Why Did Simms Write to Him?

[curious4]

Tumblety

Greetings again,

Tumblety is, on the face of it, an unlikely suspect. He would have towered over most of the population of the East End, and if not his height, his moustache would have made him conspicuous. He would even, perhaps, have had difficulty in getting through the narrow alleys - unless, of course, he negotiated with his whiskers, like a cat.

Best regards,
C4

[mklhawley]

Greetings again,

Tumblety is, on the face of it, an unlikely suspect. He would have towered over most of the population of the East End, and if not his height, his moustache would have made him conspicuous. He would even, perhaps, have had difficulty in getting through the narrow alleys - unless, of course, he negotiated with his whiskers, like a cat.

Best regards,
C4

Hi C4,

This is actually way off the mark. When they say the average height was 5 fo 8 inches, not everyone was that height. Height would have fit the usual bell curve with many people over 6 feet. Also, it was at a time when wearing hats was the norm. Check out any photo of the Whitechapel streets. To say someone the height of Tumblety would have towered over everyone is simple wrong. Also, it was the norm to wear facial hair in the Victorian Era. Tumbletly probably would have been more noticable if his did not have a mustache. It being big? Check out the photo of Tumblety on the front of Riordan's book. The mustache contoured his face.

Tumblety himself stated when he was walking the streets of the Whitechapel district during the time of the murders he dress as to not bring attention to himself. He would have never said that if he could not blend in.

To discount Tumblety as a suspect because of modern-day bias and misconception is simply foolhearty.

Sincerely,

Mike

[Jonathan H]

To Mike

You wrote an excellent article, with alchemy as a sub-theme, didn't you, as there is that primary source, a press article, from 1888 about [an un-named] 'American herb doctor from New York' being investigated by the police (it's in Evans and Rumbelow, 2006).

In that article is mentioned somebody else promoting the outlandish idea that the fiend is a deranged alchemist, and so on (sorry, not in front of me).

Sims mentions this detail in his claims about the alternate theory at Scotland Yard (which allegedly is not the Polish Jew), about a young, weirdo American suspect, one alive, and well, long after the murders.

This is arguably a composite figure, of which Dr. Tumblety is one element (other aspects of 'Dr. T' are in the 'drowned doctor').

What intrigues me is what I believe to be Macnaghten's extraordinary memory in recalling that 1888 article, or something like it, which mentions Tumblety alongside the outlandish deranged-alchemy angle. and this ends up in his pal Sims' 1907 article -- in what I have argued is a 'scrambled egg' of Druitt fused with Tumblety.

'The other theory in support of which I have some curious information, puts the crime down to a young American medical student who was in London during the whole time of the murders, and who, according to statements of certain highly-respectable people who knew him, made on two occasions an endeavour to obtain a certain internal organ, which for his purpose had to be removed from, as he put it, '"the almost living body."'

I am not saying that Tumblety necessarily had any interest in some kind of bizarro organ-alchemy, just that Mac's mind cast a wide net over many sources, and could retrieve all sorts of tiny bits and pieces -- as the particular, propaganda opportunity demanded.

[Jonathan H]

To Mike

See how Littlechild has used the same word to describe these two received bits of information. Is this the shadow of Macnaghten?

'It was believed he committed suicide but certain it is that from this time the 'Ripper' murders came to an end.

'With regard to the term 'Jack the Ripper' it was generally believed at the Yard that Tom Bullen of the Central News was the originator, but it is probable Moore, who was his chief, was the inventor.'

In his 1914 memoirs, Macnaghten claimed that he was the one who identified the hoaxer:

'On 27th September a letter was received at a well-known News Agency, addressed to the " Boss." It was written in red ink, and purported to give the details of the murders which had been committed.

It was signed, " Jack the Ripper." This document was sent to Scotland Yard, and (in my opinion most unwisely) was reproduced, and copies of same affixed to various police stations, thus giving it an official imprimatur. In this ghastly production I have always thought I could discern the stained forefinger of the journalist indeed, a year later, I had shrewd suspicions as to the actual author!

Littrlchild writing that the murders came to an end, which coincided with the removal of a chief suspect, is also very much Mac's paradigm, though actually based on the inconvenient timing of Druitt's suicide -- the 'other' sucided doctor.

[curious4]

Hi C4,

This is actually way off the mark. When they say the average height was 5 fo 8 inches, not everyone was that height. Height would have fit the usual bell curve with many people over 6 feet. Also, it was at a time when wearing hats was the norm. Check out any photo of the Whitechapel streets. To say someone the height of Tumblety would have towered over everyone is simple wrong. Also, it was the norm to wear facial hair in the Victorian Era. Tumbletly probably would have been more noticable if his did not have a mustache. It being big? Check out the photo of Tumblety on the front of Riordan's book. The mustache contoured his face.

Tumblety himself stated when he was walking the streets of the Whitechapel district during the time of the murders he dress as to not bring attention to himself. He would have never said that if he could not blend in.

To discount Tumblety as a suspect because of modern-day bias and misconception is simply foolhearty.

Sincerely,

Mike

Dear Mike,

Have twice ttried to reply to you but the server seems to have taken against me! Will try again later.
C4

[mklhawley]

To Mike

See how Littlechild has used the same word to describe these two received bits of information. Is this the shadow of Macnaghten?

'It was believed he committed suicide but certain it is that from this time the 'Ripper' murders came to an end.

'With regard to the term 'Jack the Ripper' it was generally believed at the Yard that Tom Bullen of the Central News was the originator, but it is probable Moore, who was his chief, was the inventor.'

In his 1914 memoirs, Macnaghten claimed that he was the one who identified the hoaxer:

'On 27th September a letter was received at a well-known News Agency, addressed to the " Boss." It was written in red ink, and purported to give the details of the murders which had been committed.

It was signed, " Jack the Ripper." This document was sent to Scotland Yard, and (in my opinion most unwisely) was reproduced, and copies of same affixed to various police stations, thus giving it an official imprimatur. In this ghastly production I have always thought I could discern the stained forefinger of the journalist indeed, a year later, I had shrewd suspicions as to the actual author!

Littrlchild writing that the murders came to an end, which coincided with the removal of a chief suspect, is also very much Mac's paradigm, though actually based on the inconvenient timing of Druitt's suicide -- the 'other' sucided doctor.

No problem C4.

Hi Jonathan,

Do you think the last line of the letter was a response to Simms commenting upon a discussion he had with the Major who was convinced the killer was Kosminski (Anderson's publically preferred choice)? If so, was it a way of agreeing with Simms about the Major's choice not being correct?

Mike

[ChrisGeorge]

Greetings all,

I have a question. Why did journalist G R Simms, a man who knew these Scotland Yard officials first hand, write a letter to Chief Inspector Littlechild of all people about the Ripper case?

Sincerely,

Mike

It seems to me, from the reply, that Sims had written to Littlechild to ask, among other things, if he knew the identity of someone called Dr D, as that is the first thing that Littlechild mentions. He is being polite but seems to be saying 'Stop bothering me'.

Hi all

I also believe the Littlechild letter is genuine but there are a number of odd things about it:

1) Along with Mike's questioning why Sims wrote to Littlechild of all people, I also wonder about it... why not one of the officers in the Met who were directly involved in the case?

2) Littlechild writes back to Sims and composes the letter as if Sims did not know much about the case, though he does acknowledge Sims' "great interest. . . in all matters criminal, and abnormal".

Other thoughts:

I don't see any reason why the letter should not be typed, personal letter or not.

Rather than, as Stephen said, Littlechild "is being polite but seems to be saying 'Stop bothering me'", he goes on at length about the type of person who could have committed the crimes.

The chattiness of the letter indeed belies the cold "Dear Sir" salutation at the beginning of the letter.

Is there possibly more to the "it is finished" remark at the end of the letter? That is, might this be a clue that Littlechild might have known a lot more about the person or persons behind the murders than he was letting on? Something that he and Special Branch knew about the murders and that has not so far been revealed?

Best regards

Chris

[mklhawley]

As a retired Navy commander, I can understand why Littlechild would be privy to the Ripper case even though his department was not directly responsible. My department officers (admin, training, operations, maintenance, etc.) were all required to attend department meetings. The operations officer needed to know information about maintenance and vise-versa in order to have our unit run smoothly. Did Scotland Yard not have high-level meetings with all of the heads of departments? If they didn't, then Scotland Yard would not have run well at all. In view of this, Littlechild would have been privy to all of the significant Ripper issues.

Sincerely,
Mike

[Jonathan H]

To Chris G

I don't agree.


Littlechild was writing to his social superior and had to observe the class conventions of deference and respect ('Dear Sir ...')

On the other hand, I think that he decided in writing to a famous writer who had treated him quite rudely ('Dr D'??) that he would lay it out for both this pompous twit and the public.

After all, Sims was just a writer -- Littelchild was a real polce detective and real police chief!

He may have felt that he had the go-ahead by Macnaghten's exmaple for the time ever commenting on the Ripper case in poublic upon his retirement a few months earlier.

And whom did he say was the fiend? why Tumblety, of course, though not naming him or going into details:

"It is one of the greatest regrets of my life that "Jack the Ripper" committed suicide six months before I joined the force.

That remarkable man was one of the most fascinating of criminals. Of course, he was a maniac, but I have a very clear idea as to who he was and how he committed suicide, but that, with other secrets, will never be revealed by me."

Or, so Littlechild mistakenly thought ...

Note that Littelchild apologies for inlficting another letter on Sims.

Therefore the correspondence may have begun with the retired chief perplexed over what he thought was a dressed up version, in Sims' extant writings, of the Tumblety fumble and wanted to know where it came from?

And why is a young, weirdo, American suspect the 'other' theory?

Sims replied about 'Dr D' being the chief suspect -- a suicided doctor -- and that Griffiths had seen the 'Home Office Report' which was allegedly definitive.

Littlechild, knowing he was going to blow Sims out of the water over all this, decided to write back -- saying that this time there would be no need of a reply -- and maybe provide him with a scoop he could use to expose Anderson's conceited machinations.

If 'Dr D' was a real, separate individual, Littlechild is saying, that suspect is still nothing compared to the American doctor, as Anderson 'only thought he knew'.

To Mike

No, I think that is off-track: the idea that Sims had some kind of argument about 'Kosminski' with Griffiths, or something like that.

'Kosminski' was one of the minor suspects; a local loonie who masturbated himself into a madhouse after the Kelly murder -- but who was still alive years later (quite a different fate from what I think Mac told Anderson and/or Swanson about this fictional variant of Aaron Kosminski).

I think that in his letter Sims wrote to Littlechild, as he had in public, that 'Dr D' was the Ripper suspect at Scotland Yard, that the 'Commissioner' made a 'Report to the Home Office' which was definitive and prolcaimed the mad medico as the best suspect -- and that Griffiths, as an officer of the state, had been privy to this hallowed document.

Understandably, Jack Littlechild has never heard of Druitt. and so assumes that this 'Dr D' is a self-serving confection involving Tumblety (hence his musing that the surname's initials rhyme?) because nobody else could fit the status of a super-suspect. He also perhaps misundertood the 'Commissioner' to be Anderson, and thus the author of some 'Home Office Report' which must have misled Griffiths.

In other words, Littlechild knows nothing of significance about 'Kosminski' either because he was also not a suspect from 1888, and perhaps never.

But Littlechild knows that Anderson was hunting Tumblety, as were they all, and that it was a C.I.D. debacle -- not of his Irish Dept. So he names the real chief suspect and he names the hoax letter writer, in the same order which Anderson did not in his memoirs.

As for whether Sims knew Druitt's full name I have never doubted that he did, even before Chris Phillips discovered that a minor comic writer, Frank Ricjhdarson, knew it too (eg. 'Dr Bluitt').

But there is another indication. In his breathtaking dismissal of Abberline's dismissal of the 'drowned doctor', Sims makes the following observation on March 29th, 1903:

'How the ex-Inspector can say "We never believed 'Jack' was dead or a lunatic" in face of the report made by the Commissioner of Police is a mystery to me. It is a curious coincidence, however, that for a long time a Russian Pole resident in Whitechapel was suspected at the Yard. But his name was not Klosowski! The genuine "Jack" was a doctor. His body was found in the Thames on December 31, 1888.'

If he knew the name of the Polish Jew suspect then he certainly knew the English doctor's name too.

But Sims I think did not know that 'Dr T' was an American, middle-aged doctor suspect who was 'believed' to have killed himself after going abroad, and that 'Dr D' was a young Englishman, a surgeon's son, who was rumoured to have gone abroad -- but had definitely killed himself.

[mklhawley]

Hi Jonathan,

Thanks for that clarification. It makes sense.

'The other theory in support of which I have some curious information, puts the crime down to a young American medical student who was in London during the whole time of the murders, and who, according to statements of certain highly-respectable people who knew him, made on two occasions an endeavour to obtain a certain internal organ, which for his purpose had to be removed from, as he put it, '"the almost living body."'


In 1888, the young American medical student/sub-curator story pushed by the coroner was quickly clarified to be the Philadelphia gynacologist who was seeking body parts the year prior. I initially thought that Simms' above comment was about this story, but what never made sense to me was how Simms could screw up the 'who was in London during the whole time of the murders'. Now, it's making sense. I have to find it, but I have a newspaper article stating one of the reasons why Tumblety was suspected was because of the American medical student stuff.

Mike

[mklhawley]

Here it is:

[ChrisGeorge]

To Chris G

I don't agree.


Littlechild was writing to his social superior and had to observe the class conventions of deference and respect ('Dear Sir ...')

On the other hand, I think that he decided in writing to a famous writer who had treated him quite rudely ('Dr D'??) that he would lay it out for both this pompous twit and the public.

But he didn't lay it out for the public. It was a private letter from a retired police official.

After all, Sims was just a writer -- Littelchild was a real polce detective and real police chief!

He may have felt that he had the go-ahead by Macnaghten's exmaple for the time ever commenting on the Ripper case in poublic upon his retirement a few months earlier.

Ditto. Littlechild most assuredly did not comment on the case in public unlike Macnaghten and Anderson, even if his letter is "public" to us today.

And whom did he [Macnaghten] say was the fiend? why Tumblety, of course, though not naming him or going into details.

"It is one of the greatest regrets of my life that 'Jack the Ripper' committed suicide six months before I joined the force. . . ."

But isn't that DRUITT not Tumblety? Why do you think he meant Tumblety for heaven's sake???? All of your articles, Jonathan, are about Macnaghten/Griffiths/Sims giving different "hidden" variations of the Druitt tale. Not the Tumblety saga at all. It was Montague John Druitt who killed himself by drowning in the Thames six months before Macnaghten began at Scotland Yard. That's clear.

Littlechild, knowing he was going to blow Sims out of the water over all this, decided to write back -- saying that this time there would be no need of a reply -- and maybe provide him with a scoop he could use to expose Anderson's conceited machinations.

If 'Dr D' was a real, separate individual, Littlechild is saying, that suspect is still nothing compared to the American doctor, as Anderson 'only thought he knew'.

As I noted earlier, I don't think Sims was in the least fazed by Littlechild's advocacy of Tumblety. One suspect among many... not The Suspect: a duplicitous American quack who only briefly came to the notice of Scotland Yard as possibly having been the fiend. One individual among many men caught up in the dragnet, just as Dr T was caught up in the dragnet following the Lincoln assassination. There are some real, ironic parallels there. So Dr T was able to freely go back to the United States and live for a further fifteen more years, enjoying for a time basking in the limelight in the American newspapers for having been ever so briefly the focus of attention of Scotland Yard in regard to the Yard's most famous and notorious case. "Good for business," as Frank Tumblety would have said, tipping his Yankee slouch hat to the media for once more aiding his Indian herb business.
Indeed, Jonathan, the writings of "Super Mac" as you call him and Sir Robert Anderson show how under-appreciated Tumblety was by those in the know at Scotland Yard. He was merely an also-ran. I hope you will begin to look at him that way as well, Jonathan.

Best regards

Chris George

[mklhawley]

There are some real, ironic parallels there. So Dr T was able to freely go back to the United States and live for a further fifteen more years, enjoying for a time basking in the limelight in the American newspapers for having been ever so briefly the focus of attention of Scotland Yard in regard to the Yard's most famous and notorious case. "Good for business," as Frank Tumblety would have said, tipping his Yankee slouch hat to the media for once more aiding his Indian herb business.

Chris,

Dr. T did not freely go back to the States. He jumped bail, and the reason why he sneeked off from Dover is because his usual point of entry and departure was across the country in Liverpool. He knew they were expecting a Liverpool visit. Besides, they would not have known he had jumped bail until the court date of early December. Freely going back is simply counter to the evidence.

Tumblety's business days were over Chris, so how could this have been helpful for his business? Answer - it was not good for business.

Sincerely,

Mike

[ChrisGeorge]

Chris,

Dr. T did not freely go back to the States. He jumped bail, and the reason why he sneeked off from Dover is because his usual point of entry and departure was across the country in Liverpool. He knew they were expecting a Liverpool visit. Besides, they would not have known he had jumped bail until the court date of early December. Freely going back is simply counter to the evidence.

Tumblety's business days were over Chris, so how could this have been helpful for his business? Answer - it was not good for business.

Sincerely,

Mike

Hello Mike

To be clearer about it, Tumblety reached the shores of the United States freely and without encumbrance, the suspicions of Scotland Yard notwithstanding.

Tumblety published an edition of his autobiography in 1889 so clearly his days of self-advertising were not over. That was also not the act of a man who had been the Whitechapel murderer and who needed to lay low, was it?

Best regards

Chris

[mklhawley]

Hello Mike

To be clearer about it, Tumblety reached the shores of the United States freely and without encumbrance, the suspicions of Scotland Yard notwithstanding.

Tumblety published an edition of his autobiography in 1889 so clearly his days of self-advertising were not over. That was also not the act of a man who had been the Whitechapel murderer and who needed to lay low, was it?

Best regards

Chris

Hi Chris,

What I had pointed out was the reasons why his exit was not encumbered was because he could not legally be considered jumping bail until he fails to make his court date, and that was not going to happen until December. A warrant for his arrest would have then been issued. Him physically leaving country is the other way (and he did it), thus, they could only legally arrest him if they were following him AND were at the docks while he's boarding the ship. Scotland Yard, for every reason, believed that if Tumblety was going to attempt this it would be in Liverpool, because this was his usual point of entry/departure. Tumblety knowing he was being followed is the perfect explanation as to why he chose to sneak off in Dover on the English Channel.

Tumblety also published an autobiographical pamphlet in 1893, but these two had nothing to do about advertising for his business, as evidenced by him not doing his business. Why would one advertise a business that is no longer in operation? He was doing it for reputation as he enjoyed the twilight of his life.


To say publishing a pamphlet to counter Ripper assertions does not sound like the act of the killer is like saying Ted Bundy's interview with the press demonstrates he did not do the killing. It sounds exactly like a killer would do if his name was in the papers claiming he was the killer.

Sincerely,
Mike