Likelihood that witnesses would tell truth to police?

[Pcdunn]

This is all very interesting.
I wasn't so much trying to pin down a particular witness as a liar, as trying to determine how the populace of Whitechapel in general would reply to the police.

I am intrigued by the witnesses who swore they had seen Mary Kelly alive hours after the presumed death of the woman found in her room. What would be the gain to them to lie?

[Wickerman]

I don't know how familiar you are with life in Whitechapel at the time, there are a few helpful sources around.
Whitechapel was not entirely crime ridden, no doubt the more affluent members upheld the efforts of police. Any citizens who had experienced a run-in with police, or perhaps had a criminal record may not have been so helpful.

It was likely more common not to come forward at all, than to come forward to mislead the police.
Being unhelpful often means staying silent, and we have plenty of examples of potential witnesses not coming forward where it would be expected to find someone who saw something.

So generally speaking the citizens were as mixed in their responses as they were in their social status, and no doubt in their ethnicity.

[GUT]

This is all very interesting.
I wasn't so much trying to pin down a particular witness as a liar, as trying to determine how the populace of Whitechapel in general would reply to the police.

I am intrigued by the witnesses who swore they had seen Mary Kelly alive hours after the presumed death of the woman found in her room. What would be the gain to them to lie?

Perhaps Caroline Maxwell and Mr Lewis were both honest and mistaken, or perhaps they were spot on and TOD by the doctor was wrong.

[Pcdunn]

Perhaps Caroline Maxwell and Mr Lewis were both honest and mistaken, or perhaps they were spot on and TOD by the doctor was wrong.

I would go with "honest and mistaken" before I would expect that the Doctor could be off his time of death estimation by several hours!

Still, "I 've 'ad the 'orrors" is chilling when attributed to Mary Kelly, supposedly already dead for hours.

[martin wilson]

Hi all

A lad in Walsall totally lost it with a woman bus driver, effing and blinding.
One of the blokes who works for the bus company got in his face saying ' say that to me' the lad pushed him away and the bus worker clocked him one.
The lad called the police, they were talking to both of them and a woman who was in the queue called across and a policewoman took her somewhat biased statement blaming the lad for everything.
The policewoman took her details.
The witness said "I've got a record, I can tell you that".

Little slice of life there.
all the best.

[lynn cates]

T O D

Hello GUT.

"Perhaps Caroline Maxwell and Mr Lewis were both honest and mistaken, or perhaps they were spot on and TOD by the doctor was wrong."

Indeed. And there seems no concord between Phillips and Bond on TOD?

Cheers.
LC

[GUT]

Hello GUT.

"Perhaps Caroline Maxwell and Mr Lewis were both honest and mistaken, or perhaps they were spot on and TOD by the doctor was wrong."

Indeed. And there seems no concord between Phillips and Bond on TOD?

Cheers.
LC

G'day Lynn

Precicement.

[Wickerman]

Indeed. And there seems no concord between Phillips and Bond on TOD?

Hi Lynn.

As you know we have nothing but press rumors concerning the opinions of Dr Phillips, and more than once we read how reticent Phillips is about talking to the press.
Reporters never did find anything reliable first-hand from the doctor, and here (below) in this well known paragraph from the Echo we read that Dr's Bond and Phillips agree on "nearly every conclusion".
Tantalizingly, we are left to wonder what they did not agree on.

The quote below must refer to the brief report that has survived made by Dr. Bond for Anderson, and here we are given the all important conjecture on Kelly's time of death as between 1:00 - 2:00 am.

Whether we agree with the method of deduction or not is immaterial. Given that Dr. Bond is present with the approval of Dr. Phillips, and the quote below suggests it was made jointly, an important question is would Dr. Bond betray that professional courtesy by reporting a different time of death than Dr. Phillips, considering that he knows the opinion of Dr. Phillips will be the official one and the one submitted at the inquest.
If the doctors could not agree on an important point such as time of death, would Bond not make a point of indicating this in his report?
As we know, no such disagreement was noted.

"Dr. G.B. Phillips, the divisional surgeon of the H Division, whose reticence is justified by an assurance he gave of secrecy, has copious notes of the result of the post-mortem examination, and with nearly every conclusion at which he has arrived. Dr. Thomas Bond, of Westminster, a well-known expert on crimes of violence, agrees. Dr. Phillips has only vaguely indicated to the local police the result of his investigations, but a report on the question has, it has been asserted, been jointly made by him and Dr. Bond, and submitted to Sir Charles Warren."
Echo, 10 Nov. 1888.

[SirJohnFalstaff]

I think it was probably harder to lie at the inquest for one you would be under greater scrutiny. While some may have been helpful as rosella points out, Tom W also does a good job in the beginning of his bank holiday book of showing that in the emma smith murder those involved seemed to have an attitude of "keep your mouth shout and dont talk to or involve police at all". He also shows someone like Pearly Poll had no problem lying at the inquest.

You have to consider the timetable. While I'm certain there was some "keep your mouth shut" attitude among the population of Whitechapel, I think there is a strong possibility that this would melt quite a bit after the double event.