Exonerating Michael Kidney - A Fresh Look at Old Myths

[Tom_Wescott]

Hi Lech. I don't think that's the reason I included it. There's no question that Le Grand was in Berner Street shortly after the murder, as although he didn't take Packer to the mortuary until the 4th, he'd been visiting him for days, taking him to see Eddowes, etc, and although I don't yet know why I was so sure he was at the mortuary on the 1st, it's doubtful his trip there with Packer was his first, though I'd like to know for sure.

I sorta recall asking you about not having put a footnote for this last July, when I first read that article as a complete newbie. I remember it bothered me considerably that the quotes were not documented.

I sorta don't recall that, and any quotes in my article are in fact sourced.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Lechmere]

Tom
You put forward the Echo news story about some people talking to the crowds in Berner Street on 1st October as 'evidence' that Le Grand and Batchelor were in the environs on that date, on the basis that you thought the unnamed speakers may have been them. To me that would be a leap of faith, but I quite see how these snippets almost have to be used now to piece a theory together.
I suspect that if there was direct evidence that Le Grand had been to the mortuary on 1st and had there been direct evidence that a private dectetive had provided Kidney with his cab, then you would not have had to use the vague Echo report.

I look forward to my extra large drink.

[mariab]

I re-read the salient portions of my essay and find that I frustratingly didn't provide the source for why I decided Le Grand and Kidney had been to the mortuary on the same day.

I sorta recall asking you about not having put a footnote for this last July, when I first read that article as a complete newbie. I remember it bothered me considerably that the quotes were not documented.

(But then again, in my own essays some sections spot a footnote on about every third word.) :-)

[Tom_Wescott]

Update

I re-read the salient portions of my essay and find that I frustratingly didn't provide the source for why I decided Le Grand and Kidney had been to the mortuary on the same day. Therefore, I'll have to look for it when I come back around to that material. Something must have convinced me of it, or else I confused the 1st with the 4th.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Tom_Wescott]

Hi Lech. Yes, I created the thread months ago to announce the posting of my article. What I said was that I did not REACTIVE it. However, I think this article was first published in the very first issue of Examiner, so that's how long it's been since I've read it.

For the umpteenth time, I have not called anything a fact that wasn't, so the lecturing on facts vs fiction can be saved on me.

You said this in the article:
“Le Grand, a career criminal employed as a ‘private detective’ with the Whitechapel Vigilance Committee, had been in Berner Street since just after the discovery of the murder and was also present at the mortuary on Oct. 1st.”
And this:
“Le Grand and Batchelor would have had no trouble in locating Michael Kidney. All had been to the mortuary on the same day and may have met there,”

Put simply I think you are mistaken in saying that Le Grand was at the mortuary on 1st October and accordingly he never bumped into Kidney.
If my dates are correct then the whole Le Grand cab theory falls apart.

Thank you for finally making the discussion about my essay. LOL. You quoted me dead to rights. While I would strongly disagree that my cab theory would 'fall apart', if I were wrong, I'd feel compelled to buy you a tall one should you become the first person to ever catch me developing a theory on a blatant factual error, and publishing it in a journal. Of course, I'd have to be wrong first, and I doubt that's the case. But now I'll certainly go and re-read what I've written! Of course, I'm being intentionally immodest just for fun, but I will be very grateful to you if you've caught something I missed.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Lechmere]

Tom
Blimey – I’ve re-read your article three times to check the Le Grand claims!

In this thread, on post 48 you stated:
“To my mind, the importance of the discovery was that Le Grand was the one who took Kidney to the police station.”
It’s not the biggest of big deals but it was that claim that attracted my attention.
The nature of this field is that it is for you want to establish a new 'fact' then you must prove it with substantial facts not conjecture. Otherwise it is just your theory. It is not for other people to find a fact that disproves it as that won’t realistically happen.

But I am more interested if my dates are wrong.

You said this in the article:
“Le Grand, a career criminal employed as a ‘private detective’ with the Whitechapel Vigilance Committee, had been in Berner Street since just after the discovery of the murder and was also present at the mortuary on Oct. 1st.”
And this:
“Le Grand and Batchelor would have had no trouble in locating Michael Kidney. All had been to the mortuary on the same day and may have met there,”

Put simply I think you are mistaken in saying that Le Grand was at the mortuary on 1st October and accordingly he never bumped into Kidney.
If my dates are correct then the whole Le Grand cab theory falls apart.

And you did start this thread and it was only a few months ago!

[Tom_Wescott]

I don’t find it difficult to accept the possibility that Le Grand supplied the cab that took Kidney to Leman Street. However it is hardly a matter which has been proven beyond reasonable doubt.

There’s always going to be doubt, Lechmere. But unless someone else supplies information to make it reasonable to suppose someone other than Le Grand ushered Kidney to the police station in a cab, I will say that while my conclusion is not beyond doubt, it’s currently beyond reasonable doubt. At no point, in my essay or here, have I stated that it’s a FACT that Le Grand took Kidney to the police station.

Stride was killed in the early hours of the morning on 30th September.
At some time on 1st October Kidney saw Stride’s body at the mortuary at St George’s-in-the-East.
At night time on 1st October Kidney turned up drunk in a cab at Leman Street police station.
Stride’s inquest was held on 3rd October at the Vestry Hall, St George’s-in-the-East
Kidney said amongst other things:
“I have heard something said that leads me to believe, that had I been able to act the same as a detective I could have got a lot more information.”
This doesn’t sound like someone who had been spending time with two private detectives.

Whatever I wrote in my essay would be more accurate than what I’ve posted here. That’s why I post my essays when I can. I should probably go back and re-read it for discussion (remember, I did not reactive this thread), but I simply don’t have time, as I’m reading three different things and preparing something on Emma Smith. But whatever I put in my essay is not likely to be erred. I’m not saying you’re wrong, what I’m saying is I may have been wrong in our discussions on this thread, but not likely so in the essay.

I know Le Grand was a bit of an incompetent crim but why would he send Kidney to Leman Street unless he was sure Kidney would provide the right story? All Kidney seems to have done is blather on about his own theory for which he required an unknown police detective. This again undermines the notion that Kidney was involved with Le Grand.

I would disagree with this. I don’t suspect Le Grand knew Kidney before the murder, so he didn’t know who or what he’d be dealing with. What you consider as being unlikely in this case is precisely the behavior Le Grand displayed with Packer, albeit to better effect. And as for criminals, Le Grand was not incompetent at all.

I think the reason this aspect is under discussion is because the rest of the dissertation is fairly unarguable, but I think Le Grand being shoehorned into the Kidney story detracts from it a bit.

As you may have noticed, if you’ve read some of my other Berner Street essays, they are a potpourri of whatever I’m thinking or have turned up at the time I’m writing that article. Some of the other stuff I included in there had little or nothing to do with Kidney, but I thought might be of interest to readers.

For some reason, Le Grand makes a lot of people uncomfortable. I stand behind my contention that Le Grand, and not some anonymous good Samaritan, took Kidney to the police station, but clearly that is not a documented fact, and I make an effort in all my essays to draw a clear distinction between fact, deduction, and speculation. It’s a fact that Kidney went to the police station that night, it’s deduction that told me Le Grand was the likely taxi, and my ruminations as to what was behind Kidney’s theory was pure speculation.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Lechmere]

Tom
I don’t find it difficult to accept the possibility that Le Grand supplied the cab that took Kidney to Leman Street. However it is hardly a matter which has been proven beyond reasonable doubt. It isn’t a question of 3 plus 3 equals six.
I think it is very misleading for things that are not facts being presented as facts.

In any case I think your time line is out.

Stride was killed in the early hours of the morning on 30th September.
At some time on 1st October Kidney saw Stride’s body at the mortuary at St George’s-in-the-East.
At night time on 1st October Kidney turned up drunk in a cab at Leman Street police station.
Stride’s inquest was held on 3rd October at the Vestry Hall, St George’s-in-the-East
Kidney said amongst other things:
“I have heard something said that leads me to believe, that had I been able to act the same as a detective I could have got a lot more information.”
This doesn’t sound like someone who had been spending time with two private detectives.

Also you state that:
“Le Grand and Batchelor would have had no trouble in locating Michael Kidney. All had been to the mortuary on the same day...”
and
“I’m not sure why you find it difficult to believe that Le Grand took Kidney to the police when you already know that on that same day Le Grand was in that very neighborhood doing the same with Packer, and that Le Grand and Kidney are documented as having spent part of the day in the SAME ROOM, that being the mortuary.”

Kidney was at the mortuary on 1st October and went to the police station that night after getting tanked up.

Le Grand and Batchelor took Packer to the City Mortuary on 3rd October to see the body of Eddowes, who he couldn’t identify (while Kidney was at the inquest).
On the afternoon of 4th October Le Grand and Batchelor took Packer to the mortuary at St George’s-in-the-East to see Stride’s body.
After 4pm on 4th October Le Grand and Batchelor took Packer to Scotland Yard in a cab.

So Le Grand was not at the St George’s Mortuary in the same day as Kidney. He went there three days later.

The only connection between Kidney and Le Grand that you actually provide is based on your interpretation of an Echo report concerning crowds in Berner Street on 1st October. You speculate that Le Grand and Batchelor were haranguing these crowds. But that is your speculation and it is a bit flimsy to use that to support the claim that these two arranged for Kidney to be conveyed to Leman Street later that night.
St Georges’ Mortuary isn’t that close to Berner Street anyway.

I know Le Grand was a bit of an incompetent crim but why would he send Kidney to Leman Street unless he was sure Kidney would provide the right story? All Kidney seems to have done is blather on about his own theory for which he required an unknown police detective. This again undermines the notion that Kidney was involved with Le Grand.

The logical answer is that if Le Grand was involved then he somehow found Kidney and provided him with a cab just to be ‘helpful’ in his capacity as a detective working for the WVS

Maria
“Michael Kidney was taken by an unnamed “private detective“ in another hansom cab.”
Could you provide the source for this? It may be that I have missed it.

If I have made any mistakes with dates etc. then please accept my apologies.

I think the reason this aspect is under discussion is because the rest of the dissertation is fairly unarguable, but I think Le Grand being shoehorned into the Kidney story detracts from it a bit.

[Tom_Wescott]

by choosing not to turn this into a suspect thread when I ask "to what end" you appear to have answered my question.

I will say this, you were perceptive in this thread and asked the 'right' questions.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[mariab]

I wouldn’t go so far as to say Liz’s bottom lip was deformed. Keep in mind she’s lying on her back with her head propped forward. I would say she had a prominent bottom lip

I just noticed this. Stride's most clearly propped up (possibly standing against a wall?) in her postmortem pic, Tom, like in the known full body photograph of Eddowes. They wouldn't have been able to use a Victorian flash if they shot her lying down, as the flash powder would have spilled off to the ground. Rob Clack has pictures of a Victorian man in his casket shot propped up against a wall, casket and all.
All Ripper victims appear to have been shot propped up, apart from (obviously) MJK and possibly Nichols.
Fully agree about Stride's lip though.

[curious]

Wow! I've just realized that there are 2 different Curiouses posting in this thread. Just like there were 2 hansom cab rides, 2 private detectives, 2 sisters having allegedly located Stride's flower and given it to Le Grand, and 2 victims on September 30. A coincidence – or a conspiracy? Hey, good that there are not 39 Curiouses in this thread.

Double your pleasure, double your fun.

and Tom,

by choosing not to turn this into a suspect thread when I ask "to what end" you appear to have answered my question.

the original (I believe) curious

[mariab]

Wow! I've just realized that there are 2 different Curiouses posting in this thread. Just like there were 2 hansom cab rides, 2 private detectives, 2 sisters having allegedly located Stride's flower and given it to Le Grand, and 2 victims on September 30. A coincidence – or a conspiracy? Hey, good that there are not 39 Curiouses in this thread.

[Tom_Wescott]

Hi Curious,

I'm intentionally trying to avoid discussion of Le Grand as a suspect here, because the article I wrote isn't about who did kill Stride, but who didn't...in this case, Kidney. I apologize if I seem aloof.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[mariab]

It works for me that LeGrand could have been behind Kidney showing up at the Police Station and inserted himself (LeGrand) into the investigation -- but to what end? That is the question -- at least in my mind at this moment.

Curious, the problem is that we don't know exactly what Le Grand might have said to Michael Kidney. Kidney (who was upset and quite a bit ridiculed during the inquest) refused to disclose the exact details of all this.
Most plausibly Le Grand would have wanted to shake the trail off himself if he was indeed involved in Stride's murder.

[curious]

Well, and he was also in front of the whole Batty Street Lodger thing, so maybe three times.

most researchers wouldn’t have a difficult time putting 3 and 3 together as I have done.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

It works for me that LeGrand could have been behind Kidney showing up at the Police Station and inserted himself (LeGrand) into the investigation -- but to what end?

That is the question -- at least in my mind at this moment.