Plausibility of Kosminski

[Stewart P Evans]

Don't quite understand...

...
Fair enough. At some point the Macnaghten memorandum was enclosed in an official file to enter the public record as the Macnaghten Report.
I have copies of hundreds of MEPO and HO documents, letters, memos and briefing notes. They are masterpieces of bureaucratic punctiliousness—stamped, counter-stamped, referenced, cross-referenced, notated and cross-notated, initialled, dated and counter-dated. But the Macnaghten Report bears none of these hallmarks. The most seminal document in the Whitechapel murders mystery somehow circumvented Whitehall's bureaucratic machine to emerge unscathed, suggesting [to me, at least] that its eventual introduction to the public record came about by its being privately returned to Scotland Yard in later years.
How could this have happened?
...
Simon

I don't quite understand the phrase 'At some time the Macnaghten memorandum was enclosed in an official file to enter the public record as the Macnaghten report.'

I don't quite understand the words 'The most seminal document in the Whitechapel murders mystery somehow circumvented Whitehall's bureaucratic machine to emerge unscathed, suggesting [to me at least] that its eventual introduction to the public record came about by its being privately returned to Scotland Yard in later years.'

To me the foregoing suggests someone pursuing some sort of 'conspiracy theory', and the added 'to me at least' strengthens that impression.

Do you really understand what you are talking about?

[Stewart P Evans]

Up?

Or it was never required and never sent, or it is a file copy of a document that was sent to the Home Office and was put with the Cutbush papers and culled. Either way it would lack the customary received and seen markings.

Hell Paul, you're not up at this unearthly hour as well???!

However, of course, you are on the right track concerning the status of this document.

[Stewart P Evans]

Research

...
We can't say he wasn't a prime suspect anymore than we can say he was, but Anderson's belief makes "Kosminski" the fairy at the top of the research Christmas tree, followed by Druitt and so on.

Yes, he must be right up there for research until anything arises to qualify that status, such as in the case of Ostrog.

However, and as I contend, the importance, or level, for research that is accorded to 'Kosminski' must be subjective, and commensurate with the veracity and reliability the individual researcher is prepared to bestow upon Anderson. You feel he is the best historical source, I, personally, don't, for the reasons I have given in the past.

That said, and apropos of Anderson, we also have to take into account both Macnaghten's 1894 report and Swanson's undated (but 1910 or later) annotations in his copy of Anderson's book, both of which mention 'Kosminski'.

[Stewart P Evans]

Macnaghten

Let us just take another look at Macnaghten's write up on Kosminski, in his own fair hand [MEPO 3/141 f180] dated 23rd Feb. 1894 -

[Stewart P Evans]

Swanson

Include the above from Macnaghten with the below from Swanson and it is difficult to think that they do not refer to Aaron Kosminski.

[PaulB]

Hell Paul, you're not up at this unearthly hour as well???!

However, of course, you are on the right track concerning the status of this document.

Hi Stewart,
Yes. Terrible isn't it. But it's amazing how much work one can get done without the phone ringing.

[Jonathan H]

Everything is exaggerated by Macnaghten.

A single knife threat to a female relative and he's a homicidal maniac.

He was sectioned in Feb of 1891, way too late to be 'Jack', which becomes the much more 'incriminating' March of 1889.

And was it 'many years' indulgence in 'solitary vices' -- or is that from a single notation in the sparse medical records on Aaron Kosminski?

That's not a rhetorical question. I'm at work, and do not have them in front of me.

Of course, by 'Aberconway', when the suspect was disseminated to the public via cronies, it was a much stronger tale -- yet simultanously dismissed in favour of the Drowned Doctor, another suspect encased in mythical encrustations (Ostrog too gets to be 'mad' and 'habitually cruel' to women: a desperate touch).

By 'Aberconway', this 'Kosminski' (where's his other names ...?) hates all women, lives in the very heart of the killing zone like a tarantula, and he may have been seen, not just in the vicinity of a murder scene, but actually chatting with a victim just before she was killed!?

And the witness? No less than a beat cop!

But the masturbating Polish Jew is still alive in the madhouse, and no human mind could possibly have functioned after the horror of Miller's Ct., except to do yourself in, like the doctor did -- who was not a physician and lived for three more weeks.

[Stewart P Evans]

Anderson

Now, if the below was handwritten on Metropolitan Police report paper bearing a date of 1890/91 and with markings such as 'MEPO 3/141 f200' it would be a whole new ball game and something to be accorded top priority for research.

[Stewart P Evans]

Not Quite Sure

...
But the masturbating Polish Jew is still alive in the madhouse, and no human mind could possibly have functioned after the horror of Miller's Ct., except to do yourself in, like the doctor did -- who was not a physician and lived for three more weeks.

I'm not quite sure what to make of this sentence.

[PaulB]

Yes, he must be right up there for research until anything arises to qualify that status, such as in the case of Ostrog.

However, and as I contend, the importance, or level, for research that is accorded to 'Kosminski' must be subjective, and commensurate with the veracity and reliability the individual researcher is prepared to bestow upon Anderson. You feel he is the best historical source, I, personally, don't, for the reasons I have given in the past.

That said, and apropos of Anderson, we also have to take into account both Macnaghten's 1894 report and Swanson's undated (but 1910 or later) annotations in his copy of Anderson's book, both of which mention 'Kosminski'.

No, I don't think he's the best historical source; far from it in fact. Right from the off he was problematic but as we've learned more about him the problems seem to multiply. The Bussy/Mallon material, for example, show that Anderson either exaggerated his own importance or was less than aware of other factors (or maybe a combination of the two), which is essentially how Winston Churchill described Anderson's memoirs (the Bill Adams reference in particular). I attach priority to him simply because (a) he said the Ripper's identity was established fact, whereas Macnaghten admitted that he conjectured, and (b) I assume Anderson would have known about all the serious suspects and that if he thought "Kosminski" was at worst the best of the bunch then he has to be given credence. Whether Anderson was right or wrong, he therefore has to be researched first (in the sense that if he was provably correct then we don't have to speculate about the identity of Jack the Ripper, and if he was wrong, or probably wrong, we can take "Kosminski" out of the frame. I really don't care one way or the other, but that's really the only priority I attach to Anderson. As a historical source, Anderson is extremely difficult to interpret. Macnaghten is far easier.

[Stewart P Evans]

Yet again...

...
The Bussy/Mallon material, for example, show that Anderson either exaggerated his own importance or was less than aware of other factors (or maybe a combination of the two), which is essentially how Winston Churchill described Anderson's memoirs (the Bill Adams reference in particular).
...

Yet, again, here we must disagree. For I think that the Bussy/Mallon material shows very clearly that Anderson prevaricated and misled his readers to the enhancement of his own reputation.

a. He claimed the credit for identifying Massey as the best informer when Massey had already made the approach as informer to the prison governor and asked to see Anderson (albeit Samuel Lee).
b. He claimed he took the prison governor into his confidence and asked to be smuggled into Massey's cell when he was there at the request of Massey via the governor.
c. He claimed the cell visit to be an 'ordeal' involving risk to himself as Massey was a powerful man with a 'passionate temper', when Massey was actually compliant and bearing ill-will to his betrayers only.

The whole Anderson passage about the incident totally misleads the reader and gives the impression that Anderson identified Massey and 'turned' him into an informer at risk to his own personal safety, when Anderson was actually there at Massey's own request.

[Stewart P Evans]

Anderson

I know that Paul doesn't agree but, in my opinion, the below footnote in The Lighter Side of My Official Life again shows how Anderson's writings can be misleading.

His only reference to the unsolved murder of Rose Mylett at Poplar is in a footnote on page 137 of the book. Anderson states, 'And the Poplar case of December, 1888, was a death from natural causes, and but for the "Jack the Ripper" scare, no one would have thought of suggesting that it was homicide.

This is an incorrect and totally misleading statement. The coroner's court found it to be 'murder by person or persons unknown' and the file remained archived at Scotland Yard as an unsolved murder. Any modern researcher of these murders who saw only Anderson's reference to the Poplar murder would think that it was a natural death and not murder on Anderson's say so.

He says that but for the Ripper scare no one would have thought of suggesting that it was homicide when, in fact, every doctor who attended stated it was murder by strangulation apart from Bond who changed his tune after a return visit to the mortuary at Anderson's instigation.

[PaulB]

Yet, again, here we must disagree. For I think that the Bussy/Mallon material shows very clearly that Anderson prevaricated and misled his readers to the enhancement of his own reputation.

a. He claimed the credit for identifying Massey as the best informer when Massey had already made the approach as informer to the prison governor and asked to see Anderson (albeit Samuel Lee).
b. He claimed he took the prison governor into his confidence and asked to be smuggled into Massey's cell when he was there at the request of Massey via the governor.
c. He claimed the cell visit to be an 'ordeal' involving risk to himself as Massey was a powerful man with a 'passionate temper', when Massey was actually compliant and bearing ill-will to his betrayers only.

The whole Anderson passage about the incident totally misleads the reader and gives the impression that Anderson identified Massey and 'turned' him into an informer at risk to his own personal safety, when Anderson was actually there at Massey's own request.

I'm not disagreeing with you, just saying that the meeting with Massey did take place. I don't know why Anderson exagerated it, but it matches Churchill's observation of Anderson. If the same is applied to the Polish Jew then the event took place, but the certainty is probably considerably less than he states.

[Stewart P Evans]

Yes but...

I'm not disagreeing with you, just saying that the meeting with Massey did take place. I don't know why Anderson exagerated it, but it matches Churchill's observation of Anderson. If the same is applied to the Polish Jew then the event took place, but the certainty is probably considerably less than he states.

Yes but, surely, and not putting too fine a point on it, this is deceit on Anderson's part.

[Trevor Marriott]

In practice

I see a Macnaghten who furtively creates a document which is a gun loaded and cocked, but not fired in 1894.

But in 1898, he disseminated a different version for the public.

A mistke by a previous poster is to see Macnaghten as not involved in the investigation of suspects. he investigated Druitt and 'Kosminski' -- who was incarcerated while he had been at the Met for over wo years -- begins with him in the extant record.

Senior police officers of that rank do not investigate they delegate and oversee an investigation usually from a distance,perhaps visiting a murder incident room once a week to speak to the senior investigating offficer for an update. I am sure that would have still applied in 1888.

But if it was all verbal, due to the infornation about Aaron Kosminski, who becomes 'Kosminski' the Ripper suspect, then Anderson may never have even know about the 1894 Report, not could he c=access it as it was not plaed on file.

Remembr, that is all so slippery when Mac called the 'draft' or backdated rewrite, a 'Home Office Report' for Griffiths and Sims, when it was neither. That copy was not a document of state nor did it accurately reflect the original, not about Druitt and Sadler.

Sims does not say 'copy' in 1903 -- he says this is it, the Report like there is no other version.