'M. J. Druitt- said to be a doctor'

[Jonathan H]

To Dave

No, you're right on the second point.

On the first, Macnaghten is a primary source about the posthumous investigation of Druitt -- entirely his own and private -- which he alludes to in 'Laying the Ghost of Jack the Ripper' in 1914 (obviously he is not a primary source about the 1888murders, in terms of the police investigation as he was not yet on the Force.)

This primary source, the memoir matches the primary sources about a Dorset leak to the MP aout Druitt being the Ripper. It does not match the MP about the killer killing himself on 'the same evening' as the final murder, as Mac stretched that out to a loose twenty-four hours.

This timing shif closer to the real Druitt was enough to render the 'shrieking, raving fiend' of Sims obselete. The latter had written in 1907 that the killer could not have been functioned for a 'single day' after Miller's Ct. According to Mac he could so function, for a day and a night and maybe longer.

Not being a cop Sims is not a primary source about the police investigation, except as an outsider and journalist of the time covering the story. But he does function as a primary source on Macnaghten, wg. what the latter told him -- though semi-fictionalised -- about 'Dr D'.

[Phil H]

That the cheques were a pay-off from the school is a theory, one based around him being sacked to his face. That is putting the cart before the horse.

I don't agree Jonathan - he had cheques in his possession - you need to explain those - not me. YOU are amking the assertions so the onus is on YOU.

There are are arguably no 'errors' in the 'memorandum',

So Druitt WAS a doctor, was 41 (ten years old than his own age) is that what you are telling me? If he wasn't those are errors, they are not factual. They may be deliberate obfuscations but uit is still erroneous and as historians we have no right to assign motive without specific proof.

No Jonathan - on Druitt MM is NOT a PRIMARY SOURCE. MM is, of course, in himself a primary source and that includes his comments on Druitt - BUT those comments are drawn on allegedly primary material to which we do not have access - so they are effectively hearsay. They would not be admissable in a court - indeed MM would be torn apart by a defence lawyer on his "facts". We also know that his other two suspects (from whom MJD cannot be separated textually) are wrongly identified, Ostrog because he was in custody, Kosminski because (any new material aside) nothing we have today from the period, or through modern research connects him to the murders.

Thus MM cannot be taken as a primary source on MJD.

Phil H

[Jonathan H]

To Phil H

Everything you have written is wrong.

Also, you do not seem to know the definition of a primary source which depends on different angles.

Hearsay? A court of law?

You've got no idea have you?

Druitt was deceased -- that was the dilemma: not the identity of the murderer but how to 'lay' to rest this 'ghost' with minimal fuss to all concerned.

I don't have to explain the cheques.

They were used as part of a debunked and discredited theory that Macnaghten did not know much about the real Druitt. That the latter took his own life after being dismissed from his job -- and home -- was then paid off and thus killed himself; a tragic figure who had nothing to do with the Jack the Ripper mystery.

That is all a revisionist notion, beginning in the late 1970's, at odds with the primary sources -- and rests on the 'errors' in two significantly different versions of an internal report written for very specific and different audiences.

In the one document which he wrote under his own name for the public, there are no errors about [the un-named] Druitt.

Sadly, you never address that point.

The reason the fictional cocoon are not 'errors' is because they are what he wanted to be read by different readers -- they are deliberate deceit to be blunt.

After all, Major Griffiths changed 'family' into 'friends', and Mac never corrected this alteration in Sims' later pieces.

Do you think that discreet alteration is also an error?

Of course Macnaghten is a primary source about the claim that Druitt was the Ripper. He investigated it, I believe, in 1891. No, he didn't know Druitt and the investigation was entirely posthumous and therefore, no, he is not a primary source about the living Montie but in 1914 he did not claim to be (behind the scenes n earlier years was a different matter).

But I believe Mac spoke with the relevant family members and as a police chief he believed that their story -- about their own member -- was both compelling and convincing.

The full details of that story are lost to us but we see glimpses that the notion of Druitt as the Ripper comes from Druitt before he killed himself.

You look at this as if you are the detective who knows more about all these suspects than all of the contemporaneous police -- a big call.

[Phil H]

Jonathan, I respect your commitment to your theory highly. But you do talk a lot of tripe.

My last post was explicit and correct. You'd get nowhere if trying to publish a serious academic article.

I don't have to explain the cheques.

Yes you do, since they ARE primary evidence and you are basing part of your theory on what they are (or are not).

That is all a revisionist notion, beginning in the late 1970's, at odds with the primary sources -- and rests on the 'errors' in two significantly different versions of an internal report written for very specific and different audiences.

But WRITTEN and extant - and it is you who claim to know the motivation - that is hardly a settled point.

Sadly, you never address that point.

Because the memorandum on the official file has to take precedence.

The reason the fictional cocoon are not 'errors' is because they are what he wanted to be read by different readers -- they are deliberate deceit to be blunt.

PROVE it - evidence Jonathan is what is needed - not your half-baked theories based on a house of cards, inference and supposition.

Do you think that discreet alteration is also an error?

I don't know, but as i have already said, these errors reduce the extent to which we can reply on this material. the motivation ofor the changes is unknown.

Of course Macnaghten is a primary source about the claim that Druitt was the Ripper. He investigated it, I believe, in 1891.

But he bases his information on sources unavailable to us and unspecified except in the most general and unidentifiable terms. To that extent MM is in this instance a secondary source and he is writing hearsay.

But I believe Mac spoke with the relevant family members and as a police chief he believed that their story -- about their own member -- was both compelling and convincing.

A brother has misled the inquest as I recall. Also the key word in that part of your text is "I believe" - that's not good enough. We do not have his notes or any written account of what was said - only indications that MM was incorrect on details in his official record.

The full details of that story are lost to us but we see glimpses that the notion of Druitt as the Ripper comes from Druitt before he killed himself.

Circumstantial, conjectural and inaddmisable in any serious discussion. It might satisfy you, but it ain't history!!

You look at this as if you are the detective who knows more about all these suspects than all of the contemporaneous police -- a big call.

No, I look on it as someone who wants to see Ripper studies taken seriously, who values the historical method in using and evaluating sources. I do not grasp at anything that flies by or construct castles in the air.

I am adult enough, despite your disparagment, to know that the evidence we have available simply does not allow us to construct detailed theories such as you peddle. At the very least we need to be aware that the "top cops" of the period may have been playing games, with us, with each other (frankly i don't know) or that there was a "political element" (Fenian or other) lurking behind what we have. you know enough of the case to recognise that as true - even if you don't agree with it or believe it. So it simply does not behove us to put together elaborate and unsustainable theories.

We can, sometimes, see that two pieces of surviving evidence might connect, but we can in reality go little further. We have to build carefully, tentatively and flexibly - that is all I am seeking to point out.

You may be right in your theory in every respect (I don't know) but you cannot prove it, and have no right to mislead newer students of the case that you somehow have the answer. That's as fraudulent as the diary.

By all means advance your case, but as a hypothesis, not as fact or an absolute. Then I won't annoy you so much.

Sorry to be blunt (as I say I respect you personally but challenge you academically).

Phil H

[Jonathan H]

Again, every single thing you have written is wrong.

I have never argued in absolute terms. I am one of the few who does not.

I have also provided counter-arguments to my own theory because it can only be provisional.

Now you compare me to the appalling Dairy Cultists -- wow, that's dealing from the bottom of the deck, pal.

Druitt is Macnaghten's theory, not mine, and the conventional wisdom is that he did not know much about that suspect -- an extraordinary accusation of incompetence and callousness.

This might be true, but a full review of what is now available strongly argues against it, to put it mildly.

You use words like 'admissable' as if this is how historians work. It isn't. It's how lawyers work. You confuse historical evidence and legal evidence all the time.

Of course we know why Griffiths changed 'family' into 'friends' -- to protect them. It's not an impenetrable mystery. The first 'West of England' MP article of 1891 fearfully alluded to the libel laws, and sure enough when the story was rebooted in 1898 it was libel-proofed (eg. the MP and Dorset were dropped and the method and location of suicide, minus the correct date, were included).

You never deal with any of that.

And also that Sims' more detailed profile further spun away from the real Druitt, protecting the family and their deceased member even more.

I understand why not. Because the implications are terrifying for you, so you blithely ignore it.

But you wrote something I want you to defend because I believe it is incredibly specious; that the Mac Report (which version, by the way?) must take precedence over his memoirs. You know, the same ones that are correct about Druitt which torpedoes your argument.

[Phil H]

You use words like 'admissable' as if this is how historians work. It isn't. It's how lawyers work. You confuse historical evidence and legal evidence all the time.

You simply indicate your own ignorance of the historical method.

Of course we know why Griffiths changed 'family' into 'friends' -- to protect them.

No! We don't KNOW. That is your assumption.

It's not an impenetrable mystery. The first 'West of England' MP article of 1891 fearfully alluded to the libel laws, and sure enough when the story was rebooted in 1898 it was libel-proofed (eg. the MP and Dorset were dropped and the method and location of suicide, minus the correct date, were included). You never deal with any of that.

I don't address it because I try to avoid dealing with unsustainable theory.

I challenge you to demonstrate one clear link, evidentially, between the Mp and MM.

And also that Sims' more detailed profile further spun away from the real Druitt, protecting the family and their deceased member even more.

Sims is irrelevant to what MM knew when he wrote the memorandum.

I understand why not. Because the implications are terrifying for you, so you blithely ignore it.

Grow up and talk sense. That's what I did. I was a Druittist 35 years or so ago - convinced it was him. But for all your clever ingenuity you can still point to no clear link between Druitt, victims, crime scenes or even the east End, he has no motive, no skills and no link. the rest is purely circumstantial hearsay (unless or until prime sources show us who in the family talked to MM and why).

Nothing would please me more than to see MJD brought back into the frame - he IS interesting. But at present he can no more be linked to the crimes than can Ostrog, Kosminski or Lewis Carroll - and your intellectual gymnastics and conviction resemble that of our tame anagramatist.

But you wrote something I want you to defend because I believe it is incredibly specious; that the Mac Report (which version, by the way?) must take precedence over his memoirs.

I don't have to defend it, it is simple logic and good practice.

The memorandum is on the official file, it can be traced, via the draft (Aberconway version) to MM through his own manuscript/handwriting. the provenance is clear. In putting it on the file MM clearly rested on it his integrity as a public official. That does not make it true, factual or correct, but it does give it primacy.

The later writings and memoirs have to take a secondary place. No man is on oath when writing his memoirs/autobiography. MM's memoirs can be no more than on a par with Anderson's or Dew's etc - and you will be aware of the controversy over Anderson's integrity and bona fides.

Writings by Sim and others may be interesting but are getting too second hand to be relied on. You can construct a chain of connection that may be reasonable, even attractive but AND THIS IS MY POINT cannot be proved. Sims and others may have misheard, misconstrued or misinterpreted what they were told. MM mauy have embroidered his story.

Above all - we cannot ignore (because it is inconvenient) the fact that MM is recorded as having had another suspect. That further muddies the weaters.

Phil H

[Jonathan H]

Grow up? After you lump me with the militant Diary fantasists?!

35 years, hey?

Must really burn you to your core to think that somebody new comes along and examines the same sources and realises that the case for Druitt -- or the case for Macnaghten as a reliable primary source -- is strong, just as you abandon ship.

The Report(s) were either never sent -- so much for official status -- or he hid behind the alt-version via cronies.

The memoir is the de-facto third version in which he, for the first time, put his own name on the line in public. He went against the institutionally self-serving and exciting version he had hustled to the public via Sims.

Mac pulled back from the fiction n both versions, but I will never get somebody as close-minded as yourself to have a look for yourself ...

[Phil H]

Grow up? After you lump me with the militant Diary fantasists?!

I have no personal interest in this thread, or your theory Jonathan. I have said that I admire your commitment but not your reasoning. I have done all I can to explain why your "theory" (it isn't really that) is not properly grounded and to try to explaoin the methodology you need. I wash my hands now.

If you were to set out your views in the presence of academics such as Sugden you would be laughed to scorn. I am seeking to prevent you being humiliated in that way - but you won't have it. Que sera, sera.

35 years, hey?

Again, an attempt to indicate that i sympathise with where you are coming from is mocked.

Must really burn you to your core to think that somebody new comes along and examines the same sources and realises that the case for Druitt -- or the case for Macnaghten as a reliable primary source -- is strong, just as you abandon ship.

JUST as I abandon ship???? Hardly - I recognised the wekness of the case against MJD in the 80s though I was briefly interested in the Howells/Skinner version. But MJD no longer fits the bill for the killer to me (I don't want to use the word profile). I no longer think we are looking for a SINGLE JtR, but at a number of murders by different hands. For the "classic" Jack, I am inclined towards a "Kosminski"-type. For Stride - Kidney (probably); and for MJK someone close to her. Eddowes I retain an open mind.

"Toff" killers are, for me, a fad of the pre-centenary era, pre-Swanson marginalia et al. It is the territory of Matters and Dr Stanley, McCormick and Pedachenko, of top hats and opera cloaks of a credulous and horror-related interest. It pre-dates the detailed scrutiny and demolition of the MM memoranda with all their errors.

The Report(s) were either never sent -- so much for official status -- or he hid behind the alt-version via cronies.

I was a civil servant for nearly 40 years and understand the way british official files work. What do you mean by "never sent"? Do you not understand the concept of "note for the file" or for preparatory briefing against possible Parliamentary interest?

The memoir is the de-facto third version in which he, for the first time, put his own name on the line in public.

So what?

He went against the institutionally self-serving and exciting version he had hustled to the public via Sims.

But therein lies the problem - he changed his story and for all we know may have come to hold another view - or used Druitt et al to mask a more senitive suspect, "poilitcal" or Cutbush himself or his uncle. We simply don't know. Changed stories have to be suspect because we usually cannot identify the reasons for change in a way that can be relied on. Supposititious reasoning is, I'm afraid, not enough.

Mac pulled back from the fiction n both versions, but I will never get somebody as close-minded as yourself to have a look for yourself ...

No, I am not close minded (I am indeed sympathetic to you) but I reject speculation and circumstantial reasoning as unreliable and dangerous. It is - as I have said before - a house of cards that the wind could blow over.

We don't need these elaborate, answers all questions, mirages at present. We need close textual analysis and a fresh look at every aspect of the case. why put all our eggs in one basket? Especially Druitt when I say again there is nothing to link him to the crime scenes, to the victims, to Whitechapel, to motive to skills....

Phil H

[Jonathan H]

So ... what?

A senior police official from the relative freedom and safety of retirement finally does not hide [anonymously] behind his pals and provides an opinion under his own name in his own book, one about which he can (albeit to a limited extent as there were no names used) be held accountable both at the time and for all time.

In that account he provides incomplete material about Druitt but the little he does provide matches the known facts, unlike some of the material in his Report(s).

And your reaction to properly debate that point is to write:

so what.

Other posters like DVD and Cunnilingus have effectively counter-argued that Mac is such a cheeky-dodgy source that he cannot be judged reliable even if he uses accurate bits and pieces -- and I respect that view.

Whereas 'so what' is intellectually indefensible.

But you don't really understand historical methodology, do you?

That sources which tell two different, or even three, versions of the same story -- which happens all the time -- need to be measured against a range of sources which are more reliable.

If you ever bothered to do this you would find that the memoir chapter matches the M.P. articles -- and on a key element, where it does not, Mac is closer to the facts about his chosen suspect suggesting he found information more accurate than Farquharson.

The official version of his Report was so unknown despite sitting there in the Scotland Yard files -- as opposed to Home Office files -- that Douglas Browne must never discovered it, for if he had he would not have written that Mac disagreed with his successor about the Ripper being a man who took his own life (which means Browne could not have closely read the memoir chapter either. This would explain how he might have misunderstood the last lines, about settling the hash of a sec. of state, etc., as a literal event and connected it to Balfour).

By the way Cutbush the cop was not related to Cutbush the incarcerated madman. It's likely a deception as how could Macnaghten, whom other sources assert was competent, hands-on, compassionate and possessed of a very retentive memory, make such a mistake? I think he was manipulating, or toying with data. It is one of many deceptions in both versions including the impression -- quite false but it completely misled experienced crime writers such as Griffiths and Sims -- that 'Dr. Druitt' was a suspect in 1888, eg. whilst he was alive.

In 1914 Mac conceded that this was not true -- as we can see that it could not be from the various primary sources between 1888 and 1891.

Could this theory be wrong? Yes, I have always said so. It probably is because writers whom I respect on this subject -- Palmer, Begg, Fido et al. -- think it is terribly unlikely and novelistic.

But your worshipping of Sudgen is not a good look. You say he is an academic. Do you mean with tenure at a college or uni? Which one?

I liked his book very much but he claims that there is no linking source which could explain the 'private information'. He's dead wrong, though he probably did not know that writing it in 2006 -- with the MP's breakthrough identification still two years away.

[RavenDarkendale]

In all seriousness, his leaving a note leans toward proof that he committed suicide.

Does it? I thought we only had extracts such as "since Friday I thought I was going to be like mother..." or something similar. (If the friday concerned is not specified the letter might have been written at any time, of course.)

I don't recall the brother (William was it?) saying that the note mentioned MJD's dismissal from the school etc. I would have thought those to be of more immediate concern to MJD given the timing of his death afterwards. But assuming to separate events to be cause & effect (without supporting evidence) is always dangerous as it can be subjective and wrong.

Could it not, in fact, be a letter interpreted after the event as a suicide note. It might well be, of course that MJD did kill himself, and left an explanatory note. It could also be that some sort of mental depression or lethargy or some such had changed his behaviour - perhaps made him aggressive towards colleagues or the boys, or neglectful of his duties - and thus been the reason for his dismissal.

It's all VERY vague.

Phil H

How "vague" can a letter be that says he is afraid he'll end up like his mother (institutionalized) and it would be better if he died? Especially when the body is discovered in the Thames, rocks in pockets weighing it down. Letter interpreted after the fact? Perhaps but being missing for a month having left the note raises red flags...

[Phil H]

Raven sorry, I don't agree for the reasons already explained. think about it.

Jonathan - you have become overly fervent - that is why I chose not to go into endless debate on trivial points. I have tried to help you understand how tenuous and unprofessional your construct is - evidently to no avail.

I couldn't give a tu'penny d**n about you theory for the reason I have set out several times, there is nothing to connect MJD to the murders bar your supposition.

If we accept MM's statements at face value, then why not Anderson's equally convinced, but also currently unsustained, views on Kosminski? I actually find the latter more likely than MJD as he can be shown to have lived at the heart of the area and to have been incarcerated for mental health reasons. Further, Anderson is supported by marginalia written by an officer far more closely connected to the case in the key period than MM ever was.

On Cutbush - MM was concerned enough, whatever the reason - to write a lengthy piece for the file in relation to it. Which was my point.

I think he was manipulating, or toying with data.

If YOU think that then it effectively makes his information VERY difficult to deal with.

But your worshipping of Sudgen is not a good look.

Now you are REALLY getting carried away, Jonathan. Who's "worshipping" Sugden - I simply cited him as the author of what is widely (almost universally I think) respected book on the case, and the only one that has any academic respectability. I was referring to his methodology and that of those professional historians like him.

Your approach is closer to Von Daniken, Dan Brown. Clever and might earn you a buck or two.

The problem is that all the material you seek to stitch together is post hoc. We have no idea how reliable the Mps story may have been, what his sources were. Even if you could prove the MP and MM connected, it tells us no more than that. hence, fascinating, clever, perhaps right, but currently unproven.

I liked his book very much but he claims that there is no linking source which could explain the 'private information'. He's dead wrong, though he probably did not know that writing it in 2006 -- with the MP's breakthrough identification still two years away.

I liked his book very much but he claims that there is no linking source which could explain the 'private information'. He's dead wrong

So you reject other theories and authors and denigrate them because they do not agree with you - not on the basis of their standards, use of evidence, wider applicability etc etc. That says it all.

No point debating with you further you clearly have a closed mind to anything except your own concocted theory. That is not very impressive.

I, on the other hand, am fully open to persuasion, but on the basis of PROOF and EVIDENCE, not intellectual cleverness and speculation.

Phil H

[Jonathan H]

Oh, you care alright; you're running scared and so you you just keep repeating yourself rather than debate.

I just wrote that I take very seriously experienced and erudite secondary sources. But that Sudgen, a good writer, is wrong because he is, and it's arguably not his fault because he wrote his update two year before 'The West of
England -- Identified' article which turned everything upside down, or right side up depending on your point of view.

I have always acknowledged that the
Anderson-Swanson-Kosminski theory, to put it crudely, is strong -- especially when you read Begg who considers all sources from all angles.

The reason I subscribe with the theory that
Anderson does not accuarelt recall ius because in sources by him for the public under his own name he can be shown to be wrong, which is arguably not true of Macnaghten.

On the other hand, I think that Mac misled his chief and that 'Kosminski' the fictional variant of Aaron Kosminski actually begins with the former and not the latter (I think that Swanson is repeating Anderson's opinion, not supplying his own).

[Cogidubnus]

Other posters like DVD and Cunnilingus have effectively counter-argued that Mac is such a cheeky-dodgy source that he cannot be judged reliable even if he uses accurate bits and pieces -- and I respect that view.

I resemble that comment!

All the best

Dave

[Phil H]

You are not worth arguing with Jonathan.

[Jonathan H]

Sorry Dave, I was tired and emotional and just checking -- 'worthless' swine that I am -- to see if another poster actually reads my stuff.

The opinion about Druitt is not mine but Macnaghten's.

I am arguing that if the police chief can be shown to be a reliable primary source then Jack was probably was Druitt. That's as close as we can get. Of course Mac, the family and the MP may well have been wrong. Neverthless this certainty meant that the case was announced to the public from 1898 as probably solved, but then rebooted as a 'mystery' -- new solution from Rasputin -- in 1923.

In popular memory the solution of the Jekyllish doctor became detached from the suicide in the river, and so by the time the drowned barrister was identified the story eventually seemed a disappointment -- and worse a debacle, eg. Mac did not know what he was talking about!? The supposedly definitive solution of the Edwardian Era was exposed as nothing of the kind, and this helped create 'Ripperology'.

I appreciate that for all my efforts you feel that I have failed to make a convincing revisionist case and that's fine, and entirely a matter of friendly disagreement between us. You may well be right.