Rating The Suspects.

[Fiver]

Version 17

In addition, I’ve awarded another point to Francis Thompson. This has nothing to do with recent discussions with Richard. I just noticed that for some unknown reason I hadn’t awarded him the point for drug use. This was an oversight on my part and occurred way before Richard started posting again.

Thanks. I recommend dropping Thompson from a 2 to a 1 on physical condition.

[Herlock Sholmes]

Version 17


--- (A) (B) (C) (D) (E) (F) (G) (H) ---

13 = 2 - 2 - 3 - 2 - 2 - 1 - 0 - 1 : Kelly, James
11 = 2 - 2 - 3 - 0 - 2 - 1 - 0 - 1 : Bury, William Henry
11 = 2 - 1 - 4 - 1 - 1 - 2 - 0 - 0 : Deeming, Frederick Bailey
10 = 2 - 1 - 2 - 1 - 1 - 1 - 1 - 1 : Grainger, William Grant
10 = 2 - 2 - 1 - 2 - 2 - 0 - 1 - 0 : Puckridge, Oswald
09 = 2 - 2 - 2 - 2 - 0 - 1 - 0 - 0 : Cutbush, Thomas Hayne
09 = 2 - 2 - 2 - 2 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 1 : Hyams, Hyam
08 = 2 - 2 - 1 - 2 - 1 - 0 - 0 - 0 : Kosminski, Aaron (Aron Mordke Kozminski)
08 = 2 - 2 - 2 - 0 - 0 - 1 - 0 - 1 : Lechmere, George Capel Scudamore
08 = 2 - 2 - 1 - 1 - 0 - 1 - 1 - 0 : Barnado, Thomas John
08 = 2 - 2 - 2 - 2 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 : Pizer, John (Leather Apron)
08 = 2 - 2 - 1 - 2 - 0 - 1 - 0 - 0 : Cohen, David
07 = 1 - 1 - 0 - 0 - 2 - 2 - 1 - 0 : Tumblety, Francis
07 = 2 - 2 - 0 - 1 - 0 - 2 - 0 - 0 : Smith, G. Wentworth Bell
07 = 2 - 2 - 1 - 0 - 0 - 1 - 0 - 1 : Kidney, Michael
07 = 2 - 2 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 1 - 1 - 1 : Thompson, Francis
06 = 2 - 2 - 1 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 1 - 0 : Chapman, George (Severin Antonowicz Kłosowski)
06 = 2 - 2 - 0 - 1 - 0 - 0 - 1 - 0 : Levy, Jacob
05 = 2 - 1 - 0 - 1 - 1 - 0 - 0 - 0 : Druitt, Montague John
05 = 2 - 2 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 1 - 0 - 0 : Barnett, Joseph
05 = 2 - 1 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 1 - 1 : Stephenson, Robert Donston (or Roslyn D'Onston)
05 = 2 - 2 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 1 - 0 : Sutton, Henry Gawen
05 = 2 - 2 - 0 - 1 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 : Buchan, Edward
05 = 2 - 2 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 1 - 0 : Williams, Dr. John
05 = 2 - 2 - 0 - 1 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 : Craig, Francis Spurzheim
05 = 2 - 1 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 1 - 0 - 1 : Maybrick, James
04 = 2 - 1 - 0 - 1 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 : Stephen, James Kenneth
04 = 2 - 2 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 : Bachert, Albert
04 = 2 - 2 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 : Cross, Charles (Charles Allen Lechmere)
04 = 2 - 2 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 : Hardiman, James
04 = 2 - 2 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 : Hutchinson, George
04 = 2 - 2 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 : Mann, Robert
04 = 2 - 2 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 : Le Grand, Charles
04 = 2 - 2 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 : Maybrick, Michael
04 = 1 - 2 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 1 - 0 : Gull, Sir William Withey
03 = 2 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 1 - 0 - 0 : Sickert, Walter Richard

Changes

This may be controversial but I’ve awarded a point to Oswald Puckridge for having a link to prostitutes. This is my reasoning..

It appears certain that Oswald Puckridge was the suspect mentioned by Major Henry Smith. The matches can’t be coincidence:

Medical student

In an asylum (Smith said that he told Warren about this man just after September 8th and Puckridge had been released from an asylum a month previously.)

Smith’s suspect was expected to be found, and was indeed found in Rupert Street and Puckridge lived in Rupert Street.


This has to be Smith’s man. So following on from this Smith said that this man had spent all of his time with women of loose character and that he had ‘bilked prostitutes by using polished farthings.’ When this man was arrested he had polished farthings on him.

Therefore, this gives us a connection between Puckridge and prostitutes.

…

In addition, I’ve awarded another point to Francis Thompson. This has nothing to do with recent discussions with Richard. I just noticed that for some unknown reason I hadn’t awarded him the point for drug use. This was an oversight on my part and occurred way before Richard started posting again.

[Fiver]

The pattern here is clear: instead of engaging with the documented record, you keep reaching for absolute denials (“no asylum,” “no coin link,” “no Rupert Street”).

Richard

Here is your "evidence".

The Police Suspect Profile

In his memoir From Constable to Commissioner (1910), Major Henry Smith recalled the hunt for the Ripper. He noted that the police had focused on a suspect who possessed five extremely unusual characteristics:
1. He had studied medicine extensively.
2. He had a history of asylum confinement.
3. He associated with prostitutes.
4. He had committed coin fraud.
5. He had resided in the Haymarket district, specifically on Rupert Street.

Here is what Smith actually said.

"After the second crime, I sent word to Sir Charles Warren that I had discovered a man very likely to be the man wanted. He certainly had all the qualifications requisite. He had been a medical student; he had been in a lunatic asylum; he spent all his time with women whom he bilked by giving them polished farthings instead of sovereigns, two of these farthings having been found in the pocket of the murdered woman.

Sir Charles failed to find him. I thought he was likely to be in Rupert Street, Haymarket. I sent up two men, and there he was; but, polished farthings and all, he proved an alibi without the shadow of a doubt.” - [Sir Henry Smith, From Constable to Commissioner, p. 147]

1. "He had been a medical student". Smith also said "I visited every butcher's shop in the city." Clearly, Smith did not believe the Ripper must have had medical training, let alone "had studied medicine extensively".

* Thompson had been a medical student.
* Puckridge was believed to have been a medical student.

2. "He had been in a lunatic asylum". This was not Smith saying the Ripper must have been in an asylum, merely that his suspect had been in one.

* Thompson had not been in an asylum.
* Puckridge had been in an asylum.

3. "He spent all his time with women of loose character".

* This does not match what is known of Thompson.
* We don't know yf this matches Puckridge.

4. "Whom he bilked by giving them polished farthings instead of sovereigns".

* There is no example of Thompson doing this.
* We don't know of this matches Puckridge.

5. "I thought he was likely to be in Rupert Street, Haymarket." Smith also said "Did he live close to the scene of the action? or did he, after committing a murder, make his way to lighting speed to some retreat in the suburbs?" Smith's words show he did not believe that the Ripper must have lived on Rupert Street, that was just the location of a specific suspect who "proved an alibi without the shadow of a doubt".

* There is no record of Thompson living on Rupert Street.
* Puckridge lived in Rupert Street.

Thompson matches on point 1, does not match point 2 or 4, and we don't have the information to answer points 3 or 5.
Puckridge matches points 1, 2, and 5; and we don't have the information to answer points 3 or 4.

Smith's suspect who "proved an alibi without the shadow of a doubt" was probably Oswald Puckridge and clearly was not Francis Thompson. Which is good for your theory.

* If Thompson was Smith's first suspect, then Thompson was innocent.
* If Thompson was not Smith's first suspect, then Thompson might be the Ripper.

I say first, because having proven the Rupert Street man was not the Ripper, Smith continued to follow up other leads.

"After the meeting in the West-End square, I had a short note from my short friend. "Now," he said, " I know I can trust you, I'll be at the Old Jewry as soon as I can." I had also a letter from the missioner, in which he told me that the man I had met had "some very startling revelations to make." I waited patiently for the promised visit, and confidently for a further communication from the missioner. The man never came, nor was I able to get the missioner's handwriting identified. Had either of them asked for money, I would have sent it willingly, believing, as I did, that at last I was on the right scent ; but I never had any such application from either."

"At the exit leading direct to Goulston Street, opposite the corner where the murder was committed, there was a club, the members of which were nearly all foreigners. One, a sort of hybrid German, was leaving the club-he was unable to fix the hour-when he noticed a man and woman standing close together. The woman had her hand resting on the man's chest. It was bright moonlight, almost as light as day, and he saw them distinctly. This was, without doubt, the murderer and his victim. The inquiries I made at Berners Street, the evidence of the constable in whose beat the square was, and my own movements, of which I had kept careful notes, proved this conclusively. The description of the man given me by the German was as follows : Young, about the middle height, with a small fair moustache, dressed in something like navy serge, and with a deerstalker's cap - that is, a cap with a peak both fore and aft. I think the German spoke the truth, because I could not "lead" him in any way. "You will easily recognize him, then," I said. "Oh no!" he replied ; "I only had a short look at him." The German was a strange mixture, honest apparently, and intelligent also. He "had heard of some murders," he said, but they didn't seem to concern him."

[Herlock Sholmes]

Dear Herlock,

Just a line to say I keep seeing you clip the links that actually tie, and it makes me chuckle. I’ll try a new pen for you—red ink (ink, mind you, not blood)—so the points don’t smudge.

What are you talking about. I’ve ‘clipped’ nothing. I’m the only one going on what Smith actually and what is actually known about Thompson.

About the coins.

You keep shouting “no link” as if a phrase must read ‘polished farthings = Thompson’ in the same breath or it doesn’t count. Smith’s Rupert Street suspect is explicitly tagged with a coin-bilking trick; Thompson’s biography carries its own odd coin episode from his street years. No one says the anecdotes are identical; the point is convergence of an unusual motif around a man who otherwise matches the medical and geographic profile. You asked for sourcing on the “asylum note” re false coinage—fair ask. If that specific line can’t be documented to an archival page, I’ll drop that sub-point without blinking; the probability stack never relied on it. But don’t pretend the coin strand vanishes just because you insist on a single magic sentence.

You’re just making things up Richard. I’ve just read the Thompson biography. You keep jumping between things like “coin trick” to “coin episode” but neither match. You are supposed talking about Smith’s suspect being a match, to a mathematical certainty with Thompson. I asked you for evidence because you said there was evidence of Thompson doing some kind of coin trick in the ‘asylum records.’ As Thompson was never in an asylum I now know that you are just not being truthful. Smith specifically said that his suspect bilked prostitutes with polished farthings. What Thompson did was find two sovereigns in the street.

These two cannot be connected apart from that they mention a type of coin. There is no similarity. You are the only person that would think this.

About “asylum.”

You keep treating Victorian labels as if they were ICD codes. In practice, “lunatic asylum,” “private hospital,” “priory,” and “institutional care” were sloshed together in contemporary usage. Thompson’s uncle testified to a breakdown in the early 1880s; we have his late-1888 six-week institutionalization and then Storrington soon after. You can stomp your foot and say “never in an asylum,” but contemporaries didn’t police the doorplates the way you do. The fact pattern—documented breakdown + confinement under care—is the piece that matters against Smith’s trait list.

Nope. You are making things up. Thompson saw a Doctor because he was ill. He was sent to a hospital not an asylum. No one calls a normal hospital a lunatic asylum. You are the only person that would think this but I know that you don’t think this because no adult could think this. You are simply ducking and weaving. Francis Thompson was 100% never in a lunatic asylum but Smith’s suspect was.

About Rupert Street.

You keep saying “never, ever, ever lived in Rupert Street,” as if Smith’s line requires a tenancy agreement. His five-point note says seen on Rupert Street and operating out of the Haymarket grid. Thompson’s addresses cluster right there (Panton Street / Charing Cross postal, the Haymarket fringe). That’s the nexus. We both know City CID tailed Puckridge to Rupert Street and accepted an alibi for that window—fine. Two things can be true: Smith’s team chased one man that week and cleared him; the same five-trait schema still fits Thompson unusually well, without the alibi that retired Puckridge. That’s why the match retains probative weight.

Smith’s five point note doesn’t say “seen on Rupert Street.” Do you think that the rest of us can’t read Richard? Or that we don’t have Smith’s book? What he actually said was “I thought he was likely to be in Rupert Street, Haymarket.” Anyone could have ‘gone to Rupert Street’ at some point in their lives. Just because Thompson might have been in that rough vicinity at some brief point is not a match. You need a specific link to Rupert Street and there isn’t one for Thompson.

You keep breaking links by insisting they must be identical twins; I’m showing they’re fraternal—distinct, but unmistakably related. That’s how historical inference works when we’re not handed a signed confession.



Yours truly,

“Red Ink, not red hands”

—Richard

Only when you are trying to manipulate the outcome as you are.

[Richard Patterson]

You are making links that don’t exist.

Dear Herlock,

Just a line to say I keep seeing you clip the links that actually tie, and it makes me chuckle. I’ll try a new pen for you—red ink (ink, mind you, not blood)—so the points don’t smudge.

About the coins.

You keep shouting “no link” as if a phrase must read ‘polished farthings = Thompson’ in the same breath or it doesn’t count. Smith’s Rupert Street suspect is explicitly tagged with a coin-bilking trick; Thompson’s biography carries its own odd coin episode from his street years. No one says the anecdotes are identical; the point is convergence of an unusual motif around a man who otherwise matches the medical and geographic profile. You asked for sourcing on the “asylum note” re false coinage—fair ask. If that specific line can’t be documented to an archival page, I’ll drop that sub-point without blinking; the probability stack never relied on it. But don’t pretend the coin strand vanishes just because you insist on a single magic sentence.

About “asylum.”

You keep treating Victorian labels as if they were ICD codes. In practice, “lunatic asylum,” “private hospital,” “priory,” and “institutional care” were sloshed together in contemporary usage. Thompson’s uncle testified to a breakdown in the early 1880s; we have his late-1888 six-week institutionalization and then Storrington soon after. You can stomp your foot and say “never in an asylum,” but contemporaries didn’t police the doorplates the way you do. The fact pattern—documented breakdown + confinement under care—is the piece that matters against Smith’s trait list.

About Rupert Street.

You keep saying “never, ever, ever lived in Rupert Street,” as if Smith’s line requires a tenancy agreement. His five-point note says seen on Rupert Street and operating out of the Haymarket grid. Thompson’s addresses cluster right there (Panton Street / Charing Cross postal, the Haymarket fringe). That’s the nexus. We both know City CID tailed Puckridge to Rupert Street and accepted an alibi for that window—fine. Two things can be true: Smith’s team chased one man that week and cleared him; the same five-trait schema still fits Thompson unusually well, without the alibi that retired Puckridge. That’s why the match retains probative weight.

You keep breaking links by insisting they must be identical twins; I’m showing they’re fraternal—distinct, but unmistakably related. That’s how historical inference works when we’re not handed a signed confession.

Yours truly,

“Red Ink, not red hands”

—Richard

[Herlock Sholmes]

Herlock,

Once again you’re trying to win points by caricature rather than by evidence. Let me address your latest flurry:

1. Coins.

You keep insisting that unless the word “farthings” and “sovereigns” appear in the same sentence, there is no link. But Smith’s memoir gives a Rupert Street suspect associated with coin fraud (“polished farthings”), and Thompson’s biography records his own coin episode. Both are unusual enough details to merit comparison. That isn’t “making things up” — it’s weighing convergences. As for your claim that I “invented” the asylum note about false coinage, you may want to revisit the archival material before dismissing so readily. You’ll find I don’t throw in phrases without a trail.

When you make a claim, the onus is on you to provide the proof. Could you provide it please? I’ve already said that naturally I’ll accept the point if I see the proof.

2. Asylum.

Here’s where your black-and-white thinking fails you. In the 1880s, “lunatic asylum” could mean a range of institutions, from county asylums to private religious retreats. Thompson’s uncle, James, stated he had a breakdown in 1882 and was institutionalised at Storrington Priory. Owens’ records show his absence. Call it Priory, call it asylum, call it what you like — contemporaries used the words loosely and interchangeably. You can stamp your foot and insist “never in an asylum,” but the evidence of breakdown and confinement is there in the sources.

This is untrue. Everyone knows it. You are quite deliberately stretching the evidence beyond breaking point to make a fake point.

3. Rupert Street.

This is where your geography lets you down. Thompson gave Charing Cross as his postal address, lodged with the Meynells in Panton Street, and lived on the Haymarket fringe — literally steps from Rupert Street. To write that off because he had also lived with a woman in Chelsea earlier in the year is disingenuous. Suspects move. What matters is that when Smith spoke of Rupert Street, Thompson was demonstrably embedded in that neighbourhood. That is a fact, not a flourish.

I know all of that. I’ve mentioned those facts on another thread. Smith didn’t send a man to wander around the west end. He sent him SPECIFICALLY to Rupert Street. Thompson…hold on I’ll just try and be as clear as I can…..never, ever, ever, ever, ever, lived or stayed in Rupert Street. This is no more a link than if someone had said “the suspect lives in Berner Street,” and someone said “John Richardson, that’s a match, he lived in the area, it’s close enough.”

The pattern here is clear: instead of engaging with the documented record, you keep reaching for absolute denials (“no asylum,” “no coin link,” “no Rupert Street”). That may make you feel like the last man standing, but it doesn’t impress anyone who has actually opened Walsh, Boardman, or Smith.

Richard

You are making links that don’t exist.

[Richard Patterson]

There’s only one person here sticking to evidence and it’s certainly not you.

Herlock,

Once again you’re trying to win points by caricature rather than by evidence. Let me address your latest flurry:

1. Coins.

You keep insisting that unless the word “farthings” and “sovereigns” appear in the same sentence, there is no link. But Smith’s memoir gives a Rupert Street suspect associated with coin fraud (“polished farthings”), and Thompson’s biography records his own coin episode. Both are unusual enough details to merit comparison. That isn’t “making things up” — it’s weighing convergences. As for your claim that I “invented” the asylum note about false coinage, you may want to revisit the archival material before dismissing so readily. You’ll find I don’t throw in phrases without a trail.

2. Asylum.

Here’s where your black-and-white thinking fails you. In the 1880s, “lunatic asylum” could mean a range of institutions, from county asylums to private religious retreats. Thompson’s uncle, James, stated he had a breakdown in 1882 and was institutionalised at Storrington Priory. Owens’ records show his absence. Call it Priory, call it asylum, call it what you like — contemporaries used the words loosely and interchangeably. You can stamp your foot and insist “never in an asylum,” but the evidence of breakdown and confinement is there in the sources.

3. Rupert Street.

This is where your geography lets you down. Thompson gave Charing Cross as his postal address, lodged with the Meynells in Panton Street, and lived on the Haymarket fringe — literally steps from Rupert Street. To write that off because he had also lived with a woman in Chelsea earlier in the year is disingenuous. Suspects move. What matters is that when Smith spoke of Rupert Street, Thompson was demonstrably embedded in that neighbourhood. That is a fact, not a flourish.

The pattern here is clear: instead of engaging with the documented record, you keep reaching for absolute denials (“no asylum,” “no coin link,” “no Rupert Street”). That may make you feel like the last man standing, but it doesn’t impress anyone who has actually opened Walsh, Boardman, or Smith.

Richard

[Herlock Sholmes]

Herlock,

I’ll be blunt. You have a habit of rephrasing what I’ve actually written into something easier for you to knock down. That isn’t honest debate, it’s distortion. Let me clear the record on three of your claims:

No Richard…what certainly is distortion

1. The coin issue.

I’ve never written that Thompson was literally “found with polished farthings.” What I’ve consistently said is that Major Henry Smith records his Rupert Street suspect as being associated with that coin trick, and that Thompson’s own biography (Walsh, Strange Harp, Strange Symphony) contains a separate coin anecdote — finding two sovereigns in the street, initially mistaking one for a halfpenny. The point is not that the two stories are identical in wording, but that Thompson’s life is threaded with unusual coin lore, which converges with Smith’s detail. To present my words as if I had said “Smith’s polished farthings = Thompson’s sovereigns” is simply misquoting me.

More flannel. Firstly, there is no such concept as ‘coin lore’ you have invented it to justify making things up. “Bilking prostitutes with polished farthings” and finding to sovereigns in the street cannot be connected in any way. This isn’t a match.

And while we are on this point - how is it that you’ve made the above ‘explanation when elsewhere you said this (which I’ve only just noticed) - “Thompson’s asylum files note that he once attempted to pass false coinage. Though minor in itself, this act is part of the exact suite of traits listed by Smith”

Walsh makes no mention of this as far as I can recall so could you provide us with the evidence of this please and you might tells why you have distanced yourself from it by not mentioning it in the above post?

2. The “asylum” point.

Again, you rewrite what I’ve said. Victorian terminology was not neat: “asylum,” “priory,” “hospital,” and “institutional care” were overlapping in use. Thompson’s uncle stated Francis suffered a nervous breakdown before leaving Manchester in 1882 and “never fully recovered.” We know he was absent from Owens’ summer session, then placed in the Priory at Storrington later that year. Whether you stamp “asylum” or “priory” on the door, it still fits the biographical pattern Smith noted. To say “he was never in an asylum” is a word game, not a rebuttal.

More flannel. You’ve made that up. Thompson was never in a hospital. I know it. You know it. Everyone knows it. This is another fail.

Ive just noticed further proof. Smith actually said: “…LUNATIC ASYLUM.” This cannot be confused with a normal hospital.

3. Rupert Street / Haymarket.

You say “no connection.” The record says otherwise. Thompson gave Charing Cross as his postal address, lodged with the Meynells off the Haymarket, and Panton Street is a two-minute walk from Rupert Street itself. When Smith describes his suspect as connected to Rupert Street, that geographical overlap matters. Pretending I’ve invented this “nexus” is another example of you altering my words.

Smith told Warren about the medical student just after the Chapman murder. Up until that point Thompson had been living with the woman in Chelsea. Smith would have had absolutely no reason to send a man to find this man SPECIFICALLY in Rupert Street and that it was Thompson. Rupert Street is in Soho, Thompson was living around couple of miles away in Chelsea.

Another fail.

You’re free to disagree with me on the significance of these convergences. But misquoting my phrases (“coin trickery” into “farthings in hand,” “asylum” into “never in asylum,” “Rupert nexus” into “making it up”) crosses the line from fair debate into rewriting.

Stick to what I actually write, not to caricatures of it.

Richard

There’s only one person here sticking to evidence and it’s certainly not you.

[Richard Patterson]

Absolutely staggering. Your whole theory insults the intelligence of everyone.

You keep trying to con everyone in to believing that words equate to actual physical violence. They don’t. Poems aren’t violence. Novels aren’t violence. Essays aren’t violence.

You call Thompson an arsonist and pyromaniac when he, 1) Spilt some charcoal embers in a piece of childhood misbehaviour, 2) He accidentally knocked over an oil lamp, hardly surprising for a drug addict who had once ‘seen’ Chatterton’s ghost in Covent Garden! 3) He absent-mindedly left a still lit pipe in his coat pocket (I’ve done it, am I an arsonist?). And for that you label him a proven arsonist. Don’t get on your moral high horse when you are quite prepared to stoop to this kind of thing.

I’ve shown that 2 of your 4 ‘criteria’ in regard to Smith are categorically not ‘points.’ They are both obvious non-matches.

Ive asked you 2 or 3 times why Rupert Street is relevant to Thompson but you appear reluctant to answer. Why?

You claim what is 100% untrue, that Thompson was living within 100 yards of the murder sites. You haven’t provide one single piece of evidence, not one. All that you have is that Thompson might have stayed at Providence Row at some unknown point in time. And that’s certainly a no more than might have. Stop blathering and prove what you claim as a fact. PROVE that he ever lived within 100 yard of any murder site. You won’t, because there is no evidence. And yet you also falsely claim this as a fact.

Herlock,

Same old pattern: you misstate what I wrote, you move the goal-posts, then you congratulate yourself for debunking a position I never took. Let’s tidy up your latest round — and your repeated mid-thread misquotes — in one place.

1) “Words aren’t violence.”

No one said “poems = murders.” I’ve said (repeatedly) that Thompson’s writings supply motive and mindset when read alongside his opportunity and means. He doesn’t just dabble in gothic mood; he fixates on prostitutes as pollution and redemption-by-blade. See Nightmare of the Witch Babies (the “lusty knight” stalking and disembowelling), and his Tancred piece in Merry England (1891): “the girls harlots in the mother’s womb … for better your children were cast from the bridges of London … Here, too, has the Assassin left us a weapon.” He also called vice districts “putrid ulcers” to be lanced. That is not normal piety; it’s surgical moralism. You keep blanking this because it’s devastating to your “gentle poet” image.

2) Fire-setting

I’ve cited a pattern of fire incidents in his circle, not a single boyish mishap. You try to launder three separate episodes into “oopsies,” then accuse me of the label. Call it “fire fascination” if the word arson upsets you; the behavioural relevance (risk, control, thrill) doesn’t change.

3) “Two of your four Smith ‘traits’ are non-matches”

Only by rewriting them.

• Institutional care: You play word-games with “asylum.” Thompson had a documented nervous breakdown while a medical student, then institutional care (private hospital for six weeks at the end of 1888; then the Priory in 1889). You keep pretending that if the front door didn’t literally say “Asylum,” the box can’t be ticked. Victorian usage was loose; the biographical pattern is what matters and it matches.
• Coins: I have never written “Thompson was found with polished farthings.” Smith’s Rupert Street suspect is tied to that trick in Smith’s own account. Separately, Thompson’s coin episode (Walsh) shows an unusual coin lore orbiting him during his homeless period. I’ve been explicit that it’s a convergent theme, not the same anecdote. You keep “correcting” a claim I didn’t make because it’s easier to knock down.

4) Rupert Street / Haymarket

You ask why Rupert Street is relevant, while pretending not to know London. Thompson’s documented base in the West End at this time (Panton Street / Charing Cross postal, i.e., right off the Haymarket) places him inside Smith’s hunting ground and movement corridor. That’s why it’s in the probability model: you have a suspect whose real-world geography sits on the very grid Smith patrolled and described. Calling that “made up” is another example of your selective amnesia.

5) “Within 100 yards of the murder sites”

You’re tilting at a number. My claim has been — and remains — that Thompson spent nights in East End refuges (Providence Row; his own later account of it) during the relevant window and was a habitual night-walker, which places him within minutes of several sites when he was in Whitechapel. If at any point I used “100 metres” as shorthand in a fast exchange, take this as a precision upgrade: walking reach from Providence Row to Dorset Street is trivially close; the factual point stands either way. Your “100 yards or bust” routine is just you trying to create a gotcha out of a radius.

6) The “alibi therefore innocence” crutch

You keep leaning on Smith’s line that his Rupert Street man “proved an alibi.” Two things can be true:

• the man fit Smith’s tight profile;
• he produced an alibi for a specific window that Smith accepted at the time.

That doesn’t retroactively erase the profile, nor does it settle whether Smith’s composite description maps best to Puckridge (partial fit + claimed alibi) or Thompson (full biographical convergence on med training, institutionalisation, prostitutes, coin lore, and the Haymarket/Rupert Street nexus). Your take — “alibi once = end of inquiry forever” — is naïve policing, and historically wrong.

You’ve done this throughout the thread:

• Turn “institutional care/breakdown” into “never an asylum; therefore zero match.”
• Turn “coin convergence (Smith) + coin episode (Walsh)” into “Richard says Thompson passed farthings.”
• Turn “Haymarket-Rupert nexus” into “made up.”
• Turn “East End nights / Providence Row proximity” into a fake quote about “100 yards.”

It’s the same habit you’ve had in earlier mid-threads: mis-term, mis-quote, and then sneer. If you want to debate like an adult, quote me accurately and argue the substance:

• Thompson’s six years of hands-on anatomy and dissection;
• His own testimony that his poems function as a “poetic diary”;
• His violent, blade-centric moralism toward “fallen women”;
• His night-walking and documented East/West End footprint;
• His scalpel and medical instrument familiarity;
• His post-Kelly collapse into six weeks of care, then removal from London.

You can roll your eyes at any single strand. What you haven’t done — because you can’t — is explain away the convergence. Until you engage that, your posts are just another round of strawmen and bravado.

[Richard Patterson]

This collection contains 2 absolute, provable falsehoods. Deliberate falsehood’s intended to trick anyone that hasn’t read the Walsh biography.

Francis Thompson was never accused of passing off polished farthings. The words “polished” or “farthing” don’t appear. He wasn’t accused of “passing off” any other type of coin either; polished or otherwise. Zero. Didn’t happen.

The only story that we have is of Thompson purported finding 2 sovereigns in the street. That’s it.

So what Richard has done is - Major Smith’s suspect had been passing off polished farthings - Thompson had allegedly once found two sovereigns in the street - TICK THAT ‘MATCHES’ A more blatant example of trickery is hard to imagine. Then, because he knows that I’ve pulled him up on this, in his post he alters “passing off polished farthings” (which is what Smith actually said) to the more vague “coin related trickery.”

So, the coin point fails. Not one single poster on here will be fooled by this.

…….

The Smith’s suspect was sometime in an “asylum.”

Francis Thompson was never in an asylum in his entire life. I challenged Richard to name this “asylum” but he can’t and won’t because it doesn’t exist. Sometime in October of 1888 Wilfrid Meynell persuaded Thompson to go into hospital because a doctor had said that he was in a state of near collapse.

So Richard - Smith’s suspect had been”asylum”, Thompson “hospital” - tick.

No one on here can now be fooled by this trickery.

2 out of 4 categorical non-matches.

….

Then we have a new one. The Haymarket/Rupert Street nexus. He’s just making stuff up.

Francis Thompson never had any connection to Rupert Street.

Richard - Smith mentions Rupert Street - Thompson lived somewhere in the remote vicinity - tick.

….

Blatant trickery.

Francis Thompson ticks 1 box out of 4.

The suspect was even found….with polished farthings!

Herlock,

I’ll be blunt. You have a habit of rephrasing what I’ve actually written into something easier for you to knock down. That isn’t honest debate, it’s distortion. Let me clear the record on three of your claims:

1. The coin issue.

I’ve never written that Thompson was literally “found with polished farthings.” What I’ve consistently said is that Major Henry Smith records his Rupert Street suspect as being associated with that coin trick, and that Thompson’s own biography (Walsh, Strange Harp, Strange Symphony) contains a separate coin anecdote — finding two sovereigns in the street, initially mistaking one for a halfpenny. The point is not that the two stories are identical in wording, but that Thompson’s life is threaded with unusual coin lore, which converges with Smith’s detail. To present my words as if I had said “Smith’s polished farthings = Thompson’s sovereigns” is simply misquoting me.

2. The “asylum” point.

Again, you rewrite what I’ve said. Victorian terminology was not neat: “asylum,” “priory,” “hospital,” and “institutional care” were overlapping in use. Thompson’s uncle stated Francis suffered a nervous breakdown before leaving Manchester in 1882 and “never fully recovered.” We know he was absent from Owens’ summer session, then placed in the Priory at Storrington later that year. Whether you stamp “asylum” or “priory” on the door, it still fits the biographical pattern Smith noted. To say “he was never in an asylum” is a word game, not a rebuttal.

3. Rupert Street / Haymarket.

You say “no connection.” The record says otherwise. Thompson gave Charing Cross as his postal address, lodged with the Meynells off the Haymarket, and Panton Street is a two-minute walk from Rupert Street itself. When Smith describes his suspect as connected to Rupert Street, that geographical overlap matters. Pretending I’ve invented this “nexus” is another example of you altering my words.

You’re free to disagree with me on the significance of these convergences. But misquoting my phrases (“coin trickery” into “farthings in hand,” “asylum” into “never in asylum,” “Rupert nexus” into “making it up”) crosses the line from fair debate into rewriting.

Stick to what I actually write, not to caricatures of it.

Richard

[Herlock Sholmes]

Thompson, on the other hand, matches all five traits cleanly and independently. He had six years of medical training, a documented nervous breakdown with institutional care, a prostitute lover who fled to Whitechapel in mid-1888, direct evidence of coin-related trickery in Walsh’s biography, and he lived right on top of the Haymarket/Rupert Street nexus. You can dismiss one trait here or there if you want, but you can’t hand-wave away the convergence. That’s why the probability calculations explode into the quadrillions: it’s statistically impossible for someone else to line up on all five.
.

This collection contains 2 absolute, provable falsehoods. Deliberate falsehood’s intended to trick anyone that hasn’t read the Walsh biography.

Francis Thompson was never accused of passing off polished farthings. The words “polished” or “farthing” don’t appear. He wasn’t accused of “passing off” any other type of coin either; polished or otherwise. Zero. Didn’t happen.

The only story that we have is of Thompson purported finding 2 sovereigns in the street. That’s it.

So what Richard has done is - Major Smith’s suspect had been passing off polished farthings - Thompson had allegedly once found two sovereigns in the street - TICK THAT ‘MATCHES’ A more blatant example of trickery is hard to imagine. Then, because he knows that I’ve pulled him up on this, in his post he alters “passing off polished farthings” (which is what Smith actually said) to the more vague “coin related trickery.”

So, the coin point fails. Not one single poster on here will be fooled by this.

…….

The Smith’s suspect was sometime in an “asylum.”

Francis Thompson was never in an asylum in his entire life. I challenged Richard to name this “asylum” but he can’t and won’t because it doesn’t exist. Sometime in October of 1888 Wilfrid Meynell persuaded Thompson to go into hospital because a doctor had said that he was in a state of near collapse.

So Richard - Smith’s suspect had been”asylum”, Thompson “hospital” - tick.

No one on here can now be fooled by this trickery.

2 out of 4 categorical non-matches.

….

Then we have a new one. The Haymarket/Rupert Street nexus. He’s just making stuff up.

Francis Thompson never had any connection to Rupert Street.

Richard - Smith mentions Rupert Street - Thompson lived somewhere in the remote vicinity - tick.

….

Blatant trickery.

Francis Thompson ticks 1 box out of 4.

The suspect was even found….with polished farthings!

[The Rookie Detective]

WORDS ARE NOT VIOLENCE.

Show me one example of Thompson being actually, physically violent.

A good point Herlock.


A dog without a bite, is just noise.

Like a thunderstorm.

A child's fear of the harmless thunder, yet oblivious to the destructive nature of the lightning.

[Richard Patterson]

smiths suspect was puckeridge as jerry d has shown.

Reply to Abby Normal

Abby, you’ve thrown “Puckeridge” at this thread like it’s a silver bullet, but let’s slow down. If Smith’s suspect really was Puckeridge, we’ve got a serious problem: the math doesn’t work.

Smith set out five rare, converging traits—ex-medical student, asylum history, connection with prostitutes, tricking women with polished farthings, and ties to Rupert Street/Haymarket. Puckeridge only ticks three boxes, and even those are shaky. He never had the prostitute association, and there is no evidence whatsoever for the coin-fraud trick. On top of that, he was given an alibi that the City police themselves accepted. So unless you’re saying Smith was both wrong about the traits and chasing a man already eliminated, Puckeridge cannot be the Rupert Street suspect Smith described.

Thompson, on the other hand, matches all five traits cleanly and independently. He had six years of medical training, a documented nervous breakdown with institutional care, a prostitute lover who fled to Whitechapel in mid-1888, direct evidence of coin-related trickery in Walsh’s biography, and he lived right on top of the Haymarket/Rupert Street nexus. You can dismiss one trait here or there if you want, but you can’t hand-wave away the convergence. That’s why the probability calculations explode into the quadrillions: it’s statistically impossible for someone else to line up on all five.

So when you say “Smith’s suspect was Puckeridge,” what you’re really doing is trying to collapse the investigation’s credibility just to avoid acknowledging Thompson. If Smith’s description is meaningless, then the entire Rupert Street surveillance was meaningless. But it wasn’t—Smith was a Commissioner, present at Mitre Square, and his words carry weight. To deride him is to erase the case itself.

You don’t have to like the conclusion, but you can’t keep pretending that a partial fit with an accepted alibi somehow “beats” a full match with no such escape hatch. That’s not serious analysis—that’s obstruction.

If you want to defend Puckeridge, then by all means: show us where he meets all five traits, not just three. Until then, Thompson stands alone as the Rupert Street suspect.

[Abby Normal]

smiths suspect was puckeridge as jerry d has shown.

[Herlock Sholmes]

If you want to debate probability models or challenge interpretations, fine—we can spar on the facts. But don’t insult everyone’s intelligence by claiming Thompson never showed hatred for prostitutes. It’s in his work, over and over again, and it defines him. That’s the record, and no amount of rhetorical hair-splitting changes it.

Absolutely staggering. Your whole theory insults the intelligence of everyone.

You keep trying to con everyone in to believing that words equate to actual physical violence. They don’t. Poems aren’t violence. Novels aren’t violence. Essays aren’t violence.

You call Thompson an arsonist and pyromaniac when he, 1) Spilt some charcoal embers in a piece of childhood misbehaviour, 2) He accidentally knocked over an oil lamp, hardly surprising for a drug addict who had once ‘seen’ Chatterton’s ghost in Covent Garden! 3) He absent-mindedly left a still lit pipe in his coat pocket (I’ve done it, am I an arsonist?). And for that you label him a proven arsonist. Don’t get on your moral high horse when you are quite prepared to stoop to this kind of thing.

I’ve shown that 2 of your 4 ‘criteria’ in regard to Smith are categorically not ‘points.’ They are both obvious non-matches.

Ive asked you 2 or 3 times why Rupert Street is relevant to Thompson but you appear reluctant to answer. Why?

You claim what is 100% untrue, that Thompson was living within 100 yards of the murder sites. You haven’t provide one single piece of evidence, not one. All that you have is that Thompson might have stayed at Providence Row at some unknown point in time. And that’s certainly a no more than might have. Stop blathering and prove what you claim as a fact. PROVE that he ever lived within 100 yard of any murder site. You won’t, because there is no evidence. And yet you also falsely claim this as a fact.