Where was Jack the Ripper's payment? How much did Mary Jane Kelly charge?

[Bridewell]

and yet neither Hutchinson's name nor his description appear in any document penned by a senior police official.

I'm pretty sure both appear in the statement taken by Sgt Badham and counter-signed by Abberline.

[Wickerman]

Hi Jon,
I haven't written a single word about - less still invested any significance in - the presence or otherwise of witnesses' names "in the press every week". I have been discussing the treatment of those witnesses in the fullness of time; the faith ultimately placed in them by senior investigators, and the roles they played - if any - in attempting to identify suspects. Hutchinson's suspect, if real, could not possibly have provided an alibi. He was the most likely suspect in the Kelly murder, adjudged to be the work of the ripper, and yet neither Hutchinson's name nor his description appear in any document penned by a senior police official.

Hello Ben.

Ah, “in the fullness of time”, and “the faith placed in them by senior officials”. So not what the press indulged themselves with throughout the spate of the murders, and not official police documents penned at the time of the murders?
So you are still promoting the recollections and memoirs of those officials penned long after the murders had ended.
Recollections of the sort you criticized as “Dew spew”, at one time.

Remember Hargrave Lee Adam?,
Not a police official but a well respected crime historian who was on very friendly and personal terms with several police officials, namely Anderson, Warren and Macnaghten, and Fred. G. Abberline. So much so that he was able to put their experiences and beliefs in writing.
You have no doubt heard of his extremely informative, The Police Encyclopedia, and for the sake of this exchange, The Trial of George Chapman.

H. L. Adam when writing his, Police Work from Within, 1914, included the final officially acknowledged description of the killer:
“A description of a man with whom the deceased was seen early on the morning of the 9th was given by a man who knew Kelly well. The description was as follows " Respectable appearance. Height 5 ft. 6 in., age between thirty-four and thirty-five, dark complexion and moustache curled at ends ; wearing dark coat with astrachan trimmings, black necktie, horseshoe pin, dark gaiters, light buttons on boots ; massive gold chain."

A man in Adam's position was sufficiently connected with police officials to know whether the final description had been dismissed due to certain doubts harbored by police against the witness - Hutchinson.
No such doubts existed.

Then, sixteen years later when writing about Abberline's suspect for his book, The Trial of George Chapman, 1930, Adam's included the same final witness description:
“Here is his description of the man "Respectable appearance; height, 5 feet 6 inches, and age between 34 and 35; wearing dark coat with astrachan trimmings, - black necktie, horse-shoe pin, dark gaiters, light buttons on boots, and massive gold watch chain."

Within the same book, a chart of comparative details between Jack the Ripper and George Chapman were listed, we read:
“Description given of the man seen with the woman Kelly: "Height, 5 ft. 6in.; age, 34 or 35; dark complexion, with moustache curled at ends."

“This is a most faithful description of Chapman.”

This, once again is Abberline's theory, not the theory of the writer. Abberline had passed away in 1929, just one year before this book was published.

You've yet to explain the logic of the police supposedly "giving the reporters the brush-off in an attempt to steer them away from the Isaacs/Astrachan investigation"......
secondly, have you considered the potentially dire conaequences of employing such reckless and senseless subterfuge? What if the general public, lulled into a false sense of security by the “false” claim that Hutchinson’s story was discredited,..

No fear of that, there never was a claim by police that Hutchinson had been discredited.
The privacy of all suspects is to be respected by the police until they are charged with something. Which includes dismissing certain journalists with lies and misinformation.

It really amazes me how you can be so comfortable with elaborate, pointless ploys involving the police lying to the press,

It is well proven to be the case.

.....and yet can’t seem to get your head around the basic concept of journalistic invention and embellishment.

Journalistic inventions like,..”Another story now discredited, etc.” you mean, or the statement that....”..was considerably discounted because the statement of the informant had not been made at the inquest”.

Such basic journalistic inventions have been known to form the basis of theories promoted by those who sadly do not know any better.

Use your imagination....

No, I'm sorry Ben, you have cornered the market on imagination I'm afraid.

Why do some press sources receive preferential treatment over others? What was so special about Tom Bulling that he received more inside information than rival journalists? Because they had a better reputation, perhaps? Because they weren’t known for adopting a hostile stance towards the police’s efforts? Because some senior police figure felt he could rely on a particular press figure, because they were both members of the same ornithological society?

Who, at the Echo was the equivalent of Tom Bulling?

It may not have dawned on you that the Central News was one of the preferred agencies used by Scotland Yard & the Met. to release official police communications to the media.
In this respect the figure of Tom Bulling being given “preferential treatment” can be seen to be solely as part of his function in this business arrangement. Official communication from the authorities had to go through someone at the Central News, that figure was most likely Bulling given his position at the agency.

So I ask again, who (for goodness sakes) at the Echo could have been the equivalent of Tom Bulling..

All you need to appreciate is that it happens in real life all the time, and it certainly happened in this case.

And there's your imagination shifting into overdrive again...
YOU, say so, not exactly the voice of authority, and certainly not a reliable source.

[Wickerman]

There's plenty of evidence, as I've just illustrated for the umpteeth time, and as I'm prepared to repeat for so much longer than you're capable of persisting, fruitlessly and boringly, to the contrary.

Until you learn what constitutes "evidence", I'm afraid you may very well resign yourself to repetition.

Albert Einstein is widely credited with saying “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, but expecting different results”.

In other words, expecting your verbal repetition to suddenly sound convincing may fall under that definition.

They were reporting on what the "authorities" had told them - whether they were doing so truthfully or as part of some exercise in utterly pointless inventon is for you to decide, but "speculation" doesn't come into it.

I have no issue with the Echo approaching Commercial St. Stn. What the police did was merely confirm that both stories came from the same source.
Well, Hutchinson had already done that, he had repeated the story to a Central News reporter that he saw the deceased in Comm. St with a man aged 34-35, etc. Which repeated the same details as the 'unnamed' source had provided thereby informing every reader that he was the unnamed source.
This story first appeared in the morning papers of the 14th so the public had known all day that both sources had come from the named individual, it was no revelation by the time the Echo went to print in the evening.
Like I keep telling you, it was public knowledge.

Yeah right, Jon - 'course you did.

Is this a juvenile inner self coming to the fore?

In which case, thank you Mrs. Kennedy!

"Although no evidence was produced at the inquest as to her having left her room after one o'clock, at which time she was heard singing, the police have obtained statements from several person's who reside in Millers Court that she was out of her house and in Dorset Street between two and three o'clock; and it appears almost certain that her life was taken about the last-named hour".
Source: The Press Association - 14th Nov. 1888.

Consistent with what Mrs Kennedy told the press, only she apparently was not the only one who saw Kelly.

Yes Ben, you are indeed indebted to Mrs Kennedy.

[Wickerman]

The Echo complained about the police telling them nothing....

[I]..... since we know full well that they didn't complain after mid-November, after their appetite for police information had been satiated.

Well, lets take a look at the Echo from Dec 24th 1888.
The murder in Clark's Yard.

Inspector Wildey and detectives under his direction are making searching inquiries to-day respecting the mysterious crime committed at Clark's Yard, and certain evidence which the police will not divulge, tends to show.....etc.

(Re: evidence pointing to a sailor..) This fact, coupled with other incidents which have transpired, are considered by the authorities as of an important character, though the police are naturally reticent on the subject..."

In another paragraph they report having to obtain their information from witnesses in the immediate area of the crime.

Funny.... I could have sworn someone on here asserted till he was blue in the face that the Echo had a "special" relationship with the police.

Pff, I must'a been dreaming.

[Ben]

I'm pretty sure both appear in the statement taken by Sgt Badham and counter-signed by Abberline.

Yep, just as Packer's name appears in his statement, and Violenia's in his.

[Ben]

Hi Jon.

“Ah, “in the fullness of time”, and “the faith placed in them by senior officials”. So not what the press indulged themselves with throughout the spate of the murders, and not official police documents penned at the time of the murders?”

I’m simply saying that the reported discounting of Hutchinson’s statement – which occurred shortly after his initial visit to the police station, as faithfully related in a source that makes clear the fact that they obtained their information from the police – correlates very well indeed with the absence of any reference to Hutchinson or his statement in the not-so-very-much-later documents written by senior police officials. I suggest, as many students have the case have argued before, that this was not a coincidence.

If you’re expecting an "official police document" to be written and shared with the public every time a self-proclaimed witness gets ditched, you’re not being very imaginative (again). Anyway, how do you know that wasn’t such a document that “unfortunately hasn’t survived”? How do you know it wasn’t one of those conveniently “lost reports” that you keep trying to invoke whenever you’re challenged to provide evidence for a document which you insist “must have” existed at some point?

Speaking of highly questionable invocations, you have made several claims regarding Hargrave Adam that I doubt you will be able to substantiate.

Where is the evidence that Adam was ever on “very friendly and personal terms” with Abberline? They can’t have been on any terms at all in 1914; otherwise the former would have made reference to Klosowski and the Pall Mall Gazette interview. He corresponded with Anderson at that time, and discussed his conflict with Henry Smith over the identity and ethnicity of the killer, but never once mentioned Abberline or his advocacy of Klosowski. Your suggestion, therefore, that he obtained the Hutchinson description from a “very friendly” Abberline prior to 1914 is impossible nonsense. He can’t have done, or else he would have known all about Kloswoski and enthused expansively on the subject, as he was years later to do.

I encourage anyone who might have been led astray by Jon’s inaccurate claims to read the relevant chapter from “Police Work From Within” (1914) in full here:

http://www.casebook.org/ripper_media/rps.policework.html

Adam demonstrably had no contact with Abberline on the subject of witness descriptions - and probably no contact at with him at all - in 1914. His inclusion of the Hutchinson description in his ripper chapter was neither suggested nor endorsed by Abberline. So what was it doing there? Well, I think we can guess. Adam tells us that the complexion of the man Hutchinson described was “dark”, which wouldn’t be true if he was using the actual police statementas his source, which described the complexion as "pale". Evidently therefore, he was using the only source for a "dark-complexioned" Astrakhan, which was Hutchinson’s press interview, available to anyone and everyone. Suffice to say, the quoted description was not accompanied by any suggestion from the author that it was endorsed by the police. Whose words are you using, by the way, when you describe Astrakhan man as the “final officially acknowledged description of the killer”? I can’t find it anywhere in any of the sources you referenced, and I have a disquieting suspicion that those words are yours only.

When Adam referred to Hutchinson’s description again in 1930, following the death of Abberline, he simply repeated what he had written in 1914, which was based not on police opinion, but a newspaper article from 1888. Your claim that the Klosowski-Astrakhan comparsion was “Abberline's theory, not the theory of the writer”, is thus utterly devoid of any substance.

“No fear of that, there never was a claim by police that Hutchinson had been discredited.
The privacy of all suspects is to be respected by the police until they are charged with something. Which includes dismissing certain journalists with lies and misinformation.”

…Which these “certain journalists” then feed to the public, accepting them to be true because they were obtained from the police? So, if a member of the public spots Astrakhan-the-ripper, but doesn’t alert the nearest policeman because he had just read in the papers that the police no longer sought Astrakhan types, what then? Astrakhan the ripper gets away, that’s what; his trail grows cold, and all thanks to the criminally stupid and absurdly illogical antics that you suggest the police adopted.

Or, OR, for slightly more sane explanation; the police felt comfortable informing the Echo that Astrakhan man had been discredited because it was true.

“Journalistic inventions like,..”Another story now discredited, etc.” you mean, or the statement that....”..was considerably discounted because the statement of the informant had not been made at the inquest”.”

Invention? I thought the police were supposed to have lied to the Echo, who then unwittingly published these lies and inflicted them on the public? Or were they were merely “speculating”, as you previously insisted? That’s three entirely different, but equally bad excuses for dismissing the Echo article. I do wish you would just pick one, and make up your mind. When people invent things, they generally do so for a good reason, but there was no reason – good or otherwise – for claiming falsely that yet another witness had been discarded. Nothing could be less juicy or less sensational, and it wouldn’t even have made the police look “bad”, if that was their motive. On the contrary, it would have highlighted their proactivity and unwillingness to accept a statement without proper “investigation”.

“It may not have dawned on you that the Central News was one of the preferred agencies used by Scotland Yard & the Met. to release official police communications to the media.”

And it may not have dawned on you – in fact I’m certain it hasn’t – that the relationship between the police and the Central News was actually rather fraught, with the latter often acting against the wishes of the former. This was especially true in the case of Hutchinson, where Central News published an interview with Hutchinson, clearly in conflict with the police’s intentions, and including lots of extra material that was absent from the original statement. You might also wish to visit the link Garry provided, where the Central News’s less-than-stellar reputation is alluded to.

You can persist for however long you wish in the obvious delusion that the police never exhibit a preferential treatment towards some newspapers or journalists over others, just as you can persist in the delusion that police indiscretions never occur, or that the press never receive case-related information, or that politicians never lie, or that your poo never stinks, but you would still be wrong on all counts.

[Ben]

“Albert Einstein is widely credited with saying “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, but expecting different results”.

Great advice, but you don’t seem very willing to take it on board.

Whenever you repeat the same nonsense over and over, I will counter-repeat, using the very same points that I used to extirpate the nonsense the first time. Sometimes I’ll word myself differently, but at other times I won’t bother; I’ll just visit the archives and copy-and-paste my original response. I don’t expect it to produce “different results” on you when I do this. I’m not trying to convince you of anything; I know all too well that you won’t allow yourself to be convinced by anything that doesn’t point towards an educated, well-dressed gentleman being Jack the Ripper. But I don’t enjoy the keyboard-warrior approach – in which the warrior repeats himself ad infinitum and hopes that his opponent gets bored enough or exhausted enough to stop responding – and it certainly won’t work against me.

“Well, Hutchinson had already done that, he had repeated the story to a Central News reporter that he saw the deceased in Comm. St with a man aged 34-35, etc. Which repeated the same details as the 'unnamed' source had provided thereby informing every reader that he was the unnamed source.
This story first appeared in the morning papers of the 14th so the public had known all day that both sources had come from the named individual, it was no revelation by the time the Echo went to print in the evening.
Like I keep telling you, it was public knowledge.”

No, it wasn’t.

A casual observer could easily have assumed that two separate people had seen the same individual, and that the two descriptions were “virtually” the same because the person being described was wearing the same clothes. The police would not have been anxious for it to become “public knowledge” that a description that they had been responsible for circulating had “proceeded from the same source” as an entirely unsanctioned press interview, which contained numerous embellishments. On the contrary, they would have sought to distance themselves from the 14th November account. The relevant point, which you keep trying to bury in more and more rubble, is that the police imparted accurate information to the Echo after receiving them at Commercial Street police station. Would they then publish lies about the reason for Hutchinson’s “very reduced importance”, knowing full well that the consequence of such action would have been an embargo on any future audiences with the police? The answer is absolutely no way.

...Like I keep telling you.

“Is this a juvenile inner self coming to the fore?”

Not at all. I just don’t understand why you couldn’t have been honest and admitted that you had forgotten that Kennedy’s evidence appeared in the Evening News on the 10th, as opposed to pretending you knew all about it, but wanted to “see how I would handle it”.

"Although no evidence was produced at the inquest as to her having left her room after one o'clock, at which time she was heard singing, the police have obtained statements from several person's who reside in Millers Court that she was out of her house and in Dorset Street between two and three o'clock; and it appears almost certain that her life was taken about the last-named hour".
Source: The Press Association - 14th Nov. 1888.”

That whole article is nonsense, as we’ve discussed before. I always felt sorry for some of those further-away newspapers that had to rely on “telegrams” – essentially fag-ends from London which ranged from the distinctly unreliable to the provably false. Let’s see what else the article has to say: “It is conclusively proved that Kelly having spent the greater part of Friday evening in the Britannia Publichouse, at the corner of Dorset street, returned home about midnight with a strange an whose company she had previously been keeping.” – Do you agree with that? Exactly, it’s nonsense. Had there been any suggestion that “Mrs. Kennedy” knew Kelly personally and was the last person to see her alive, she would unquestionably have appeared at the inquest.

“Funny.... I could have sworn someone on here asserted till he was blue in the face that the Echo had a "special" relationship with the police.

Pff, I must'a been dreaming.”

I guess you must’a been.

Because I certainly never used the word “special” in the context of the Echo’s relationship with the police.

I’m pretty sure I only drew attention to the basic reality that sometimes the police supply some information to some journalists. The fact that the police were adopting a tight-lipped attitude at one stage of the investigation does mean that they would never discuss any case-related information at any stage thereafter, and nor does it preclude them from going back to tight-lipped again after that.

Complicated stuff, obviously.

You’ll notice that in neither of the articles you quoted were the Echo remotely critical of the police for not disclosing information at that stage.

Regards,
Ben

[Observer]

Hi Ben

Other than Hutchinson's "admittance", for want of a better word, that it was he whom Sarah Lewis saw loitering in the vicinity of Millers Court at 2:30 a.m. on the morning of the 9th November what other evidence do we have that it was indeed him ?

Regards

Observer

[Ben]

Hi Observer,

I would have to include the only reliable press sketch of Hutchinson, which depicts a shortish, stoutish man wearing a billycock or wideawake hat - and is thus a good "match" for Lewis's description. It remains a possibility that she saw someone other than Hutchinson, but such is the striking similarity between her sighting and his "admitted" behaviour, that is must be considered an exceptionally remote one, in my opinion.

Jon'll back me up on this!

All the best,
Ben

[Garry Wroe]

Invention? I thought the police were supposed to have lied to the Echo, who then unwittingly published these lies and inflicted them on the public? Or were they were merely “speculating”, as you previously insisted?

As I've said on previous occasions, Ben, dismissing what at the time was considered to have been a stellar witness would have done nothing for the Echo's credibility or circulation. It makes no sense whatsoever. Had someone at the Echo sought to peddle misinformation it seems far more likely that this would have related to something that Hutchinson had purportedly seen or heard whilst watching Kelly and Astrakhan - in other words, something with the whiff of sensationalism about it. But to kill a story that potentially still had plenty of mileage left in it strikes me as beyond absurd.

[Ben]

Agreed, Garry.

The above would also apply to the Star report from 15th November, which described Hutchinson's account as "another story now discredited". Pulling the plug on a story that still had plenty of journalistic mileage - and claiming falsely that the police had ditched it - made no sense whatsoever.

The same report also dismissed Packer as having peddled a "worthless story", but for some reason people don't "dismiss" that dismissal as they do with Hutchinson's. Strange, that!

All the best,
Ben

[Garry Wroe]

Give it time, Ben.

[Wickerman]

Hi Jon.
I’m simply saying that the reported discounting of Hutchinson’s statement – which occurred shortly after his initial visit to the police station, as faithfully related in a source that makes clear the fact that they obtained their information from the police...

This is the crux of the matter, there is no "clear fact" involved. The Echo made a claim, an unsourced claim, which implied the police have entertained doubts, but there is no direct reference to the police, either City or Met. or even to Scotland Yard.
The reason given for this suggested doubt (in Echo 14th Nov.) was that this statement had not been given at the inquest, which is complete and utter rubbish, this is why we know it is false.
The police take unsworn statements all the time - a police statement IS unsworn, this is among their daily duties, and every statement is investigated to their satisfaction.

Next, as for the "latest inquiries" and "later investigation", used in the Echo of the 13th with reference to Hutchinson's story, this is overturned by a follow-up article on the next day - 14th, where they write:

"The police do not attach so much importance to this document as some of our contemporaries do; but they think it sufficiently significant to induce them to make it the subject of careful inquiry."

So they are still investigating his story - making careful inquiries, yet the Echo on the previous day would have us believe the police have already concluded the story is to be doubted.
Someone at the Echo had dropped the ball, they just scuttled their own story - which is one firm indication that what they write is pure conjecture and not derived from any official sources at all.

If you’re expecting an "official police document" to be written and shared with the public every time a self-proclaimed witness gets ditched, you’re not being very imaginative (again).

That's the level of the bar Ben. When you insist it is a fact he was discredited then you set yourself up for failure when you cannot provide the required proof - "fact" requires "proof".
Your argument cannot be any stronger than "he may have been discredited", and leave it at that - just conjecture.

Anyway, how do you know that wasn’t such a document that “unfortunately hasn’t survived”? How do you know it wasn’t one of those conveniently “lost reports” that you keep trying to invoke whenever you’re challenged to provide evidence for a document which you insist “must have” existed at some point?

The fact his statement has survived, but any paperwork pertaining to his dismissal has not, is a bit awkward for that theory.

Abberline's interest in Isaacs stemmed from Nov 10/11th - the missing lodger.
This makes him a person of interest in connection with the murder of Kelly.
Nothing whatsoever to do with the later attack on Annie Farmer, which some of the press had conjectured in early December. Which is why Abberline was so interested in Isaacs when he was seen to resemble the man described by Hutchinson.
Which shows that as far out as Dec. 6th Abberline had Hutchinson's story in the forefront of his mind.

When Adam referred to Hutchinson’s description again in 1930, following the death of Abberline, he simply repeated what he had written in 1914, which was based not on police opinion, but a newspaper article from 1888. Your claim that the Klosowski-Astrakhan comparsion was “Abberline's theory, not the theory of the writer”, is thus utterly devoid of any substance.

What Adam wrote in 1930 was this:
"Chief Inspector Abberline, who had charge of the investigations into the East End murders, thought that Chapman and Jack-the-Ripper were one and the same person. . . . . . . Abberline never wavered in his firm conviction that Chapman and Jack-the-Ripper were one and the same person. When Godley arrested Chapman Abberline said to his confrere "You've got Jack-the-Ripper at last!"

Indications within the Pall Mall Gazette (1903) suggest that Abberline only recently developed the 'Chapman was the Ripper' theory and to the best of our knowledge Abberline never put pen to paper to detail out his theory to anyone. That being the case Adam likely never knew of Abberline's theory until he began researching for his book, The Trial of George Chapman.

When you write a book with the intention of crediting the theory to a well respected ex-Inspector of police who is still alive it would be very wise if not professionally expedient to make sure the named inspector did still maintain the same theory in 1930 as he had in 1903.
Since 1903 Abberline 'could' have changed his mind, or been in possession of some further details either confirming or discrediting his earlier theory.
It would be extremely embarrassing for Adam if Abberline had changed his mind. So a meeting between the author and the ex-inspector is essential, and perhaps indicated by the quote I provided above.

…Which these “certain journalists” then feed to the public, accepting them to be true because they were obtained from the police?

Not their concern, and given the aggravation caused by the actions of nuisance reporters, it's quite possible they derived some small pleasure from it.

Invention? I thought the police were supposed to have lied to the Echo,...

The "discredited" bit was from the Star, not the Echo, and the Star never claimed to have obtained their info from any police - therefore, conjecture, invention.

And it may not have dawned on you – in fact I’m certain it hasn’t – that the relationship between the police and the Central News was actually rather fraught, with the latter often acting against the wishes of the former. This was especially true in the case of Hutchinson, where Central News published an interview with Hutchinson, clearly in conflict with the police’s intentions, and including lots of extra material that was absent from the original statement. You might also wish to visit the link Garry provided, where the Central News’s less-than-stellar reputation is alluded to.

I already knew about that. The press agencies were the preferred outlet for official press releases from Scotland Yard. The police did not deal directly with any individual newspaper on any subject concerning the murder investigation.
The fact the Central News was not entirely honest in their business relationship with Scotland Yard only reflects true life situations - no-one is entirely honest and no-one is entirely crooked. Both used each other for their own ends.
The police used the press, and the press used the police, they both complained about each other yet they both needed each other - that was the reality.

[Wickerman]

That whole article is nonsense, as we’ve discussed before. I always felt sorry for some of those further-away newspapers that had to rely on “telegrams” – essentially fag-ends from London which ranged from the distinctly unreliable to the provably false.

Every newspaper country-wide used telegrams issued by the press agencies, how do you think the London papers obtained the Hutchinson interview...
Was that distinctly unreliable or provably false?

You’ll notice that in neither of the articles you quoted were the Echo remotely critical of the police for not disclosing information at that stage.

Like this you mean?

Writing early this afternoon our reporter said: The police exhibit so much reticence that it is really a matter of great difficulty to obtain any information whatsoever.
Echo, 17 July 1889.

I'd say that was a complaint, wouldn't you?


When an Echo reporter presented himself at the mortuary, he obtained – unintentionally on the part of the police – a piece of information. “You can't come in,” said the constable who opened the gate. “Only persons who wish to identify the body can be admitted.” “Then has not the body yet been identified?” asked the reporter; and the constable replied, “Not yet.”
Echo, 17th July 1889.

Unintentional is not a euphemism for cooperation.


An Echo reporter this morning visited Dr. Phillips, the Divisional Surgeon of Police,..... in the hopes of obtaining some further particulars from him. In this, however, he was disappointed. Like the officers at the Police-station, Dr. Phillips at once refused to give any information concerning the crime. He was courteous but firm. “I am not an independent party,” he said. “I have refused to give information to others; so you must excuse me if I refuse to give information to you.”
Echo, 17 July 1889.

The officers at the police station apparently refused to give information to the Echo.


Writing at two o'clock, a Press Association reporter said: - Rumour has it – but no confirmation can be obtained from the police – that the deceased was a charwoman, known in the neighbourhood as “Alice.”
Echo, 17 July 1889.

Yes, a general attitude towards the press, no special treatment for anyone.


The excitement in the locality has been intensified by the announcement that a man answering the description of the individual popularly known as Jack the Ripper has been arrested. This rumour the police refuse to affirm or deny.
Echo, 17 July 1889.

Still, no cooperation with the Echo.

The Echo never had any 'understanding' or 'special' treatment with Scotland Yard or the Met at any time throughout the Whitechapel murder investigation.

[Ben]

Hi Jon,

There police provided some information to some newspapers some of the time, whereas other papers, due to their hostility towards the police, did not receive any information. But there was no such thing as a newspaper or press source that received all the relevant information all the time.

If, for any reason, these basic concepts are still too taxing for you to take on board, do let me know and I will attempt to simplify further.

Here is an example of the police sharing information the Echo, and not their "morning contemporaries". It is from the 7th December, it relates to your chum Isaacs, and it utterly repudiates the dross attributed to Abberline in other papers:

“The East End police this morning gave an emphatic denial to the report that the Whitechapel murderer was arrested yesterday. “The only ground” assert the officials, “for such a story is that a cab containing a prisoner drove up to the police-station, and the cry was at once raised, “There’s Jack the Ripper”. The man was apprehended on a warrant for robbery. The authorities declare there is not the slightest reason for asserting that he has been in any way engaged in the commission of the murders”.

Like this you mean?

Writing early this afternoon our reporter said: The police exhibit so much reticence that it is really a matter of great difficulty to obtain any information whatsoever.
Echo, 17 July 1889.

I'd say that was a complaint, wouldn't you?

No, I wouldn't - because it isn't.

At least not in the sense that it implies any sort of criticism of the police for not sharing that one particular piece of information on that one particular occasion.

Then you provide another irrelevant example, unworthy of re-requoting in this post, of a constable refusing entry to anyone who was not in position to identify the body, which so obviously ruled out all members of the press. Then you provide other irrelevant examples, equally unworthy of reproduction, of the police refusing information in specific instances, without receiving an ounce of criticism for so doing.

The Echo never had any 'understanding' or 'special' treatment with Scotland Yard or the Met at any time throughout the Whitechapel murder investigation.

Which is an erroneous, proven-false claim that your press trawl doesn't illustrate in the slightest. I'm not sure on what planet three examples of refused information equates to "never" sharing "any" information, but please join us on ours.

Regards,
Ben