Who was the author of the 'Maybrick' diary? Some options.

[Sam Flynn]

Excellent points, Obs. Polishing the inside cover of a watch, especially to the point that any engravings thereon are worn down/rounded off, seems utterly bizarre.

[Observer]

The scratches could have been made immediately after the inscriptions, possibly as a by-product of the ageing/polishing process.

This polishing process described by one of the experts baffles me. The marks in question are located on the inside back cover. Why would anyone wish to polish the inside back cover? What's the point. Why go to the trouble of removing the back cover in order to polish an area that's never seen? I own a nine carat gold wrist watch, and i've had a look at the inside back cover, there are jeweller's marks there. What's more they look as if they were placed there yesterday, not at all rubbed out. Another thing, they are tiny, not legible to the naked eye, it didn't need a microscope to make then out though! An ordinary, cheap, jeweller's loup with a 10x magnification sufficed.

It seems likely to me that whoever inscribed the watch with those initials thought to himself, hello, those marks look a little too sharp considering they are meant to be over a hundered years old, and they polished them out to age them

Anyone out there with a gold watch? Take the back off, let's hear what you find.

[Graham]

A quick re-read of Dr Wild's report on his SAM investigation of the scratchings shows that he uses the words 'appears to have been' and 'suggests' and 'indicate' and 'seem likely'. In other words, he is exercising an analytical scientist's age-old right to hedge his bets.

Dr Turgoose, in his earlier investigation using an SEM, did not rule out the possibility that it could be a recent forgery. The marks, he said, could have been artificially aged, but added that such a process could be complex.

My wife has attended several courses in jewellery design and making in Birmingham's Jewellery Quarter. These courses included basic engraving and she has a set of, admittedly inexpensive and not great quality, engraving tools. We've both had a go, not on gold but on copper, and it really isn't all that difficult (after a spot of practice) to reproduce your own signature, freehand, or something that looks very much like it.

One other point which I think is mentioned in 'Ripper Diary': until relatively recently, it was as I understand accepted that the Ripper had murdered seven women in the East End. Which begs the question: why are there only five sets on initials on the Watch?

Graham

[Sam Flynn]

I’m no expert but I can’t see it being that easy

About as difficult as writing on a piece of aluminium with a rusty nail. Given the difficulty people have with even seeing them, it doesn't seem that the engravings had to be particularly deep.

[Sam Flynn]

The 'scratchings' were deemed to be many tens of years old and made with a number of different implements. Under examination with an Electron microscope were found embedded in parts of the 'scratchings', rusted iron particles which were probably from one of the implements. These would have been impossible to have been placed there.

It seems to me that they could have been left behind by a corroded implement at any time.

[Sam Flynn]

And I think that I'm right in saying (I'll happily stand correcting though) that the alleged Maybrick scratches were overlaid by more modern ones.

"More modern" as in more recent, which tells us everything about sequence but nothing about age. The scratches could have been made immediately after the inscriptions, possibly as a by-product of the aging/polishing process.

[Spider]

I believe that was the case, one being a possible repairers mark 'H 93' possibly denoting the year 1893, as it wouldn't have been 1993!

[Herlock Sholmes]

And I think that I'm right in saying (I'll happily stand correcting though) that the alleged Maybrick scratches were overlaid by more modern ones.

[Spider]

Hi Herlock
It wouldn't be too hard to figure out that if you wanted to make engravings in something appear old, or at least obfuscate the matter, you would scratch them in there lightly, or however, and then "buff" them out (for lack of better word) to make it appear old. no?

The 'scratchings' were deemed to be many tens of years old and made with a number of different implements. Under examination with an Electron microscope were found embedded in parts of the 'scratchings', rusted iron particles which were probably from one of the implements. These would have been impossible to have been placed there.

[Graham]

Hi Abby,

I’m no expert but I can’t see it being that easy. Everyone would be at it

Everyone IS at it! Fake jewellery is big business!

Graham

[Herlock Sholmes]

Hi Herlock
It wouldn't be too hard to figure out that if you wanted to make engravings in something appear old, or at least obfuscate the matter, you would scratch them in there lightly, or however, and then "buff" them out (for lack of better word) to make it appear old. no?

Hi Abby,

I’m no expert but I can’t see it being that easy. Everyone would be at it

[Abby Normal]

Hi Caz and Gareth,

I accept that whoever did it didn’t need to be a master craftsman but I still don’t think that I could do it for example. Especially the signature. But the point Caz has made is surely the important one. Creating the initials and signature that could give a scientific examiner no cause to doubt that it could have been done in 1888/9 would require very high levels of skill. I may be recalling incorrectly here but didn’t the scientist who did the test (the unusual name of Turgoose [or something similar] comes to mind) say that he couldn’t have replicated it?
If it is possible to apply those kind of scratches to a gold watch and include an ageing process (and I’ve no doubt that it is) we are left with a question that is probably impossible to answer.
Did Albert Johnson or his brother know anyone with the required high levels of skill and knowledge? And furthermore wouldn’t there be a risk of him crawling out of the woodwork for a bit of publicity or possible reward (via a newspaper story for example) by shouting “it was me?”

Hi Herlock
It wouldn't be too hard to figure out that if you wanted to make engravings in something appear old, or at least obfuscate the matter, you would scratch them in there lightly, or however, and then "buff" them out (for lack of better word) to make it appear old. no?

[Herlock Sholmes]

I love a good hypothetical scenario. So here’s one (it may have been suggested before.)

One of Maybrick’s brother’s finds the diary somewhere other than beneath the floorboards. Searching his study perhaps? Or perhaps Lowry found it at the office and presented it to the brothers? One of the brother’s take a moral viewpoint. “If our brother is responsible for the deaths of these poor women they have a right to justice. We must inform the police.”
The other takes the pragmatic approach. “But think of the scandal. We would all be ruined. Tarnished for the rest of our lives by our brother’s infamy.”

I know, very melodramatic but you get the picture

They come to a compromise. “We’ll hide it under the floorboards. By the time anyone finds it we will all be long gone.”

If it was Lowry that found it they pay for his silence.

[Herlock Sholmes]

But, Gareth, aren't you missing the point? Obviously someone was originally able to scratch crude but legible words and initials inside the watch, and presumably with no great difficulty. Nobody's questioning this [except possibly Abby Normal, who seemed to be sceptical about their very existence because I hadn't been able to see them myself in 2001 ].

The point is, when your great grandfather scratched his own initial on his ring [ouch, sounds painful], would he have been able to make it look, under a microscope, like he had not done it yesterday, but decades before he was even a twinkle in your great great grandfather's eye?

This is our main concern here, not the initial [ha ha] difficulty of scratching initials into soft metal surfaces. But while we're here, do you think your example from personal experience suggests your great grandfather could also have scratched a passable forgery of your great grandmother's signature, using her maiden name, into a slightly larger soft metal surface, and then done a professional job of giving it the appearance of many decades of wear when viewed under a microscope?

If it was all such a doddle, why haven't we seen other Maybrick artefacts coming out of the brickwork, such as a gold ring that turns out to be brass... er, bad example there. How about a couple of brass rings with AC scratched on them, or a hankie embroidered with the initials FM complete with traces of arsenic and a note attached reading "the whore will suffer", in a suitably diary-like hand?

Love,

Caz
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Hi Caz and Gareth,

I accept that whoever did it didn’t need to be a master craftsman but I still don’t think that I could do it for example. Especially the signature. But the point Caz has made is surely the important one. Creating the initials and signature that could give a scientific examiner no cause to doubt that it could have been done in 1888/9 would require very high levels of skill. I may be recalling incorrectly here but didn’t the scientist who did the test (the unusual name of Turgoose [or something similar] comes to mind) say that he couldn’t have replicated it?
If it is possible to apply those kind of scratches to a gold watch and include an ageing process (and I’ve no doubt that it is) we are left with a question that is probably impossible to answer.
Did Albert Johnson or his brother know anyone with the required high levels of skill and knowledge? And furthermore wouldn’t there be a risk of him crawling out of the woodwork for a bit of publicity or possible reward (via a newspaper story for example) by shouting “it was me?”

[caz]

It seems unlikely, reading the posts here on this Forum, that there will ever be any agreement, or further solid positive evidence, forthcoming with regard to The Floorboards, The Electricians And Mike Barrett. (Hey, could be a Peter Greenaway work!!). As I and others have suggested, why on earth would a dying man wish to secrete anything under the floorboards? And how could he have achieved it anyway?

Well that would be for the diary's author to explain, Graham, but it does seem to me all too obvious why a Battlecrease provenance - Maybrick's own bedroom where he died on May 11th 1889, no less - would have been our hoaxer's dream, at least compared with some dead pal of Mike Barrett's, who expected him to do something sensible with it while saying nothing about where it had been for the last 100 years.

A dying "Sir Jim", writing his last entry, did express the wish that the book would be found and would reveal all when he was in his grave. If I had been the hoaxer I think I might have hinted at a loose floorboard under his bed, or very close to it, which he had used on previous occasions to secrete stuff he didn't want found while he was alive and still kicking.

Love,

Caz
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