Suspect questions

[AndrewL]

I have often thought of the JTR mystery as a jigsaw puzzle with most of the pieces missing. I also think it is important to remember that which documents have survived and which have not is essentially random, which inevitably distorts our understanding of the case.

So, bearing this in mind, would anybody like to answer the following questions:

1. If the Macnaghten memorandum had been lost or destroyed, would we even have heard of Montague Druitt?

2. If the Swanson Marginilia had never come to light, what would Kosminski's status as a suspect be today?

3. If the Littlechild letter was still gathering dust in an attic somewhere, would Tumblety have ever come to light?

4. How likely is it that there were other major police suspects we have never heard of simply because the documents are no longer available?

[GUT]

I think Druitt may have come to light because we still have the MP.

Tumblety would eventually have been looked at as we have newspaper reports claiming he had been arrested on suspicion.

[Jonathan H]

1. Researchers/buffs would have split between those who were sure that Macnaghten/Sims meant a drowned doctor who was purely mythical- propaganda, versus those who argued, laterally, that the pair must actually mean Montague Druitt, the drowned barrister. The latter group would have been tiny--but correct--and the former, large and hegemonic, would itself have split between those who said this suspect never existed and those who searched, fruitlessly, for a medical man who was fished out of the Thames.

2. Martin Fido's theory about David Cohen, or variations thereof, would predominate as Macnaghten naming a 'Kosminski' would be seen as just another of his 'errors'. Whereas Swanson in 1895 had said a man who was deceased, and Anderson had inspired sources which pointed to a Polish-Jewish local man whose hideous career was cut short by being sectioned, and who had died soon after (as Anderson apparently told his son). This is a better fit for Cohen.

3. Dr. Francis Tumblety would have been found, as a Ripper suspect headliner in US newspapers, by some researcher in the digital age. In fact, probably by many. Inspector Walter Andrews' trip would have been found and its significance poisonously 'debated', just the same. But the anti-Tumblety crowd would have relentlessly played an ace: the total lack of a solitary, senior police figure, either officially or unofficially, to go on record that here was a "likely" suspect from 1888

4. None whatsoever.

[Mayerling]

1. Researchers/buffs would have split between those who were sure that Macnaghten/Sims meant a drowned doctor who was purely mythical- propaganda, versus those who argued, laterally, that the pair must actually mean Montague Druitt, the drowned barrister. The latter group would have been tiny--but correct--and the former, large and hegemonic, would itself have split between those who said this suspect never existed and those who searched, fruitlessly, for a medical man who was fished out of the Thames.

2. Martin Fido's theory about David Cohen, or variations thereof, would predominate as Macnaghten naming a 'Kosminski' would be seen as just another of his 'errors'. Whereas Swanson in 1895 had said a man who was deceased, and Anderson had inspired sources which pointed to a Polish-Jewish local man whose hideous career was cut short by being sectioned, and who had died soon after (as Anderson apparently told his son). This is a better fit for Cohen.

3. Dr. Francis Tumblety would have been found, as a Ripper suspect headliner in US newspapers, by some researcher in the digital age. In fact, probably by many. Inspector Walter Andrews' trip would have been found and its significance poisonously 'debated', just the same. But the anti-Tumblety crowd would have relentlessly played an ace: the total lack of a solitary, senior police figure, either officially or unofficially, to go on record that here was a "likely" suspect from 1888

4. None whatsoever.

Fascinating set of questions on suspects. That fourth one in particular is a bug-a-boo to me. On another thread I recently stated that I really question if the identity of "Jack" will ever be really solved due to the length of time that has passed since the crimes. But there is always that "hope springs eternal" spark that one day something will turn up. The Mr. McCawber in all of us hope so.

The fact is the MacNaughten, Littlechild, and Swanson items have actually generated real research (which is good) and while some have questioned them or their worth they did turn up and get generally accepted. But then how about the "discovery" of the Maybrick Diary? That sort of shows the pitfalls of finding a documentary trail. I won't knock the Diary - it still has some adherents - but most of us don't think well of it.

When considering future potential documentary trails, one really ought to take the time to consider what would be the most likely spots to look for these? I have mentioned that when Henry Mathews died in 1921 his obituary in the old supplement to the original Dictionary of National Biography mentioned his personal papers and some writings about his career. That would be something I'd aim for.

I suppose all of the leading police figures from Mac and Anderson down to Abberline and Dew have been subject to some probing. It would be interesting if this is done for researchers to admit such and show how far they went.

I know an area I am curiously interested in, but have been too lazy or ill not to look into: what were the comments of all the contemporary celebrities who left letters, journals, and diaries. Charles Dickens, throughout his correspondence, refers to every prominent criminal case that occupied the High Victorian period of the 1840s- 1870s. Dickens died in 1870. Wilkie Collins was a physical wreck due, in part, to drug addiction in 1888. He died in 1889. Did he leave anything like a diary or journal and comment on that last major murder mystery of his lifetime? What about Thomas Hardy, whose "Wessex" settings (I believe) includes Druitts' Dorset. If so, could he have heard anything. That he was interested in homicides is clear - "Tess of the D'Urbervilles" was based on an actual case, and it was published in 1891, and Hardy's first major novel, "Desperate Remedies" was based on the influence of Wilkie Collins.

One of these years I really have to pull myself together to look into those authors. Many of them seem to have heard something. One in particular needs a study: Marie Belloc Lowndes. Where did she get that "Lodger" story from that is so similar to the tale Walter Sickert used to talk about?

Jeff

[AndrewL]

Thanks Jonathan, interesting answers. I suppose my wider point is that our understanding of the case has been heavily influenced by these documents, any of which could easily have been lost. But then I suppose that is true of most historical subjects - some sources survive, some don't and so we always get a slightly distorted picture of the truth.

One follow-up question - if the Macnaghten Memorandum had been destroyed, when would Druitt's name have been discovered? Presumably the Tom Cullen and Dan Farson books would never have been written, radically changing the historiography of JTR.

[Jonathan H]

To AndrewL

I think that somebody, sometime, perhaps more recently, would have made a concerted effort to focus on 'drowned' rather than 'doctor', and thus to have checked the entire Thames of London for suicides in 1888/9--and inevitably found references to the drowned barrister in regional papers.

You see, Druitt, albeit un-named, first makes his appearance as a Ripper suspect in 1891 with the MP, but that faded and was forgotten in the blink of an eye. Whereas Major Griffiths'account of 1898 (Druitt's comeback) was very influential, as was George Sims' relentless proselytizing from 1899 to 1917 of a medical men who took his own life--to the point where it was the pop cultural origin (or rather consolidation) of the top-hat-toff of every illustrator since.

Druitt dominated the Edwardian era as the prime solution, even though his name was unknown to just about anybody and his specific identity was unrecoverable. In my opinion that was done deliberately.

Aaron Kosminski, also un-named, has, nevertheless, been with us via Major Griffiths since 1895, and also consolidated in the writings of Sims and Anderson (but not Macnaghten's memoirs).

Dr Tumblety really vanished in the British press, yet elements of the American suspect shadows the Edwardian era too: a middle-doctor, a deviant, who was rich enough not to have to work, and who was being cornered by a police dragnet (Sims in 1907 even writes the leading alternate theory to the Drowned English Doctor is not the mad Pole but an American medico).

To Mayerling

It was [probably] solved. The solution was broadly shared with the public. It is a post-war notion or construct or misconception that the case remained a mystery to everybody at the Yard.

[AndrewL]

Thanks Jonathan. As you say, probably only a small minority would have concluded that Druitt was the man identified by Macnaghten - and yet they would have been quite right. Another example of the pitfalls created by missing documents and the danger of jumping to conclusions.

[pinkmoon]

Why name anyone if you don't have an evidence surely they must have been something so compelling for sir Melville to comit Druitts name to paper.