Why did Macnaghten deny Cutbush as a serious suspect?

[Mort Belfry]

The Whitechapel terror lasted about four months.The attacks escalated during that particular killing spree its true but it is misleading to think that after such an episode of insane killings the rippers "mind gave way" as Macnaghten suggests.

I purposefully didn't add that bit to the quote as that wasn't the point I wanted to illustrate. Obviously whatever happened after November 1888 to put a stop to the killings is a matter for pure conjecture and Macnagthen's comments about his mind giving way is just an easy dodge on his part. But whether arrested, interred or dead we'll likely never know what stopped him killing. What I wanted to highlight was Macnaghten's point that the Whitechapel murderer and Thomas Hayne Cutbush are unlikely to have been the same person.

What Macnaghten outlined in the quote I gave above is a precursor of profiling and a basic understanding of signature killings that was put into practical use by the FBI's behavioural unit and NCVAC in the latter end of last century.

In the case of Nichols, Chapman, Eddowes and Kelly it is obvious that the Ripper's obsession is not for rape or sadism, but for the physical destruction of what were probably objects of sexual desire to him. Like Jeffrey Dahmer, the Whitechapel murderer likely has anatomical interest in the dead.

Casually stabbing somebody years later would not be a satisfactory release on any level for the perpertrator. The victim has to be dead before the Ripper gets any thrill from it, which is why the first thing he did with his victims was to slash their throats. The Ripper wouldn't run the risk of getting caught with victims that he wasn't even going to kill, there would be no gain to the risk.

[Natalie Severn]

Thanks Mort Belfry,
It depends on what type of killer the Ripper was.If he was insane and suffering from paranoid schizophrenia for example,he would probably have been "hearing voices" which he believed were instructions to kill the street walkers whose reproductive organs were "diseased" etc etc He would not have been getting a buzz doing such murders as these, just believing himself to be "under orders to clean up the streets"for example [I know this was crafty Sutcliffe"s line but they didnt believe him and neither do I -the evidence pointed there to a sexual serial killer who wore a special suit etc].
The Whitechapel terror lasted about four months.The attacks escalated during that particular killing spree its true but it is misleading to think that after such an episode of insane killings the rippers "mind gave way" as Macnaghten suggests.He could indeed have committed suicide --lots of people with that illness did---but equally he could have gone into remission from his illness,ceased to hear his voices and presented as reasonably well and functional for some time. The next episode of psychosis could have been of a quite different order.The command voices next time could have been telling him to carefully check his water supply which was being poisoned by Catholic extremists [Cutbush"s Uncle had this exact delusion and its recorded in his Times Orbituary] or as in the case of Thomas Cutbush,that doctors were trying to poison him with drugs and needed to be shot-which he tried to do.
The notion that all insanity took the form of an unbroken line of increasing intensity is profoundly wrong.The episodes can get worse each time they occur as the mind eventually begins to disintegrate but it usually takes many years to reach burn out-ten or more-[see medical notes on Kosminski showing sharp deterioration around the turn of the century 1900 which was nine or ten years after his admission].It doesnt normally happen in just a few months . Today modern drugs can control the course of the illness to a large extent.

[Mort Belfry]

Aaron Kosminski,along with Montague Druitt and Ostrog were named in the memorandum as "more likely than Cutbush" to have been JtR----.Something doesnt make sense here,particularly since the memorandum is full of confusing innaccuracies about the ages occupations and institutionalisations of his various leading suspects.

Macnaghten does give a reason, which isn't too silly:

It will be noted that the fury of the mutilations increased in each case, and, seemingly, the appetite only became sharpened by indulgence. It seems, then, highly improbable that the murderer would have suddenly stopped in November '88, and been content to recommence operations by merely prodding a girl behind some 2 years and 4 months afterwards.

In terms of the signature killing of the known victims, Cutbush does seem to be an unlikely Ripper. On one hand you have a repeated offender who, given the opportunity, will shred a human being into as many pieces as possible, and on the other hand you have a bum stabber.

Hi Mike,
I'd rather say that Druitt and Kosminski are more likely suspects than... Ostrog.

I don't think Macnaghten necessarily loses credibility for mentioning Ostrog. Given research into him we know Ostrog to be a weak suspect now, but for Macnaghten writing back in 1894 or whenever it was, without this research having been done Ostrog would have seemed as likely a suspect as say someone like James Kelly does to us now.

[Cap'n Jack]

'Britain was, and continues to be, the most treacherous nation in the world.'

I can confirm that, they paid me £75.00 for Bangladesh, and then took the East India Company off me.
Bastards.

[Natalie Severn]

Well yes,but then the British have probably had more experience than anyone else in the field , Simon.And yes,to read what Monro and Anderson got up to by way of deceit ,duplicity and disinformation in the 1880"s makes your head spin.

[Simon Wood]

Hi Norma,

Britain was, and continues to be, the most treacherous nation in the world.

Yet people still like to think cosy things about Robert Anderson and James Monro.

Regards,

Simon

[Natalie Severn]

Thanks Simon.Not for nothing were the British known in their colonies as "The Perfidious Albion"!

[Simon Wood]

Hi Norma,

Here's the potted version [The Times, same date]—



Imperialist tactics—

Travel abroad in the name of the Sovereign, rape, pillage and generally cause military mayhem, establish a new regime with lots of pompous landmarks and form a club which none of the locals are allowed to join.

Regards,

Simon

[Natalie Severn]

Thanks for the press cutting.Do you happen to know what this Bill was about Simon?

[Simon Wood]

Hi All,

The Times, 26th June 1883—



Regards,

Simon

[Simon Wood]

Hi All,

Melville Macnaghten was Mister Disingenuous.

His 1914 memoirs "The Days of My Years" tell us—

1881: Assaulted by Indian land rioters. Meets James Monro, District Judge and Inspector General of Police in Bengal. They become good friends.

1888: Returns to England. Offered the job of Assistant Chief Constable in the Metropolitan Police by James Monro, but his appointment is blocked by Commissioner Warren.

Friendship with Monro through involvement in a "Hindoo" uprising aside, I have often wondered why the job of Assistant Chief Constable in the Metropolitan Police was offered to a tea plantation manager who just happened to return from India at the appointed hour.

Police and law experience? Zero. Zilch.

Or was it?

Melville Macnaghten was in London, attending a meeting at the Banqueting Rooms, St James's Hall, June 25th 1883, to discuss the Indian Criminal Procedure Bill.

Regards,

Simon

[Cap'n Jack]

To your earlier question, White Knight
despite the best efforts of Debra, Natalie, Robert, myself, and others we have still not been able to trace or recover material relating to TC's whereabouts between the end of 1888 and his reappearance on the streets of London in early 1891.
Perhaps the most annoying detail of the Macnaghten Memo is his own failure to mention where Thomas was during those years, for he must have known, as he had employed officers who knew Cutbush - senior and junior - intimately to research that very detail.
Although this seems to leave us staring at a brick wall, I am able to peer through such solid structures and see what lurks behind... and what I see is Macnaghten reluctant to provide such information for very good reason indeed, for if Thomas was simply at home with his mum and aunt, eating buns and studying medical books, then there is absolutely no reason not to say so, as it provides material that shows Thomas to be at home, peace and representing no danger to the general public.
But Thomas wasn't at home was he?
He was more likely in a safe house, some kind of convalescent home where he could be watched by staff and a police officer under the control of his uncle Charles.
Has anyone yet thought to check the names of the Metropolitan officers resident at such homes in early 1891 to see if any of 'em worked directly for the CO's office at Scotland Yard?

[Cap'n Jack]

Nicely said, Natalie.
Does anyone have 'Prince Jack' published in 1978?
There appears to be a reference in there to Macnaghten admitting that he had burnt 'incriminating' papers on the Ripper case in 1903 before accepting his new position.
I might have got this wrong, and it might not be a reference to the Ripper case at all... but I think it probably is, and if so, why on earth would any papers have been 'incriminating'?
Only if they implicated a police officer one supposes...or a near relative.

[Natalie Severn]

Hi again WK,
I have"nt ever thought Macnaghten was an incompetent police chief as such, but I dont believe he was as serious and committed as Monro or Anderson.He was an old Etonian with a "Tea plantation" background and seems to have had a privileged lifestyle in London Society and enjoyed friendships with sophisticated company such as his friend the writer and journalist Sims. Macnaghten also seems to have taken great advantage of more than a few "job perks" in that he had a large collection of "freebies" or crime memorabilia from the Ripper Investigation----numbers of ripper letters and artefacts including the famous "Dear Boss" letter in red ink -he allegedly had an entire room given over to such crime trophies . This is what makes his remark about poor old Inspector Race in his Macnaghten Report sound like so much hypocrisy-----in that he wonders aloud why the knife used in the Cutbush attacks of 1891 had been in the possession of Inspector Race for the past three years instead of being in the "Prisoner"s Property Store---presumably Macnaghten was very well aquainted with " the Prisoner"s Property Store" since he had a sideline in pilfering for his "crime memorabilia" from time to time .
Whatever the case he was clearly showing his disapproval of Inspector Race and one understands this may be largely to do with Race having gone to The Sun newspaper with his story about Thomas Cutbush who he had arrested in 1891 and subsequently investigated and consequently believed was Jack the Ripper.
Unfortunately The Sun"s claims that it could not print certain aspects of the story for fear of libel though it claimed all source material was available for interested parties to see, cannot now be tested,since its all been lost in time.
Whatever the situation was, Macnaghten was having none of it concerning Thomas Cutbush and was clearly prepared to trash the story once and for all in his Report . The following three ways serve to illustrate what I mean though he empoyed some other tactics in his report as well:

a] by lambasting Race [the police source for sun"s articles] having a go at him in the report over Cutbush"s knife which he states Race had kept to himself for three years and had had no right to do so

b]by turning Cutbush"s knife attacks into "mere proddings" -which they were assuredly not,since he was sent off to a hospital for the criminally insane,Broadmoor, immediately afterwards
or

c] by a ploy that was to divert attention away from Cutbush completely and instead focussing the readers attention on three individuals he actually names ie Druitt, Kosminski and Ostrog -but about whom he says there was no shadow of proof which could be thrown at any one of them!

Macnaghten it seems really takes the biscuit for wanting to have it every which way!

[White-Knight]

After another look at The Myth, I'm more hooked than ever..Although I felt convinced by Cutbush himself as a strong candidate I had not really gone for all elements of the Mac conspiracy angle on top myself, as my earlier posts suggest. I think more recently though, the memo is looking less credible and more suspicious than ever as those gaps just haven't been filled in even after more and extensive research. Look at Druitt..Aspallek has done some excellent work and unearthed some intersting snippets but the links to him being JTR are more and more tenuous..'interesting he shows interest in legal matters',' had broad soulders','physically bigger than we thought' 'played soccer' as he admits himself, we can still do no more in terms of the geography, than get him to Cannon St.. This is real progress and all but its not even in the same league as Cutbush...still.

I've thought for a while Mac was mainly protective, prejudiced and basically a bit of a dumb toff officer, maybe he was really as 'crafty' as AP suggests too.The more Druitt fades, the more Tom Tom steps forward.As for Ostrog and Kosminski..same story.. I think that bomb really did go off back then, even more loudly than when I saddled up to this 'posse' only the other day, which prompted me to look at The Myth again.

Tell me Cap'n..I've been followin as much thread on Cutbush as pos'..but have I missed news of the missing movements of Tom Tom tween the spree and Broadmoor,as posed and laid as next step for researchers, at the end of The Myth? I am in the dark. How bout you?