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

[Graham]

https://medium.com/boston-university...x-da49e1287d5e
Thought this article might be of interest. Apologies if it has been posted before.

Darryl,

I believe that report has been posted on this Forum, but a long time ago. I've seen it before. One small point: the report states that chloroacetamide is a relatively modern development as a preservative; however, it's listed in the Merck Catalogue of 1857. I think its main early use was as an insecticide, and I don't know if it was used in inks or paper around the late 1880's. I would guess not.

Graham

[Abby Normal]

I think the problem with that is you’re debating with posters who aren’t prepared to accept normal arguments, who use supposition as fact and who have personal interests in prolonging the discussion.
The bottom line is that some people are not prepared to accept that it’s possible to draw conclusions about the diary, the watch etc. indeed, it’s hard to imagine the kind of proof that would not be discounted - a video recording of Barrett writing the diary would be dismissed instantly!

It’s classic conspiracy theorist-techniques: question every little discrepancy in the sources, assume the most far fetched scenarios on the basis that they can’t be ruled out, discount sources not to your liking and cast doubt over every little detail. That way, there’s always more to discuss, and if one is hoping to sell books or be invited as guest speaker to a conference, then more discussion is good, right?

So Steve Elamarna is right: there’s little point in continuing. You and David Orsam are doing stellar work trying to keep arguments empirically based, but I just think you’re up against people whose only objective, for whatever reason, is to continue the discussion far beyond reason.

well said. very well said.

[Darryl Kenyon]

https://medium.com/boston-university/the-maybrick-hoax-da49e1287d5e

Thought this article might be of interest. Apologies if it has been posted before.

[Graham]

The reports of both the electron microscope specialists are not what I would call wholly supportive of the claimed late 19th century age of the scratchings, and this alone would I think worry me if I'd got any £££'s invested in the Watch being genuine Ripper.

There is also the fact that there are only five initials when for a long time after the East End murders it was thought that [I]seven/I] women had been killed. I don't think anyone on this Forum has so far responded to this point. (Unless Maybrick was claiming he bumped off only five, and the other two were someone else's victims......)



Graham

[John Wheat]

Most of us accept that the "Maybrick" watch and diary aren't genuine, John. It's now a question of whodunnit and when.

I know that Sam it's just the recent threads are becoming tedious and we aren't getting any closer to definitely knowing whodunit and when.

[Kattrup]

Most of us accept that the "Maybrick" watch and diary aren't genuine, John. It's now a question of whodunnit and when.

I think the problem with that is you’re debating with posters who aren’t prepared to accept normal arguments, who use supposition as fact and who have personal interests in prolonging the discussion.
The bottom line is that some people are not prepared to accept that it’s possible to draw conclusions about the diary, the watch etc. indeed, it’s hard to imagine the kind of proof that would not be discounted - a video recording of Barrett writing the diary would be dismissed instantly!

It’s classic conspiracy theorist-techniques: question every little discrepancy in the sources, assume the most far fetched scenarios on the basis that they can’t be ruled out, discount sources not to your liking and cast doubt over every little detail. That way, there’s always more to discuss, and if one is hoping to sell books or be invited as guest speaker to a conference, then more discussion is good, right?

So Steve Elamarna is right: there’s little point in continuing. You and David Orsam are doing stellar work trying to keep arguments empirically based, but I just think you’re up against people whose only objective, for whatever reason, is to continue the discussion far beyond reason.

[Herlock Sholmes]

I sense frustration that the watch can’t be dismissed easily.

[Sam Flynn]

Most of us accept that the "Maybrick" watch and diary aren't genuine, John. It's now a question of whodunnit and when.

[John Wheat]

Maybe, Caz, but I'm struggling to understand why the enclosed back of a watch case should endure much wear and ageing at all.

It wouldn't Sam. It all points to someone falsifying the scratches like everything points to the diary being a forgery. This is all getting very tedious now.

[Sam Flynn]

Weren't the experts saying that a modern hoax would have needed all this 'bizarre' polishing in order to mimic all the natural signs of wear and ageing they'd expect to see with scratches made in soft metal many decades ago?

Maybe, Caz, but I'm struggling to understand why the enclosed back of a watch case should endure much wear and ageing at all.

[Graham]

Hi Caz,

I believe that Dundas described the Watch as a lady's watch doubtless because of its small size, a mistake which I understand has been made by other persons involved and interested. But it seems that you're saying Dundas provided a physical description of a watch which could not have been the Johnson Watch. This so far as I can tell doesn't seem to be highlighted in Ripper Diary.

Tangled, innit?

Graham

[caz]

Hi Graham,

Well either Murphy was lying for some unknown reason about remembering scratch marks like those Albert showed him in 1993, or he was telling the truth, in which case Dundas was either lying or confused.

We know that Dundas described a completely different watch when asked about this [which for all I know gave birth to Feldman's ridiculous two-watch theory], but he'd also have had a double motive for saying the marks were made after he'd worked on it, because a) it could be said he didn't do a careful enough job if they were there and he didn't notice them, and b) it could be said that he made them himself.

If Murphy didn't want to open himself up to be accused of anything, he could easily have said he didn't remember any scratches, or didn't need to look at that inner surface because Dundas did all the work, and it would have been no skin off anyone's nose.

The fact remains that there are no scratches on that surface older than the Maybrick and ripper markings.

Love,

Caz
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[Graham]

Hi Caz,

all your points are fair enough. But - and please correct me if I'm wrong here - I understand the Watch was repaired, cleaned and polished by a Mr Dundas who then returned it to Mr Murphy. Later, when Mr Dundas was contacted by the private-eye Mr Gray, he said that there were only repair markings on the Watch when he serviced it, adding that any marks such as Gray described (i.e., initials and a signature) had been made since he serviced and polished the Watch.

I can guess what you're going to say: that Murphy claimed to have re-polished the Watch after Dundas serviced it, and that he noticed 'scratch marks' on the rear case. He declined to say what he thought these marks were.

So who's got it right?

Graham

[caz]

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.

Again, I can't help feeling the point is still being missed.

Weren't the experts saying that a modern hoax would have needed all this 'bizarre' polishing in order to mimic all the natural signs of wear and ageing they'd expect to see with scratches made in soft metal many decades ago?

Love,

Caz
X

[caz]

The Case of the Vanishing Scratches

Morning all,

Aren't you forgetting the elephant in the room here?

Let me try and explain what must have happened for the Maybrick and ripper markings to have been put in the watch in 1993:

Murphy the jeweller opens up the back of the gold watch before putting it on sale in his shop window, sometime in early to mid 1992. He sees some faint scratch marks on an inner surface and tries - but fails [and this is the important bit] - to polish them out to improve its appearance.

Along comes Albert with the winnings from a horse race and snaps up the watch on July 14th 1992.

Now someone, who knows Albert has this watch - either Albert himself, his half-brother Robbie or A.N.Other - sees an early newspaper story the following Spring, about a diary that has come to light, linking James Maybrick to the JtR murders, which will not be published until the Autumn [so no clues yet about which murders will be claimed on this occasion].

So far so good?

That person then thinks "I know, I could use Albert's gold watch to create a companion piece for this diary".

So he has a closer look at the watch, to see if there's a surface inside that would be suitable for forgery purposes [where have we heard that one before?] and what does he find? Those same faint scratches that Murphy was unable to polish out the year before. But he doesn't know about any of this, nor presumably how those scratches got there to begin with or when, nor whether anyone else may have seen them in recent years. Would the hoaxer even recognise any recent efforts to polish them out? Presumably not, if neither Drs Turgoose or Wild could date the scratches or the polishing as recent, using their electron microscopes.

The hoaxer can't risk those scratches being examined at a later date and found to be recent, because that would prove his own work even more recent, so now he will either have to find another watch with a nice, scratch-free surface, which will be less of a headache, or he'll need to do what he doesn't yet know defeated Murphy the jeweller. He'll need to polish them out so completely, before even starting on his Maybrick and ripper work, that the surface will be smoother than a baby's bottom and betray no sign of those original scratches even under microscopic examination. Oh well, it'll be worth it in the end.

So - once the markings have been applied to the now pristine surface, our intrepid hoaxer polishes and ages the surface again, before applying some superficial scratches, which he polishes and ages again, until the effect is the same as it was when he first opened the back and saw the surface he was faced with. Not only this, but if anyone uses electron microscopy or any other technique to ascertain the order of all the markings and scratches now there, it will be clear that the Maybrick and ripper ones were made first.

As luck would have it, this turns out to be the best possible case scenario. Without knowing what the jeweller may or may not have done with the watch previously, or what he may or may not have known about its physical condition and appearance, inside and out, the watch is taken back to the shop, to show Murphy what is now on that inner surface and to ask him what he knows about this curious timepiece, and would you credit it? He comes out with: "Oh yes, I saw those faint scratches back in 1992 but couldn't polish them out. Sorry about that".

You couldn't make it up, could you? Any other scenario and the hoaxer could not have hoped for this kind of luck.

Smooth, completely unscratched surface when the hoaxer first looks at it? Much easier to use, but too risky unless he can either avoid the jewellers shop like the plague, and hope nobody else will track down where and when the watch was bought and what was known about it by then, or go back and try bribing Murphy with a few quid to lie for him, in the event that he knows damned well the markings were not there in 1992, because he remembers cleaning it thoroughly inside and out and the surface in question was untouched.

See, to my mind, there's nothing remotely simple about any of this.

Love,

Caz
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