Plausibility of Kosminski

[Jonathan H]

No offence, but all of that is not dealing directly with the argument I am proposing.

[JtRMordke]

I think why only Swanson and Anderson were aware of the significance of Kozminski as a suspect comes down to something that was pointed out in the annotated copy of the memoirs, in which 'only known to the heads of CID' was scribbled and underlined twice in the margins. This is interesting, as it suggests that only some aspects of the case were known to all of the force, and that there was an element of confidentiality to a lot of the case.

[Errata]

No offence, but all of that is not dealing directly with the argument I am proposing.

Yeah sorry. I do that sometimes. Highly tangential mind.

I think your argument is sound, and clearly I have no answers for you. The tangential nature of my reply was simply due to the fact that I accepted what you propose. I mean, we'll never know, but your scenario is the best explanation I've heard so far. Although I am not sure what under your scenario accounts for the misinformation that Kosminski was dead. Unless they just didn't bother to even pretend they believed their own story...


So I accepted that and went on to thinking about how dinner parties had to be the utmost hell for these guys due to the rich and/or titled blowhards who think that hearing tales from the Raj at their clubs makes them sage and perceptive men of action... Rather like my Uncle Bob, who I was on the phone with when reading your post.

So, that's a tour of my brain for you. We have t-shirts at the shop on the way out.

[Jonathan H]

To Errata

In my opinion, since Anderson, in the extant record seems not to have a theory about any suspect before 1895, and yet after that time is forever commited to the Polish Jew suspect, presumbly 'Kosminski', then it was in that year that -- I theorise -- Macnaghten told Anderson about the chronic masturbator. That is the same year that Swanson first mentioned a deceased fiend. Ergo Macnaghten gave those two what they would most want to hear; a good suspect, a local, locked-up lunatic. Plus he's dead, which is satisfying and also means he can never be visited for a once-over. I think Anderson and/or Swanson did believe their own story, the problem was it was not theirs -- it was Mac's.

[Errata]

To Errata

In my opinion, since Anderson, in the extant record seems not to have a theory about any suspect before 1895, and yet after that time is forever commited to the Polish Jew suspect, presumbly 'Kosminski', then it was in that year that -- I theorise -- Macnaghten told Anderson about the chronic masturbator. That is the same year that Swanson first mentioned a deceased fiend. Ergo Macnaghten gave those two what they would most want to hear; a good suspect, a local, locked-up lunatic. Plus he's dead, which is satisfying and also means he can never be visited for a once-over. I think Anderson and/or Swanson did believe their own story, the problem was it was not theirs -- it was Mac's.

So, this makes sense but for a couple of things. Which may make sense and I just havent put it together in head correctly.

This would mean that Anderson was never aware of the Seaside Home identification (if it happened) in 1890. Which is fine, except how do you take a suspect from an asylum and bring to him to a whole other district for identification without involving Anderson's office?

On a more behavioral note, how do you just take someone's word on Jack the Ripper? How do you not want to see the file, to see the evidence, to go look the bastard in the eye or dance on his grave?

I mean, clearly both could easily happen, it just seems so... disinterested. Like Anderson just didn't give a crap. And sure the man is as prone to burning out as anyone, it just seemed like he took it so personally.

[Jonathan H]

To Errata

I think tht raise really important counter-points here.

I would argue it this way.

The 'Seaside Home' story only appears in one source and was never tested in puiblic. It maybe Swanson's recollection, or it maybe his recording of Anderson's recollection.

I belong to the school of thought which argues that there could not have been such an identification, not as described, and remain totally unknown to anybody else at Scotland Yard.

For example, Macnaghten knows nothing about it, although his inverting the witness and suspect's ethnicity, in 'Aberconway' via Griffiths and Sims, set the whole thing in motion -- quite inadvertently.

Anderson and or Swanson are sincerely mis-remembering the failed identification of Sadler and the successful identification of Grant by a Jewish witness, eg. Lawende. Both suspects were Seamen and the former has a Sailor's Home as part of his tale. In order for the mind to substitute Sadler-Grant for 'Kosminski' a fading memory must take care of that 'sea' element and replace it with something: the Seaside Home.

Secondly, once Macnaghten, in 1895, informed Anderson about this deceased Polish Jew suspect who was the latter supposed to consult about him? Not his family or doctors, because the former already knew -- the swine! -- and the latter do not not know and must not. This is because of the always looming negative publicity.

My theory is that the trigger for Macnaghten to inform Anderson about 'Kosminski' was the unexpected positive identification of Grant by Lawende, a Druitt lookalike -- minus the tattoos.

Rightly or wrongly, Macnaghten believed Druitt to be the deceased fiend, but he did not want to share this information with his superior. So he gave him a suspect from a confidential briefing report which had never been used or read by anybody else. This took the heat off Grant for being the Whitechapel assassin, and, hey presto, Swanson now claims that the real prime suspect is dead.

Actually that last detail is borrowed from Druitt.

Tom Divall, in 1929, claimed that Macnaghten told him that the Ripper had fled to the States and died in an asylum. Mac must have told Sims that 'Dr D' had been incarcerated in an asylum 'twice' before he began his reign of terror. Yet in his memoirs Macnaghten pointedly denied that [the un-named] Druitt had ever been so 'detained'

This is all suggestive evidence, in the extant record, that the formidably charming Macnaghten was quite capable of talking to people, including policemen, out of both sides of his mouth -- of turning fact into fiction.

[Errata]

The 'Seaside Home' story only appears in one source and was never tested in puiblic. It maybe Swanson's recollection, or it maybe his recording of Anderson's recollection.

I belong to the school of thought which argues that there could not have been such an identification, not as described, and remain totally unknown to anybody else at Scotland Yard.

I also am a firm believer that the identification never took place. If for no other reason than the idea of maintaining secrecy about an extremely mentally ill unwashed man with severe personal space issues put in a tiny carriage with two cops for six hours just cracks me up.

Secondly, once Macnaghten, in 1895, informed Anderson about this deceased Polish Jew suspect who was the latter supposed to consult about him? Not his family or doctors, because the former already knew -- the swine! -- and the latter do not not know and must not. This is because of the always looming negative publicity.

This I am not so sure about. It is certainly possible. However given the absolute hell the various law enforcement agencies were put through, rightly or wrongly, it seems too pat. Like Mac told Anderson about this suspect, Anderson grabs at it like a life raft, but doesn't request more information. I would think that after being presented with this suspect Anderson would say "Great! Let me see his file."
Now I can picture a scenario where Mac starts tap dancing for his life at that point, cobbling together information from a number of people.

But what really gets me is why these proud men, who love their jobs, and consider themselves brilliant at it, would finally figure out who the killer was and NOT announce his death. Like, if they were going to lie, and they honestly thought he was dead, why wouldn't they lie in their favor? Saying that "we could not prosecute him because he was mad, but now he's dead and the world is safe again thanks to your brilliant law enforcement agencies" If Anderson didn't know that the Polish Jew was fiction, why not officially close the case? I mean, they didn't have the right guys, but none of them knew that.

Really, why were they all so confident in their suspects 15 or 20 years out, but not 5 or 10 years? What were they afraid of in 1895 that they were not afraid of in 1910? I mean, if they really thought they were right? Bagging Jack the Ripper, even if he was already dead certainly could not hurt a law enforcement career.

[robhouse]

But what really gets me is why these proud men, who love their jobs, and consider themselves brilliant at it, would finally figure out who the killer was and NOT announce his death. Like, if they were going to lie, and they honestly thought he was dead, why wouldn't they lie in their favor?

Hi Errata,

I don't really understand what you are saying here. Are you postulating this in relation to Kozminski, or to another suspect? I am just asking because Kozminski was not dead when Anderson wrote his book, and there is no suggestion that Anderson thought he was dead. I am just a bit confused as to your point. Can you explain this a bit more clearly?

EDIT: Sorry, I think I see... you are speaking about Druitt. As in, if the police knew that Druitt was the Ripper and was dead, then why wouldn't they talk about it... (?)

Rob H

[Roy Corduroy]

This is all suggestive evidence, in the extant record, that the formidably charming Macnaghten was quite capable of talking to people, including policemen, out of both sides of his mouth -- of turning fact into fiction.

And Druitt, in his various incarnations resulting finally in Simon Pure, could have been Mac's biggest fiction of all.

I'm not saying it was.

Simply that if Macnaghten is, as you suggest, Jonathan, spoon feeding his ready made suspects to Anderson, Sims, or anyone else, Druitt could be his most polished gem. But not necessarily the guilty one. If either of them were.

In a MacCentric World, if Anderson is not your cup of tea, then wipe him from the slate. The Swanson Marginalia too. There is still the Memorandum where Macnaghten said Kosminski. Regardless of what Mac said later or whose strings he pulled. Maybe Macnaghten just "liked" the Druitt story better and felt more comfortable with it. After Robert Anderson's awkward rollout of the Polish Jew theory, you could hardly expect Mac to comment on it. At all.

Something to think about in considering the "plausibility of Kosminski."

Roy

[Errata]

Hi Errata,

Sorry, I think I see... you are speaking about Druitt. As in, if the police knew that Druitt was the Ripper and was dead, then why wouldn't they talk about it... (?)

Rob H

Yes, I was speaking of Druitt, and Swanson with Kosminski (not Anderson), but something else as well.

Clearly these men (and Anderson) speak of their suspects with a great deal of personal certainty. And they certainly paint a picture of them having known who the perpetrator was within a couple of years of the murders. And the impression is given that they have evidence which proves to them beyond a reasonable doubt as to who was responsible. Which is not 100% true. I believe that they believe. I believe that they believe there is sufficient proof for their own minds. But I think (and I realize many do not agree) that there is some embroidering of truth in order to present a solid case for the public. And in a memoir, who really cares? But it begs the question that if they were so sure in 1895 (or whenever) as to the identity of the culprit, why wouldn't they close the case? Swanson clearly believed it was Kosminski, and evidently he believed Kosminski was dead. MacNaughten Believed it was Druitt, Druitt was dead. I am not sure where Anderson thought Kosminski was, I think if Swanson thought he was dead likely Anderson did as well. If they were willing to embroider a little for a memoir, why wouldn't they embroider a little more, and in 1895 (or whenever) say that they knew who the culprit was all along, and now that he was dead, the case was closed.

It's like only slightly more embroidery to restore the city's faith in law enforcement, and their fellow man. Citizens could say "Oh, they did know what they were doing, we were wrong to doubt, we can have faith in them". And even if Anderson could not personally justify it, surely Macnaughten or Swanson could. Governments do this all the time. It's clearly not ideal, but a people need to believe in their police.

Maybe they couldn't prove it in a court of law, but if the guy they "knew" did it was dead why not USE it? Give the people a little piece of mind?

I can't help but think that they knew they didn't know.

[Roy Corduroy]

Errata, in writing their memoirs, these former policemen Anderson and Macnaghten were expected, I would think, by their respective publishers, to comment on this most famous of cases. And they did comment, each in their own way. With Swanson jotting notes in his copy of Anderson's book. These were written over twenty years after the murders. Anderson in 1910, Macnaghten in 1914.

Once Dr. Houchin sectioned Aaron Kosminski to Colney Hatch county asylum in 1891 he cannot be charged with any crime. Unless he is released. Instead Aaron is tranferred to Leavenden asylum where he died in 1919. Montague John Druitt committed suicide in December 1888.

Memoirs are for public consumption. It is, however, the Macnaghten Memorandum, written in 1894 in response to the Sun newspaper articles which cast suspicion on one Thomas Cutbush as being the Ripper, which is the starting point for both of these theories, Druitt and Kosminski. That Memorandum, dated but not initialed off by any other police officers or Home Office personnel, lay in the Scotland Yard files until recovered in the post World War II twentieth century, and is the starting point for both these avenues of research.

Roy

[robhouse]

If they were willing to embroider a little for a memoir, why wouldn't they embroider a little more, and in 1895 (or whenever) say that they knew who the culprit was all along, and now that he was dead, the case was closed.

It's like only slightly more embroidery to restore the city's faith in law enforcement, and their fellow man. Citizens could say "Oh, they did know what they were doing, we were wrong to doubt, we can have faith in them". And even if Anderson could not personally justify it, surely Macnaughten or Swanson could. Governments do this all the time. It's clearly not ideal, but a people need to believe in their police.

Hi Errata,

A couple points to ponder:

1. The very first mention of Druitt appeared in the 11 February 1891 edition of The Bristol Times and Mirror --- just 4 days after Kozminski was admitted to Colney Hatch. Druitt was not named, but he was described as the son of a surgeon, and it was said that he committed suicide. The story was related by "a West of England member who in private declares that he has solved the mystery of 'Jack the Ripper.'" The West of England MP was later identified as Henry Richard Farquharson. See: http://www.casebook.org/dissertation...f-england.html

2. In December 1894, after public alarm following the the murder of Augusta Dawes by Regianld Saunderson in Kensington, the Police released a statement that the Ripper was known to the Police and had died in an asylum a year previously (so around late 1893). The Police released this statement to calm the public's fears that the Ripper had returned. The original report of this statement in the Evening Star has not yet been discovered (to my knowledge), but the story was reprinted in New Zealand and other newspapers.

For example:

January 17, 1895 - Bangor Daily Whig and Courier (Maine, U.S.A.)
Jack the Ripper Dead?
In connection with young Saunderson's insane crime and the Kensington stabbings the authorities have been extremely alarmed lest another Jack the Ripper scare should seize upon the popular mind. This led them recently to make the important announcement that they have reason to believe that the author of the Jack the Ripper crimes has been several years in his grave.

1 February, 1895 - Timaru Herald (New Zealand)
Towards the end of last year another murder of the same class was committed at Kensington, the alleged perpetrator being a young man named Saunderson, who has now been pronounced insane. Many people in London believed him to be "Jack the Ripper," and some of the newspapers took that view. It appears, however, that they were wrong; that is to say, if we may credit the following paragraph from the last letter of the London correspondent of the Lyttelton Times. What seems to cast some doubt upon his story is the great difficulty which the friends of the medical student referred to in the paragraph would have experienced in hushing the matter up and hurrying the man into a private asylum. It also appears strange that when, as alleged, the facts all came to the knowledge of the London police a year ago, they did not let the public know through the newspapers that "Jack the Ripper" had at length been got rid of by death. Here is what the correspondent says:

"The Kensington murder having, in a small way, revived the 'Jack the Ripper' scare, the authorities have thought it well to acknowledge - what many have long suspected - viz., that the mysterious hero of the Whitechapel horrors is dead. (...) The real Jack, it seems, belonged, as many suspected all along, to the medical profession, or rather was a student. His friends at last discovered the horrible truth, and had him confined in a private asylum. When he died a year ago the evidence in their possession was submitted to Scotland Yard, and convinced them they had at last found the genuine 'Ripper.'"

Then in May 1895 (ie. about 5 months after these reports first appeared) Swanson stated to the press that the Ripper had died in an asylum:

May 7, 1895, Pall Mall Gazette
The theory entitled to most respect, because it was presumably based upon the best knowledge, was that of Chief Inspector Swanson, the officer who was associated with the investigation of all the murders, and Mr. Swanson believed the crimes to have been the work of a man who is now dead.

So in answer to your question about why didn't the police tell the public that they knew the Ripper's identity, and embroider the facts "to restore the city's faith in law enforcement, and their fellow man"... they apparently did.

Rob H

[Jonathan H]

Up to a point I agree with Rob, but Swanson does not say in 1895 that the suspect died in an asylum.

Also, whilst it is true that Anderson never refers to the Polish Jew being dead, surely this is not a vital detail known only to Swanson and not to Anderson?

I also agree that Andy Spallek's 'The West of England MP -- Identified' (2008) essay is one of the most important pieces written on this subject.

It showed that the unlikely idea of the late Montague Druitt being the fiend began among his immediate circles in Dorset (eg. family; Tories) and not with Macnaghten mixing up various suspects from a few files.

You ask why the police would not announce that the Ripper was dead?

They did, or at least Macnaghten took it upon himself to do so in 1898 by showing, or reading to, Major Arthur Griffiths the contents of an alternate version of his internal Report debunking Cutbush as the fiend.

Mac told Griffiths that this was a definitive Home Office Report which it was not. He also disseminated a version quite different from the official version, for in the latter Druitt is a mere hearsay suspect about whom police have not even bothered to ascertain whether he was a physician, or not?

Griffiths altered 'family' into 'friends' to obscure this un-named suspect's true identity, but, I argue, the discreet fictionalizing of Montie had already begun by Macnaghten, who turned a young barrister into a middle-aged doctor.

With the widely-read George Sims, Mac went much further -- adding more fictional details about 'Jack' being a fabulously affluent, totally unemployed recluse. Thus the Ripper's identity orbited further and further away from the real Druitt -- even the date of his body bobbing up in the Thames was redacted backwards by a month.

This Drowned Doctor, claimed Sims, was undoubtedly the Ripper because he had been sectioned, 'twice', for being a homicidal harlot hater. The penny-pinching state was at fault for unleashing this ticking bomb! Nevertheless, a herculean police were right onto this Jekyll-and-Hyde suspect, missing arresting him by only days -- perhaps mere hours (Really? News to Abberline and Reid?)

To Edwardians, therefore, there was no Ripper mystery. He had been identified as an insane medical man who had killed himself. The uber-celebrity writer George Sims had pronounced, and he had top police contacts. Sure, the public were denied the late maniac's name -- but what good would it do to know?

What was missed was that Macnaghten came clean, somewhat, in his 1914 memoirs; that the real Ripper was unknown to police for years after he had killed himself. That it was Mac who put to rest his 'ghost' based on information received -- 'certain facts' leading to a 'conclusion'.

What is missed now, in my opinion, is that Macnaghten's affable character would never have allowed the 'protean' and tormented Montie Druitt to be recognized by his peers; would never have allowed the maniac's surviving family to be distressed -- even ruined -- by blithely spilling all to the likes of Sims, and through his credulous chum the public.

This would mean, before we ever knew of Druitt's true identity, that the 'Drowned Doctor' must be, to some extent, a fictional construct, eg. either he was not really drowned or he was not really a doctor, but he cannot be both as it would be too indiscreet an act by such a discreet gentleman-policeman.

To Roy

I think you make a really good point.

If you argue that a source is deliberately unreliable, as I do, then how do you know it is reliable about anything at all? Perhaps Mac used Druitt as a Trojan Horse for Tumblety.

Anderson's Polish Jew suspect was considered in its day an embarrassing, sectarian afterthought, perhaps quite unfairly, due to the ascendancy of Sims' claim that the Ripper was 'one of us'; a real-life version of Stevenson's monster. This gripped the popular imagination in a way that some poor, foreign wretch could never do.

By 1913 Maria Belloc Lowndes had consolidated Sims' 'Jack' into the [accidentally Druitt-like] figure of the 'Avenger' in her novel 'The Lodger': young, handsome, a Gentile, a Gentleman, a bachelor, who lives not at home, and who kills himself.

Plus Mac did comment on Anderson's memoir -- by implication. For 'Laying the Ghost of Jack the Ripper' is composed, partly, as a refutation of Anderson's 1910 claims.

[Wickerman]

And yet we agonize over every detail put forward in witness testimony, press statements, ad nauseum, in order to identify a particular suspect. Not so these police officials, where does Druitt, Kosminski, Ostrog, Tumblety fit in with any given suspect description?

There seems to be a significant disconnect between who 'they' think their personal suspect was and any person last seen at or near the crime scene's.
It's almost like they were playing to a different set of rules, which actually they were.

Regards, Jon S.

[Versa]

And yet we agonize over every detail put forward in witness testimony, press statements, ad nauseum, in order to identify a particular suspect. Not so these police officials, where does Druitt, Kosminski, Ostrog, Tumblety fit in with any given suspect description?

There seems to be a significant disconnect between who 'they' think their personal suspect was and any person last seen at or near the crime scene's.
It's almost like they were playing to a different set of rules, which actually they were.

I agree and also feel that when thinking about the profitability of their memoirs a good way of upping the sales may of been to hint at the identity of JtR and hiding the sensational revelation of his identity (which in fact they did not know) under layers of nonsense which they believed could neither be proven or disproved safe in the knowledge that JtR's real identity would in all likelihood never be known.