Kosminski and Victim DNA Match on Shawl - Part 2

[Phil Carter]

4. He misinterpreted what he was told..I do feel his work suffers from his conscious decision to go it alone and not run things past others on sites t
like this........

Hello Steve,

That last line is one I certainly agree to.

regards

Phil

[Phil Carter]

Hello Chris,

Yes, we all know of the stance of Alan McCormick of the Crime Museum. I was trying to get at EXACTLY the wording of Russel Edwards in his book. And in doing so am troubled by these comments quoted by Mr. Edwards in his book (paraphrased rather).

As I wrote previously though. I would naturally think that 'documentation to prove it' would be referring to The Swanson Marginalia and End page annotations.... except that it cannot be that.......

"Aaron" Kosminski was not mentioned in it. Only a 'Kosminski' was.
and
The SM and EPA doesnt "prove" anything of the sort in any case.

So if Mr. Edwards has been told this by Mr. McCormick then the Crime Museum's former curator is actually only spinning his own belief which, in itself, is unprovable. Isn't that contributary to perpetuating a myth?

If so, upon what evidence does Mr McCormack perpetuate the unproven and unwritten myth that Aaron Kosminski was involved at all?

I only ask.

regards

Phil

[Jonathan H]

From the little we have, we can see that Macnaghten knows more accurate data about 'Kosminski' than Anderson and/or Swanson.

Anderson writes and speaks of a Polish suspect who was about our and about for brief time in 1888, and was incarcerated in 1889--and identified. Soon after he was deceased, or so Anderson's son claimed his father believed.

None of that matches Aaron Kosminski, except being a Polish Jew at large in Whitechapel.

There is no evidence in the extant record that anybody at Scotland Yard ever saw either version of Macnaghten's report.

The notion of a positive witness identification does not appear until 1910-- to years after Anderson gives an interview which shows that his memory is in free fall

[Phil Carter]

1. Yes, Phil. It seems to have happened before the shawl was purchased. Kosminski was in the frame before the money was spent, and the DNA done. Hence the need for a 'blind' DNA test where the tester doesn't know who the possible subject is so as to avoid possible unwitting prejudice. Standard practice normally.

...
The fact that the conversation is paraphrased from memory, possibly long after the event, means we can't take it as literally true. If it really was as RE says, then I think it's a bit iffy. But of course we don't know what the other party to the chat would say. He might recall it very differently.

Hello Mick,

Ahh, and now we get to the crux of the matter. Aaron Kosminski was in the frame BEFORE the shawl was purchased. Before the DNA was done, before any money was spent. Unwitting predjudice? Indeed.

People can draw their own conclusions from this.

As regards the paraphrasing, I call that a "get out of jail free" card. If quoted or questioned, all Mr Edwards has to say is that he mis-remembered or has mis quoted.

There are very very few facts actually appearing in this book of substance it appears when broken down.


many thanks


Phil

[PaulB]

From the little we have, we can see that Macnaghten knows more accurate data about 'Kosminski' than Anderson and/or Swanson.

Anderson writes and speaks of a Polish suspect who was about our and about for brief time in 1888, and was incarcerated in 1889--and identified. Soon after he was deceased, or so Anderson's son claimed his father believed.

None of that matches Aaron Kosminski, except being a Polish Jew at large in Whitechapel.

There is no evidence in the extant record that anybody at Scotland Yard ever saw either version of Macnaghten's report.

The notion of a positive witness identification does not appear until 1910-- to years after Anderson gives an interview which shows that his memory is in free fall

Hi Jonothan
arguably Macnaghten did not know more about "Kosminski" than Anderson and Swanson. In your interpretation of events he did, but it's only your interpretation.

Anderson does not write about somebody who was out and about in 1888 and incarcerated in 1889. Macnaghten does, Anderson does not. And if Swanson is correct and the identifation took place at the Seaside Home, then the date is a lot later than 1889.

The limited information provided does fit Aaron Kosminski.

I agree that the memoranda was filed but never used.

To describe Anderson's memory as in free-fall is grossly unfair. He confused some information about a crime when writing late at night and very tired. And whilst his memory may have been failing him, leading to the confusion of details, Jack the Ripper was among the most serious cases he had to deal with and consequently not one he is likely to have been confused over.

[Caligo Umbrator]

Hi Jonothan
arguably Macnaghten did not know more about "Kosminski" than Anderson and Swanson. In your interpretation of events he did, but it's only your interpretation.

Anderson does not write about somebody who was out and about in 1888 and incarcerated in 1889. Macnaghten does, Anderson does not. And if Swanson is correct and the identifation took place at the Seaside Home, then the date is a lot later than 1889.

The limited information provided does fit Aaron Kosminski.

I agree that the memoranda was filed but never used.

To describe Anderson's memory as in free-fall is grossly unfair. He confused some information about a crime when writing late at night and very tired. And whilst his memory may have been failing him, leading to the confusion of details, Jack the Ripper was among the most serious cases he had to deal with and consequently not one he is likely to have been confused over.

Hi, Paul.
I agree.
Macnaghten doesn't really provide any accurate information about Kosminski.
He says that Kosminski was "removed to a lunatic asylum about March 1889", which, unless there are pertinent documents that are missing from the record, is incorrect.
Oddly, some of the 'Macnaghten Memoranda' is very precise in its information - such as the correct day, month, year and location of the discovery of the Pinchin Street torso.
The discrepancy between the preciseness of Pinchin Street information and the woeful inaccuracy of the details pertaining to the JTR suspects may, I feel, be due to Macnaghten consulting the available files or notes concerning the 'torso' case, while not being able to rely on anything other than his own recollection with regards to the JTR suspects.
In any case it seems that, as others here have stated, the 'Memoranda' was more likely only intended as a response to the allegations published in a newspaper that a Thomas Cutbush was JTR, rather than a serious effort to identify who JTR might actually have been.
Yours, Caligo

[Jonathan H]

Sorry PaulB, but ...

Sorry Paul, but I have to respectfully disagree with all of that.

It is not my interpretation of 'events', but rather the evidence to be found in the surviving sources.

Macnaghten knows in 'Aberconway' that 'Kosminski' is still alive. That is what he says. He was incarcerated (and I believe still is) about March 1889 ...

So, in 1894 Mac knew that Aaron Kosminski was very much alive. By the time Donald Swanson writes his annotations, the suspect has died 'soon afterwards' e.g. soon after being sectioned.

Even if that were Swanson meaning soon after Feb, 1891--which I do not think he means at all--he is still completely wrong, and Macnaghten, in 1894, is completely right.

Mac's proxy, Sims, writes in 1907 that this Polish suspect was out and about for a considerable time after the Kelly murder. In fact, Sims implies the man is still alive in 1907--again that's correct about Aaron Kosminski.

Whereas this is what Anderson told Griffiths (as Alfred Aylmer) in 1895:

'[Anderson] has himself a perfectly plausible theory that Jack the Ripper was a homicidal maniac, temporarily at large, whose hideous career was cut short by committal to an asylum'.

That broadly matches 'Kosminski' as written by Macnaghten e.g. out and about in 1888, and incarcerated by March 1889.

It does not match Aaron Kosminski.

Anderson's memoirs give the false impression that the events he describes happened in late 1888 into early 1889--again reflecting the Macnaghten report(s) timeline.

This is why Farson, Cullen, Odell, Rumbelow and Fido were looking for a Jewish suspect from that time, and settled on Pizer (and the witness who had affirmed to him but it led nowhere). Some modern writers act as if this was a bizarre theory--it wasn't.

When Martin Fido found Aaron Kosminski he rejected him as Anderson's suspect it waspartly because his incarceration was way too late.

Why too late? Because of the way Anderson had described these events between 1895 and 1910.

Anderson must have told his son that the Ripper had died in the asylum, which, again, does not match Aaron Kosminski (in fact, the suspect outlived Anderson).

What is so devastating about the 1908 interview is not just that he has confused different pipes from the Kelly and McKenzie crime scenes, he has confused Home Secretaries who were different men, from different parties, from different governments, from different years.

Because he was ... tired?

All of his errors over the years are self-serving.

They make him look better re: the Ripper. That's not an accident. That's conceit.

He even, as his memory goes into free fall in 1908 --and arguably by 1910, even more so with the slam dunk identification that only happened with Grant--he makes errors which drop the Liberal Party into it! That's not just a mistake. That's a corrosive, partisan bias. Very mean and ornery.

Chris Phillips found a source from 1910 in which Sims in "Mustard and Cress" has to help Anderson, as the latter is doing such a lousy job propagating his own suspect. On one level Dagonet is insulting, unfairly so, about Anderson as a an anti-Semite. But on another level, he also writes that there was a Polish-Jewish suspect named in a final report lodged at the Home Office.

Funny that Anderson never referred to this allegedly definitive document.

[Jonathan H]

To Caligo

I don't think Macnaghten relied on any files.

He simply went to Colney Hatch and discovered that the cause given for Aaron Kosminski's mania was "self-abuse" (or he wrote to the doctors).

This happened, after all, while he had been on the Force for over two years.

The real question is why did he backdate the incarceration of this suspect to a time before he joined Scotland Yard?

I is not well understood here that Melville Macnaghten was hands-on about investigating notorious crimes, especially this one.

From the moment he arrived at the Met, Macnaghten was consulting the files on the case, he was patrolling the East End by himself and he was trying to work out which reporter faked the 'Dear Boss' letter--and in a year, he claims, he had worked out whom it was.

[pinkmoon]

But if that's the case why accepting it over Macnaghten who appears to abandon Kosminski?

Hi gut,people always tend to forget about sir Melville when they say it has to be Kosminski but the police never had enough evidence to arrest him if the police really thought he was their man he would not have been forgotten about and left to rot in the asylum for all those years and would Lawende(not Mr lavender as the mail said) have been left in peace if he said he didn't want to identify Kosminski because he didn't want to see him hung which is basically identifying him.Sir Melville chose Druitt over Kosminski for a very good reason a reason we will never really know and can only guess .I think Kosminski was only looked at by the police because they were desperate anything is better then nothing when you have no suspect someone decided because he picked up a knife to his sister and lived locally and was a lunatic he might be worth looking at.

[Chris]

Aaron Kosminski was not Jack the Ripper and the killer’s true identity might never be revealed, a leading expert on the murders said today.
Last month, it was claimed that forensic evidence proved Polish-born Kosminski was the Whitechapel killer.
...
But according to Andrew Smith, a Gothic expert and leading authority on the Ripper murders, the DNA was contaminated and therefore the evidence is “very shaky”.
He said: “Kosminski’s name has been around for a long time but we need forensic evidence and there isn’t any.
“I do not believe it is Kosminski. The idea that his DNA hasn’t been contaminated is highly unlikely. After 126 years the identity of Jack the Ripper remains a mystery.”
http://www.standard.co.uk/news/londo...r-9772403.html

[PaulB]

Aaron Kosminski was not Jack the Ripper and the killer’s true identity might never be revealed, a leading expert on the murders said today.
Last month, it was claimed that forensic evidence proved Polish-born Kosminski was the Whitechapel killer.
...
But according to Andrew Smith, a Gothic expert and leading authority on the Ripper murders, the DNA was contaminated and therefore the evidence is “very shaky”.
He said: “Kosminski’s name has been around for a long time but we need forensic evidence and there isn’t any.
“I do not believe it is Kosminski. The idea that his DNA hasn’t been contaminated is highly unlikely. After 126 years the identity of Jack the Ripper remains a mystery.”
http://www.standard.co.uk/news/londo...r-9772403.html

Who is Andrew Smith?

[pinkmoon]

Who is Andrew Smith?

I think Andrew Smith is someone who is very interested in the jack the ripper murders I don't think he has any formal qualifications just a keen amateur.

[Chris]

Who is Andrew Smith?

He's an academic, and therefore a proper expert:
https://www.shef.ac.uk/english/people/smith

His web page says he's written chapters on Jack the Ripper in a couple of books. I think one of them is the book that accompanied the exhibition at the Docklands branch of the Museum of London a few years ago.

To be fair, I think the article in the Standard was really meant to be about an exhibition at the British Library, but they obviously thought Jack the Ripper would make a good headline.

[PaulB]

He's an academic, and therefore a proper expert:
https://www.shef.ac.uk/english/people/smith

His web page says he's written chapters on Jack the Ripper in a couple of books. I think one of them is the book that accompanied the exhibition at the Docklands branch of the Museum of London a few years ago.

To be fair, I think the article in the Standard was really meant to be about an exhibition at the British Library, but they obviously thought Jack the Ripper would make a good headline.

Thanks for that. He lists a contribution to Alexadra Warwick' s edited book of a few years ago. I suppose he has read Russell Edwards' book?

[anna]

The Evening Standard..a great paper to end this silly episode in,as everyone reads it on their way home from work,and it's available free at every supermarket,and other outlets in London.

Now,whatever anyone else said about the shawl,the effect can never be the same.The public won't believe them,and it will seem like someone has their own reason for keeping it all going,and they'll look daft.

We don't even know this Andrew Smith.

But our community owes him and the Evening Standard a real vote of thanks..finally the truth is out there.

What a lovely way to start the weekend...with RE and this bloody shawl behind us.