Upon what basis did the Druitt family suspect Montague?

[Jonathan H]

Has Druitt been re-fictionalized?

To Robert

Everything you are writing is a theory based on very limited primary sources.

And it is a painfully weak theory, though I grant you this is the long-standing, conventional, collective wisdom of the 'community' about Druitt, the allegedly cleared never-really-a-suspect.

In effect, Montie has been fictionalized all over again (as he once was disguised as a middle-aged physician) by some of today's cognoscenti; as a tragic innocent totally unconnected to the Whitechapel crimes -- not even delusionally connected.

To make this face-lift work it means a person has to ignore every other primary source, ones which are arguably more reliable about Montie than a press story -- where Druitt was a deceased stranger to the reporter (who never even mentions his name).

That Druitt was depressed because he was sacked from the school is a theory.

That Druitt was sacked whilst alive is also a theory based on a single source.

That the line 'since Friday ...' refers to going mad like mother -- rather than being sectioned like mother -- is a theory about that source, not a fact.

This is what Henry Farquharson was saying about [the un-named] Montie Druitt, from the same region and 'better' class, a few years after the latter killed himself:

The Bristol Times and Mirror

Feb 11th 1891

'I give a curious story for what it is worth. There is a West of England member who in private declares that he has solved the mystery of 'Jack the Ripper.' His theory - and he repeats it with so much emphasis that it might almost be called his doctrine - is that 'Jack the Ripper' committed suicide on the night of his last murder. I can't give details, for fear of a libel action; but the story is so circumstantial that a good many people believe it. He states that a man with blood-stained clothes committed suicide on the night of the last murder, and he asserts that the man was the son of a surgeon, who suffered from homicidal mania. I do not know what the police think of the story, but I believe that before long a clean breast will be made, and that the accusation will be sifted thoroughly.'

Druitt suffered from homicidal mania, not from suicidal depression over being let go from the lesser of his two vocations.

When another unfortunate was killed in the East End, two days later, and a suspect had been arrested, Farquharson would not be moved. He was thus ahead of the police about the arrested sailor and Coles as not a Jack victim:

From 'The York Herald' and 'The Yorkshire Herald'

Feb 18th 1891:

'The member of Parliament who recently declared that 'Jack the Ripper' had killed himself on the evening of the last murder, adheres to his opinion. Even assuming that the man Saddler [sic] is able to prove his innocence of the murder of Frances Coles, he maintains that the latest crime cannot be the work of the author of the previous series of atrocities, and this view of the matter is steadily growing among those who do not see that there is any good reason to suppose that 'Jack the Ripper' is dead. So far as Saddler is concerned, there is a strong feeling that the evidence will have to be very much strengthened against him by next Tuesday, if he is to be committed for trial. His manner in the Thames Police-court was consistent with any theory.'

In 1907 this is how the public were [partially] let in on it, anonymously, by Macnaghten via George Sims, this time referring, obliquely, to Blackheath and the search by William:

'The third man was a doctor who lived in a suburb about six miles from Whitechapel, and who suffered from a horrible form of homicidal mania, a mania which leads the victim of it to look upon women of a certain class with frenzied hatred.

The doctor had been an inmate of a lunatic asylum for some time, and had been liberated and regained his complete freedom.

After the maniacal murder in Miller's-court the doctor disappeared from the place in which he had been living, and his disappearance caused inquiries to be made concerning him by his friends who had, there is reason to believe, their own suspicions about him, and these inquiries were made through the proper authorities.

A month after the last murder the body of the doctor was found in the Thames. There was everything about it to suggest that it had been in the river for nearly a month.'


Here is Sir Melville Macnaghten in 1913:

Washington Post (Washington, D.C.)

4 June 1913

'FATE OF JACK THE RIPPER

Retiring British Official Says Once Famous Criminal Committed Suicide
London Cable to the New York Tribune
The fact that "Jack the Ripper", the man who terrorized the East End of London by the murder of seven women during 1888, committed suicide, is now confirmed by Sir Melville Macnaughten, head of the criminal investigation department of Scotland Yard, who retired on Saturday after 24 years' service.

Sir Melville says:

"It is one of the greatest regrets of my life that "Jack the Ripper" committed suicide six months before I joined the force.

That remarkable man was one of the most fascinating of criminals. Of course, he was a maniac, but I have a very clear idea as to who he was and how he committed suicide, but that, with other secrets, will never be revealed by me."

Here is another version of what he said at his 1913 press conference announcing his retirement:

Pittsburgh Press

6 July 1913

'Following out his observation regarding the necessity of the ideal detective "keeping his mouth shut," Macnaughton (sic) carried into retirement with him knowledge of the identity of perhaps the greatest criminal of the age, Jack the Ripper, who terrorized Whitechapel in 1888 by the fiendish mutilation and murder of seven women.

"He was a maniac, of course, but not the man whom the world generally suspected," said Sir Melville. "He committed suicide six months before I entered the department, and it is the one great regret of my career that I wasn't on the force when it all happened. My knowledge of his identity and the circumstances of his suicide came to me subsequently. As no good purpose could be served by publicity, I destroyed before I left Scotland Yard every scrap of paper bearing on the case. No one else will ever know who the criminal was - nor my reasons for keeping silent."

For this theory to work, of A depressed Montie killing himself over his dismisal, or something else, it means that we in 2013 know more about the real Druitt than a highly regarded police chief of the day, albeit one who made a posthumous investigation, and who was so incompetent he could not figure out that this man killed himself because he had been sacked from his teaching job?

Nor apparently could his family figure this out either?

For file Sir Melville wrote that Druitt:

'... He was sexually insane and I have little doubt that his own family believed him to have been the murderer.'

Why put themselves through the horror of such a 'belief' -- and the potential for family ruination -- if it was all so simple and non-criminal; that he killed himself due to a non-violent mental disease?

[RivkahChaya]

Hi Riv and Dave

There is no evidence of impaired functioning that I am aware of.

It could have been very subtle, and it might not have been anything serious-- he could have had dizziness, poor coordination, and fatigue from an inner ear infection, for example, and memory lapses making him disorganized because he was sick (inner ear infections are insidious, because they aren't painful the way middle ear infections are, and don't produce cold symptoms, other than a headache or nausea; if you get a fever, it is often a low one; I had one once, that presented first with dizziness and nausea, so I thought it was food poisoning; it was only when it didn't go away for a couple of days, and I had headaches and blurry vision that I saw a doctor), but if he was hyper-vigilant over any onset of symptoms, he could have made something simple and transient out to be the beginning of the end, in his mind. If it made him lose sleep, it could have snowballed-- he could oversleep, and not show up to teach, getting him sacked, and making him feel as though he was on a downward spiral, because that's how his mother went.

If he was in addition slightly prone to clinical depression, which people with a tendency to other neurological problems are, and not because they are depressed over their other problem, but more likely because they have a common cause, he would also be the type of person to assume the worst.

So, it wouldn't have to be anything anyone else was aware of.

I know from my experience that people with degenerative diseases manage to keep them a secret long after diagnosis. They themselves notice something is "off," and see a doctor, but may not tell anyone else, other than a spouse, for years.

[Robert]

Hi Riv and Dave

There is no evidence of impaired functioning that I am aware of. Monty's cricket dues were paid up. He was registered at King's Bench Walk for 1889 which seems to suggest that he planned to keep up this business address, and he was performing in court till virtually the very end. Of course, something happened at the school but we don't know what. It could be something as simple as failure to juggle his court work and his school work, till Valentine got fed up and gave him the push. His cricket form seems to have suffered too, but we can't hang too much on that.

Jonathan if he is suppposed to have killed himself because of Kelly, then as somebody once joked, you'd have thought he'd have started to have doubts about his mental health a bit earlier than that. Walking off with a woman's womb is wacky,that's for sure.

[RivkahChaya]

Monty had no immediate financial worries. He left a goodly sum. i suspect the thing that would have depressed him the most about being sacked, was his exclusion from the social scene including his beloved cricket.

Granted, we'd pretty much taken the ball and run far afield, but what I was saying wasn't so much that he was flat broke, as that he was beginning to mismanage things, like writing checks that weren't covered-- even when he had money. It just wasn't in the right account (I don't really know how accounts worked then-- maybe you had just one account for both checking and savings, or maybe if you had checking and savings, a banker who knew you might freely transfer to cover a bad check as a favor, without asking your permission, considering he couldn't just call you to ask about it). I was building on the suggestion that the checks may have been returned. Honestly, I still don't know whether they were written to him or by him. If they were returned, they might show that he was breaking down mentally.

Although, I guess whether they were for something he meant to pay, and hadn't gotten around to, or checks he hadn't deposited because he was having lapses of some kind, then that still explains why he'd go in the water with them in his pocket.

[Jonathan H]

This is a primary source about the death of Montague Druitt.

It is quite different, in its focus, from what some people here are speculating upon:

Southern Guardian
England
Saturday, 1 January 1889

SAD DEATH OF A LOCAL BARRISTER.

The Echo of Thursday night says : — "An inquiry was on Wednesday held by Dr. Diplock, at Chiswick, respecting the death of Montague John Druitt, 31 years of age, who was found drowned in the Thames. The deceased was identified by his brother, Mr. William Harvey Druitt, a solicitor residing at Bournemouth, who stated that the deceased was a barrister-at-law, but had lately been an assistant at a school at Blackheath. The deceased had left a letter, addressed to Mr. Valentine, of the school, in which he alluded to suicide. Evidence having been given as to discovering deceased in the Thames — upon his body were found a cheque for £60 and £16 in gold — the Jury returned a verdict of "Suicide whilst of unsound mind."

The deceased gentleman was well known and much respected in this neighbourhood. He was a barrister of bright talent, he had a promising future before him, and his untimely end is deeply deplored.

The funeral took place in Wimborne cemetery on Thursday afternoon, and the body was followed to the grave by the deceased's relatives and a few friends, including Mr. W.H. Druitt, Mr. Arthur Druitt, Rev. C. H. Druitt, Mr. J. Druitt, sen., Mr. J. Druitt, jun., Mr. J.T. Homer, and Mr. Wyke-Smith. The funeral service was read by the vicar of die Minster, Wimborne, the Rev. F.J. Huyshe, assisted by the Rev. Plater.

[Cogidubnus]

Hi Robert

You say that Montie had no immediate financial worries, his estate being in the region of £2,600 - but how much of that was immediately realisable?

There is a big difference between cash immediately realisable (eg in hand and current account), cash on deposit (perhaps available at 90 days notice), or other realisable assets...which might include stocks/shares/property etc.

If you're sufficiently disorganised or emotionally upset (like mother?) it's still quite possible to be long-term financially secure, but short-term vulnerable - especially if you've been used to paying off largeish outgoings from immediate earnings...if a couple of cheques have bounced would that be shameful enough?

I don't know...and I appreciate it's fanciful, but has anyone checked?

All the best

Dave

[Jonathan H]

Yeah, I guess so, that must have been a real bummer, that and being a vicious serial killer who was about to be sectioned by his own family ...

[Robert]

His estate was in the region of £2600.

[Robert]

Monty had no immediate financial worries. He left a goodly sum. i suspect the thing that would have depressed him the most about being sacked, was his exclusion from the social scene including his beloved cricket.

[Jonathan H]

No room at the Inn?

To Caz

As expected you did not deal with my essential point about a covertly fictionalized suspect (the drowned doctor) being compared to an overtly fictionalized suspect (the Vicar's Ripper).

And that the former helps the image of the police better than the latter, yet the latter fits the real Druitt better.

I understand why you don't.

Sims is not saying that the Vicar's tale is an hoax. That is not his meaning at all.

He is saying that the cleric is real but is inevitably ignorant of the ways of criminal lunatics; that on their death-bed they will lie to make 'a good exit', rather than make an honest confession.

Plus Sims is blithely rewriting the Vicar's tale. The latter is not claiming to have received the confession, in person, at all.

Sims' trump card is that the real Jack had no time to confess anything to anybody because he killed himself immediately. But that is not true of Druitt (and Macnaghten in his memoirs created a twenty-four hour gap which is enough time to confess to 'his own people') who had three weeks to confess anything to anybody he chose.

But I agree with your point about Victorian sentimentality.

The Vicar wants to see the Ripper as an ill man, rather like a family member would, one who does not want to see Jack as evil.

I think the cleric tried to defend the un-named Montie before the pesky reporter by saying that he had gone originally to the East End to help Unfortunates. Realizing that he should not have said that, he quickly added the Mac-Griffiths fictional shield that he had been 'at one time a surgeon' (again Mac does not see Druitt as so mentally ill that he was not responsible for his crimes. He was turned on by ultra-violence: the Nero of the East End).

How well did this muddying the waters work by the cleric who would not compromise?

RipperLand in the 21st Century rejects the 'North Country Vicar' source as being about Druitt, or of any significance whatsoever.

'Gone abroad' obviously means that the club thought Montie was overseas and so he had to be dismissed. They would not have done this if his any suicide notes had been discovered.

It's just common sense, whether they meant the phrase literally or euphemistically they would not have written it into the official minutes of their club's records if they knew by the 21st of Dec. that Montie was missing and had left a message that he was off to do harm to himself.

This suggests that the primary source is correct: a worried William did not arrive until the 30th of Dec. because Montie was not missing until that moment -- he had left word that he was suddenly abroad, specific location unknown.

This fits Sims' version: that the friends believed that he was the Ripper because he and vanished from the place at which he lived (not worked, as the mad doctor did not work at all).

So, William Druitt arrived on the 30th and found out that his brother had been sacked from the school for the same reason: AWOL. He searched his sibling's belongings and either found one or two, suicide notes which alluded to suicide due to the fate of their mother.

Whether that was literally true, about finding the note(s), the point is the inquest had to be satisfied as to Montie killing himself due to some kind of breakdown, not murdered or self-murdered due to guilt over something.

For example, William did not make any claim that it was because his brother was dismissed from the school, and no other source even bothers to mention this detail at all, probably because it was redundant.

The received wisdom on all this -- Druitt as a tragic gay suicide totally unconnected to the Whitechapel crimes -- was always weak as it flew in the face of the very same surviving primary sources which were being used to construct this myth.

The vicar only wants to see Jack as ill, not evil. Whereas some modern researchers, in their zeal, have gone much further by supposedly getting Druitt off the hook as a suspect altogether.

Yet this theory hung from a slender thread: the theory (treated as fact) that Mac did not know much about Montie.

This is now a now discredited theory since the identification of the MP in 2008 as the missing bridge had at last been found between the Druitt family in Dorset (that's likely Vicar Charles, by the way) and the affable police chief via the Old Boy Network.

My contribution, considered nothing much here, is the revisionist reassessment of sources by the police chief, or about him, or on his behalf.

For example, the frantic friends in Sims, searching for the missing mad doctor, is clearly brother William and the friend who alerted him fictionalized for public consumption. That is not a detail which could be in P.C. Moulson's report about the recovery of Druitt's water-logged corpse.

To know that detail, about the hunt by the brother, Macnaghten either read the same 1889 sources as we do, or he met with the family, or a family member.

Either way he originally knew, in about 1891, that Druitt was a young barrister who killed himself three weeks after the Kelly atrocity.

Confirmation is that Mac's memoirs disagree with M.P. Farquharson about the murder and self-murder taking place the same evening, and do not claim that the murderer was a middle-aged medico.

But for many people here, and in recent, authoritative secondary sources, this theory of a meticulously briefed, competent and discreet Macnaghten is flatly rejected because there does not seem to be room for two police chiefs to be just as certain about their preferred Ripper suspects.

[RivkahChaya]

If you're facing, for example, terrible financial difficulties, and are considering doing away with yourself, you do NOT attempt to put your affairs in order...suicide is, in fact

All true, but then, I thought that went along with the leaving a note part; people who are in dire straits, and have dependents sometimes try to make the suicide look like an accident, or, if they read the policy carefully, an "impulse."

What if the two cheques found about his person were returned ones?

I hadn't thought about that. How did the business of refusing or returning checks go back then? Did the school issue him his last paycheck, then stop payment because he was fired? or were they checks he wrote that got returned? did banks return them by mail then? I suppose if he thought his body would never wash up, he might have wanted to take them with him, rather than burn them, or something-- it could have even been some sort of compulsion. In that case, the train ticket might somehow have represented guilt or failing that he deliberately took with him.

Also, if he couldn't keep track of his personal affairs, and not for lack of trying, but maybe for memory lapses, that may be why he felt he was "going to be like mother."

In my experience (and I have some), people who are having first psychotic episodes, of schizophrenia, or manic episodes of bipolar disorder with psychotic features (the best modern equivalent of "crazy"), don't have a good perspective on the fact that something is going wrong, but people who are having memory lapses, or just not taking care of business as they should, due to the onset of something like Alzheimer's, or Huntington's disease, are at first, very aware that something is wrong with them. As it progresses, they become less aware, but in the beginning, it can be very frightening.

I don't know what Druitt had, or what his mother had, I'm just saying that if he couldn't keep track of his finances, because he sometimes couldn't remember where he'd spent money, or he lost checks, or forgot bills, and paid more in interest, he could certainly feel like he was "going crazy," like his crazy mother.

Just a thought.

[Cogidubnus]

Hi Rivkah

If you're facing, for example, terrible financial difficulties, and are considering doing away with yourself, you do NOT attempt to put your affairs in order...suicide is, in fact, (at least in part), being contemplated as a way of escaping that. You don't discuss it with your family/friends either...sometimes not even a spouse...

You even try to avoid opening envelopes that might contain a bill or dunning letter...to the extent that post piles up until you can summon courage to open it...debt management charities/agencies recognise this and offer counselling to help...

With the loss of his steady school earnings did Druitt face financial pressures? Has anyone ever had this checked out? What if the two cheques found about his person were returned ones? This might explain a good deal...

Just a thought

Dave

[RivkahChaya]

With his impending suicide taking up every waking thought at that point, I doubt Monty would have worried about messing up anyone's bookkeeping.

Well, I was being flippant, but what I really meant, was that people who commit suicide to the extent of leaving a note generally put their affairs in a little bit of an order-- they cancel appointments, take pets to the shelter, seriously, and sometimes a person not having done such things has caused a medical examiner to rule a death not a suicide, or at least to rule it an "impulsive" suicide, which is a modern way of saying "temporary insanity," and such a ruling can sometimes allow survivors to collect on insurance.

I guess I'm still not sure whether the checks were written to Druitt, or from him, but if they were to him, couldn't a family member bank them? I guess I would think he'd leave them with the note, but I suppose maybe he didn't check his pockets carefully. It's hard for me to imagine, but I suppose back them, people wore pants over again without laundering them, and stuff might end up at the bottom of a pocket.

As far as arguments that a story must be true because if it were fiction, it would be a better story, with fewer loose ends, that just strikes me as stupid. It reminds me of psychics, who claim that we have to believe they have real powers because of the fact that they fail pretty often. If it were all an act, like stage magicians, they'd succeed every time, or so the claims of people like Uri Geller go.

[caz]

Hoaxes within hoaxes

This is the the theme of the Vicar's tale: the fiend was not a fiend at all, but a gentleman who was good but destroyed by a mental affliction over which he had no control.

Hi Jonathan,

As soon as I saw your words - and before I read on and saw your reference to the Maybrick diary - I felt like I was being smacked over the head with it: "tis love that does destroy..." and the plea to anyone who should discover Sir Jim's confession: "Remind all, whoever you may be, that I was once a gentle man. May the good lord have mercy on my soul, and forgive me for all I have done. I give my name that all know of me, so history do tell, what love can do to a gentle man born".

In short, the fiend was not a fiend at all, but a gentleman who was good but destroyed by a love over which he had no control.

You see why I'm sceptical about the Vicar's Tale, as published in the Mail? And why I think the diary was a similar kind of tale, told a long time ago, when such tales were fashionable?

Using the same logic as those who advocate the Maybrick Diary as likely to be authentic because it is so dodgy, you would not construct a tale as convolucted and unsatisfying as the Vicar's if the whole thing was made up and/or the clergyman did not even exist.

Oh but that's exactly the sort of thing being made up at the time. Who didn't enjoy reading a good old yarn involving the ripper confessing all on his death bed? Plenty of real people made false confessions at the time of the murders, but when these began to dry up, the next best thing would be to invent someone's confession and claim it was really by the murderer this time - a hoax within a hoax. You have Sims saying it better here than I could, and in genuine Victorian-speak too:

'There are bound to be various revelations concerning Jack the Ripper as the years go on. This time it is a vicar who heard his dying confession. I have no doubt a great many lunatics have said they were Jack the Ripper on their death-beds. It is a good exit, and when the dramatic instinct is strong in a man he always wants an exit line, especially when he isn't coming on in the little play of "Life" any more.

I don't want to interfere with this mild little Jack the Ripper boom which the newspapers are playing up in the absence of strawberries and butterflies and good exciting murders...'

He recognises the Vicar's Tale for what it is, and not just because he claims to know the real Jack didn't get a chance to confess. That was just him showing off his supposed inside knowledge. He knows the Vicar's Tale has hoax written right through it like a stick of Blackpool rock.

At the inquest we are not sure what happened in terms of the details; whether there was two notes or one, or whether behind that there were any notes at all because a key witness, George Valentine, was not there.

You are surely not suggesting that William invented Monty's note addressed to Valentine? I think you'd do better to stick to the forgery theory. Valentine was sure to be interested in the details of the inquest, and all hell would have broken loose if he had heard that such a note had not been given to him but opened and read by someone else.

What we do know is the cricket club sacked Montie because they thought he was overseas.

'We' know no such thing, Jonathan. You only think you know. Your failure to find what you describe as 'credible' examples where 'gone abroad' simply meant 'can't be found' doesn't mean the cricket club minutes didn't contain a perfectly credible example. What do think it means whenever people have referred to the ripper being 'abroad' in Whitechapel? It may sound old-fashioned these days, but it's perfectly good English and the meaning could not be clearer.

We can theorise that nine days after the club sacked Montie, if the date is correct in that 1889 source, William Druitt arrived at the school -- where his brother had also been sacked for being AWOL -- because Will was worried about his supposedly o.s. brother and wanted to search his belongings (which were still at the school, strange if he had been sacked to his face).

Not really that strange, assuming Monty was on the edge by that point and ready to tip over. Valentine may have given him the cheques and told him to collect all his belongings, but if he just wanted to end it all he'd have written the notes, left them with his stuff and headed off.

By 'no other relative' it can mean just the immediate members: father (deceased) mother (sectioned) William (present) and Montie (deceased). No other living relatives. Everybody had cousins, and this is how the Druitt names could be interpreted at the funeral. Big deal.

I can live with that. You are right, that would be no big deal. Maybe that's what William did mean, and maybe that's how it was interpreted, in which case he wasn't being deliberately economical with the truth in order to conceal a more destructive truth.

Love,

Caz
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[caz]

I've always been sort of puzzled by him going into the water with the checks in his pockets, because he could have messed up someone's bookkeeping forever. But, in regards to his identity, he may not have thought his body would ever wash up.

Drowning has got to be a pretty awful way to die, compared to some other ways you could take your own life; I can't help wonder if he chose it in order not to leave a body for people to deal with, as would be the case if he poisoned himself, or shot himself, or hanged himself.

Hi Rivkah,

With his impending suicide taking up every waking thought at that point, I doubt Monty would have worried about messing up anyone's bookkeeping. However, if his thoughts extended to drowning himself (I agree, pretty awful, especially that time of year) in order to spare the family having to deal with his body, it would have been simplicity itself to tear up the season ticket and cheques before taking his final dip, just in case he was washed up before all other identifying features were obliterated.

Love,

Caz
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