Framing Charles

[Fiver]

Let's step back a moment.

'History' isn't the study of life, nor of 'reality.' It is the study of what was documented. Or not even that. It is the study of the documentation that has survived.

Taking it a step further, we need to analyse the documentation. People who wrote historical documents often had agendas and biases, made estimates, were misinformed, or were unclear. An extreme example is the historian Procopius, who wrote multiple histories. In one, he portrayed Emperor Justinian as a great leader. In the other, Procopius portrayed Justinian as a demonic monster in human form that sometimes forgot to grow a head.

A Ripper-linked example would be the statements of Fanny Mortimer. They disagree about when she began observing Berner Street, how long she was at her doorway, and which direction a man with a black bag was traveling. But these two contradictory statements occur in the same edition of the same newspaper.

[Fiver]

You are cleariy out of your depth. Please do some more research before wasting our time any further. Pickfords delivered tons of provincial horse flesh every week.

Which does not refute anything I said. There a hundreds, if not thousands, of possibilities for what Lechmere carried on any particular day. Even if he delivered to a single location, like a market, odds are good he would be delivering multiple commodities and to multiple recipients. The only way that he would be delivering only horseflesh every day would be if he worked for a butcher, knacker, or cats meat man; not if he worked for Pickfords.

[Fiver]

It’s obvious you’re new to all of this. And like a lot of newbies, you’ve done a bit of Googling and consider yourself an expert.

I see you have chosen insults instead of attempting to refute anything I said. Everyone is making assumptions, most especially Fisherman. I am quite willing to change my mind based on reasoning and evidence, but so far no one has refuted my assumptions about Charles Lechmere's work schedule.

Charles Lechemere worked for Pickford's at Broad Street Station. Trains ran on regular schedules, so a carman's shift would logically be tied to that. From what I can find, the standard for Pickford's was "Each team of horses takes out for delivery, and returns with, two loads of goods daily" and "a full three-horse-van carries between four and five tons". At the time, Pickford's appears to have transported goods for both businesses and individuals. There certainly would be regular bulk shipments to and from large firms, but even those wouldn't necessarily be the same size or be shipped every day. Smaller firms and individuals would be even more irregular in the size and frequency of their shipments.

The nearest Market appears to have been Spitalfield's Market (fruit, vegetables, flowers), though plenty of other things were available there as well. And there were plenty of business outside the Markets. A period source notes "All day long and all the year round there is a constant Fair going on in Whitechapel Road. It is held upon the broad pavement, which was benevolently intended, no doubt, for this purpose. Here are displayed all kinds of things; bits of second-hand furniture, such as the head of a wooden bed, whose griminess is perhaps exaggerated, in order that a purchaser may expect something extraordinarily cheap. Here are lids of pots and saucepans laid out, to show that in the warehouse, of which these things are specimens, will be found the principal parts of the utensils for sale; here are unexpected things, such as rows of skates, sold cheap in summer, light clothing in winter; workmen’s tools of every kind, including, perhaps, the burglarious jemmy; second-hand books – a miscellaneous collection, establishing the fact that the readers of books in Whitechapel – a feeble and scanty folk – read nothing at all except sermons and meditations among the tombs; second-hand boots and shoes; cutlery; hats and caps; rat-traps and mouse-traps and birdcages; flowers and seeds; skittles; and frames for photographs. Cheap- jacks have their carts beside the pavement; and with strident voice proclaim the goodness of their wares, which include in this district bloaters and dried haddocks, as well as crockery. And one is amazed, seeing how the open-air Fair goes on, why the shops are kept open at all.^"

The idea that Lechmere would have been delivering a single commodity is wildly unlikely when his van would have been carrying 4 to 5 tons of goods. Even if he was delivering to Spitalfields Market, it is unlikely that the entire cargo would go to a single vendor or consist of a single commodity. Then Lechemere would be expected to return to Broad Street Station with. Again, this would be wildly unlikely to have been picked up from one location, let alone be one commodity.

As noted, period standard for Pickford's appears to have been each van doing 2 sets of deliveries and returns. Lechmere might have had the occasional day where he only did one set of deliveries and returns, but it would be an exception and he'd probably have to work later on another day to make up for the lost wages.

And, as previously noted, a Pickford's van typically carried both a carman and a conductor, or book carrier.

[MrBarnett]

All that's fine, Gary, but none of it shows her marriage to Cross would have been seen as illegal or untoward or would have had a negative psychological influence on young Charles Lechmere--which is where my interest lies. You're finding her guilty by implication.

A lot of people sink in the world; it doesn't make them shady outlaws. Hereford is in her past. She's a London woman now, and had been for at least 9 years when she married Thomas Cross. Why would she give a rat's about the opinion of the Prebend of Parma in Herford, now that she was in the East End and never planned on going back?

And how is any of this evidence of bigamy in the eyes of the law? You are confusing perceived social stigma in Hereford with what was seen as normal and acceptable in the East End.

P.S. Your repeated references to 'Googling' is becoming more than a little juvenile, but I suppose it goes back to someone demonstrating to you that the phrase "bumbling buffoon" was absent from hundreds of thousands of on-line texts and newspapers from the 19th Century, and that didn't sit too well, did it?

Don't blame technology if you came to the wrong conclusion. It's simply a tool--no different from a library card. Almost all the texts I read are from the 19th Century and were not generated by "Google."

The Prebend was the executor of her father’s will, from which she may well still have been in receipt of income. Her two sisters, equal beneficiaries of the will, were recorded in 1891 as being of independent means.

If her husband had been still alive and she had known about it when she remarried, she would have committed bigamy. If he had been still alive when she married her subsequent husbands, whether she knew it or not, her subsequent marriages would have been invalid. The name Charles Allen Lechmere seems to have been unique, so it’s appearance in the press would have alerted many people to the location of John Lechmere’s son.

I’m impressed that you have discovered where ML was between 1849 and 1858. It was London was it? I could only find her in Hereford in 1851. Perhaps that was just a day trip to tie up some loose ends to do with her father’s estate. Can you share your research findings with us?

Presumably, her awayday to Hereford, it was back to the Smoke to continue her transformation from a butler’s daughter into a Cockney guttersnipe, heedless of Victorian morality as all East Enders were.

[MrBarnett]

Let's step back a moment.

'History' isn't the study of life, nor of 'reality.' It is the study of what was documented. Or not even that. It is the study of the documentation that has survived.

Historians demand documentation--and for good reason. There isn't any other way of going about their business, unless one is compiling an 'oral' history.

Of all the huge swirling infinite mess of reality that we call "life," historians are forced to navigate their way using only the scraps of paper that managed not to be pulped.

And since the vast majority of life, experience, reality, etc., is never documented, the surviving "paper trail" can often be misleading. At its worse, the 'historical record' might be leaving us with a false impression.

If we forget the inquests for a moment, and forget the 1861 census, the surviving 'paper trail' for Charles Allen Lechmere shows that he was known as Charles Allen Lechmere. He used the Lechmere name when he got married, when he registered his children for school, etc. The Lechmere theorists claim that he used the name a 100 times in various documentation.

Thus, when he uses the name 'Cross' at the inquest(s), it looks suspicious as hell. It's a 'one-off,' or maybe a 'two-off.'

That's fine, but just bear in mind that this belief is based strictly on the surviving paper trail; we cannot know what name Lechmere may have used casually, or what his co-workers may have called him, because such things are almost never written down or recorded. He could have been known as 'Charles Cross' to dozens of people, but unless their diaries or letters survived, we would never know it.

With this in mind, study Case History #1, on the thread 'David Orsam' compiled, which can be found here:

Lechmere/Cross "name issue" Part 2 - Casebook: Jack the Ripper Forums

Here we have a guy named William Adams of Yorkshire. (Aside: Before anyone asks, I re-checked Orsam's work and found nothing wrong with it. What he states is accurate).

William Adams was William Adams on his birth certificate, on every census in which he appeared, on his marriage banns, and the 'Adams' name was what was listed when his children were born, etc.

If it wasn't for a strange quirk there would be nothing in the surviving historical record to show that he was anything other than William Adams. Historians would be stuck with this alleged 'fact.'

But, as Orsam noticed, there was a terrible mining accident in 1907 that killed several miners near Burnley, Yorkshire, and our guy 'Adams' was one of them.

The startling thing is, despite all the paper trail, his name was listed in the paper as 'W. A. Slack.'





What the heck is going on?

What the surviving paper trail could not tell us is that Adams went by the name 'William Slack' at work...he had been raised by his step-father, Tom Slack, and he used the 'Slack' name casually, even though he used the name 'Adams' when getting married, registering his children, etc.

Slack may even have been the only name his employers and co-workers knew, because they gave that name when reporting the casualties of the mining disaster.

Based strictly on the surviving paper trail of 'official' documents, we wouldn't know any of this, except that his widow explained it at the inquest:




Think on that for a bit. The same can be true of Lechmere--and this is precisely what several people have been saying for years. Just like Adams, Lechmere may have 'adopted' the Cross name from his step-father in his formative years and it was the name he was known by at work. And like Adams, he nonetheless used his 'proper name' on the census returns, his children's baptismal records, etc.--all of which leave us with a false impression. The only difference is that Lechmere lived a lot longer than Adams.

And since this is an entirely reasonable possibility, the only question left, then, is whether Lechmere would have felt obliged to give his 'proper' name when addressing the inquest.

Which brings us to the curious case of the bloke from Ryde, Hampshire, also mentioned by David Orsam.

But I'll leave you or others to chase that one down.

Cheers.

What the heck is going on?

Well, it seems to me that in the Adams/Slack case it was felt appropriate that the name issue should be clarified in court.

Is that right?

The deceased’s wife thought it was somehow wrong that his unofficial name should be used, so she volunteered the information about his ‘proper’ name.

[MrBarnett]

I see you have chosen insults instead of attempting to refute anything I said. Everyone is making assumptions, most especially Fisherman. I am quite willing to change my mind based on reasoning and evidence, but so far no one has refuted my assumptions about Charles Lechmere's work schedule.

Charles Lechemere worked for Pickford's at Broad Street Station. Trains ran on regular schedules, so a carman's shift would logically be tied to that. From what I can find, the standard for Pickford's was "Each team of horses takes out for delivery, and returns with, two loads of goods daily" and "a full three-horse-van carries between four and five tons". At the time, Pickford's appears to have transported goods for both businesses and individuals. There certainly would be regular bulk shipments to and from large firms, but even those wouldn't necessarily be the same size or be shipped every day. Smaller firms and individuals would be even more irregular in the size and frequency of their shipments.

The nearest Market appears to have been Spitalfield's Market (fruit, vegetables, flowers), though plenty of other things were available there as well. And there were plenty of business outside the Markets. A period source notes "All day long and all the year round there is a constant Fair going on in Whitechapel Road. It is held upon the broad pavement, which was benevolently intended, no doubt, for this purpose. Here are displayed all kinds of things; bits of second-hand furniture, such as the head of a wooden bed, whose griminess is perhaps exaggerated, in order that a purchaser may expect something extraordinarily cheap. Here are lids of pots and saucepans laid out, to show that in the warehouse, of which these things are specimens, will be found the principal parts of the utensils for sale; here are unexpected things, such as rows of skates, sold cheap in summer, light clothing in winter; workmen’s tools of every kind, including, perhaps, the burglarious jemmy; second-hand books – a miscellaneous collection, establishing the fact that the readers of books in Whitechapel – a feeble and scanty folk – read nothing at all except sermons and meditations among the tombs; second-hand boots and shoes; cutlery; hats and caps; rat-traps and mouse-traps and birdcages; flowers and seeds; skittles; and frames for photographs. Cheap- jacks have their carts beside the pavement; and with strident voice proclaim the goodness of their wares, which include in this district bloaters and dried haddocks, as well as crockery. And one is amazed, seeing how the open-air Fair goes on, why the shops are kept open at all.^"

The idea that Lechmere would have been delivering a single commodity is wildly unlikely when his van would have been carrying 4 to 5 tons of goods. Even if he was delivering to Spitalfields Market, it is unlikely that the entire cargo would go to a single vendor or consist of a single commodity. Then Lechemere would be expected to return to Broad Street Station with. Again, this would be wildly unlikely to have been picked up from one location, let alone be one commodity.

As noted, period standard for Pickford's appears to have been each van doing 2 sets of deliveries and returns. Lechmere might have had the occasional day where he only did one set of deliveries and returns, but it would be an exception and he'd probably have to work later on another day to make up for the lost wages.

And, as previously noted, a Pickford's van typically carried both a carman and a conductor, or book carrier.

Ah, so you’ve established what kind of van he was driving. And what load he was carrying.

Very impressive.

Now perhaps you can explain how Pickford’s deliveries of provincial horse flesh worked. Who received them and what other commodities were carried alongside the produce of the knacker’s yards, bearing in mind the strict legal distinction between knacker’s meat and food for human consumption.

How many firms were involved in the horse flesh trade and where were they located?

I’m assuming you have established these facts because you are not using qualifiers.

[MrBarnett]

I was already aware of these points, but thank you for putting all this out in detail. As someone who is trying to look at this historically, I have attempted to use qualifiers in my statements.

For example, I said "It seems like Lechmere was the name he used in everyday life, while Cross, the name of his police stepfather, was the name he used when dealing with the police and the legal system." I put in the qualifier because we only have two examples of Lechmere testifying at an Inquiry. As you note, we do not know whether his neighbors and coworkers knew him as Cross or as Lechmere. It is even possible that neighbors from one neighborhood knew him as Cross while neighbors in another neighborhood might have known him as Lechmere.

We can be reasonably sure that some of his neighbours knew him as Lechmere. Including some ex-neighbours living in Berner Street in 1888.

[MrBarnett]

Nicely consistent. If somebody posts an opinion that doesn't fit in with your own agenda then "attack, attack, attack"!

You are suggesting that the noose should be placed around Lechmere's neck on the basis that he gave a different name to a policeman.

I have posted a contribution quoting somebody who was there at the time, admitting that she didn't use her real name either. Ergo, this wasn't an unusual circumstance. This wasn't an incident that was so unusual. It certainly wasn't anything illegal. The onus is on you to prove that "going by" another name was a criminal offence. Possibly "grounds for suspicion" I grant you. But not illegal.

But hey, if you are not going to take the word of a former Met Murder Squad detective, I guess you aren't going to be persuaded by anything a JCL nomark like me is going to say.

You have an example of someone ‘admitting’ that they were not using their real name? And why would she have done that? It’s almost as if people had a concept of their ‘real/proper’ name and felt it was appropriate to use that when dealing with authority. We can’t allow that idea to spread. It might make us suspicious of CAL.

I should point out that I am not attempting to put a noose around Lechmere’s neck. I think it’s unlikely that he was JTR - at least I’ve seen nothing to convince me that he was. My interest is in his mother and how she might have felt about the unique name CAL appearing in the national press.

[MrBarnett]

I see you have chosen insults instead of attempting to refute anything I said. Everyone is making assumptions, most especially Fisherman. I am quite willing to change my mind based on reasoning and evidence, but so far no one has refuted my assumptions about Charles Lechmere's work schedule.

Charles Lechemere worked for Pickford's at Broad Street Station. Trains ran on regular schedules, so a carman's shift would logically be tied to that. From what I can find, the standard for Pickford's was "Each team of horses takes out for delivery, and returns with, two loads of goods daily" and "a full three-horse-van carries between four and five tons". At the time, Pickford's appears to have transported goods for both businesses and individuals. There certainly would be regular bulk shipments to and from large firms, but even those wouldn't necessarily be the same size or be shipped every day. Smaller firms and individuals would be even more irregular in the size and frequency of their shipments.

The nearest Market appears to have been Spitalfield's Market (fruit, vegetables, flowers), though plenty of other things were available there as well. And there were plenty of business outside the Markets. A period source notes "All day long and all the year round there is a constant Fair going on in Whitechapel Road. It is held upon the broad pavement, which was benevolently intended, no doubt, for this purpose. Here are displayed all kinds of things; bits of second-hand furniture, such as the head of a wooden bed, whose griminess is perhaps exaggerated, in order that a purchaser may expect something extraordinarily cheap. Here are lids of pots and saucepans laid out, to show that in the warehouse, of which these things are specimens, will be found the principal parts of the utensils for sale; here are unexpected things, such as rows of skates, sold cheap in summer, light clothing in winter; workmen’s tools of every kind, including, perhaps, the burglarious jemmy; second-hand books – a miscellaneous collection, establishing the fact that the readers of books in Whitechapel – a feeble and scanty folk – read nothing at all except sermons and meditations among the tombs; second-hand boots and shoes; cutlery; hats and caps; rat-traps and mouse-traps and birdcages; flowers and seeds; skittles; and frames for photographs. Cheap- jacks have their carts beside the pavement; and with strident voice proclaim the goodness of their wares, which include in this district bloaters and dried haddocks, as well as crockery. And one is amazed, seeing how the open-air Fair goes on, why the shops are kept open at all.^"

The idea that Lechmere would have been delivering a single commodity is wildly unlikely when his van would have been carrying 4 to 5 tons of goods. Even if he was delivering to Spitalfields Market, it is unlikely that the entire cargo would go to a single vendor or consist of a single commodity. Then Lechemere would be expected to return to Broad Street Station with. Again, this would be wildly unlikely to have been picked up from one location, let alone be one commodity.

As noted, period standard for Pickford's appears to have been each van doing 2 sets of deliveries and returns. Lechmere might have had the occasional day where he only did one set of deliveries and returns, but it would be an exception and he'd probably have to work later on another day to make up for the lost wages.

And, as previously noted, a Pickford's van typically carried both a carman and a conductor, or book carrier.

Your source is an article that appeared in All The Year Round in 1863 and which describes Pickfords activities at Camden. Their relationship with the LNWR was going through a sticky patch at that time and they moved from Camden around 1864.

Pickfords were universal carriers, meaning they carried just about anything: consumer goods, foodstuffs, minerals, building materials, fuel...and more besides.

Do you really believe the few facts and figures you have gleaned about their activities in Camden in 1863 are valid for whatever loads CAL was carrying in 1888?

Broad Street and Liverpool Street next door were major hubs for butchers meat, fish and cats meat. Deliveries from there would have gone to Smithfield, Billingsgate and Harrison, Barber and a handful of other horseflesh wholesalers.

[MrBarnett]

This well known photo allegedly shows a Pickfords van loaded with fuel for Capt Scott’s Terra Nova at the West India Docks in 1910.

What other commodities do we imagine would have carried alongside marine fuel?

[Al Bundy's Eyes]

This well known photo allegedly shows a Pickfords van loaded with fuel for Capt Scott’s Terra Nova at the West India Docks in 1910.

What other commodities do we imagine would have carried alongside marine fuel?

Oates?

[MrBarnett]

Oates?

Very appropriate for a cereal killer.

[Joshua Rogan]

This well known photo allegedly shows a Pickfords van loaded with fuel for Capt Scott’s Terra Nova at the West India Docks in 1910.

What other commodities do we imagine would have carried alongside marine fuel?

A pianola?

[rjpalmer]

What the heck is going on?

Well, it seems to me that in the Adams/Slack case it was felt appropriate that the name issue should be clarified in court.

Is that right?

The deceased’s wife thought it was somehow wrong that his unofficial name should be used, so she volunteered the information about his ‘proper’ name.

As I already acknowledged in my previous post, this a separate issue.

Adams/Slack was not a witness; he was the subject of the inquest. He was one of the dead bodies, and a death certificate would need to be filled out, so his “legal” name was relevant to the inquiry. The widow might also have wanted his commonly understood name broadcast in the newspapers, to alert distant relatives and friends, who may have been confused by the name he had used at work--‘W. A. Slack.’

Whether Adams/Slack would have felt obliged to give both his names had he survived and merely given evidence at the inquest is unknowable, so we must look at other case studies to answer that particular question.

The relevance of the Adams/Slack case study was simply to show that a man’s name in all existing documentation (marriage license, children’s school registrations, census returns, etc.) does not necessarily tell us the name he casually used in other aspects of his life, which, in Adam’s case, was the name of his stepfather. This was relevant to this thread, because we were asked to draw certain conclusions about Lechmere's use of 'Lechmere' in similar documents.

But if ‘Slack’ always used the name 'Slack' at work, but 'Adams' outside of work, why couldn't the same be true of 'Cross'?

If we want to discuss the second question—whether such men would feel obliged to give both names in court—we might want to turn to “Charles Taylor” of Ryde, who evidently felt no such compulsion.

But, as I said earlier, I will leave others to draw their own conclusions. I am satisfied.

[MrBarnett]

As I already acknowledged in my previous post, this a separate issue.

Adams/Slack was not a witness; he was the subject of the inquest. He was one of the dead bodies, and a death certificate would need to be filled out, so his “legal” name was relevant to the inquiry. The widow might also have wanted his commonly understood name broadcast in the newspapers, to alert distant relatives and friends, who may have been confused by the name he had used at work--‘W. A. Slack.’

Whether Adams/Slack would have felt obliged to give both his names had he survived and merely given evidence at the inquest is unknowable, so we must look at other case studies to answer that particular question.

The relevance of the Adams/Slack case study was simply to show that a man’s name in all existing documentation (marriage license, children’s school registrations, census returns, etc.) does not necessarily tell us the name he casually used in other aspects of his life, which, in Adam’s case, was the name of his stepfather. This was relevant to this thread, because we were asked to draw certain conclusions about Lechmere's use of 'Lechmere' in similar documents.

But if ‘Slack’ always used the name 'Slack' at work, but 'Adams' outside of work, why couldn't the same be true of 'Cross'?

If we want to discuss the second question—whether such men would feel obliged to give both names in court—we might want to turn to “Charles Taylor” of Ryde, who evidently felt no such compulsion.

But, as I said earlier, I will leave others to draw their own conclusions. I am satisfied.

Why offer that example? It’s very different from the Lechmere case. Taylor had lived pretty much all his life with his stepfather and was working in his well known local business when the incident he witnessed took place. He presumably drove carts across the IOW with the name Taylor emblazoned across them.

Was his biological father the scion of a notable family?’
Might he have had reason to be proud of the name Jones?

If anyone had suggested that Lechmere’s ommission of his proper name was a unique event, then this example would be worth presenting. As it is, it’s rather pathetic.