson at Bushmills"


you may find it and more on...the Secret Special Branch Ledgers decision notice page.

http://forum.casebook.org/archive/index.php/t-5857.html

(feeling generous :-) )



Phil

[Phil Carter]

Hello Rob,

... in addition you will find more with your own quote...here..

http://forum.casebook.org/showthread.php?t=4688&page=13


Phil

[robhouse]

Again, I am not suggesting that the SB had no involvement at all, as they shared information with the MET. The whole point of the SB was to collect information from various sources—informants mostly, also regular Met PCs. They collected any information that was relevant to protecting domestic security, and focused primarily on Fenians. I am well aware that there are a few references to Jack the Ripper, and my sense is that they simply came across such references when they were a part of an inquiry related to a matter that fell under SB jurisdiction... in other words, if they were collecting information on an Irish nationalist sympathizer in London and his neighbor (just for example) mentioned to a PC that she suspected he might be the Ripper because he went out at night or something like that.

Trevor Marriott has blown this whole SB thing completely out of proportion, and the mentions of the Ripper in those files is almost certainly pertaining to suspects of little or no importance at all.

RH

[Trevor Marriott]

Again, I am not suggesting that the SB had no involvement at all, as they shared information with the MET. The whole point of the SB was to collect information from various sources—informants mostly, also regular Met PCs. They collected any information that was relevant to protecting domestic security, and focused primarily on Fenians. I am well aware that there are a few references to Jack the Ripper, and my sense is that they simply came across such references when they were a part of an inquiry related to a matter that fell under SB jurisdiction... in other words, if they were collecting information on an Irish nationalist sympathizer in London and his neighbor (just for example) mentioned to a PC that she suspected he might be the Ripper because he went out at night or something like that.

Trevor Marriott has blown this whole SB thing completely out of proportion, and the mentions of the Ripper in those files is almost certainly pertaining to suspects of little or no importance at all.

RH

A bit like your book then !

[Natasha]

Also, I know its been mentioned else where, but what else can we find out about the letter sent to Yarmouth?

Sorry made a mistake about the letter I meant the letter sent to Norfolk

[robhouse]

Then what do you think the point of the Special Branch ledgers was? What were they for?

(not expecting a coherent reply...)

RH

[Natasha]

Since you mention fenians, that probably is the reason why these files will not be released

On retrospect you are most probably right in regards to the connection between the files and JTR.

The recent case like that of Jane McConnell, may be the reason why those files will not be released and will remain classified

[Trevor Marriott]

The Special Branch registers is what you need to be discussing not ledgers, there is a difference. The ledgers were used for accounting purposes.

These registers were started retrospectively to document fully all the information which had been amassed by Special Branch from a variety of sources over many years some going back to the time of Jenkinson. Files were stacking up and there was a need to get more space.

Many of the entries which were documented could have quite easily have been nothing more than hearsay or as a result of malicious communications. There is no way of knowing which is genuine information or not.

The problem with many Ripperolgists is that they see a name mentioned in a police document in connection with the murders and they never stop to think where it has come from in the first instance or whether it is hearsay or malicious. The rule of thumb seems to be "if its in a police document, or a police man is quoted as saying it" is must be true !

As to the suspect names mentioned in the registers there is no telling the provenance of these entries. My own feeling have looked into them is that they are all either hearsay or were maliciously given to the police.

All of the information gathered whether it be hearsay,malicious or genuine would have been the subject of a file and investigated and then the file written up and filed. The registers clearly show that process. Sadly those files are long gone so we are told and I have no reason to suspect otherwise.

I don't believe there is any other secret information squirreled away in the SB archives on the ripper. Had there been then I am sure Lindsay Clutterbuck would have found it when he was accessing all the archives when doing his thesis as he does touch on the Ripper files in that thesis.

For a more detailed story on the files etc this might give you some enlightened reading

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Jack-Ripper-...revor+marriott

[Debra A]

Again, I am not suggesting that the SB had no involvement at all, as they shared information with the MET. The whole point of the SB was to collect information from various sources—informants mostly, also regular Met PCs. They collected any information that was relevant to protecting domestic security, and focused primarily on Fenians. I am well aware that there are a few references to Jack the Ripper, and my sense is that they simply came across such references when they were a part of an inquiry related to a matter that fell under SB jurisdiction... in other words, if they were collecting information on an Irish nationalist sympathizer in London and his neighbor (just for example) mentioned to a PC that she suspected he might be the Ripper because he went out at night or something like that.

Trevor Marriott has blown this whole SB thing completely out of proportion, and the mentions of the Ripper in those files is almost certainly pertaining to suspects of little or no importance at all.

RH

I think you are spot on, Rob
'suspect' is a term that can be seen to be used throughout Irish Special Branch files and correspondence (these have not been redacted and are available to view as entire documents, not just brief index ledger entries) in reference to people suspected of being involved in secret societies and activities associated with those. 'Suspect XXX' is usually found at the top of the paperwork followed by a brief description of the intelligence gathered on that particular suspect from informants in the subject line, a full report then follows. Special Branch primarily gathered intelligence. What we see in the SB ledgers is just the reference headings.
The context could then be something like -suspect Wilson (of SB interest for secret society activity) is known as Jack the Ripper at Bushmills. It need not have anything at all to do with JTR or the investigations, just something an informant has passed on.