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Jane Coram:
"Forgive me for going back to basics here, but the foundation of your argument (I hope I'm correct in saying) is Walter Dew's statement in his memoirs; that the weather was grim that night, making it unlikely that Hutchinson would have walked around all night and that the absence of Mrs Lewis in Hutchinson's statement consolidates the suggestion that it was the early hours of Thursday morning and not Friday morning."
Plus Hutchinson did not mention the young couple Lewis said she saw in Dorset Street as she went to the court, plus Hutchinson says nothing about standing about on the southern side of the street (where the loiterer apparently stood), but instead that he went to the court and stod there for three quarters of an hour, plus astrakhan man was wearing his coat open in spite of the wet and windy night, plus Hutchinson stood about leaning on a lamppost in spite of the wet and windy night, plus nobody seems to have seen astrakhan man in Dorset Street on Friday morning, plus Hutchinson was adamant that he saw only two other people in Dorset Street between 2.15 AM and 3 AM, approximately.
"On the other side, we have the signed police statement saying it was the 9th, a letter from Abberline showing that he accepted Hutchinson's dating of the incident as correct, and the newspaper reports, one of which at least was a statement made by Hutchinson confirming it was Friday the 9th."
We do. There is not the slightest doubt about what day Hutchinson believed he was in Dorset Street. The doubt lies in whether that was a correct assessment. If it was not, he either was there on another day or not at all, actually leaving us with two possibilities for a muddled up day: A true one, where it did happen, and a "false" one, if you will, where he was never there, but had the police or at least Dew believing that a mistaken date was the explanation to the detail/s that had him dropped later on.
"It has already been brought out on the ‘Did Hutchinson get the night wrong?’ thread that Dew’s memoirs are riddled with errors, and were written 50 years after the event. Neither of those points can really be disputed. I could post up a page full of the errors in Dew's book, but the errors are there for everyone to see. We have to decide for ourselves how much faith we put in Dew."
Yes. And we also have to look at what KIND of errors he made. For example, the Bowyer thing is glaring, but it has been suggested that the "boy" mentioned may have been McCarthys son running ahead. But it would be useful to see the error types listed.
"It's difficult to see if Dew is suggesting that Hutchinson was mistaken about the time or the date or both. It is possible to prove which he meant.
Hutchinson, in his statement to the Daily News of 14th November, says:
"I am able to fix the time, as it was between ten and five minutes to two o'clock as I came by Whitechapel Church. When I left the corner of Miller's court the clock struck three o'clock."
That really makes it impossible for Hutchinson to have got the time wrong, so Dew must be suggesting that he might have got the date wrong."
Others will tell you that this is no evidence that holds any water. It was A/ not in the police report, and B/it points to Hutchinson having been three hours out, and not a full day. So the arguments go.
Needless to say, I concur with you - Dew meant that Hutchinson was a full day out and nothing else.
"Hutchinson doesn't say in his statement that this was a Friday, only that it was the 9th. It's reasonable to suggest that he didn't know that Friday was the 9th, because he doesn't state it there specifically. However -
In his statement to the Daily News of November 14th, Hutchinson says:-
"I went down to Shoreditch mortuary today and recognised the body as being that of the woman Kelly, whom I saw at two o'clock on Friday morning."
So it's clear that Hutchinson was in no doubt that it was Friday morning when he made those statements, if these reports are accepted at face value. You suggest that even though he put it in his statement, that he might have only thought it was the 9th when it was in fact the 8th."
This is correct. Hutchinson mentioned both Thursday and Friday in his press interviews, and going by that, he was in Dorset Street on the night of Thursday and the morning of Friday.
The problem is, when you mistake a day, you don´t tell the police "I was really there on Wednesday, but since I have muddled the days afterwards, I will say it was on Thursday instead".
No, instead you say with conviction what you BELIEVE, and if your belief is wrong, that does not change the wording in the police report. After tht, it is a question of what means Abberline et al had to expose the error, and how long it would have taken. For all we know, the suspicions of a flaw may have been there very shortly after Abberline had stated his approval.
If and when a fatal error was found out by the police, they would have reacted professionally and changed their view of the testimony. If this happened in Hutchinson´s case, and if he WAS one day off, the reaction would be that Hutchinson was dropped and awarded no further interest. If he had lied - or if the police had had suspicions that this was the case - I fail to see why Dew would treat Hutchinson as a very honest witness of the best intentions in his memoirs. Therefore, to me, the only reasonable solution is that the police dropped him, but without reprimanding him or judging him either a liar or a timewaster.
"Is that a fair summary so far?"
As far as I can see, yes - at least with my additions inserted.
The best,
Fisherman
"Forgive me for going back to basics here, but the foundation of your argument (I hope I'm correct in saying) is Walter Dew's statement in his memoirs; that the weather was grim that night, making it unlikely that Hutchinson would have walked around all night and that the absence of Mrs Lewis in Hutchinson's statement consolidates the suggestion that it was the early hours of Thursday morning and not Friday morning."
Plus Hutchinson did not mention the young couple Lewis said she saw in Dorset Street as she went to the court, plus Hutchinson says nothing about standing about on the southern side of the street (where the loiterer apparently stood), but instead that he went to the court and stod there for three quarters of an hour, plus astrakhan man was wearing his coat open in spite of the wet and windy night, plus Hutchinson stood about leaning on a lamppost in spite of the wet and windy night, plus nobody seems to have seen astrakhan man in Dorset Street on Friday morning, plus Hutchinson was adamant that he saw only two other people in Dorset Street between 2.15 AM and 3 AM, approximately.
"On the other side, we have the signed police statement saying it was the 9th, a letter from Abberline showing that he accepted Hutchinson's dating of the incident as correct, and the newspaper reports, one of which at least was a statement made by Hutchinson confirming it was Friday the 9th."
We do. There is not the slightest doubt about what day Hutchinson believed he was in Dorset Street. The doubt lies in whether that was a correct assessment. If it was not, he either was there on another day or not at all, actually leaving us with two possibilities for a muddled up day: A true one, where it did happen, and a "false" one, if you will, where he was never there, but had the police or at least Dew believing that a mistaken date was the explanation to the detail/s that had him dropped later on.
"It has already been brought out on the ‘Did Hutchinson get the night wrong?’ thread that Dew’s memoirs are riddled with errors, and were written 50 years after the event. Neither of those points can really be disputed. I could post up a page full of the errors in Dew's book, but the errors are there for everyone to see. We have to decide for ourselves how much faith we put in Dew."
Yes. And we also have to look at what KIND of errors he made. For example, the Bowyer thing is glaring, but it has been suggested that the "boy" mentioned may have been McCarthys son running ahead. But it would be useful to see the error types listed.
"It's difficult to see if Dew is suggesting that Hutchinson was mistaken about the time or the date or both. It is possible to prove which he meant.
Hutchinson, in his statement to the Daily News of 14th November, says:
"I am able to fix the time, as it was between ten and five minutes to two o'clock as I came by Whitechapel Church. When I left the corner of Miller's court the clock struck three o'clock."
That really makes it impossible for Hutchinson to have got the time wrong, so Dew must be suggesting that he might have got the date wrong."
Others will tell you that this is no evidence that holds any water. It was A/ not in the police report, and B/it points to Hutchinson having been three hours out, and not a full day. So the arguments go.
Needless to say, I concur with you - Dew meant that Hutchinson was a full day out and nothing else.
"Hutchinson doesn't say in his statement that this was a Friday, only that it was the 9th. It's reasonable to suggest that he didn't know that Friday was the 9th, because he doesn't state it there specifically. However -
In his statement to the Daily News of November 14th, Hutchinson says:-
"I went down to Shoreditch mortuary today and recognised the body as being that of the woman Kelly, whom I saw at two o'clock on Friday morning."
So it's clear that Hutchinson was in no doubt that it was Friday morning when he made those statements, if these reports are accepted at face value. You suggest that even though he put it in his statement, that he might have only thought it was the 9th when it was in fact the 8th."
This is correct. Hutchinson mentioned both Thursday and Friday in his press interviews, and going by that, he was in Dorset Street on the night of Thursday and the morning of Friday.
The problem is, when you mistake a day, you don´t tell the police "I was really there on Wednesday, but since I have muddled the days afterwards, I will say it was on Thursday instead".
No, instead you say with conviction what you BELIEVE, and if your belief is wrong, that does not change the wording in the police report. After tht, it is a question of what means Abberline et al had to expose the error, and how long it would have taken. For all we know, the suspicions of a flaw may have been there very shortly after Abberline had stated his approval.
If and when a fatal error was found out by the police, they would have reacted professionally and changed their view of the testimony. If this happened in Hutchinson´s case, and if he WAS one day off, the reaction would be that Hutchinson was dropped and awarded no further interest. If he had lied - or if the police had had suspicions that this was the case - I fail to see why Dew would treat Hutchinson as a very honest witness of the best intentions in his memoirs. Therefore, to me, the only reasonable solution is that the police dropped him, but without reprimanding him or judging him either a liar or a timewaster.
"Is that a fair summary so far?"
As far as I can see, yes - at least with my additions inserted.
The best,
Fisherman
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