What makes Druitt a viable suspect?

[Herlock Sholmes]

Can you see MM or Monro or anyone else of high rank going out on the streets of Whitechapel doing house to house enquiries ?

From memory, Macnaghten personally attended the scene of the Pinchin Street torso and the scene of Elizabeth Jackson’s dismembered body being found, at the time. He was known to be very hands on for someone so senior. So you’re point collapses.

[Trevor Marriott]

As we should be rigidly using police jargon I have this to say:

Delta Foxtrot Charlie:

I was proceeding across my living room in a Northerly direction in the pursuit of my usual habit when I came upon a book left unattended on a table. I thought to myself “hello, hello, hello what’s all this then?” I proceeded with due caution to examine the offending item only to discover that within it were certain statements that I found problematical. I felt it my sworn duty to read the said item before deciding my next course of action. I found the contents to be no risk to the public so I continued on my way.

Evening all

Cue the music and the shot of the feet of a male and female officer walking the beat.

How’s that.

Well that shows you have finally lost the plot

[Trevor Marriott]

From memory, Macnaghten personally attended the scene of the Pinchin Street torso and the scene of Elizabeth Jackson’s dismembered body being found, at the time. He was known to be very hands on for someone so senior. So you’re point collapses.

So what does that prove he visited a crime scene, and then went back to his palatial office.

The world and his brother visited Millers Court, even policemen from Ireland my original point has far from collapsed

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[Trevor Marriott]

And your point is?

You seem to be equating 'suspect' with being guilty. The point is that it doesn't matter whether these suspects were Jack the Ripper or not, what matters is trying to understand why and how and when they became suspects..

We know how he became a suspect, MM received information from someone who had been told by a family member of Druitt that they, the family suspected him of being the killer. From that MM formed an opinion that the family could have been right in their belief-- Wow thats real hard evidence to work with

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[Sam Flynn]

The world and his brother visited Millers Court, even policemen from Ireland

That's probably because the victim came from Ireland, and her murder was so extreme. A tour of Miller's Court would have had infinitely more cachet than surveying a railway arch with its resident weeing tramps.

[PaulB]

It ususally works the other way the officers on the ground seek out the information and channel it upwards !!!!!!!!!!

Can you see MM or Monro or anyone else of high rank going out on the streets of Whitechapel doing house to house enquiries ?

www.trevormarriott.co.uk

I agree, but you are conveniently ignoring what I said about information received from from foreign and provincial forces, Special Branch, government agencies, the upper-classes.... That didn't come the way of the bobby on the beat.

[PaulB]

We know how he became a suspect, MM received information from someone who had been told by a family member of Druitt that they, the family suspected him of being the killer. From that MM formed an opinion that the family could have been right in their belief-- Wow thats real hard evidence to work with

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

No, that's how you are choosing to interpret the sources. What Macnaghten is in fact saying is that some years after mid-1889 the police received information implicating Druitt (there is no hint of the source of the information), and at some point Macnaghten received private information from which he deduced that the family also believed Druitt was the murderer. Not only does Macnaghten refer to information received by the police and information he had received, he wrote of information 'which came into my possession at one time or another', from which one could conclude that information was received more than once.

[John G]

No, that's how you are choosing to interpret the sources. What Macnaghten is in fact saying is that some years after mid-1889 the police received information implicating Druitt (there is no hint of the source of the information), and at some point Macnaghten received private information from which he deduced that the family also believed Druitt was the murderer. Not only does Macnaghten refer to information received by the police and information he had received, he wrote of information 'which came into my possession at one time or another', from which one could conclude that information was received more than once.

Sorry to interject, but isn't Macnaghten vague to say the least when referring to the police information: "...Certain facts, pointing to his conclusion [the perpetrator's suicide soon after MJK murder], were not in possession of the police till some years after I became a detective officer."

What facts? Were the "facts" investigated? What's meant by the equivocal "pointing to this conclusion"?

[PaulB]

Sorry to interject, but isn't Macnaghten vague to say the least when referring to the police information: "...Certain facts, pointing to his conclusion [the perpetrator's suicide soon after MJK murder], were not in possession of the police till some years after I became a detective officer."

What facts? Were the "facts" investigated? What's meant by the equivocal "pointing to this conclusion"?

Hi John,
Yes, he is maddeningly vague. What he wrote in full was: 'Although the Whitechapel Murderer, in all probability, put an end to himself soon after the Dorset Street affair in November 1888, certain facts, pointing to this conclusion, were not in possession of the police till some years after I became a detective officer.'

We don't know what the facts were, we don't know if they were investigated, and we don't know if the facts pointed to the identity of the Whitechapel Murderer or to him having committed suicide, or to both.

Whatever the facts were, they apparently implicated Druitt. That it was the same information as that which led to Macnaghten's conclusion about what the family believed is possible, but it's by no means certain, especially given Macnaghten 'one time or another' comment.

[rjpalmer]

Knowing how the police work I would put my faith in the officers who were on the ground working the case to know more than those senior officers who sat in palatial officers shuffling papers who only thought they knew.

Fair enough, Trevor. Yet in support of your beliefs, you chose to quote Sir Edward Bradford, a 'palatial officer' who was not even at the Met in 1888 and 1889!

Bradford knew bugger all about the Whitechapel Murder investigation, and his Feb 15th 1891 quote about Coles was probably meant to be a 'home run ball' slapped over the fence to the detriment of one James Thomas Sadler.

As soon as he found out Sadler wasn't in the UK at the time of the Tabram, Nichols, and Chapman murders, he was undoubtedly whistling a different tune!

[Wickerman]

Just because Sims is referring to Macnagten’s memo, doesn’t mean Abberline is.

I'm pretty sure he's not actually, RJ.

Elsewhere Simon suggests that since both Sims and Abberline refer to a “drowned doctor” this proves the common source. Maybe, but I am not entirely convinced. There are other explanations. Jon Smyth wonders if there was another drowning and a resulting confusion;....

Instead of parsing the sentence we should read it as it was written, that some doctor was fished out of the Thames shortly after the Millers Court murder and a report was made to the Home Office about it at the time.

Abberline's words:
"...soon after the last murder in Whitechapel the body of a young doctor was found in the Thames.........A report was made to the Home Office about the matter".

You don't report "the matter" six years later, the report was clearly sent to address the suicide, therefore this report was sent shortly after or within days/weeks of the suicide, not six years after.
Abberline is not talking about Mac's 1894 report.

[Wickerman]

If you start applying the modern meanings to what people wrote and said in the past, you'd very quickly end up with a horrendously distorted view of what was going on. That's why you do not apply 21st century word usage, especially modern jargon, to the 19th century. And that, amongst other reasons, is why this subject is history. It is necessary to understand that 19th century world, not apply our world too it.

Oh boy, do I appreciate you pointing that out. I could not make that fact sink in with one casebook member, conspicuous by his absence in recent months. Much appreciated Paul.

[rjpalmer]

Hi Jeff. At the risk of putting Simon even further to sleep, I do have one tedious comment in regards to your well-considered post. In reference to Abberline's statement:

"I know all about that story… but there is absolutely nothing beyond the fact that he was found at that time to incriminate him."

If the suggestion is that Abberline is referring to legal evidence, the sentence makes no sense. The mere act of committing suicide in Chiswick does not "incriminate" someone in a murder committed in Dorset Street, East London. Yet, if taken literally, Abberline is stating that it does.

So it seems to me that Abberline is using the term "incriminate" in a loose colloquial sense, and not in a legal sense, which might suggest that he is ignorant of the other 'facts' that may have pointed to MJD's alleged guilt.

As with Chief Inspector Littlechild, I am not even entirely convinced that he knows who MJD is!

I hope that makes sense. But, as you say, he is not alive and cannot be questioned as to exactly what he meant.

Hi Wick. I think that is a reasonable interpretation, despite it running entirely counter to the collective wisdom.

[Simon Wood]

Sir Edward Bradford whistled a different tune, up until the arrival of a sealed package . . .

Rocky Mountain News [Colorado], 17th January 1892. Datelined “London, Jan 2.”

Reporting that a Royal Commission was to “investigate the now almost forgotten Whitechapel murders”, the newspaper continued—

“It is understood that the death of a Catholic priest in the east end of London has placed some important revelations in the hands of the police. There can be no doubt that the priest, under the seal of confession, died possessed of information that might have led to the arrest of the murderer or murderers of the wretched women known as Jack the Ripper’s victims. That the priest had qualms of conscience regarding the sanctity of confession, even in connection with such atrocities, is evinced by the sealed packet he left behind him addressed to Sir Edward Bradford, chief of London’s police department. On the package was inscribed, in the dead priest’s handwriting, ‘This is to be opened after my death - my lips must never reveal it.’ Beyond the above, carelessly mentioned by a garrulous official who has since been severely reprimanded for his indiscretion, no further information can be obtained from the police.”

The identity of the “garrulous official” is unknown, but perhaps it should be noted that on 7th February 1892, Chief Inspector Frederick George Abberline, lead investigator during the Whitechapel murders, retired, aged 49, from the Metropolitan Police.

[Wickerman]

The bottom line if that Druitt was suspected by Macnaghten and that Macnaghten suspected him for twenty or more years.

It also might be fair to point out that in those 20 years (1894-1914), Mac. and possibly the Met. police as a whole, cannot have discovered or learned anything about any other suspect which superseded what Mac. himself knew about Druitt.