Seaside Home?

[PaulB]

Hi Simon..am I not right in remembering that the seaside home records record an unknown guest (around 1891?) I'm sure I've come across that somewhere?

Jeff

First Annual Report. Since its opening until March 1891 the Home had received 102 visitors, 1 ex-superintendent, 9 inspectors, 11 sergeants,74 constables, 5 ex-police officers, "and 2 other visitors admitted by special request". This detail should be noted, but no special significance attached to it.
Paul

[robhouse]

Is not the key phrase in the marginalia:

"where he had been sent by us with difficulty"?

What was the difficulty, I wonder? Presumably not just the distance involved, so was it perhaps that the suspect concerned in this alleged identification, was not in police custody, but somebody else's?

One other point which should perhaps be mentioned: The marginalia allude to "identification". My reading of the text suggests that the witness (whoever it may have been) was shown just the one suspect and asked whether or not this was the offender. If this is what transpired, strictly speaking, it's a "confrontation". A confrontation ID is very weak from an evidential point of view, for obvious reasons - the witness is shown only one person and must either accept or reject that person as the offender. Such a procedure would have been permissible only if the suspect had been asked to stand on an ID Parade and had refused to do so. If such an offer was not made, any identification resulting from the confrontation would be invalid and not admissible. That was certainly the case in my time, but even my police service doesn't go back as far as the 19th century.

It could have been (I'm not saying it was!) that the whole "refused to give evidence" thing was a red herring to conceal a blunder in ID procedure.

If you haven't actually quite gone away, Trevor, perhaps you can confirm (or otherwise) that my understanding is correct. So much changed with PACE 1984, that it's sometimes difficult to recall, with certainty, how things used to be.

Regards, Bridewell.

This is a very reasonable idea. It seems most likely that the suspect was brought to the witness, who was perhaps either in a convalescent home, or near a convalescent home that the police could use for the identification.

[Cogidubnus]

Hi Dave,

Never take anything for granted.

Yes it's on a thread at the "other place" too - Which is why I said I took it for granted it was too difficult, meaning it had been exhausted as a possibility!


Dave

[Trevor Marriott]

If there was an identification, and if it was at the Seaside Home, and if Kosminski was the suspect (i.e. if Swanson got his facts right) then the problem of location has to be overcome.

For some reason (if he did get his facts right) an identification, involving Kosminski, was held about 50 miles from London in a (Police?) Convalescent Home. We are told that the suspect was taken there "with difficulty" for whatever reason. Taking this statement at face value (always dangerous I know) I would have to ask, if it was so difficult, why the witness wasn't taken to the suspect? Logical inference: taking the suspect to the witness, difficult though it was, was easier than taking the witness to the suspect.

My surmise - (if Swanson meant exactly what is recorded in the marginalia): there was a witness in the Seaside Home who was so ill or incapacitated that he couldn't be moved.

Regards, Bridewell.

The great difficulty in taking him down was that they took him down on a tandem Kosminski was on the front and Swanson behind. Swanson complained because Kosminski wouldnt do his fair share of the pedalling hence the great difficulty

[Simon Wood]

Hi Dave,

Never take anything for granted.

http://forum.casebook.org/showthread.php?t=310

Regards,

Simon

[Cogidubnus]

I take it for granted we're disregarding the City of London Police Convalescent Home at Dover as altogether too difficult (and not a likely venue for a Jewish witness)...

Dave

PS edit:-

Perhaps it was Anderson on his summer holiday

Love it...

[Trevor Marriott]

Hi Simon..am I not right in remembering that the seaside home records record an unknown guest (around 1891?) I'm sure I've come across that somewhere?

Jeff

Perhaps it was Anderson on his summer holiday

[Simon Wood]

Hi Jeff,

I don't know if you're right or not.

Please start digging.

Regards,

Simon

[Jeff Leahy]

Hi All,

In 1891 the Police Convalescent Home at 51 Clarendon Villas, Hove, was also the Southern Counties Police Orphanage [see Kelly Directory 1890/1891].

It had accommodation for sixteen people.

1891 Census [5th April], seven weeks after Aaron Kosminski's incarceration at Colney Hatch.

Police Convalescent Home
51 Clarendon Villas
County: Sussex
Civil District: Hove
Ecc[lesiastical] District: Brighton

Mary M.P. Griffen, Head, Lives by Own Means, 33, Born Portsea, Hampshire

Fanny March, Widow, 57, Born Ssx [Sussex] Biddlecombe

James H. Archer, Visitor, Scholar, 10, Born Brighton

James H. Cousens, Visitor, Scholar, 6, Born Leic[ester]

Letitice Roper, Servant, 41, Weeks, Ryde, Isle of Wight

Eliza Inman, Servant, 14, London, Bow

James M. Hay, Boarder, 42, Police Inspector, Kent

Henry R. Hatch, Boarder, 47, Police Constable, Mdx [Middlesex] Southall

Frederic Child, Boarder, Police Constable, 20 (?), Bucks, Beaconsfield.

It's hard to imagine the Metropolitan [or City] Police bringing history's most infamous murderer to a small house in Hove tenanted by women and children.

Regards, Simon

Hi Simon..am I not right in remembering that the seaside home records record an unknown guest (around 1891?) I'm sure I've come across that somewhere?

Jeff

[Simon Wood]

Hi Dave,

There was a Jewish Convalescent Home in Brighton, unconnected to the police. Unfortunately for our purposes it was the Jewish Children's Convalescent Home at 35 Montgomery Street, Hove, which opened post-1891.

Regards,

Simon

[Cogidubnus]

Apropos of nothing Simon, wonder where Biddlecombe in Sussex is? I've not heard of one...either way...next stop Jewish Home?

Dave

PS Edit - wonder if Biddlecombe is actually the name she was born under...it's a peculiarly Sussex name from the Heathfield/Waldron/Frant area DW

[Simon Wood]

Hi All,

In 1891 the Police Convalescent Home at 51 Clarendon Villas, Hove, was also the Southern Counties Police Orphanage [see Kelly Directory 1890/1891].

It had accommodation for sixteen people.

1891 Census [5th April], seven weeks after Aaron Kosminski's incarceration at Colney Hatch.

Police Convalescent Home
51 Clarendon Villas
County: Sussex
Civil District: Hove
Ecc[lesiastical] District: Brighton

Mary M.P. Griffen, Head, Lives by Own Means, 33, Born Portsea, Hampshire

Fanny March, Widow, 57, Born Ssx [Sussex] Biddlecombe

James H. Archer, Visitor, Scholar, 10, Born Brighton

James H. Cousens, Visitor, Scholar, 6, Born Leic[ester]

Letitice Roper, Servant, 41, Weeks, Ryde, Isle of Wight

Eliza Inman, Servant, 14, London, Bow

James M. Hay, Boarder, 42, Police Inspector, Kent

Henry R. Hatch, Boarder, 47, Police Constable, Mdx [Middlesex] Southall

Frederic Child, Boarder, Police Constable, 20 (?), Bucks, Beaconsfield.

It's hard to imagine the Metropolitan [or City] Police bringing history's most infamous murderer to a small house in Hove tenanted by women and children.

Regards,

Simon

[Cogidubnus]

But thereagain....

But why would a copper express recognition but then fail to come up for the start? So it's the Jewish Convalescent Seaside Home? Is that what you're suggesting Bridewell?

Dave

[Cogidubnus]

Seeing Light?

Ah now that WOULD make sense...I believe "Curious" surmised something along these lines early in the thread...we are talking presumably a recuperating copper...don't suppose they had an Injuries Book in those days...

Dave

[Bridewell]

If there was an identification, and if it was at the Seaside Home, and if Kosminski was the suspect (i.e. if Swanson got his facts right) then the problem of location has to be overcome.

For some reason (if he did get his facts right) an identification, involving Kosminski, was held about 50 miles from London in a (Police?) Convalescent Home. We are told that the suspect was taken there "with difficulty" for whatever reason. Taking this statement at face value (always dangerous I know) I would have to ask, if it was so difficult, why the witness wasn't taken to the suspect? Logical inference: taking the suspect to the witness, difficult though it was, was easier than taking the witness to the suspect.

My surmise - (if Swanson meant exactly what is recorded in the marginalia): there was a witness in the Seaside Home who was so ill or incapacitated that he couldn't be moved.

Regards, Bridewell.