A Matter of Culture and Druitt

[Mayerling]

There is a photograph (it is sometimes posted on this website) of Montie reading a large book - presumably a Bible.

For all the specialist in Montie's career, have any of you ever run across what (aside from a Bible, or law books, or newspapers with cricket scores information) he read for enjoyment in the form of fiction. For example, did he possibly like Dickens?

Just if any of you ever noticed this.

Jeff

[Mayerling]

About three weeks back I tried to get this thread started but it got sort of ignored, probably because like many of my thoughts it seems tangential to the investigation of the Whitechapel Murders. Possibly it is, but being of a literary bent anything regarding writing always is a matter of interest to me.

However, on another thread under the "General Suspects" section of this area of the "Suspects" I have been examining with TradeMark several of his postings regarding interviews on the subject of the Ripper and some contemporaries (all of whom were better known in England in 1888). The following thought crossed my mind, and I hope this time it attracts real attention.

Aside from police and Home Office or Government Officials, the only two celebrities that I know of who actually wrote contemporary statements regarding the Ripper and his/her crimes were Queen Victoria and George Bernard Shaw. Victoria took a keen interest in the murders and was frustrated when more occurred after she was assured that they would cease happening. Shaw is recalled for a somewhat half-serious/half-satiric letter to the newspapers where he called the Ripper "an independent genius" who by his brutal and frightening actions had caused a ripple of real interest in social reform in the East End. How serious Shaw was about this view is anyone's guess. He would later also write a letter (supposedly from Jesus Christ) insisting that oaths using his name did not make him the responsible party in the murders.

My question becomes this: there were plenty of other major cultural and historical figures of top level active in 1888. Wilkie Collins, author of "The Moonstone", "The Woman in White", and "Armadale" was still alive (he'd die in 1889), and although past his prime and ill must have taken some interest in the case. Did he write any letters about his views? Conan Doyle would later reveal his suggested solution to the mystery (a murderous midwife) in a book of memoirs published decades later - but what was his views in 1888. What were the views of H. G. Wells, Joseph Conrad, William Gladstone, Sir Henry Irving, Ellen Terry, Henry James, Oscar Wilde, James Whistler...well you get the idea. There are plenty of volumes of collected papers and letters of these figures - has anyone bothered looking through them at all.

Maybe we should start thinking of doing it. They might have heard something, or perhaps they could have dismissed some rumors that still float around.

Jeff

[GUT]

There is a photograph (it is sometimes posted on this website) of Montie reading a large book - presumably a Bible.

For all the specialist in Montie's career, have any of you ever run across what (aside from a Bible, or law books, or newspapers with cricket scores information) he read for enjoyment in the form of fiction. For example, did he possibly like Dickens?

Just if any of you ever noticed this.

Jeff

I've not seen anything Jeff.

Clearly he was educated in the classics, so I'd more expect an interest in Joyce and the like, Dickens was contemporary fiction,may was Conan Doyle.

PS must have missed the thread, thanks for bringing it to my attention.

[GUT]

About three weeks back I tried to get this thread started but it got sort of ignored, probably because like many of my thoughts it seems tangential to the investigation of the Whitechapel Murders. Possibly it is, but being of a literary bent anything regarding writing always is a matter of interest to me.

However, on another thread under the "General Suspects" section of this area of the "Suspects" I have been examining with TradeMark several of his postings regarding interviews on the subject of the Ripper and some contemporaries (all of whom were better known in England in 1888). The following thought crossed my mind, and I hope this time it attracts real attention.

Aside from police and Home Office or Government Officials, the only two celebrities that I know of who actually wrote contemporary statements regarding the Ripper and his/her crimes were Queen Victoria and George Bernard Shaw. Victoria took a keen interest in the murders and was frustrated when more occurred after she was assured that they would cease happening. Shaw is recalled for a somewhat half-serious/half-satiric letter to the newspapers where he called the Ripper "an independent genius" who by his brutal and frightening actions had caused a ripple of real interest in social reform in the East End. How serious Shaw was about this view is anyone's guess. He would later also write a letter (supposedly from Jesus Christ) insisting that oaths using his name did not make him the responsible party in the murders.

My question becomes this: there were plenty of other major cultural and historical figures of top level active in 1888. Wilkie Collins, author of "The Moonstone", "The Woman in White", and "Armadale" was still alive (he'd die in 1889), and although past his prime and ill must have taken some interest in the case. Did he write any letters about his views? Conan Doyle would later reveal his suggested solution to the mystery (a murderous midwife) in a book of memoirs published decades later - but what was his views in 1888. What were the views of H. G. Wells, Joseph Conrad, William Gladstone, Sir Henry Irving, Ellen Terry, Henry James, Oscar Wilde, James Whistler...well you get the idea. There are plenty of volumes of collected papers and letters of these figures - has anyone bothered looking through them at all.

Maybe we should start thinking of doing it. They might have heard something, or perhaps they could have dismissed some rumors that still float around.

Jeff

Again not that I've ever heard of,a buta anyone with access to those archieves of papers, and letters it would be an interesting exercise anyway. If for nothing more than an inside into the brains of these giants of the literary world.

[GUT]

I wonder if Montie's had much time for reading novels, I know I don't and nowadays I ony practice part time and don't have a 2 nd job as a school master ( or was the second job as counsel???)

[Mayerling]

I wonder if Montie's had much time for reading novels, I know I don't and nowadays I ony practice part time and don't have a 2 nd job as a school master ( or was the second job as counsel???)

It depends on placing the individual in his time in considering the issue.

You and I are living in September 2015 at this moment. I'm retired, and you are semi-retired. But we have more items of interest for our spare time than Montie did. We have television, the internet, books, video games, regular games, radio, movies, and theatre, and family and friend events (get-togethers). Montie in 1888 would only have had books, newspapers, magazines, theatre, sports (he has that cricket interest), family and friends as the broad basis of his entertainment for his non-working hours. And he is not (like us) retired or semi-retired. Since books would have been part of his entertainment choices, he might have picked up and read a few pages of a popular novel of his day (think of Stevenson's "Treasure Island" or "Dr. Jeckyl and Mr. Hyde") reading it whenever he had some time. Most of his main reading would have been for law courts or for classrooms, but he could have had a bit for himself.

[Mayerling]

Again not that I've ever heard of,a buta anyone with access to those archieves of papers, and letters it would be an interesting exercise anyway. If for nothing more than an inside into the brains of these giants of the literary world.

It's funny what one can find. Dickens' correspondence has been published, and he discusses many of the criminal cases of his time (most notably his views on the Road Murder of 1860 involving Constance Kent and her family). But Dickens died in 1870, so for the purposes of my general question he isn't pertinent, but he certainly is suggestive of what I had in mind here regarding contemporary writers or celebrities.

This is a kind of listing to show who to forget when considering this issue:

Jane Austin - died 1817
John Keats - died 1821
Percy Byshe Shelley - died 1822
George, Lord Byron - died 1824
Mary Shelley - died 1831
Walter Scott - died 1832
William Thackeray - died 1863
Emily Bronte - died 1843
Anne Bronte - died 1845
Charlotte Bronte - died 1855
Thomas de Quincy - died 1859
Elizabeth Gaskell - died 1866
Dickens - died 1870
Edward Bulwer Lytton - died 1873
George Elliott - died 1880
Charles Reade - died 1879
Benjamin Disraeli - died 1881
Thomas Carlyle - died 1881
Anthony Trollope - died 1882

None of these people could have commented on the Ripper or Whitechapel, but many of them do comment on crimes in their time. Thackeray wrote of the Peytal Murder Case in France in 1839, and would attend the execution of Courvoisier for the murder of Lord William Russell in 1840 (writing the essay, "On Going to See a Man Hanged"). Carlyle was impressed by some questions and answers in the trial of John Thurtell, inventing the term "gigmanity" for respectability, because Thurtell was considered respectable and kept a gig.

Of course it would be people alive in 1888 and after that one would be curious about.

Jeff

[Robert]

Nice idea, Jeff, and to literary giants we might add radical politicians who may well have used the murders as evidence of what happens when a sub-class of desperately poor people exists.

[GUT]

It depends on placing the individual in his time in considering the issue.

You and I are living in September 2015 at this moment. I'm retired, and you are semi-retired. But we have more items of interest for our spare time than Montie did. We have television, the internet, books, video games, regular games, radio, movies, and theatre, and family and friend events (get-togethers). Montie in 1888 would only have had books, newspapers, magazines, theatre, sports (he has that cricket interest), family and friends as the broad basis of his entertainment for his non-working hours. And he is not (like us) retired or semi-retired. Since books would have been part of his entertainment choices, he might have picked up and read a few pages of a popular novel of his day (think of Stevenson's "Treasure Island" or "Dr. Jeckyl and Mr. Hyde") reading it whenever he had some time. Most of his main reading would have been for law courts or for classrooms, but he could have had a bit for himself.

I know Jeff that when I am practicing anywhere near full time I have NO time for reading anything other than law. Montie was said to have been working basically as a Special Pleader, effectively drafting documents I can assure you that is extremely time consuming, even in this day and age of dictaphones and computers just can't see him, with ateaching job on top, having much free time for reading.

The funny thing is drafting for just a case a month takes nearly as much time as for a case a week. Because of economies of scale and research once crank out 5 sets of documents and the like.

[GUT]

Nice idea, Jeff, and to literary giants we might add radical politicians who may well have used the murders as evidence of what happens when a sub-class of desperately poor people exists.

Definitely, but we seem to know much of their thoughts.

[Pcdunn]

This is a very interesting idea to me, but then I am a librarian.

It would also be worth looking at the contemporaries' diaries, journals, and collected letters, as they may not have made public comment in the newspapers, but could have expressed their opinion on the WM privately or in a letter to a friend or relation.

Could Druitt's book have been a volume of case law, perhaps?

[Mayerling]

Nice idea, Jeff, and to literary giants we might add radical politicians who may well have used the murders as evidence of what happens when a sub-class of desperately poor people exists.

Thanks Robert. Actually more than just radical politicians. All politicians. How would former Home Secretary (Gladstone's Liberal Government of 1880-85) Sir William Harcourt have thought of the antics of his successor Henry Matthew's handling of the investigation by Warren's Scotland Yard? Or Gladstone for that matter - they being out of power their perspective on the situation would have no doubt been critical, but it would have been of interest.

Jeff

[Mayerling]

This is a very interesting idea to me, but then I am a librarian.

It would also be worth looking at the contemporaries' diaries, journals, and collected letters, as they may not have made public comment in the newspapers, but could have expressed their opinion on the WM privately or in a letter to a friend or relation.

Could Druitt's book have been a volume of case law, perhaps?

I would be dependent in advancing this idea on librarians, as they have more immediate access to collections of letters or diaries or journals. Every time I have looked at a contemporary diary or journal I look for that period of the summer to autumn to winter of 1888 to see if there were any comments. I have to admit I rarely find any but many of the books I look at happen to be selections from such full collected works. Sometimes I have been pleasantly surprised by an out of left field occurrence. I purchased a book of the letters and journals of Paul Gauguin (foreign commentators are welcomed here too), and discovered nothing about the Ripper, but that Gauguin was one of the crowd outside a French prison in December 1888 when the best known KNOWN murderer of the day (the French killer Prado) was guilloutined. It was rather interesting to see Gauguin an interest in crime, although Prado's case drove the French police to distraction for nearly a year.

In that photo of Montie it could be a legal tome, but it could also be a Bible.

Jeff

[Mayerling]

I know Jeff that when I am practicing anywhere near full time I have NO time for reading anything other than law. Montie was said to have been working basically as a Special Pleader, effectively drafting documents I can assure you that is extremely time consuming, even in this day and age of dictaphones and computers just can't see him, with ateaching job on top, having much free time for reading.

The funny thing is drafting for just a case a month takes nearly as much time as for a case a week. Because of economies of scale and research once crank out 5 sets of documents and the like.

G'day GUT,

Wouldn't Montie have been working through some solicitor or several of them, and possibly with some barrister's chambers? If so wouldn't he have had a staff to assist him in drafting documents and the like? I've seen American law firms (admittedly large ones) but they have plenty of people about doing "skut work" like shepherdizing. Perhaps nothing as elaborate as that, but I keep thinking Montie would have had some assistance.

As for the work at Valentine's School, the curriculum would have most likely been set up by Montie with Valentine, and most of it would have been repeated for each form the same way every year - just some adjustment for new features that could not be ignored (and in the 1880s such changes were not usually found in classes on the Classics (Latin and Greek) or math. I wonder what if anything Valentine's would have had on the sciences (Gregor Mendel's researches were in the 1860s - 1880s, but the results were published in a small foreign magazine or journal before his death, and only rediscovered and spread in the 20th Century). History/Current Events is another feature: the latter would have to be kept up to date. But that would only require reading the current newspapers.

Jeff

[GUT]

G'day GUT,

Wouldn't Montie have been working through some solicitor or several of them, and possibly with some barrister's chambers? If so wouldn't he have had a staff to assist him in drafting documents and the like? I've seen American law firms (admittedly large ones) but they have plenty of people about doing "skut work" like shepherdizing. Perhaps nothing as elaborate as that, but I keep thinking Montie would have had some assistance.

As for the work at Valentine's School, the curriculum would have most likely been set up by Montie with Valentine, and most of it would have been repeated for each form the same way every year - just some adjustment for new features that could not be ignored (and in the 1880s such changes were not usually found in classes on the Classics (Latin and Greek) or math. I wonder what if anything Valentine's would have had on the sciences (Gregor Mendel's researches were in the 1860s - 1880s, but the results were published in a small foreign magazine or journal before his death, and only rediscovered and spread in the 20th Century). History/Current Events is another feature: the latter would have to be kept up to date. But that would only require reading the current newspapers.

Jeff

Unfortunately Jeff he'd have had little assistance in drafting, that's exactly why the Solicitors would brief him, so they didn't need to do it.

In '88 I imagine it would be handwritten.

Even today most chambers will at most have a typist, so you dictate in a dictaphone and she types it up (how the typist is paid varies but often in accordance with the percentage you use her) so even today in such chambers newer barristers tend to do their own.

Montie's greatest demand, I suspect, would have been that at his seniority (or lack thereof) he wouldn't have had a sat array of old documents to basically copy, so each one would have to be researched (yuck legal research). Most Barristers work on the basis of about 4-5 hours preparation for each billable hour and that number increases dramatically the more junior you are.

I know my first, probably 10, years at the bar I barely read anything other than law and would regularly put in 100 hour weeks.