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I am starting this thread to argue that there have been a number of new sources discovered, in relatively recent years, which puts Macnaghten-Druitt back in play as a likely, if not the likeliest solution to the 'Jack the Ripper' mystery (eg. it's not a mystery to certain primary sources).
1. Andrew Spallek's identification of the 'West of England' MP as a near-neighbour of the (Tory) Druitts and a fellow upper class, Old Etonian, clubby Tory, and Indian plantation-owner like Macnaghten -- Henry Richard Farquhrason.
2. The new 'West of England' M.P. source recently found by Paul Begg -- who does not agree with my interpretation of its significance -- which establishes, again, the theme of certainty about Druitt's guilt, and that Mac is thus the 'odd man out' in terms of police disagreeing with M.P. Farquharson's 'remarkable theory'.
3. My focus, over several published articles, arguing for the primacy of Mac's 'Laying the Ghost of Jack the Ripper' 1914, over Mac's own internal Reports and Sir Robert Anderson's memoirs on this subject. For example, Macnaghten does not confirm Farquharson's error about Druitt killing himself 'the same evening', but rather provides a loose twenty-four hour gap. This is too long for the maniac to be staggering around, a bloody, shrieking husk while facing no impediment to his watery grave (the method and location of suicide are, understandably, with-held by Mac).
4. The likelihood, I argue, that the 'North Country Vicar' article of 1899 and the clergyman's piece 'The Whitechurch [sic] Murders--Solution to a London Mystery' are not only about Druitt, they provide an explanation for the family's extraordinary belief in their tragic member's culpability (he confessed to a priest) and the modus operandi for Mac's turning Mr. Druitt into Dr. Jekyll: 'substantial truth in fictitious form'.
But the most critical breakthrough, I argue, was in realising that Sims is a Macnaghten source-by-proxy. That he was feeding the writer more exaggerated-fictionalised bits about Druitt, not in his 'Reports'. Eventually I noticed -- it only took three years -- that there is a detail in these writings which could not come from P.C. Moulson's Report, and yet which Mac knew and passed onto his famous literary and Liberal pal: that the fiend's brother, William, was frantically looking for his missing sibling.
Acton, Chiswick & Turnham Green Gazette
United Kingdom
Saturday, 5 January 1889
FOUND DROWNED. — Shortly after mid-day on Monday, a waterman named Winslade, of Chiswick, found the body of a man, well-dressed, floating in the Thames off Thorneycroft's ... Witness heard from a friend on the 11th of December that deceased had not been heard of at his chambers for more than a week. Witness then went to London to make inquiries, and at Blackheath he found that deceased had got into serious trouble at the school, and had been dismissed ...
In 1898, Major Griffiths working from Mac's 'Aberconway' version changed the Druitt family into anomic 'friends', and this discreet alteration, to protect everybody concerned, was continued by Sims -- whether he knew it was 'substantial truth in fictitious form' or not?
George Sims, as Dagonet, in his 'Mustard and Cress' column in 'The Referee' Feb 16th, 1902
... At the time his dead body was found in the Thames, his friends, who were terrified at his disappearance from their midst, were endeavouring to have him found and placed under restraint again.
Sims under his own name in 'Lloyds Weekly' magazine, Sept 22nd 1907, 'My Criminal Museum--Who was Jack the Ripper?
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.
To know that William Druitt was desperately looking for his missing Montague you have either heard the whole story from not just the M.P. but intimates of Druitt -- like his family, or a family member -- or, you have at the very least read what we can read in the 1889 press account. which would also tell you that Druitt was a young barrister, who killed himself three weeks after the Kelly atrocity.
People used to ask me if there was any evidence in the meagre extant record that Macnagahten knew more about Druitt than just PC Moulson's Report (which would have given Mac the name, date of the body's recovery, and the train ticket found in a pocket) that is accurate, and the answer is yes: see above.
Whether by fortuitous accident or by sly design, Druitt morphed into a middle-aged doctor further protecting the Druitts, but Mac originally knew the basic biog. data about his preferred suspect -- and that blows the old paradigm to smithereens.
I can understand a Trevor Marriott dismissing this fragment as nothing; as too second-hand (eg. it's not even a source by Macnaghten) but that is looking like at it as a trained-professional member of law enforcement -- as in can an arrest be made? Historical methodology has a much lower standard of 'evidence' than that because the solution does not have to be absolute (eg. a conviction in court) rather it is openly provisional and thus subject to revision.
I would like to see debate on this point about the semi-fictional 'frantic friends', and whether others agree, or not, that it is a significant breakthrough?
1. Andrew Spallek's identification of the 'West of England' MP as a near-neighbour of the (Tory) Druitts and a fellow upper class, Old Etonian, clubby Tory, and Indian plantation-owner like Macnaghten -- Henry Richard Farquhrason.
2. The new 'West of England' M.P. source recently found by Paul Begg -- who does not agree with my interpretation of its significance -- which establishes, again, the theme of certainty about Druitt's guilt, and that Mac is thus the 'odd man out' in terms of police disagreeing with M.P. Farquharson's 'remarkable theory'.
3. My focus, over several published articles, arguing for the primacy of Mac's 'Laying the Ghost of Jack the Ripper' 1914, over Mac's own internal Reports and Sir Robert Anderson's memoirs on this subject. For example, Macnaghten does not confirm Farquharson's error about Druitt killing himself 'the same evening', but rather provides a loose twenty-four hour gap. This is too long for the maniac to be staggering around, a bloody, shrieking husk while facing no impediment to his watery grave (the method and location of suicide are, understandably, with-held by Mac).
4. The likelihood, I argue, that the 'North Country Vicar' article of 1899 and the clergyman's piece 'The Whitechurch [sic] Murders--Solution to a London Mystery' are not only about Druitt, they provide an explanation for the family's extraordinary belief in their tragic member's culpability (he confessed to a priest) and the modus operandi for Mac's turning Mr. Druitt into Dr. Jekyll: 'substantial truth in fictitious form'.
But the most critical breakthrough, I argue, was in realising that Sims is a Macnaghten source-by-proxy. That he was feeding the writer more exaggerated-fictionalised bits about Druitt, not in his 'Reports'. Eventually I noticed -- it only took three years -- that there is a detail in these writings which could not come from P.C. Moulson's Report, and yet which Mac knew and passed onto his famous literary and Liberal pal: that the fiend's brother, William, was frantically looking for his missing sibling.
Acton, Chiswick & Turnham Green Gazette
United Kingdom
Saturday, 5 January 1889
FOUND DROWNED. — Shortly after mid-day on Monday, a waterman named Winslade, of Chiswick, found the body of a man, well-dressed, floating in the Thames off Thorneycroft's ... Witness heard from a friend on the 11th of December that deceased had not been heard of at his chambers for more than a week. Witness then went to London to make inquiries, and at Blackheath he found that deceased had got into serious trouble at the school, and had been dismissed ...
In 1898, Major Griffiths working from Mac's 'Aberconway' version changed the Druitt family into anomic 'friends', and this discreet alteration, to protect everybody concerned, was continued by Sims -- whether he knew it was 'substantial truth in fictitious form' or not?
George Sims, as Dagonet, in his 'Mustard and Cress' column in 'The Referee' Feb 16th, 1902
... At the time his dead body was found in the Thames, his friends, who were terrified at his disappearance from their midst, were endeavouring to have him found and placed under restraint again.
Sims under his own name in 'Lloyds Weekly' magazine, Sept 22nd 1907, 'My Criminal Museum--Who was Jack the Ripper?
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.
To know that William Druitt was desperately looking for his missing Montague you have either heard the whole story from not just the M.P. but intimates of Druitt -- like his family, or a family member -- or, you have at the very least read what we can read in the 1889 press account. which would also tell you that Druitt was a young barrister, who killed himself three weeks after the Kelly atrocity.
People used to ask me if there was any evidence in the meagre extant record that Macnagahten knew more about Druitt than just PC Moulson's Report (which would have given Mac the name, date of the body's recovery, and the train ticket found in a pocket) that is accurate, and the answer is yes: see above.
Whether by fortuitous accident or by sly design, Druitt morphed into a middle-aged doctor further protecting the Druitts, but Mac originally knew the basic biog. data about his preferred suspect -- and that blows the old paradigm to smithereens.
I can understand a Trevor Marriott dismissing this fragment as nothing; as too second-hand (eg. it's not even a source by Macnaghten) but that is looking like at it as a trained-professional member of law enforcement -- as in can an arrest be made? Historical methodology has a much lower standard of 'evidence' than that because the solution does not have to be absolute (eg. a conviction in court) rather it is openly provisional and thus subject to revision.
I would like to see debate on this point about the semi-fictional 'frantic friends', and whether others agree, or not, that it is a significant breakthrough?
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