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Phil
“I know nothing about any investigation of Barnett.”
Well, I haven’t checked for exact sources but I know Abberline interrogated Barnett for a long time. I believe they checked his alibi (a Bishopsgate Lodging House), and most damningly checked his clothes for blood.
Clearly the police did ‘check out’ Barnett, which strongly suggests he was held under a degree of suspicion - however briefly.
Did this suggest that the police suspected (if briefly) Barnett for just the Kelly killing or as the culprit for all of them?
My guess (when I guess I will signal it!) is that for each Whitechapel murder the police were to an extent open minded enough to investigate whether it was a domestic or had some other motive and was not part of the random series. But then I am not sure that the police really understood the nature of seemingly random serial killings (and it is my firm assumption that this is what they were dealing with).
As for tracing Fleming – we don’t know that he was using an alias. He checked into the Whitechapel Workhouse in 1889 under his real name and signed on at the census in 1891 under his real name. We only know of him using an alias when he was mad in 1892. If this was the same person of course!
But whoever Fleming was, he was relatively local. I’m sure the police will have asked around a lot and some people would have known him by his real name if he was going under a false name. It was a crowded area but he was a local. It is considerably less easy to hide under an alias very close to an area where you were born and bred – obviously.
For example Robert Paul was found. Clearly it took a bit of doing but they found him – although admittedly he didn’t use a false name. Interestingly Dew forgot that Paul had been found and mentions the search in his memoirs.
If Fleming had been sought (as sensibly he would have been, unless he was eliminated as a person of interest for some other reason – such as that Barnett was mistaken) and the search was unsuccessful, then I think one of the policemen would have mentioned it in their reminiscences. Or one would have sold the story to the press – they were prone to doing that.
The lack of Fleming references in a way tells its own story.
DVV
I hope you have calmed down now.
I have in fact gone into considerable detail with respect to the Fleming and Evans/Fleming evidence.
I am sorry if this has made you uncomfortable in you Fleming skin.
I hope you are able to stick to the evidence and avoid these insults.
Is it now regarded as wrong, or bad form, for a proposer of one culprit to pick apart the case for a ‘rival’ culprit?
I most certainly have never employed that complaint when different people have vigorously cross-examined me about Charles Lechmere and quite frankly I would be ashamed of myself if I did resort to that objection.
I would regard it as an admission that my case was poor and time to admit I was wrong!
By the way I was at Lakeside shopping centre today (Essex) and saw a very tall skinny chap. No one else took any notice but I would guess he was about 6 foot 7 (or perhaps a little taller as I saw someone I know who is six foot tall walk past him and he was more than a head shorter) and I would guess weighs less than 12 stone. He looked in perfect health.
Perhaps I should have stopped him and asked for his stats!
But shamefully it is more my style to take a sneaky photo – here!
“I know nothing about any investigation of Barnett.”
Well, I haven’t checked for exact sources but I know Abberline interrogated Barnett for a long time. I believe they checked his alibi (a Bishopsgate Lodging House), and most damningly checked his clothes for blood.
Clearly the police did ‘check out’ Barnett, which strongly suggests he was held under a degree of suspicion - however briefly.
Did this suggest that the police suspected (if briefly) Barnett for just the Kelly killing or as the culprit for all of them?
My guess (when I guess I will signal it!) is that for each Whitechapel murder the police were to an extent open minded enough to investigate whether it was a domestic or had some other motive and was not part of the random series. But then I am not sure that the police really understood the nature of seemingly random serial killings (and it is my firm assumption that this is what they were dealing with).
As for tracing Fleming – we don’t know that he was using an alias. He checked into the Whitechapel Workhouse in 1889 under his real name and signed on at the census in 1891 under his real name. We only know of him using an alias when he was mad in 1892. If this was the same person of course!
But whoever Fleming was, he was relatively local. I’m sure the police will have asked around a lot and some people would have known him by his real name if he was going under a false name. It was a crowded area but he was a local. It is considerably less easy to hide under an alias very close to an area where you were born and bred – obviously.
For example Robert Paul was found. Clearly it took a bit of doing but they found him – although admittedly he didn’t use a false name. Interestingly Dew forgot that Paul had been found and mentions the search in his memoirs.
If Fleming had been sought (as sensibly he would have been, unless he was eliminated as a person of interest for some other reason – such as that Barnett was mistaken) and the search was unsuccessful, then I think one of the policemen would have mentioned it in their reminiscences. Or one would have sold the story to the press – they were prone to doing that.
The lack of Fleming references in a way tells its own story.
DVV
I hope you have calmed down now.
I have in fact gone into considerable detail with respect to the Fleming and Evans/Fleming evidence.
I am sorry if this has made you uncomfortable in you Fleming skin.
I hope you are able to stick to the evidence and avoid these insults.
Is it now regarded as wrong, or bad form, for a proposer of one culprit to pick apart the case for a ‘rival’ culprit?
I most certainly have never employed that complaint when different people have vigorously cross-examined me about Charles Lechmere and quite frankly I would be ashamed of myself if I did resort to that objection.
I would regard it as an admission that my case was poor and time to admit I was wrong!
By the way I was at Lakeside shopping centre today (Essex) and saw a very tall skinny chap. No one else took any notice but I would guess he was about 6 foot 7 (or perhaps a little taller as I saw someone I know who is six foot tall walk past him and he was more than a head shorter) and I would guess weighs less than 12 stone. He looked in perfect health.
Perhaps I should have stopped him and asked for his stats!
But shamefully it is more my style to take a sneaky photo – here!
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