Topping Hutchinson - looking at his son's account

[Rubyretro]

[QUOTE]

Well yes, by 1891 he was a lodger. We don’t know that he had his own room though. And we know he was a plumber by then and not a casual labourer which indeed would have provided him with more money.
This is not very relevant as to what he was doing in 1888.

It's really quite relevant. If he was a plumber in 1891, that is only 4 years on.
So either he was an apprentice beforehand, or he at least was working with a plumber 'picking the job up' and unqualified (I think that is unlikely since he went on to be successfully self employed, as a plumber, and not a 'jack of all trades). If so, he couldn't have been a casual labourer in 1888.
Alternatively, since his father was a plumber, he could have either have learned the job directly from his father (so no being a groom, and no need to be penniless and labouring in London), or was an apprentice directly after leaving school.
Any which way that you look at it, the time scales are too short to have Toppy in dire straits, living hand to mouth in a common lodging house in 1888

By the way, I think that you should have more respect for Garry's research into plumbing apprenticeships. I think that you would agree that he appears to be an honourable man, and he has done a lot of first hand research. He probably knows rather more about Victorian plumbers and their qualifications, than we can learn by doing a few Google searches.

Did he go to school longer than most? Did he get a good education, just because he went to school at some point? I very much doubt he was taught the violin at school by the way.

As far as I can see, although children were mean't to go to school until the age of 12 (Education Act 1870, it was only made compulsory after 1880), the reality was that parents were expected to pay for the schooling, and many couldn't or wouldn't. Apart from the fact that employers saw children as a source of cheap labour, very poor people also saw children as another mouth to feed, and the potential to bring some more money into the household. Therefore, many children didn't actually stay in school (yes I do know about
Charity -my own great grandmother went to the 'Ragged School' in Mile End).
I would argue that Toppy's family didn't need to send Toppy out as child labour, and that a parent's natural desire would be for their son to 'better himself'. I don't think that Toppy learn't the violin at school ; Nor do I think that he was taught it in order to go out begging. It was probably because his parents wanted to teach him skills -and not 'only' plumbing!

As for creativity, it is Toppy’s son Reg who you are really accusing of being creative.
That is the extra factor here. In piecing together the known facts about Toppy’s life you are relying purely on the extant official records and press reports. You are discounting the evidence of Toppy’s son.

But 'Reg said so" is not 'evidence' at all ! I think that there are various different reasons why Reg might have said what he did -and he might not have lied. I said that I would answer this -but it will be a long and complicated answer. However, I've got two days off...so maybe, I'll try and give you some possibilities..

I am looking at the records and seeing if there is anything which particularly contradicts the supposed family tradition. There isn’t. In fact there are two snippets which lend weight – the posh suspect and the payment for services rendered (the amount paid isn’t the significant aspect, that can easily have inflated in the telling, it is the detail of payment being made).

WHAT ????? Lechmere, those are two 'telling' details that point to the story being false ! But that's beside the point -both stories were printed in the Press, and/or recounted as street gossip, and available to Toppy. They are
worthless.

Clearly the groom/labourer in 1888 becoming a plumber in 1891 is not great so far as corroboration goes, but it is not as if it is exactly inexplicable or an out of this world leap.

understatement ?!
It is only explicable if you put ' Occam's knife' firmly back in it's drawer.

[Lechmere]

Apart from the fact that Hutchinson told Kelly he had no money on that particular morning, we cannot say that Hutchinson was in general in 1888 a beggar, or in dire straights.
Not everyone in the Victoria Home was a hobo.
As I said, in 1901 he wasn’t a self employed plumber (I will check this) although he may have been later in life.

I wasn’t questioning Gary being an honourable man at all. However I am afraid that we know from very good and overwhelming direct evidence that plumbing apprenticeships were relatively rare by the 1880s, and a distinct minority of plumbers followed that route.

Your certainty that Toppy couldn’t have gone through a spell as a labourer or a groom, inbetween perhaps learning some plumbing through his father when he was say 12 or 14 and then returning to plumbing when his attempt to go his own way didn’t work out, is somewhat baseless. It just simply is not an incredible story. It is not a neat story. It would be a neat story of Hutchinson had said he was a plumber. Yet people seldom lead neat lives.

I think you are over exaggerating the amount of abject poverty in England. There were pockets of it, but most working class people lived perfectly ‘respectable’ lives, did send their children to school and weren’t reliant on using them as sweated labour to supplement the family’s income. Although of course they didn’t live as comfortably as people have now grown accustomed.

I rather doubt Toppy read American newspapers and he would only have picked up street gossip if he lived in hose streets – as opposed to Fitzrovia.

But now you are suggesting that Toppy lied to Reg? (I await your reasoned response with baited breath).
Reg’s statements are evidence. You may discount it (that word again – should I say disregard) but it is still evidence.

[Rubyretro]

Right, Lechmere let me give you some different possibilities to show you that Reg's story need not be as cut and dried as you think. In other words, it need not come down to Reg lied - Reg didn't lie. First , here are some options, which I'll develop afterwards :

(none of the options include 'Reg was telling the simple truth', because that is not the question that I'm replying to here).

1. Melvyn Fairclough did some research looking for the real George Hutchinson and found Reg. He then suggested to Reg that his father had been the George Hutchinson in the Ripper case :

1a) Reg didn't know anything about the case, but liked the attention and the sweetner of money if the book was a success. He spouted the fruits of Fairclough's research, knowing that what he said wasn't true.

1.b) Reg didn't know anything about the case, but liked the attention and promise of money, so said that he was aware that the witness was his father, and boned up on the case by himself.

1.c) Reg didn't know anything about the case but under the 'information' presented by Fairclough as 'fact' (his father had been the witness in the Kelly murder), and the 'suggestion' of certain facts, he then began 'remembering' things that his father had said (false memory by suggestion).

2.a) Reg was telling the truth and his father really did tell him 'the story' -but Toppy was lying to make himself more glamourous and interesting.

2.b) Reg was telling the truth. His father really did tell him 'the story' -but Toppy, being around the East End at the time, and knowing that he had the same name as the witness (and being young and frivolous) had passed himself off as the witness to bum free drinks or for a 'jape' with his mates, and had grown to sincerely believe his own lie (false memory by reinforcement of an idea through repetition).

2.c) Reg was telling the truth and his father really did tell him 'the story', however the story came from Toppy reading newspaper accounts of the murder at the time and -hooked by the coincidence of the same name-identified himself with and visualised himself into the shoes of the witness (false memory by visualisation).

First of all, if you make a brief anaylsis of the possible 'reasons' that I've given above, only two out of the six accuse Reg of lying directly.

Reg may have been perfectly sincere when recounting his story -and still have been wrong ( I hope you're reading this, Garry. You said this, and I thought about it, as I do about all your replies).

Only one option of the six accuses Melvyn Fairclough of witting dishonesty, and the same when applied to Toppy, the plumber.
However, three of the six implicate 'false memory syndrome', and their keywords 'suggestion, repetition, and visualisation'.
I can't be arsed to try and do a synthesis of 'it' here, but here are some interesting links :

https://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/...oftus.mem.html (The Formation of False Memories)

unisci.com/stories/20012/0613011.htm (False memories easily Created)

Infact, I will leave it there, for now..although I'm willing to argue it..
A clue is, it's not what a person 'remembers' 'rightly' that proves anything if they could have got the information from a source prior to their story. The giveaway is what they got wrong -repeating the mistakes of their sources. 'Lord Randolph Churchill' and the sum paid to Hutchinson, were surely wrong, and betray Reg/Toppy/Fairclough. There is no 'extra information' that couldn't have been gleaned from the Press of the time.

[lynn cates]

My Lord!

Hello Ruby. The Lord Randolph business looks like a page from the SB ledgers.

Cheers.
LC

[Rubyretro]

Apart from the fact that Hutchinson told Kelly he had no money on that particular morning, we cannot say that Hutchinson was in general in 1888 a beggar, or in dire straights.

He was living in a Common Lodging House, a single man, living 'hand to mouth' , obliged to go at 5 in the morning and present himself for work (with no guarantee of getting it) with a load of other desperate men, even obliged to hike to places as far as Romford in the drizzle, or 'walk about all night', and relient on prostitutes for sex. That's what I call 'dire straits'.

Not everyone in the Victoria Home was a hobo

No, but they not only had to put up with the above conditions but they were obliged to submit to the God Squad too (according to you)..

As I said, in 1901 he wasn’t a self employed plumber (I will check this) although he may have been later in life.

I don't know about 1901 -I'm pretty sure that he was later.

I wasn’t questioning Gary being an honourable man at all. However I am afraid that we know from very good and overwhelming direct evidence that plumbing apprenticeships were relatively rare by the 1880s, and a distinct minority of plumbers followed that route.

It is why I didn't base my argument on Garry's -I know what you think on the matter. Nonetheless, it may be that Garry has the best argument.

Your certainty that Toppy couldn’t have gone through a spell as a labourer or a groom, inbetween perhaps learning some plumbing through his father when he was say 12 or 14 and then returning to plumbing when his attempt to go his own way didn’t work out, is somewhat baseless

.
I won't repeat myself. It is however totally logic defying that Toppy would have learn't plumbing aged 12-14, and then lived the horrendous life of a casual labourer in a lodging house (when he could have earn't some money),
for...for...for fun ???

It just simply is not an incredible story. It is not a neat story. It would be a neat story of Hutchinson had said he was a plumber. Yet people seldom lead neat lives

.
Although they don't lead 'neat lives', they usually think that the steps that they take are logical at the time they are taking them. It is unbelievable to imagine that Toppy could have thought that leading the life of Hutch was a logical step forward in his promising young life.

I rather doubt Toppy read American newspapers and he would only have picked up street gossip if he lived in hose streets – as opposed to Fitzrovia.

The American newspaper got the story somewhere -it could have been a topical 'urban myth' of the time. he could have got gossip from any pub or shopkeeper in the East End.

Reg’s statements are evidence. You may discount it (that word again – should I say disregard) but it is still evidence.

Forgive me -I know that I'm not an intellectual- but I just can't see how the say so of some one is evidence ? So..if Reg had said that Toppy was born on Mars, would you take that as evidence that Toppy must certainly have been born on Mars ?
I'm confused.

[Abby Normal]

I found the baptism record for Toppy’s son, also called George Hutchinson today.
I don’t know whether it has been seen before.
It is dated 2nd April 1899 and is from Holy Trinity Church, Stepney. This was on Morgan Street E3, in what I would describe as Bow, but is quite near Mile End tube station.
Their address is however 10 Barbel Street, Westminster Bridge Road, in Lambeth SE (I was thrown for a bit thinking it said Barbel Street, Westminster).
In the 1901 census the Toppy family was living at 80 Tower Street SE (in the Southwark area).

It is interesting that Toppy’s father was called George, Toppy was called George and his eldest son was called George.
George was a popular name in this branch of the Hutchinson family.

They were at 12 Tuscan Street, Bethnal Green by 1911, but the children at that time were born in such diverse places as Westminster, Stratford, Mile End and Bethnal Green.
His wife, who he married in 1895, was from Poplar.
Bearing in mind he was from Norwood, near Croydon, and he lived off Tottenham Court Road in 1891, clearly Toppy moved around quite a lot.

He had a son called William born around 1907 in Stratford. I’m wondering whether this is William Percy Hutchinson of 16 Bonwell Street, who lost two children in the Bethnal Green Tube Disaster in 1943. One was called William George Hutchinson and was born in 1937, and may have been Toppy’s grandson. Bonwell Street was one street over from Tuscan Street.

Hi Lechmere
Nice!

What are your thoughts on the probability of a 19 year old Hutch? One who knew a prostitue for several years (which would put him at age 16 or 17 when he first made her acquaintance), lived in a lodging house and did things like travel to and from places like Romford.

[The Good Michael]

All, Topping was 22 at the time, not 19. Young, but not a child.

Mike

[Lechmere]

Good Michael – you are a spoil sport.

Abbey Normal – I don’t think Hutchinson knew Kelly for three years as she moved around a lot from one side of the East End to the other. I view that as one of the least believable parts of his testimony.
Also I don’t think Romford was out of bounds for a 19 year old, still less for a 22 year old.

Rubyretro – the thing is Reg had a dad called George Hutchinson, and he claimed this dad was THE George Hutchinson and added two details (the toff and the money) which corroborate it. He did not make an outrageous claim such as that he was born on Mars.
That is why it should be regarded as evidence.
In summary you think that the connection is due to someone lying or due to false recreated memory. These are possibilities of course.

That Reg said his dad was paid an improbably large sum, and instead of simply poshish looking bloke it was someone like Lord Randolph Churchill actually make the story more credible. That is the sort of exaggeration with the telling you would expect in a verbal tradition. It would be much more suspicious if Reg had said his dad was paid a few shillings and made seen some bloke in an Astrakhan coat.

[Fleetwood Mac]

All, Topping was 22 at the time, not 19. Young, but not a child.

Mike

Something that may point away from Topping is the 'military appearance' comment.

Someone at 22 having a military appearance? I would assume middle aged at least to hone the straight back, disciplined, rigid gait that may constitute a 'military appearance'.

Anyway, can anyone point me in the direction of these signatures. I've been looking around for the boards for them but no luck.

Cheers.

[richardnunweek]

Hi,
Topping was 22 years old in 1888, only a couple of years younger the Mary Kelly, we tend to forget how young she was, and I can see no reason why Hutch was not familiar with her.
As for the hundred shillings payment... The Wheeling article mentioned a figure of approx that amount in 1888 , Gossip? remembered by a hoaxer named Topping many years later, as it has been stated by some .
Do we honestly believe that?
Believe that Topping, adopted the real George Hutchinson's identity, researched his statement, remembered the payment from a rare [ non UK edition] article, all that for the ability to spin a yarn down the local?
Its not only son Reg's account, but Toppings tale was remembered by other members of the family including Toppings brother , remember J D Hutchinson's post on casebook a few years back?.
Please lets not be so negative..
Regards Richard.

[The Good Michael]

Richard,

and it isn't just the story. It's:

George
East End
No other George
Age
The Story
Family recollections
Signatures
Logic

Mike

[lynn cates]

additions

Hello Richard and Michael. Wish I could add something to your posts. Unfortunately I can't. You have said it all.

Cheers.
LC

[The Good Michael]

Hello Richard and Michael. Wish I could add something to your posts. Unfortunately I can't. You have said it all.

Lynn,

Perhaps 2 loud mouthed ne-er-do-wells are sufficient in this case

Mike

[Rubyretro]

Rubyretro –

the thing is Reg had a dad called George Hutchinson, and he claimed this dad was THE George Hutchinson and added two details (the toff and the money) which corroborate it. He did not make an outrageous claim such as that he was born on Mars.
That is why it should be regarded as evidence

.

It cannot be considered as 'evidence'.

'The toff and the money' cannot 'corroborate' anything, because both bits of
information were known/printed in the Press prior to Toppy/Reg/Fairclough
citing them.

Corroboration would have to be something along the lines of Reg claiming
that his father had described A Man as having a huge hairy wart on the end of his nose, and it now (that is after Fairclough's research was finished) beeing discovered, beyond doubt, that Hutchinson had described A Man as having a huge hairy wart on the end of his nose, but that Police had withheld
this information at the time.

Even then, the corroboration would not be 100 % certain, as we could not prove that the information had not appeared in some obscure forgotten paper, or was not known to locals at the time.

I don't believe that the sum of money mentioned being the same as the Wheeling Register, is a coincidence :
it shows that 'the source' was either the same source as the Wheeling Register (probably local gossip), or that it was the Wheeling Register itself -in which case it is a hint that Fairclough was probably the person who dug it up.

I'm pretty certain that I read somewhere on Casebook (possibly in the archives ?), that it was also claimed that Packer had received the exact same sum. He surely didn't, so this points to an 'urban myth' circulating at the time amongst very poor people.

[Abby Normal]

All, Topping was 22 at the time, not 19. Young, but not a child.

Mike

Hi Good Michael and Lechmere

Thanks for correcting me. I agree age 22 is not too young for any of the things I mentioned (knowing prostitutes, living in a lodging house, trips to Romford).

Lechmere
I find it surprising you find Hutch's statement of knowing MK for several years (because she moved alot) as the least beleiveable. I have no problem with that.

What else to Hutch's story do you find unbeleiveable?