Farquharson's Theory

[lynn cates]

Tories

Hello Jonathan. Your position seems well reasoned. Farqy and Mac are adamant that no new killings (new--post MJK) are the work of "Jack."

If you are correct about the Druitt confession, of course that would account for their position.

Is there another possible reason why Farqy and Mac--and the Tories in general--might adhere to this opinion?

Cheers.
LC

[Jonathan H]

I had originally theorised that perhaps the brother found 'blood-stained clothes (mentioned by the original MP article) at the school, among his missing brother's digs, and maybe the real suicide note which admitted to the murders.

I felt that without Montie confessing,there was no way it would occur to brother William and/or other family members that he was 'Jack', even if they knew him to be bit unsavoury, a bit violeent with harlots.

Plus the telescoped-mythical version of the tale was of a confession in deed. Was there a confession in word in those three weeks between the final murder and self-murder?

The original MP article hints at a 'clean breast' being made too.

Then Chris Scott, a few years ago, placed the 'North Country Vicar' source on these boards and I was just thunderstruck!

If this was about Druitt, not only did he confess -- to a priest -- the confession set in motion the scheduled dissemination of the tale in 1899, in admittedly veiled form. To me it is too much of a coincidence that Mac did the same thing a month before.

the public of 1898/9 had no idea that of the two semi-fictional doctor-suspects were in competition only one admitted to being 'substantial truth in fictitious form' (the Vicar's) but both were, only one was Yard-friendly (Mac's), and only one matched the real Druitt as a man who could function after the Kelly murder before shifting off this mortal coil (the Vicar's).

[lynn cates]

investigation

Hello Jonathan. Thanks. That could be the case.

But I recall from Campbell's book, that when Sir Robert's tale about dynamite and the Tory government's complicity therein, first broke, Winnie (if I recall properly) had a quick search of the records done to see if there were any evidence that might prove embarrassing to them.

My point is that, given Lord Salisbury's government was complicit in the Jubilee dynamite plot (they were), and given the lack of desire for investigation to be made that might touch on this, could a Tory MP be forward to concoct a story that "settled matters"--using a suicide who was "ready to hand"?

The net result being, "'Ere now. Nothing to see. Move along, move along."

Cheers.
LC

[Jonathan H]

It's not impossible, just terribly unlikely i think.

The 'son of a surgeon' tale appears before the Coles murder, and does not put the police in a good light. eg. if a politician can saolve the case what do we need Scotland Yard for?

The new MP source is even worse, much worse; the police are convinced he is not dead and are 'railroading' a working man.

That's not reassuring propaganda, it's a public relations debacle!

Whereas, I think the 'Western Mail' of Feb 1892 is trying to quash the MP tale, specifically and deliberately -- even naming Farquharson!

It says that the MP's theory is 'naturally exploded' because of the Coles murder -- described here as definitely by 'Jack' -- and because the police are watching some prime suspect day and night, awake and asleep.

This story is, I believe, as made up as Sims' later herculean police hunt for the 'demented doctor', who was about to be arrested but took his own life in the Thames.

The latter mythos was made up by Macnaghten, so why not the former as thematically they are so similar?

Even if not, then Mac concealed from his fellow police that he was totally convinced by Farquharson's 'remarkable theory'.

Therefore, as we see in many sources, Druitt is unknown or disregarded by other police and yet remains Mac's secret about which he was as privately convinced as the MP and the family -- rightly or wrongly.

There was a suicide on Wimbledon Common, by pistol, which was linked by the media to 'Jack'. If you were looking for a handy suicide that one is much better, and conveniently timed because his demise was after Coles.

[lynn cates]

templates

Hello Jonathan. Thanks. I'm not sure that Lord Salisbury had much to fear after 1887 & 1888.

I find it odd that there are 2 main genera of SY suspects:

1. The drowned doctor.

2. The peregrinating night owl who was watched and who knew it.

There are so many similarities in each of these two that it seems there must be a template for each.

Cheers.
LC

[Jonathan H]

Templates

In my opinion the template for Druitt becoming a doctor had three pillars.

1. His father was a deceased, middle-aged surgeon, exactly what his son would become, awkwardly, in the reproductions of the original MP tale in 1891 eg. son of a father who suffered from homicidal mania', and so on, and in Mac's Report(s).

2. The classic 'The Strange Case of dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde' by Robert Louis Stevenson. the novella from 1886 and the stage version from 1888. A civilized doctor, with concerned chums, whose bestial alter-ego takes his own life as the forces of justce inexorably close around him.

3. The arrest and escape of Dr. Tumblety, who was arguably the major Ripper suspect of 1888, and bits of his proifle -- affluent, reclusive, about to be arrested -- become part of Sims' profile.

The template for the man being watched was a man being watched, but it came to nothing. Yet Mac recalled it and used it in 1892, I theorise, and it wound its way into the semi-fictional tale of 'Kosminski'.

[ChrisGeorge]

There was a suicide on Wimbledon Common, by pistol, which was linked by the media to 'Jack'. If you were looking for a handy suicide that one is much better, and conveniently timed because his demise was after Coles.

Hi Jonathan

Don't forget my Jewish Met policeman, PC Richard Brown, who, after being dismissed from the police, killed himself with a shot to the head in Hyde Park on Friday, November 16 at lunchtime. Is it beyond the realm of possibility that it was convenient for a senior policeman to blame a seemingly deranged schoolmaster and barrister who drowned himself weeks after MJK's murder, rather than let suspicion fall closer to home, on a policeman who did away with himself within days of the Miller's Court crime? Just a thought. Carry on.

Best regards

Chris George

[lynn cates]

O K

Hello Jonathan. Thanks. That seems to be pretty close.

Cheers.
LC

[Jonathan H]

Coles' murder did not clear Druitt

To Chris Goerge

I think that is very intriguing!

The counter, of course, is that it perpetuates a stubborn myth of the case which Mac initiated, and it lasts to this day.

That police were sure Kelly was the final victim at the time when they had no cognition of this, nor that 'Jack' was deceased or had stopped. I think it was subsequent Whitechapel murders which cleared a load of suspects, including Tumblety.

Had Druitt been thought of as a Ripper suspect in 1888, or 1889, he'd have been cleared too.

Yet he was not later on.

Subsequent murders could not clear him according to his own family?!

Surely Coles' murder would clear him. Would not the family grab at that straw, that the police were still hunting the fiend?!

The 1892 'Western Mail' piece claims this is exactly what police think. That the MP is quite mistaken -- by Coles' murder alone.

But the family didn't change their minds, and neither did Farquharson, and neither did Mac -- after he hared the tale 'some years after'.

The new source shows that a reporter goes to see the MP and asks about the implications of Coles' murder, and the police taking in Sadler.

The MP is adamant: not a 'Jack' murder for he has killed himself some considerable time before.

How does Farquharson know that?

How can he be so sure?

How can he be so sure the police are on a wild goose chase, with or without Sadler in the frame?

How does he know that the Druitt family have not changed their minds because of the Coles' murder?

Maybe he does not need to even speak with them, and since he has the date of Montie's self-murder quite wrong, he probably never did.

The persistent theme is one of rigid certainty.

Those who simply hear the full story become serene and forever immovable in their opinion about the late Mr. Druitt.

[lynn cates]

dissent

Hello Jonathan.

"That police were sure Kelly was the final victim at the time when they had no cognition of this, nor that 'Jack' was deceased or had stopped"

All the police? Surely there were dissenting voices?

Cheers.
LC

[Jonathan H]

Not to my knowledge, not in the extant record.

I am happy to be shown if I am in error. I am often wrong.

My reading of the meagre sources is that Macnaghten redacted this paradigm to the public, of the 'autumn of terror', via Griffiths, and even more extravagantly via Sims.

That the 'police' knew at the time that the 'drowned doctor' was likely the fiend, and that there would be more more Jack murders -- and there weren't.

This was deliberately putting the cart before the horse.

When Le Queux read this jaw-dropping revision in Griffiths he was not fooled, and said so in public.

You see, if you do not believe that either Druitt or Tumblety was 'Jack' you do not have to limit yourself to Kelly as the final victim?

[lynn cates]

canonical inclusion

Hello Jonathan. Thanks. But why, then, the hub bub over McKenzie and Coles?

At lower police levels it seems they were on the verge of canonical inclusion?

Cheers.
LC

[curious]

Hi Jonathan

Don't forget my Jewish Met policeman, PC Richard Brown, who, after being dismissed from the police, killed himself with a shot to the head in Hyde Park on Friday, November 16 at lunchtime. Is it beyond the realm of possibility that it was convenient for a senior policeman to blame a seemingly deranged schoolmaster and barrister who drowned himself weeks after MJK's murder, rather than let suspicion fall closer to home, on a policeman who did away with himself within days of the Miller's Court crime? Just a thought. Carry on.

Best regards

Chris George

Hi, Chris,

Very interesting article and man.

Here we have another person whose background is seemingly untraceable. With a name like Brown, it must be a nightmare to attempt to find him.

Are you still working on him?

Thanks,

Oops, I meant to add that I once worked for a man who had moved from one company to another as he followed his "star", a man whose career was above his, but who always took some of his own people when changing companies.

Something happened in the "star's" life. It has been so many years ago, the details are fuzzy. I don't recall if the star was fired or arrested or what.

The man for whom I worked died within a few days -- of a heart attack, if I recall and not of sucide.

At first, I was thinking of this as I read your article on Brown. Then his checkered military service was recounted and makes him even more interesting for consideration as the Ripper. . .

[Trevor Marriott]

Not to my knowledge, not in the extant record.

I am happy to be shown if I am in error. I am often wrong.

My reading of the meagre sources is that Macnaghten redacted this paradigm to the public, of the 'autumn of terror', via Griffiths, and even more extravagantly via Sims.

That the 'police' knew at the time that the 'drowned doctor' was likely the fiend, and that there would be more more Jack murders -- and there weren't.

This was deliberately putting the cart before the horse.

When Le Queux read this jaw-dropping revision in Griffiths he was not fooled, and said so in public.

You see, if you do not believe that either Druitt or Tumblety was 'Jack' you do not have to limit yourself to Kelly as the final victim?

And thereby eliminating Druitt and Tumblety, job done

[Jonathan H]

To Lynn

I don't understand your question?

Scotland Yard did not know, or think of, the Ripper as deceased until 1895, when Swasnon and anderson seem to have committed themselves -- and in public -- to the deceased 'Kosminski' (who wasn't).

Whereas from 1891 Macnaghten was committed to the deceased Druitt, though privately, unbeknown to the rest of the Yard.

When Mac rebooted the MP's surgeon's son story of 1891 as the 'drowned doctor' of 1898, he cleaned up the messiness of a clueless constabulary until 1891 -- and really that was just himself -- but he made the opinion seem monolithic and super-efficient.

Whereas, in his 1914 memoirs Mac conceded that 'some years after' the killer killed himself, he 'laid' to rest the 'ghost' of 'Jack the Ripper'.

To Trevor

Yes, that is one way of looking at it for sure.

Another is that the evidence against Druitt was so compelling that Mac, alone among police in 1891, realised they had been fruitlessly chasing a phantom for years -- and how embarrassing was that going to look if it came out?