Did Hutchinson get the night wrong?

[Ben]

What you say makes perfect sense to me, Garry.

It also neatly accounts for Dew's reference to witnesses being confused as to "time and date".

Going back a bit, it appears you're right about the lighting issue. I was probably thinking of Prater.

All the best,
Ben

[Ben]

Your latest observation was spot on, Janie!

Hi Fisherman,

“And in it, just at the end, Hanks suddenly says about his lost fiancée: "We both had done the math."..”

Oh boy…

Yes. This is because “math” is an American expression and Tom Hanks is an American. In England, we don’t use the expression “math”. We talk about “maths”. It appears that your googling efforts may have led you astray again, because you clearly missed Wikipedia’s entry:

In English, the noun mathematics takes singular verb forms. It is often shortened to maths or, in English-speaking North America, math.

I only commented on this in an earlier post because I was surprised to hear a Swede using the Americanized version.

If this was your attempt to “lecture” me “about my own language”, I’m afraid it backfired very badly.

Meanwhile, back on topic…

“The only outlandish thing around here is your claim that a forty year old chat between a father and his son would be exactly reiterated when an author with an agenda (sounds vaguely familiar) scribbles it down all them decades later.”

But the author’s "agenda" didn’t enter into the equation when it came to quotes directly attributed to Toppy by Reg, and I’m surprised to see you keep missing this distinction. Fairclough only comes into it if you want to suggest that he deliberately or unwittingly encouraged Reg to lie about what his father had told him, and invent Toppy quotes that Toppy was never responsible for. In which case, everything uttered by Reg should reasonably be treated as suspect, because if his father was the real witness, he would have no need to resort to outright fabrication when communicating with Fairclough.

“So that´s why people who say that somebody moves like a queen are always speaking of Elizabeth II, right?”

No, Fisherman.

“More like the queen” carries an entirely different meaning to “More to do with the Queen”. The latter involves the personal involvement of the real queen, whereas the former is merely an illustrative simile.

“That is one of the funnier things that has been claimed lately - that the Hutchinsonians have an opposing camp that have sold their souls to the devil in exchange for an ever ongoing support for Toppy.”

I think you’ll find that it has been those with a long history of hostility towards the suggestion that Hutchinson lied and/or murdered prostitutes that have demonstrated the most eagerness to establish “sides” over the issue, as witness their continued references to “Hutchinsonians”. It is faintly amusing to see the term “fanatic” applied to the calm and considered contributions of Garry Wroe and Bob Hinton, but fortunately a long way from reality. In all seriousness, though, it might be an idea if those sorts of accusations were kept to a minimum.

Regards,
Ben

[Garry Wroe]

From the ‘By George’ thread:-

"Assuming your final sentence to be true, Lechmere, Hutchinson must have come forward in total ignorance of Lewis’s testimony and yet still placed himself at the same location as the man seen staring intently into Miller’s Court. Unless (as I suspect you might) you dismiss this co-occurrence as nothing more than coincidence, it must be concluded that the Lewis account provides independent corroboration for Hutchinson’s claimed Dorset Street vigil. More to the point, it extinguishes any potentiality that Hutchinson confused the date on which this vigil occurred."

Over the years, very much has been said about the "independent corroboration" you speak of, Garry. And the loiterer and Hutchinson have come to be treated as one and the same, since all they did was "so very alike"

But if, as Lechmere has argued, Fish, Hutchinson had no prior knowledge of the Sarah Lewis revelations, this is overwhelmingly the most logical and common sense conclusion.

What we know is that Hutchinson said he was there from 2.15 to 3 AM, approximately. Dew tells us that he is of the meaning that Hutchinson was confusing the dates.

Dew assumed Hutchinson to have been an honest witness who, owing to either date or time, must have been in error regarding his alleged encounter with Kelly. He leaves no room for doubting his belief that Carrie Maxwell was mistaken over the date, as witness, ‘[I]f the medical evidence is accepted, Mrs. Maxwell could not have been right. The doctors were unable, because of the terrible mutilations, to say with any certainty just when death took place, but they were very emphatic that the girl could not have been alive at eight o'clock that morning.’

Tellingly, however, no such imputation was directed at Hutchinson. But then, how could it have been? According to Dew, ‘[t]he doctors were unable … to say with any certainty just when death took place …’ Thus, if the medicos were unable to specify a precise time of death, there was no possibility that Hutchinson’s alleged 2:00am encounter with Kelly was discounted on the basis of the available forensic evidence. No possibility whatsoever. Accordingly, we are left with but one alternative – Dew believed Hutchinson to have been mistaken over the timing of the Kelly encounter, not the date.

The evidence has been there all along: ‘Was the man in the billycock hat Jack the Ripper? In spite of contradictory evidence which came to light later, and in spite of a departure from his method of swift and sudden attack, I think he was, always providing Mary Cox was correct in what she said.’

So there it is. Dew believed Blotchy to have been Kelly’s killer. And since Kelly and Blotchy entered Kelly’s room shortly before midnight, Hutchinson could not have seen Kelly touting for business two hours later. In other words, Dew believed that Hutchinson’s Kelly encounter occurred significantly earlier than midnight.

So it turns out that you were right all along, Fish. According to Dew’s version of events, Hutchinson didn’t meet Kelly in the early hours of 9 November, he met her late on the eighth. And this, albeit in an unexpected way, certainly supports the notion of date confusion on Hutchinson’s part – assuming, of course, that one attaches any credence whatever to Dew’s evidentially uncorroborated conclusions.

[Lechmere]

Mrs Retro (and Mr Ben), what do you mean my idea of the Victoria Home? I was only quoting contemporary accounts. I didn't provoide any extra information.

I don't think the washing facilities were very private - so a blood splattered Hutchinson would be a bit of a give away I suspect.

Orwell's 'Down and Out in Paris and London'? A good read but a polemic work, designed to raise hackles. Also he was not used to it - even if he did go to public school.

Mr Ben - I'm not totally convinced by the Toppy connection incidentally but he is the best match anyone has presented.

[Fisherman]

Hey Ben!

Guess what? I just saw "Castaway" on TV, the Tom Hanks movie, you know? And in it, just at the end, Hanks suddenly says about his lost fiancée: "We both had done the math."

So I checked on Google, and found 566 000 hits for "do the maths" and 2 880 000 for "do the math".

What has the world come to, Ben - am I now lecturing you about your own language? You should try Swedish sometime, it has a lot less words in it to confuse. Ruby had a go and did not do all that bad!

The best,
Fisherman

[Fisherman]

Ruby!

Au contraire - je suis certain que tu n´as pas raison.

Pecheur

[Jane Coram]

Hi Letchmere,

Thanks. I think it very unlikely that Hutchinson had known Mary for three years, in view of her nomadic lifestyle, unless he had just bumped into her at one of her addresses and then lost contact with her again. It would seem nigh on impossible that he knew her consistently through those three years, unless he was following her about. This is especially true if Topping and Hutchinson are one and the same.

Hugs

Janie

xxxxx

[Rubyretro]

Fiskare,

Jag känner att du bara försöker få det sista ordet genom att vara dum och tråkig.

[Fisherman]

Ben:

"Fisherman, we only have Reg’s word for exactly what his father said, and if we’re using him as basis for an identification of an historical figure from 1888, we can’t “fiddle” with the quotes directly attributed to Toppy in an effort to make them seem less outlandish."

The only outlandish thing around here is your claim that a forty year old chat between a father and his son would be exactly reiterated when an author with an agenda (sounds vaguely familiar) scribbles it down all them decades later. A good thing, then, that "it had more to do with the royal family than ordinary people" does not point out any more than a wish to level society on Toppys behalf, just as "someone LIKE Churchill" is not the same as "Churchill"! So I´m merrily "stuck" with that, Ben.

"it’s suspiciously convenient that both quotes attributed to Toppy just happen to correlate with the suspect theory being touted by the interviewer at the time, but unfortunately, the blame for these outlandish claims originates not from Fairclough in this case, but from Reg, who claimed to have quoted his father directly."

Oh, he SAID that: "I am quoting my father directly". I really should read that book again. I never saw that before!

You DO realize that this is silly, don´t you? And still, you try to squeeze something out of it that is not there, just as you try to make me look as if I have borrowed from the Ripper and the royals. Says a lot, that does!

"It was a specific implication royal involvement in the murders, something you simply don’t do if you’re only wishing to convey the impression that the individual came from a higher echelon in society."

Aha . So that´s why people who say that somebody moves like a queen are always speaking of Elizabeth II, right? And the king of Rock n´roll, Elvis Presley, is really prince Philip. Where do you HAVE these things from, Ben? From "What you say when you wish to convey societal status and importance", paragraph two, first section? Yes?

"I could just as easily argue that the only reason you’re picking and choosing which aspects of Hutchinson’s account you want to be true is because you’re now a card-carrying “Toppyite”.

That is one of the funnier things that has been claimed lately - that the Hutchinsonians have an opposing camp that have sold their souls to the devil in exchange for an ever ongoing support for Toppy.
Not true, I´m afraid. The only fanatic wiews around these boards are signed by people who endorse Hutchinson as the murderer. T´was always thus, and thus t´will always be.

"as a general rule I try to steer clear of inflammatory categorizations of posters."

Agreed, then!

The best,
Fisherman

[Ben]

Excellent points, Ruby.

“Same answer, but in this case we must realize that the EXACT wording Toppy used is not possible to establish.”

Fisherman, we only have Reg’s word for exactly what his father said, and if we’re using him as basis for an identification of an historical figure from 1888, we can’t “fiddle” with the quotes directly attributed to Toppy in an effort to make them seem less outlandish. I’m afraid that until you’re in a position to prove that Reg meant anything other that what he claimed regarding his father's view, you’re essentially stuck with “It was more to do with the royal family than ordinary people” and “someone like Lord Randoph Churchill”. Yes, it’s suspiciously convenient that both quotes attributed to Toppy just happen to correlate with the suspect theory being touted by the interviewer at the time, but unfortunately, the blame for these outlandish claims originates not from Fairclough in this case, but from Reg, who claimed to have quoted his father directly.

It was a specific implication royal involvement in the murders, something you simply don’t do if you’re only wishing to convey the impression that the individual came from a higher echelon in society.

“The Toppy connection just adds to it. That is why the connection is opposed so vehemently by the Hutchinsonians.”

It has been opposed vehemently for years by many people, Lechmere, not just “Hutchinsonians” for whom such an identification would not make a scrap of difference, unless it is to be argued that family men or plumbers can't be serial killers. I could just as easily argue that the only reason you’re picking and choosing which aspects of Hutchinson’s account you want to be true is because you’re now a card-carrying “Toppyite”, and that you’re dismissing the proposed three-year acquaintance because Toppy was unlikely to have been bumming around with Kelly near Pennington Street in 1885. But as a general rule I try to steer clear of inflammatory categorizations of posters.

Regards,
Ben

[Rubyretro]

Lechmere Re:

Ben is right, and your idea of this place is more Oliver Twist/Old Hovis Ad..

I'm sure that the Sally Army had more or less the same ethos as the Victoria..

Although Orwell was writing at a later date, read what he had to say about being forced to wash in conditions (at a Salvation Army Home) that I 'd rather not wash in..I shouldn't think that things were much different in 1888..


I maintain that such conditions would be foul for Toppy -and he had known better and had a choice.

As far as Hutch goes -are you now telling me that, not only he had access to a private lock up, but he wouldn't attract attntion if he washed himself and his clothes -he was obliged to ??

(this gets better and better)

[Rubyretro]

[QUOTE]

Calm down Mrs Retro, calm down
You are starting to remind me of an ex-smoker who now hates and detests people who still puff away.
Please tell me you are not like that?

certainly not, Baron Mere-Letch !

I am a smoker who is a non-smoker for very long stretches.

When I am a non-smoker, I never, ever, make life hard for my smoking friends.

Which means that I become a 'passive smoker' when my smoking friends are 'round at my place.

I gradually come to actively encourage my friends' smoking, which leads to me passively smoking more, until I feel forced to beg a whole ciggie..

And that is how I re-become an 'active smoker' again..

[Lechmere]

Toppy would have been 22.
It isn't known were he was in 1885 - I dont think it is known where he was between 1881 and 1891 - which is common enough for those days.

In my opinion Hutchinson is unlikley to have actually know Kelly for three years as she moved around an awful lot from one side of the East End to the other during that period. It is just conceivable that he was acquainted with her in say 1885 and got reacquainted in 1888 or something like that. In other words I think he over exaggerated how much he knew her to give himself credibility to the police as a witness as I think he wanted money from them as a roving informant.

[Jane Coram]

Hi Guys and Gals,

Sorry to butt in, but I've been following the thread from the beginning - and there have been some very interesting posts, but I've got a bit lost on a couple of points.

Can I just ask where Topping was living in 1885? It's just that Hutch states that he'd known Kelly for three years, and I can't quite fit that in anywhere.
I just wanted to confirm Topping's age in 1888 as well.

Thanks a lot,

Janie

xxxx

[Lechmere]

Calm down Mrs Retro, calm down
You are starting to remind me of an ex-smoker who now hates and detests people who still puff away.
Please tell me you are not like that?

Be assured Miss Retro, the Victoria Home made its inmates wash their clothes. I have no doubt that to the discerning nose the place still whiffed a bit, but...

The Telegraph said:
“The lavatory, ventilating, and sanitary arrangements are on an enlightened scale.”

From Later Leaves:
"’(6) Baths, warm or cold, can be had in the house. For a warm bath, a charge of one penny is made.’
In Victoria House, every facility is given to the lodgers to keep their underclothing clean — in fact, it is insisted that they shall do so.”

I also recommend you read what the magazine article In Whitechapel has to say about the cleaning arrangements.
On the down side, as you pointed out, the poor inmates had to put up with pious prelates prattling on.

In my opinion Toppy as the Ripper doesn’t work at all, but I don’t think it was Hutchinson anyway. The Toppy connection just adds to it. That is why the connection is opposed so vehemently by the Hutchinsonians.