One Incontrovertible, Unequivocal, Undeniable Fact Which Refutes the Diary

[Soothsayer]

Ah, yes, that's better.

The 'M' is reasonably well demarcated in all versions of the Kelly picture that I have seen - albeit, the foot of it is cut off by Kelly's arm (or whatever).

I just did a quick Google, imported a picture of the wall into Powerpoint, ran the slide show, and even at poor resolution, the 'M' is quite marked - with its telling rising second half (just as in the diary).

The 'F' is tenuous, but just about discernible even at low resolution. In Harrison (from Feldman?), it was obviously very clear (because someone had traced it out for us), but once you are directed where to look, it is easy to pick out the 'M' in multiple versions.

As has been said on this site many times, these letters - linked as they are to the quotation in the diary, are very very intersting indeed.

Soothy

[Soothsayer]

Hi Tom,

Yes, I am the person who in 1988 first commented on the letters on the wall.

I discussed my 'find' with a number of Ripper luminaries at the time, but as I recall none of us could decipher the letters, let alone fit them to a suspect.

And that, as far as I was concerned, was that.

Who'da guessed it would lead to all these shenanigans?

Regards,

Simon

I'm sure you don't want to dredge it all up again, Simon, but could you just clarify where you thought you saw letters?

Was it where the 'F' and the 'M' are supposed to be, or was it somewhere else on the photograph?

Ta

Soothsayer

[Soothsayer]

One last word on the 'Poste House' 'anachronism'.

In one of Shakespeare's (or Marlowe's) fine works, the Bard makes reference to 'cannon' whilst writing of an age before cannon had been invented. That's a very obvious anachronism.

There is a pub in Edinburgh called the Athletic Arms. As long as I've been in Edinburgh, I've never heard anyone call it that. It is universally known as 'The Diggers' (there's a graveyard next door, geddit?).

Let's imagine that the pub gets sold tomorrow and the forward-thinking new landlord decides to change the pub's name to 'The Diggers' - not through coincidence, but because he or she thinks it would stop people driving past whilst looking for 'The Diggers'.

Would that make every text I have ever sent my mate suggesting we meet at 'The Diggers' an anachronism?

Hey - it's thought-provoking stuff for eight in the morning!

Soothsayer the Magnificent

[Observer]

Hi

Apologies if this has been mentioned. One would have thought that in a diary which had been penned by Jack the Ripper the pages would have been dripping with new revelations, fresh evidence in abundance adorning it's pages, but what do we have? As Sam has pointed out a bunch of facts that is readily available to anyone, written in an immature melodramatic stlye.


Add to this the fact that the family who discovered the diary/ photo album ,were known to have purchased, from a book dealer, another antique Victorian diary.

The very fact that the Grand National is mentioned in the diary, and the fact that Maybrick (in the book devoted to his murder) is noted as attending the Grand National just prior to his death speaks volumes to me. One can see the glee in the hoaxers eye as he visited Liverpool library and upon finding out that that years Grand National was ran in record time he hurriedly returns home to include that fact in his ficticious diary.

Liverpool library also provided the hoaxer with the book of poetry from which he quoted a line from an obscure poem, from an obscure poet. I forget the poet and poem but he had Maybrick quote the line in the diary. It is known that a certain Liverpudlian borrowed that book of poetry from a Liverpool library. This, this alone should put the final nail in the coffin of the diary, but no, we still have those who choose to ignore every obstacle put in the diaries way.

Wind up merchants the lot of them, surely.

Surely???

all the best

Observer

[Ben]

Hi Soothsayer,

I just did a quick Google, imported a picture of the wall into Powerpoint, ran the slide show, and even at poor resolution, the 'M' is quite marked - with its telling rising second half

Trouble is, the image you're looking at isn't just an M. The right and left stems (particularly the right one) of the imagined letter are actually part of two continuous lines that travel upwards from the "M" image. Likewise, the middle part of the letter - the V-shape - branches out on the left as part of a continous line that veers off diagonally. We don't know what the pattern looks like behind Kelly's corpse. The "F" is worse than useless because it wholly lacks a base, making it look more like a crude "c" if anything.

Thus, you only get "M" and "F" if you mentally blot out anything that isn't M-ish or F-ish.

More telling, however, is the fact that none of the contemporary police at the scene (who were there in numbers) noticed anything resembling initials.

Can't agree with the "diggers" analogy, I'm afraid. "Diggers" rolls of the tongue much better than the "Athletic Arms", which can't be abbreviated terribly successfully. "Fancy a pint at the, um, "Athy"? - doesn't quite work. The Poste House is neither a roll-off-the-tongue nickname nor a logical abbreviation, especially when capitalized and including that distintive "e" for Poste.

Poste House meant Poste House.

Best regards,
Ben

[Ally]

It is completely invalid to compare the Shakespeare Cannon anachronism to the Poste House anachronism. We are looking at the Poste House anachronism as a means of dating when the document was written, not when it supposedly took place as a work of fiction. When Shakespeare wrote Hamlet, cannons did in fact exist, just not in the time frame his fictitious work took place. So whoever wrote the Diary had to have written it AFTER the Poste House was in existence which would not have been contemporary Victorian times. Which means it's a fake.

[Soothsayer]

It is completely invalid to compare the Shakespeare Cannon anachronism to the Poste House anachronism. We are looking at the Poste House anachronism as a means of dating when the document was written, not when it supposedly took place as a work of fiction. When Shakespeare wrote Hamlet, cannons did in fact exist, just not in the time frame his fictitious work took place. So whoever wrote the Diary had to have written it AFTER the Poste House was in existence which would not have been contemporary Victorian times. Which means it's a fake.

Ally,

Have a quick look at my post again. I don't make any suggestions that Shakespeare had not heard of cannons (he must have - how else could he have mentioned them in Hamlet?). I simply illustrate his use of cannons in Hamlet as a true anachronism.

"So whoever wrote the Diary had to have written it AFTER the Poste House was in existence which would not have been contemporary Victorian times".

Or, 'Poste House' was a local name for the pub which then became known legally as the 'Poste House'.

The diary remains ultimately unblemished (all Casebookers seem happy on that point). The 'F' and the 'M' link the crime scene to the murderer's confession (not many other candidates can say that). The 'anachronism' (singular, note - though we were told the diary was loaded with them) turns out to be incorrect. The Ryan book is a source for all the intricate detail on Maybrick's life, but the claimant makes no attempt to prove it by listing the actual page references. The anti-diarist argument keeps coming up short time and time again!

No wonder the tide is turning in favour of the diary being authentic!

The future's bright, guys - hang in there (keep the faith) ...

Soothsayer

[Observer]

As I said folks wind up merchants nearly every last one of them

Observer

[Ally]

Observer,

It does seem that both Sooth and Tom at the very least share the same idiotic and faulty logic and are both prone to making statements of "fact" that are anything but. Such as the diary being "unflawed" and " ultimately unblemished" which "all casebookers agree to". It's like they live in their own little world where if they say it, it must be true and logic and facts need not come knocking.

[Soothsayer]

Observer,

It does seem that both Sooth and Tom at the very least share the same idiotic and faulty logic and are both prone to making statements of "fact" that are anything but. Such as the diary being "unflawed" and " ultimately unblemished" which "all casebookers agree to". It's like they live in their own little world where if they say it, it must be true and logic and facts need not come knocking.

It's a nice world. Candy cane houses and candy floss clouds.

[Ben]

No wonder the tide is turning in favour of the diary being authentic!

You're either delusional or a liar, I'm afraid. Either way, you're beginning to look pretty ridiculous, especially when you dredge up the worst excuses imaginable for "explaining away" obvious anachronisms; especially when you keep repeating the "F and M" argument after it's been thoroughly trashed; especially when you keep inventing some chorus of agreement to the outrageous claim that the diary is "unblemished".

[Omlor]

"I'm going to re-register tomorrow with a Great Name."

-- Tom Mitchell (yesterday)

Readers are urged to remember that the person trolling here believes the diary is a fake and is simply performing this little game for a bit of perverse amusement.

Thanks,

--John

[Soothsayer]

You're either delusional or a liar, I'm afraid. Either way, you're beginning to look pretty ridiculous, especially when you dredge up the worst excuses imaginable for "explaining away" obvious anachronisms; especially when you keep repeating the "F and M" argument after it's been thoroughly trashed; especially when you keep inventing some chorus of agreement to the outrageous claim that the diary is "unblemished".

The tide is turning. Hands up if you can feel it.

[Soothsayer]

Ah, yes, that's better.

I didn't try very hard to hide the fact, mind ...

[Observer]

Hi Soothsayer

As I don't own a copy of said book, i.e. Ryan's book, then I can't quote the pages. But therein will you deny that there's is a reference to James Maybrick going to the Grand National shortly before his death?

And would you deny that anyone hoping to perpatrate a hoax, in which they most shamefully tried to besmirch the good name of James Maybrick as being Jack the Ripper, would find this fact advantageous to their little scam? All the more so when they found out that that Grand National had been ran in record time, they just had to metion that in the diary didn't they? It smacks of of a hoax because it is a one.

all the best

Observer