Any updates, or opinions on this witness.

[richardnunweek]

Hi Sam.
I do not have theories , I have stated facts that the number 39 has significance in Black Magic and masonic.
I have tongue -in-cheek, suggested that 39 appear a lot in this series .
As for Topping himself telling us he was the witness , he was dead and buried long before radio broadcast/Ripper and the Royals was around.
Reg admitted he knew nothing personally about the murders, and indeed borrowed a book on the subject from a younger member of the family.
Where did all this come from if not from his father, including the rare mention of a payment?
Regards Richard.

[rjpalmer]

Abby - I don't want to come across like I was snubbing your response. I am well aware that in the 1903 interview, Abberline states that he was oblivious to the Daily Chronicle piece, but the reasons that Helena Wojtczac concludes that he WAS aware of it (at least by the time the PMG piece was published) are quite convincing. The "elephant in the room" is that Abberline was rooming with a PMG journalist in the 1901 census and that this is probably the same chap that became the interviewer. It was two old chums discussing the Chapman/Klosowski theory, the latter turning it into an "interview," and during the course of their conversation, they discussed the Daily Chronicle piece. The icing on the cake is that Abberline uses precisely the same arguments that had appeared the Daily Chronicle story, even mentioning the mythical murders in Jersey City, U.S.A., even though Abberline's source was supposedly Sir Edward Carson who never said anything about Jersey City or any American murders.

None of this will make sense to you, of course, but that is the argument. Hence Abberline's obsession with the "peaked cap" being a reflection of the Daily Chronicle piece. Either way, there is utterly nothing he states that even remotely suggests that he believed Hutchinson was discredited, that's just standard "Ripperological" bosh from people wishing to plump for their suspect. And depending how much faith one wants to put in H.L. Adam, it's even theoretically possible that Abberline was the later the source for the Hutchinson/Klosowski comparison in the introduction to his book. Adam claims that Abberline was still plumping for Klosowski in the years after 1903 and even chased down Lucy Baderska and interviewed her. Regardless of what Adam used to suggest the Hutchinson connection, this doesn't diminish the fact that it was the "peaked cap" that is what caught Abberline's attention in 1903 and Astrakhan did not wear a peaked cap.

[Ben]

Thanks, RJ. Glad to hear the Victoria Home information was of interest.

Are you saying every deckhand on the R.M.S. Ormuz had to be living in London at the time of the 1881 UK census?

Not at all.

I’m saying that the deckhands of the Ormuz probably all had London as their nearest port, otherwise they would have embarked from one of the many other British ports that facilitated passage to Australia.

Sailors, by their nature, come from all over the place and move from port to port

But he wasn’t a real sailor, as we’ve already established. He was a “bodge” sailor who secured passage because of the paucity of genuine professionals, many of whom were taking strike action at the time. This is obvious from the fact that his prison records described him as a labourer or a “tinsmith”. In addition to which - and as Senise’s research makes very clear - the Ormuz had a reputation for employing a bodge crew.

By far the most likely group of people to take up the roles of faux sailors were those living in close proximity to the docks themselves, who were ideally situated to learn through the local grapevine of the opportunities presented by the strike for securing potential work, making up the numbers vacated by actual sailors.

All the best,
Ben

[Ben]

I’m afraid these continued references to peaked caps and the Daily Chronicle amount to little more than obfuscation. The fact remains that Abberline mentioned nothing about Hutchinson or his account in the 1903 PMG article, despite the golden opportunity Klosowski presented for him to do so. It defies sanity to infer ludicrously tenuous parallels with peaked cap-wearing men when there was an opportunity to wheel in the star witness for a potentially compelling facial comparison.

As Abby has observed, Abberline had already complied a “case” against Klosowski for intended submission to Melville Macnaghten, and it would logically have included the very same eyewitness-related observations he shared with the PMG reporter - the ones that were conspicuous in their absence or any reference to Hutchinson or Astrakhan.

Sorry, but the idea that he was tailoring his Klosowski-related observations to address the trivial specifics of an article he wasn’t even familiar with (while saving the really juicy stuff for later!?) simply won’t wash. He was presenting the entire case against Klosowski, such as it was, and he gave not the slightest hint that he was deliberately withholding information - especially not eyewitness evidence that might have enhanced it considerably.

H.L. Adam obtained Hutchinson’s description from the contemporary newspapers for use in his 1914 piece, then regurgitated it again in 1930 after “discovering” Klosowski. We know this because only press versions of his evidence described the man’s complexion as dark. Adam certainly didn’t have any contact with Abberline prior to his initial 1914 reference to the description, or else he would have been familiar with the latter’s pro-Klosowski stance, which the author was later to adopt.

All the best,
Ben

[Ben]

Hi Richard,

It hasn’t been terribly clear to me that your tongue was embedded in your cheek when you presented your “number 39” thesis, but I’m relieved to hear it was, and I’m grateful for the clarification.

Where did all this come from if not from his father, including the rare mention of a payment?

Probably from an active imagination and aided (or rather unaided) by the very poor interviewing techniques employed by messrs Fairclough and Sickert.

All the best,
Ben

[Abby Normal]

Here's a touch of realism:

[ATTACH]18781[/ATTACH]

... is that coffee I smell?

Not even close

[Sam Flynn]

Hi Sam.
I do not have theories , I have stated facts that the number 39 has significance in Black Magic and masonic.
I have tongue -in-cheek, suggested that 39 appear a lot in this series .
As for Topping himself telling us he was the witness , he was dead and buried long before radio broadcast/Ripper and the Royals was around.
Reg admitted he knew nothing personally about the murders, and indeed borrowed a book on the subject from a younger member of the family.
Where did all this come from if not from his father, including the rare mention of a payment?
Regards Richard.

Let's not confuse the straightforward (and to my mind conclusive) idenfication of the Miller's Court witness with numerological theories or the Royal Family/Masonic/Churchill stuff, because it only gives anti-Topping theorists an excuse to deflect attention away from the important point - namely, that we've found our man.

[Sam Flynn]

Not even close

Look at those two signatures, Abby.

"Not even close", my arse.

[Abby Normal]

Look at those two signatures, Abby.

"Not even close", my arse.

Sam as part of my job i look at documents and signed paperwork and have to make sure sigs match.

As people age there sigs get more idiosyncratic, with more flourish and or get lazier.

They dont get more basic and school boy.

And the the first initial is the last to change, and in these two its one of the most different.

I think your thrown off by the “ basicness” of the two sigs, but they are very different.

And besides, with all three of the original sigs so different its useless to try and compare with a later sig.

And please keep your arse out of it.

[Fisherman]

Sam as part of my job i look at documents and signed paperwork and have to make sure sigs match.

As people age there sigs get more idiosyncratic, with more flourish and or get lazier.

They dont get more basic and school boy.

And the the first initial is the last to change, and in these two its one of the most different.

I think your thrown off by the “ basicness” of the two sigs, but they are very different.

And besides, with all three of the original sigs so different its useless to try and compare with a later sig.

And please keep your arse out of it.

Avoiding, as best as I can, to poke MY arse in this business, it needs to be said that Swedens foremost criminal specialist on signatures, Frank Leander, disagreed with you, Abby. And he had a lifetime of doing these comparisons behind him when he concluded that he would be surprised if the signatures were not from the same man, and added that he expected any forthcoming new evidence to further seal the deal.

That is all I am going to say about it this time over, since Leanders garcious and helpful contribution was not received in a very balanced manner when it arrived some years ago.
That, however, does not change what he said.

Over and out.

[Abby Normal]

Avoiding, as best as I can, to poke MY arse in this business, it needs to be said that Swedens foremost criminal specialist on signatures, Frank Leander, disagreed with you, Abby. And he had a lifetime of doing these comparisons behind him when he concluded that he would be surprised if the signatures were not from the same man, and added that he expected any forthcoming new evidence to further seal the deal.

That is all I am going to say about it this time over, since Leanders garcious and helpful contribution was not received in a very balanced manner when it arrived some years ago.
That, however, does not change what he said.

Over and out.

Thanks fish
What he say about the original three sigs..did he think they matched with each other too?

[Ben]

I would also like to sign off from this vexed Top-ic by reminding all interested parties that renowned expert Sue Iremonger is, to date, the only document examiner to have compared all three original statement signatures, and presented her findings at the 1993 World Association of Document Examiners conference.

She concluded that while all three statement signatures were written by the same hand, whoever signed them was not the signatory on Toppy’s 1898 marriage certificate.

But this has been discussed ad nauseam on a great many threads.

Changing the topic entirely, I thought I’d share a photo I took from the window of my lodging house on Goulston Street a couple of weeks ago.

Just to clarify my perspective, I’m looking in a roughly north-easterly direction from the southern end of Goulston Street.

- The Victoria Home was located where the white building to the left of the high-rise block of flats now stands.

- To the left of this, behind some trees can be discerned the spire of Christchurch Spitalfields, which still stands on Commercial Street, roughly facing the entrance to Dorset Street.

- Follow the horizon to the right and you’ll see the chimney of the old Truman Brewery, right behind the Hanbury Street murder location.

- Alice McKenzie was murdered in Castle Alley, the former site of which is a stone’s throw from my position, nestled somewhere behind the large brown building in the immediate foreground.

- If I lobbed another stone to my immediate left, I would have hit the entrance to the former Wentworth Model Dwellings, where Eddowes’ apron remnant was jettisoned.

- To the immediate right of the high-rise block are two yellow cranes, and the one on the left is situated roughly where Martha Tabram was found murdered 130 years ago.

Anyway, I hope the above illustrates at least reasonably well how centrally located Hutchinson would have been in relation to the murder sites.

All the best,
Ben

[Abby Normal]

I would also like to sign off from this vexed Top-ic by reminding all interested parties that renowned expert Sue Iremonger is, to date, the only document examiner to have compared all three original statement signatures, and presented her findings at the 1993 World Association of Document Examiners conference.

She concluded that while all three statement signatures were written by the same hand, whoever signed them was not the signatory on Toppy’s 1898 marriage certificate.

But this has been discussed ad nauseam on a great many threads.

Changing the topic entirely, I thought I’d share a photo I took from the window of my lodging house on Goulston Street a couple of weeks ago.

Just to clarify my perspective, I’m looking in a roughly north-easterly direction from the southern end of Goulston Street.

- The Victoria Home was located where the white building to the left of the high-rise block of flats now stands.

- To the left of this, behind some trees can be discerned the spire of Christchurch Spitalfields, which still stands on Commercial Street, roughly facing the entrance to Dorset Street.

- Follow the horizon to the right and you’ll see the chimney of the old Truman Brewery, right behind the Hanbury Street murder location.

- Alice McKenzie was murdered in Castle Alley, the former site of which is a stone’s throw from my position, nestled somewhere behind the large brown building in the immediate foreground.

- If I lobbed another stone to my immediate left, I would have hit the entrance to the former Wentworth Model Dwellings, where Eddowes’ apron remnant was jettisoned.

- To the immediate right of the high-rise block are two yellow cranes, and the one on the left is situated roughly where Martha Tabram was found murdered 130 years ago.

Anyway, I hope the above illustrates at least reasonably well how centrally located Hutchinson would have been in relation to the murder sites.

All the best,
Ben

right smack in the middle. thanks for posting that pic!

[DJA]

Sue Iremonger is also of the opinion that the first "Hutchinson signature" was written by Badham.

[Ben]

Glad it was of interest, Abby!

You are correct, Dave. I’d forgotten that detail. She believed the signature was scrawled by Badham in “conscious immitation” of the other two.