Why did Macnaghten deny Cutbush as a serious suspect?

[Cap'n Jack]

'Macnaghten, of course, described Druitt as 'sexually insane' and Ostrog as having been 'detained in a lunatic asylum as a homicidal maniac'. As we are discussing Macnaghten's citing of these other men as 'more likely' suspects than Cutbush then, obviously, whether or not they actually had 'serious mental health issues' is not relevant to the argument'.
I think otherwise, Stewart, for Macnaghten was acutely aware of the mental health issues within the Cutbush family, including that of one of his most senior and most public officers; then obliquely he dances out known criminals who might have been Jack the Ripper, whilst obscuring the criminal activity of the man he is dismissing.
I imagine myself as the most senior police officer involved in the hunt for the Yorkshire Ripper, five years on with still no arrest, and with five memos in my information system telling me that Peter Sutcliffe must be the Yorkshire Ripper, so I sit down and write my own memo, dismissing Sutcliffe as the killer, because I have a tape recorded message telling me that the Yorkshire Ripper is from Newcastle.
The 'lie' doesn't have to belong to the person promoting it, for he was fed with it.

[aspallek]

Stewart,

Regarding Macnaghten's naming of Druitt, do you now believe his primary source of information was MP Farquharson?

Although, Farquharson's ramblings would have been reported to Macnaghten, and I believe the memorandum displays a bit of dependence on Farquharson, I still tend to believe Macnaghten's primary source of information was other than the MP.

Still, the identification of Farquharson clearly points to Druitt's being named as a suspect as early as February 1891, three years before the memorandum was penned and barely two years after the murders.

[Natalie Severn]

Macnaghten took the view that the Whitechapel murderer had five victims who he murdered because of his sexual insanity.Not only that but he believed the sexual insanity was of a mounting intensity which culminated in the murder and mutilation of Mary Kelly.
Whatever Macnaghten had been told about Druitt"s sexual insanity matched the picture of the ripper he had in his mind viz a depraved sexual killer whose lust intensified with each killing. Clearly this did not match what was known to Macnaghten in 1894 about Thomas Cutbush.
Macnaghten stated in his memorandum that "the fury of the mutilations "increased" in each case"-----and "the appetite[of the killer] was sharpened
by indulgence".And he added ,"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" .
And there we have the problem ,it rests in Macnaghten"s conception of the killer.
But it is known that when paranoid schizophrenics such as Thomas Cutbush become psychotic they do not work in that way if they turn into killers,and,lets be clear,if they do turn to killing, these are the killers who are capable of performing the most cold blooded,most gory and gruesome murders of all-the ones that hit the headlines of National newspapers.But, they can not be called "sexual serial killers" per se.Because,like the Ripper,there is rarely any "connection" or sign of penetration or other sexual activity.However,what there may be,and often is, is evidence of some punitive obsession connected to the sexual activity or women"s reproductive organs.As I wrote above,quotations from the Bible are often given to support and justify such obsession.And to make matters more confusing each episode of psychosis may take a different form so that it is possible to learn that such a killer may be engaged in frenzied stabbings while "obeying"his voices regarding one set of instructions, coolly pushing a work colleague who has annoyed him down a flight of stairs on another occasion ----and breaking his neck as nearly happened when Thomas Cutbush did just that to one of his colleagues at work who was in a coma for two weeks as a result-----while on another occasion randomly stabbing women in the street .
Jack the Ripper could well have been this type of killer.He was not necessarily the sexually insane killer of "progressive intensity" imagined by Macnaghten in his 1894 memorandum.

[Robert]

A variety of motives and behaviours, Nats? In other words : let's not put this dangerous lunatic in a straitjacket.

Sorry, couldn't resist.

[Stewart P Evans]

Speculation

'Macnaghten, of course, described Druitt as 'sexually insane' and Ostrog as having been 'detained in a lunatic asylum as a homicidal maniac'. As we are discussing Macnaghten's citing of these other men as 'more likely' suspects than Cutbush then, obviously, whether or not they actually had 'serious mental health issues' is not relevant to the argument'.
I think otherwise, Stewart, for Macnaghten was acutely aware of the mental health issues within the Cutbush family, including that of one of his most senior and most public officers; then obliquely he dances out known criminals who might have been Jack the Ripper, whilst obscuring the criminal activity of the man he is dismissing.
I imagine myself as the most senior police officer involved in the hunt for the Yorkshire Ripper, five years on with still no arrest, and with five memos in my information system telling me that Peter Sutcliffe must be the Yorkshire Ripper, so I sit down and write my own memo, dismissing Sutcliffe as the killer, because I have a tape recorded message telling me that the Yorkshire Ripper is from Newcastle.
The 'lie' doesn't have to belong to the person promoting it, for he was fed with it.

How we interpret what we know depends, of course, on 'where we are coming from,' and we all know where you are 'coming from' AP.

Cutbush was detained in an asylum for the criminally insane and there was absolutely no chance of either proving he was the Ripper or even taking him to court. So, even if Macnaghten and the Metropolitan Police hierarchy were overly concerned about it (and I doubt they were), it would not become a problem for the simple reason that Cutbush was insane could not be proved to be the Ripper (even if he was, and in my opinion he wasn't) nor could he be named publicly as the Ripper (no evidence existed and this hadn't been proved). It was all unsubstantiated newspaper speculation.

So all we are left with is the scenario that a mentally ill inmate of an asylum was being claimed to be the Ripper by a single sensationalist newspaper. Hardly a matter for great concern to the police apart from being another of the many attacks on their failure to capture the murderer.

[Stewart P Evans]

'A Danger to Others'

However , the research that Nick Warren carried out in 1993, Stewart, would not have been informed by the recent snippets we have had revealed through glimpses of the recently accessed Berkshire Record Office Files during the last few weeks.Moreover,as I understand, only three of the files on him -out of some twenty files that exist on him- have so far been made accessible,and yet these snippets tell me all I need to know,to confirm for me that Thomas Cutbush could indeed have been Jack the Ripper.
Indeed just one of these snippets is suffice,and that is that he was considered "a danger to others",which if you recall, Aaron Kosminski"s records did not consider him to be.

Norma, I haven't seen anything in the recent information released from Broadmoor that convinces me that Cutbush might have been the Ripper.

Just about every inmate of Broadmoor would have been considered a danger to others - that is why they were in there! But the Ripper was no foaming at the mouth lunatic - he was able to carry out a series of murders and escape without leaving a clue. Most serial killers display no obvious signs of being a danger to others which is why they often get away with it for so long. Cutbush was a rather obvious head case - and I now await the arguments for the deterioration of his condition.

However, take it as a fact, no one is ever going to prove, nor get anywhere near proving, that he was Jack the Ripper. It's just another example of bulding up a circumstantial case where no hard evidence exists.

[Trevor Marriott]

I totally agree with Stewart and in addittion would add that the evidence i would not even class as circumstancial

[Natalie Severn]

The calm,cold intelligent schizoid personality

Stewart,
The only thing that remains reasonably dependable in the case of a person who develops the illness still labelled as paranoid schizophrenia-as in the Oxford Medical Dictionary, is the basic personality which is still medically termed "schizoid".
All manifestations of the illness that may develop in a person having the original basic personality-type of schizoid into the psychotic paranoid schizophrenic can differ hugely.
It is indeed quite typical for a person to go from having a good work record,as Thomas Cutbush did when he was a clerk in the Tea Company at The Minories up to 1888,[ie according to Macnaghten],to beginning to talk , think and behave rather oddly as has been mentioned with regard to the unexpected ,murderous attack Cutbush made on an elderly man,a work colleague,who he is alleged to have waited in hiding for and hrown down the stairs,simply because the man commented on him looking at himself in a mirror rather often-or the unexpected physical assault he made later on a warder at Broadmoor he saw talking on a pathway.
Schizophrenia is a baffling illness even today for when a sufferer is "in remission" they can appear very cool calm and collected,and even when in the throes of a psychosis when they believe they are hearing voices in the night and other such bizarre delusions,they can present truly extraordinary "sang froid" ESPECIALLY when committing a violent act.The prevailing view that the norm is for such a sufferer to be "foaming at the mouth" is totally inaccurate and misleading.They are not,but rather amongst the coolest killers on the planet.
The situation viz a viz Thomas Cutbush in 1891 is very difficult to determine.He could have been visibly insane as Macnaghten maintains,but what is of crucial importance here is that he could have been having very different "delusions" than he was having in 1888 .His voices may not have been ordering him to "clean up the streets" this time but rather to stab any woman wearing a red shawl or an woman with a prominent behind etc .His mental health too would be deteriorating and the episodes of sanity or remission fewer .
However,even at this point Cutbush is recorded as having had a reasonable conversation with the rector of a church on the Embankment when he was on the run from the law in March 1891.
Best
Norma

[Cap'n Jack]

Stewart, were a long campaign but I smell victory.
As you know my work was already in the review print run prior to Nick Warren's article about Cutbush in 1993.
Just thought I'd correct that one.
My understanding is that only 3 files from the Cutbush files have been studied so far, leaving another 17, so perhaps it is better not to fire a cannon yet, or even jump a gun.
As you say the original 'Sun' articles themselves represent a large degree of speculation, especially the missing paragraph from the library copy which I believe you do possess; something I asked you to contribute to the discussion a long time ago.
However it is the response to those articles which is of greater interest; and as I've always said why should the most senior police officer of the land feel obliged to stand up and defend a complete and utter maniac from speculative new reports, especially when that maniac is confined for life under an HMP order in Broadmoor?
No reason whatsoever.
By the time the Sun published its story and Macnaghten wrote his memo, Cutbush was well beyond the reach of the law, and as you quite rightly point out if Cutbush was indeed Jack the Ripper there was buggar all anyone could do about it... apart from Her Majesty of course.
I suppose the crutch piece of the discussion has to be Executive Superintendent Cutbush's role in the entire affair, which neither you, me nor anyone else yet understands, and it is useless to pretend we do.
I know you'll agree with me that the suicide of such a high ranking officer is an extremely rare event in the history of British policing. I know of only one other, which was very recent. Without the risk of being wrong I would suggest that Charles Henry Cutbush's suicide is the most singular event in a hundred years of British policing.
My explanation for the bizarre and unique event is that Charles did the honourable thing to compensate for some great dishonour that he had part engineered.
You said earlier that a person who commits suicide must be insane.
Well Stewart, I couldn't agree more.

[Jake L]

Hi all,

So all we are left with is the scenario that a mentally ill inmate of an asylum was being claimed to be the Ripper by a single sensationalist newspaper.

I take it this refers to the liberal newspaper, The Sun.

When I came across the reports (here and here ) of Inspector Race going to the papers with his suspicions re Cutbush (see earlier thread), I assumed that Insp Race was the source for the Sun's story.

Apparently I was mistaken - seems it was not so.

According to the Sun (19th Feb, 1894 -the last installment of the Cutbush exposé) and Reynold's News of the previous day, we have Insp. Race going to The Morning Leader (T.P. O'Connor's "other paper"), not the Sun. With other papers such as Lloyd´s & Reynolds News (the truly "yellow" papers of the day) running with this story (getting Broadmoor mixed up with Dartmoor in the fray), it seems the Sun had to rush for print:

"We had this information for months in our office, for months the representatives of the paper have been searching for witnesses, examining them, often finding them only after weeks of patient labour. It was not our intention to have published the story for some weeks to come, but on Monday night I was called out to the Lobby of the House of Commons by two of my staff, to tell me that a portion of our information was to be offered to two morning papers. I am glad to say, for the credit of journalism, that The Morning, a Conservative contemporary, refused to have anything to do with a discovery the credit of which belonged to another office; in other quarters the taste and the honour were not so delicate as we had anticipated, and there was consequently nothing for it but to stop up all night and bring out The Sun as a morning paper at five o'clock instead of an evening paper at the usual hour."
- The Sun, 19th Feb Editorial

In other words, we have two papers going out with the story -the Sun with it's own investigative bit and Morning Leader with Insp Race - at the same time (plus others following suit).

It is interesting that the first part of the article is an interview of Henri Labouchere, who as the proprietor of "The Truth", it seems, was no stranger to exposés, libel cases - and hoax busting (as in the Parnell case).

It is also worth noting that although Labouchere's verdict is "at best circumstantial", the Sun included this in the report.

The other interesting bit is that MacNaghten's account of the knife doesn't quite seem to tally with the other accounts. Too many knives, one would suppose...

I guess that we'll never know what it was that transpired (in Broadmoor) in 1894 that made Race go to the press.

What would really be useful is to see what Insp. Race actually said in the Morning Leader, in other words see the article before making any sort of conclusions as to the Sun story. A great one, I might add...but I'm a pessimist by nature

/jake

[Stewart P Evans]

'Restates'

Stewart, were a long campaign but I smell victory.
As you know my work was already in the review print run prior to Nick Warren's article about Cutbush in 1993.
Just thought I'd correct that one.

AP, unfortunately there is no ultimate victory in Ripperworld. What is there to correct regarding what I said about Nick Warren's essay of April 1993 in Ripperana? It was the most detailed account of Cutbush's escapades at that early date and your book had not been published at that time. And, as pointed out in the A-Z, "A. P. Wolf restates the case against Cutbush in Jack the Myth without adducing new evidence."

[Stewart P Evans]

The Morning Leader

The Morning Leader first ran its story on 13 February 1894 and on the 15 February the final story -

[Robert]

Hi Stewart

Let's not get too hung up on the artificial organized/disorganized or psychopath/schizophrenic dichotomies.

Take Adolf Hitler. He may have been sane, but he obviously had a screw loose in a way that Goering, say, or Goebbels didn't. He murdered millions, yet as far as I know there is no record of his having personally shot, stabbed or even punched anyone during his political career. However, he had an amazing ability to connect with his irrational side. Before meeting a foreign statesman whom he wanted to intimidate, or making an important speech to the German nation, he would work himself up into a lather so that, at the crucial moment, he could tap into his inexhaustible reserves of rage and resentment. At such moments, were we seeing the real Hitler, or was it an act? The question seems almost without meaning.

Now imagine that instead of committing suicide, Hitler had been captured, judged insane and placed in an asylum. Unless his mind found a way of escaping into a catatonic dreamworld, I suspect he would have been a very disorganized and violent patient indeed.

[Stewart P Evans]

The Morning Leader

Here's a better copy of the small one above -

[Stewart P Evans]

'Hung Up'?

Hi Stewart
Let's not get too hung up on the artificial organized/disorganized or psychopath/schizophrenic dichotomies.
Take Adolf Hitler. He may have been sane, but he obviously had a screw loose in a way that Goering, say, or Goebbels didn't. He murdered millions, yet as far as I know there is no record of his having personally shot, stabbed or even punched anyone during his political career. However, he had an amazing ability to connect with his irrational side. Before meeting a foreign statesman whom he wanted to intimidate, or making an important speech to the German nation, he would work himself up into a lather so that, at the crucial moment, he could tap into his inexhaustible reserves of rage and resentment. At such moments, were we seeing the real Hitler, or was it an act? The question seems almost without meaning.
Now imagine that instead of committing suicide, Hitler had been captured, judged insane and placed in an asylum. Unless his mind found a way of escaping into a catatonic dreamworld, I suspect he would have been a very disorganized and violent patient indeed.

I'm not 'hung up' on anything, let alone psychological profiling. I was addressing points made by others with points made by Macnaghten - not conclusions (which I am not qualified to come to) drawn by myself.