One Incontrovertible, Unequivocal, Undeniable Fact Which Refutes the Diary

[caz]

The Diary clearly wasn't written by Maybrick. So who still cares wether Mike Barrett wrote the diary or someone else did?

Because the truth actually matters? Who cares if William Bury was the ripper or someone else was? I think you do. He killed his wife, so he's fair game.

Mike was a liar, so he's also fair game. He may as well have written the diary, because he said he did in June 1994? Even though he retracted this and later tried to accuse his estranged wife of writing it, and later still reverted to his original Tony Devereux story?

That may be truth enough for some, but not for me, John.

Love,

Caz
X

[rjpalmer]

I see no great drama

Of course not, Ike. You never do.

You also see no great drama in Maybrick's handwriting looking nothing like the diary's. Nor in Dr. Baxendale's observation that the diary's ink and paper had not yet fully bonded when he examined them in 1992. Nor in Maybrick referring to his wife's godmother as her aunt.

Indeed, as far as I can tell, your unwavering faith in the diary's authenticity can be admirably summed up with those five magical words.

"I see no great drama."

Surely that's nothing to brag about!

Come on, RJ, this is exactly what I meant about 'not trying hard enough'. Caz has addressed the first issue many many months and posts ago when she asked how certain young Caroline could be that she was not remembering her dad pestering someone else (for example, Eddie Lyons)?

I need not try 'hard.' I merely need to read and decide whether the arguments are sound.

If Caz wants to change little Caroline's 'testimony' to fit her theory, rather than change her theory to fit what was actually said, I'm not going to "try hard" to twist myself into a pretzel shape.

Feldman dates the car ride with Little Caroline, along with her memory of her father pestering Tony, to February 1993.

There is no evidence that Eddie and Michael Barrett knew each other until four months later, June 1993 (I date this from Barrett pounding on Lyon's door and from Robert Smith meeting with Barrett & Lyons in The Saddle).

Thus, you have the chronology backwards.

In February 1993, Little Caroline could hardly have been misremembering Michael pestering or arguing with Eddie Lyons four months in the future.

[Iconoclast]

Of course not, Ike. You never do.

Honestly, I'll know a drama when I see it. Give me the drama and I'm your man. Telling me that there's a smoking gun on Tony's bookshelf because two Liverpool lads wanted to read a book about Liverpool murders is definitely not a drama I'm going to be tuning-in to or downloading any day soon.

You also see no great drama in Maybrick's handwriting looking nothing like the diary's.

This is not the drama you want it to be. I've got some old notebooks from 1989-1991 and my writing is almost unreadable because I'm writing for my own recollections and I'm doing so quickly. I also have some letters from the same period and they are completely different - you would never say they were written by the same person. The former is extremely lazily written and slants from left upwards to the right. The latter is extremely structured and slants massively from left downwards to the right. No smoking gun there though because I recognise both and I know I wrote both. If I wrote (and possibly still write, if ever I did these days) in this way, then why shouldn't James Maybrick? Now, I know what you're like when you're in this 'mood', RJ, (you like to conclude from illogical premises) so let me add quickly here that I am absolutely NOT arguing that James Maybrick wrote in different hands based upon the fact that I do. That would not be a conclusion supported by the premise. Important to note from a logical perspective, I'm sure you'd agree.

Nor in Dr. Baxendale's observation that the diary's ink and paper had not yet fully bonded when he examined them in 1992.

I'm happy to grant that one for now and - as smoking guns go - that's a smokey gunlike one. I don't have any background whatsoever in this field so I can't comment on what conditions (if any) may have effected this outcome naturally if the document was composed in the LVP.

Nor in Maybrick referring to his wife's godmother as her aunt.

Honestly, you're surely not still pushing this one? There is absolutely nothing amazing about this whatsoever. You must be getting a bit desperate.

It would seem that this potential confusion between ‘aunt’ and ‘godmother’ is surprisingly common: even if the following example is from a strictly fictional television series (the outstanding Suits, produced by Universal Cable Productions, 2011-2019), it illustrates the point rather neatly:

Suits, Series 3, Episode 13 (Moot Point):

INT Courtroom, two teams of lawyers and a judge

SPECTER
I was wondering if he has a copy of his motion - we never got one.

STEMPLE
Not with me, Your Honour. Something suddenly came up: my niece, she took ill.

JUDGE
Well, when your family is sick you have to attend to them.

ROSS
Your Honour, Mr. Stemple may not have a copy of his motion but we do have a copy of his family tree: he has no nieces.

STEMPLE
I meant 'niece' figuratively. She is actually my goddaughter.

Now, clearly Stemple was lying because he had initially said 'niece'. That proves she was his niece. He said she was his niece, she must have been his niece. She was his NIECE for the good Lord's sake! Niece, niece, niece!

Oh that one makes me laugh every time I think about it. Which is close to never.

I need not try 'hard.' I merely need to read and decide whether the arguments are sound.

Well let's just have a quick look at what a 'sound' argument becomes when it falls into your hands.

Feldman dates the car ride with Little Caroline, along with her memory of her father pestering Tony, to February 1993.

So what we know so far is that Caroline 'remembered' her dad pestering Tony (because, of course, she had been asked this - not did she remember her dad pestering someone, but did she remember her dad pestering Tony). Well, she's a kid and she's very excited to be in Mr. Feldman's posh Landarn car so she says "Yes", but she may simply mean "Yes, I remember my dad pestering someone on the 'phone".

There is no evidence that Eddie and Michael Barrett knew each other until four months later, June 1993 (I date this from Barrett pounding on Lyon's door and from Robert Smith meeting with Barrett & Lyons in The Saddle).

Thus, you have articulated the critical bit of your premise but totally ignored it: 'There is no evidence that ...'

Thus, you have the chronology backwards.

Thus you are about to do something quite illogical with logic.

In February 1993, Little Caroline could hardly have been misremembering Michael pestering or arguing with Eddie Lyons four months in the future.

So:

Premise 1: Young Caroline remembers her dad pestering someone on the 'phone prior to February 1993.
Premise 2: There is no evidence that Mike and Eddie knew each other before June 1993 - four months later!
Premise 3 (unwritten but implied): If there is no evidence for something, it could not possibly ever ever ever ever ever be true!
Conclusion: Therefore young Caroline could not have been remembering her dad pestering Eddie Lyons (or indeed anyone other than Tony D).

Now, young Izzy Iconoclast has just finished her degree in Philosophy & Politics so I feel confident when I say that this is not a properly-structured syllogism therefore the conclusion cannot be said to follow logically from the premises. If the premises do not logically follow, neither does the conclusion. Obviously I added Premise 3 for clarity, but Premises 1 & 2 would have been sufficient for the conclusion to fail.

And this is what you get when you're in this 'mood', RJ. And that's a shame because your research skills are admirable. It's just a shame that your grasp of logic (and statistics whilst I'm on a roll) are so shockingly bad.

Cheers,

Ike

[caz]

Hi Ike.

Most of what you've written doesn't require a response, but I can't resist responding to the above nonsense.

First off, the red diary is not a 'document.' It is entirely blank. There is not writing in it whatsoever. Your use of the deceptive term 'document' speaks volumes. For comparison purposes to a historical document, it is entirely worthless.

Further, the advertisement placed by Martin Earl confirms, beyond any doubt, that Barrett was willing to purchase an entirely blank diary filled with entirely blank paper. What can a blank sheet of paper tell someone? Nothing, of course. More to the point, what can 20 sheets of blank paper tell someone that one blank sheet can't? Is this some sort of Zen puzzle? Barrett needed at least twenty blanks sheets. Blank sheets are for writing on. The implication is painfully obvious. And you've never offered any coherent counter-explanation.

Secondly, what do you mean by having 'the same characteristics?'

During you're absence, we've been repeatedly told (by Caz) that Martin Earl, having reached Mike on the phone, described in intricate detail the attributes of the red diary. That it was tiny. That is was not really a diary, but a memo book. That is was stamped on every page with the year 1891. That is was entirely and utterly blank.

Are you seriously suggesting that the 'characteristics' of this 'document,' as described by Earl, were 'likely' the have been 'the same' as the scrapbook that was being peddled by Eddy Lyons? On what planet?





Or, rather, are you suggesting that the street-smart Barrett, a former scrap-metal dealer (an occupation not known for 'giving a sucker an even break') believed he could trade this tiny, blank, daily planner straight across to Eddy Lyons for "what was very clearly a very valuable historical document" ??

Those are your own words, Ike. Very clearly a very valuable historical document.

Cheers.

Hmmm. We know what Mike asked for: an unused or partly used diary for 1880-90 with at least 20 blank pages. An unusual request, Martin Earl remembered.

The scrapbook shown to Doreen was partly used, with 17 blank pages at the end, and had just the one indication of date: May 1889. It had entries consistent with it having been used as a diary. That is what Mike would have been thinking of, if he requested a Victorian diary after seeing Eddie's old book and coveting it. Mike would be taking a risk if the thing was a joke, or if it was someone's valuable heirloom.

If you are not even prepared to consider the possibility that this was the true order of events, reversed by Mike when he wanted to use the 1891 diary to support a false confession, there's not much point in having this debate, is there? If you are 100% certain that the scrapbook was found [in an auction sale] after the red diary was rejected, you will never be able to consider an alternative scenario. What's the point in having a mind if you make it up before you have all the facts and can never change it?

We also now know what Mike ordered, when a potentially acceptable item was located and described to him. Regardless of how detailed or accurate that description was, we know precisely what he was sent: a pocket appointments diary and memo book for the year 1891 - two years too late for anything supposedly written by the real James Maybrick. If Mike still hoped he could use it for a hoax, why didn't he ask, at the very least, if the diary had dates inside, or just the year on the front cover? It was outside of his 1880-90 specification, so he didn't need to order it and Anne didn't need to pay for it. The date thing would have been vital for a hoax - never mind the size of the blank pages and the spaces between the printed dates - but not so if Mike didn't know the relevance of the May 1889 date in the scrapbook when he asked Martin Earl to send him the red diary, and was more interested in it being from the same decade or thereabouts.

[caz]

My apologies, Ike, but I'm surprised that you haven't seen fit to keep up with Caz's posts. I suggest you either scan the archives, or ask her for the full details, as I will likely be accused of misstating her position.

As I understand her theory, Barrett's curious purchase was an attempt to trade a tiny, blank, intricately described memo book to Eddy Lyons in exchange for what you now describe as "a very valuable historical document."

If this suggestion leaves you confused and unconvinced, you have my full sympathy.

And even though Barrett was obviously willing to accept an entirely blank diary from Earl, Caz seems to believe that Mike's request for 'at least twenty blank pages' was somehow an attempt to compensate for the 17 blank pages at the back of the 'Maybrick' scrapbook.

I've never quite grasped why she believes this would have been necessary, not does it even coincide with Mike's actual request to Martin Earl.

Maybe you should swing back by tomorrow morning and ask her.

Enjoy your day.

I genuinely don't recall ever suggesting that Mike had requested a diary from 1880-90 in the hope that Eddie Lyons would accept this in exchange for his old book.

But in any case, Mike did not know, when making his request, what he might be offered. I think Eddie would have roared with laughter if Mike had tried to palm him off with the tiny 1891 diary instead of hard cash, but then I also think Doreen would have roared with laughter if Mike had tried to palm her off with the same tiny 1891 diary he had supposedly ordered for his Maybrick hoax.

[caz]

I may just have to do that as I wasn't aware she'd made such a claim.

Cheers,

Ike

Nor was I, Ike. I have been reading these posts in the order they were written, so I have yet to see if anyone has 'outed' me since RJ first mentioned this 'exchange' idea.

I swear that when I referred the other day to Aldridge Prior, the hopeless liar, I had not yet read any of your own references - or indeed seen the wonderful picture of Aldridge himself.

I would put that down to great minds thinking alike, but I'm pretty sure others would put it down to fools never differing.

Love,

Mrs Brady, Old Lady
X

[caz]

One of several facts that makes people skeptical of the watch is the remarkable timing of its discovery so hot on the heels of Barrett showing up in London with the dodgy diary.

The timing is strange, is it not? Or are people suggesting that Albert and Robbie Johnson also had a shadowy meeting with Eddie Lyons down at The Saddle?

How about the even more remarkable timing of the dodgy watch going on sale just across the Mersey, so hot on the heels of Mike showing up in London with the dodgy diary?

You are free to see those two events as entirely coincidental, along with the earlier double event of 9th March, and - while we're at it - the five consecutive words used in the diary and attributed to Dr Fuller, by hoaxers who had no idea what his actual words were back in 1889, let alone that he had used that identical phrase.

And I'm free to be sceptical about all these 'coincidences'.

[rjpalmer]

If they could only bring themselves to imagine what the consequences might reasonably have been, if the diary had been sold on to a clueless and unsuspecting Mike Barrett in the Saddle that lunchtime, after the floorboards had been raised in Maybrick's old bedroom, turning his little world upside down overnight

As recently as two days ago, you suggested that Barrett had contacted Martin Earl to ascertain the value of a blank or almost blank Victorian diary (despite Mike already knowing that the one on offer was supposedly the Diary of Jack the Ripper, per his phone call with Doreen Montgomery). It remains a thoroughly bizarre suggestion, but let's go with it.

If such was the case, how could Barrett have already bought the diary in The Saddle at lunchtime on March 9th? Isn't this a discrepancy in your theory?

Earl's advertisement in Bookdealer doesn’t appear until March 19th--ten days later--and he did not send Barrett a bill until March 26th. So, your explanation for Mike’s odd purchase is already gasping for air.

I think what you must be suggesting is that Fat Eddie was the ‘clueless and unsuspecting’ one. He risked his job--and legal trouble--by stealing what Ike has referred to as ‘clearly a very valuable historical document’ from Dodd’s house, and yet as fast as his car can travel he rushes over to The Saddle and hands it over to Mike Barrett's grubby mitts, on credit, without even determining what exactly he had, or what it was worth, or how much it might fetch—even though Eddie had supposedly told his employer that it ‘might be important.’ Mike was able to take the diary home, study it, etc. without paying a red penny.

It wouldn't be until some two weeks later, on or around March 27th, that Mike returns to The Saddle and seals the deal, bamboozling Eddie out of this potential “best seller” by waving Martin Earl's unpaid bill for £25 in the air.

Oh, brother.

Eddie, thoroughly satisfied with this transaction, buys a round, and rides off into the sunset, having served his purpose in our little drama. Within months, Barrett would turn down a £15,000 offer for the diary.

So, let me fix your statement. We are not dealing with a "clueless and unsuspecting" Mike Barrett. We are dealing with clueless, unsuspecting, and thoroughly reckless Eddie Lyons.

These theories work so much better if we assume that everyone involved is a complete moron.

I think Eddie would have roared with laughter if Mike had tried to palm him off with the tiny 1891 diary instead of hard cash

I think pretty much anyone would have roared with laughter if they were told that Eddie Lyons sold the Diary of Jack the Ripper to Mike Barrett for a measly £25 on the strength of an unpaid bill from Martin Earl! But that is what you are claiming as you try to wish-away Barrett's attempt at buy the raw materials for a hoax. It is only marginally more believable than Eddie accepting the red diary itself.

No, I don't see many people jumping onboard this train wreck, but perhaps you have already convinced Ike to abandon his former idea that a scrapbook found under the floorboards of Maybrick's old house was "clearly a very valuable historical document."

To everyone but 'Fat Eddie,' that is.

[rjpalmer]

How about the even more remarkable timing of the dodgy watch going on sale just across the Mersey, so hot on the heels of Mike showing up in London with the dodgy diary?

You are free to see those two events as entirely coincidental, along with the earlier double event of 9th March, and - while we're at it - the five consecutive words used in the diary and attributed to Dr Fuller, by hoaxers who had no idea what his actual words were back in 1889, let alone that he had used that identical phrase.

And I'm free to be sceptical about all these 'coincidences'.

There's nothing coincidental about a bandwagon hoax. One event inspires the other, so it doesn't qualify as a coincidence. We have no reason to believe that Suzanne and Ron Murphy were lying about having had the watch in their possession for years, so it is you who must swallow the 'coincidence' of the 'remarkable timing.' I don't find it remarkable in the least.

Rather than accuse a respectable and blameless couple, the Murphys, it is easier for me to believe that it was Robbie Johnson who was the one telling lies, because Feldman explicitly informs us this was indeed the case--Feldy had caught Robbie telling an outright lie about the watch; when pressed, Albert also admitted that his brother was often involved in 'dodgy' schemes; Robbie somehow managed to finagle is way into owning 1/4 share of what was supposed to be an investment for his little niece, pocketing, I've been told, £10,000.

That's enough to place suspicion clearly on his shoulders. I suspect Honest Albert was merely collateral damage; his only contribution was inventing a false 'discovery' story, knowing that people would (rightly) suspect his sketchy brother had he been the one who first noticed the scratches.

I'm going to leave Dr. Fuller alone. It's too tedious.

As for the 'double event' of 9 March, I'll have more to add to this at a later date.

[Iconoclast]

I think what you must be suggesting is that Fat Eddie was the ‘clueless and unsuspecting’ one. He risked his job--and legal trouble--by stealing what Ike has referred to as ‘clearly a very valuable historical document’ from Dodd’s house ...

OMG, man, have some pride! You are surely not questioning the validity of my describing the possible thoughts of Jack the Ripper as 'a very valuable historical document'?????????

Now, you can pursue this 'Everyone's wrong, all of the time, I'm dead clever me, I'm never wrong' routine as much as you want but it starts to set alarm bells ringing in the rational mind when relatively undebatable issues are debated, criticised, and mocked all of the time, relentlessly, without fail. It works against your arguments to simply keep saying - and I'm paraphrasing - 'Whatever you say, it's rubbish, stupid, far-fetched, inane, pathetic', etc., religiously, like a cut-and-paste fetish you can't control and haven't sought treatment for yet.

The possible thoughts of Jack the Ripper? Who gives a ?

Well, I can think of quite a few thousand people, just off the top of my head ...

[Iconoclast]

I think what you must be suggesting is that Fat Eddie was the ‘clueless and unsuspecting’ one. He risked his job--and legal trouble--by stealing what Ike has referred to as ‘clearly a very valuable historical document’ from Dodd’s house, and yet as fast as his car can travel he rushes over to The Saddle and hands it over to Mike Barrett's grubby mitts, on credit, without even determining what exactly he had, or what it was worth, or how much it might fetch—even though Eddie had supposedly told his employer that it ‘might be important.’ Mike was able to take the diary home, study it, etc. without paying a red penny.

The fact that Eddie Lyons, electrician, may not have recognised the Maybrick scrapbook as 'clearly a very valuable historical document' does not mean it wasn't (and isn't) clearly a very valuable historical document. And the fact that we can see it as clearly a very valuable historical document does not mean that everyone on the planet will.

It was clearly a very valuable historical document (assuming it was the real deal, of course) whether it was unearthed by someone 'in the know' or not.

I'm guessing, following this logic, that you assume the Dead Sea scrolls are worthless because they were found by a shepherd who didn't know what he'd found until Someone Very Knowledgeable told him?

[caz]

Hi Caz,

If I recall correctly one ‘explanation’ Robert used in a fairly recent book was that the phrase ‘one off’ was used in the prison system as far back at the 19th century. We all know that David’s point wasn’t about ‘one off’ being used in isolation though but as a metaphor. Also we know that the prison use of the term ‘one off’ is completely unrelated to some unique occurrence. It’s completely unconnected. It’s difficult to see how that could be put down to a simple error.

Hi Herlock,

When you say 'we know' that the prison use of the term is 'completely unrelated' and 'completely unconnected' to how 'one off' is used in the diary, what do you mean by that? This was the last of the examples Robert Smith cited, and he wasn't claiming it to be the best comparison with its appearance in the diary. The first example he mentioned was 'a one-off job', from Foundry Volume 50, in 1922.

Here is what Robert wrote about the prison example:

'The phrase was used, according to Jonathan Green's Dictionary of Jargon, in 19th century prisons, to refer to convicts being sent on "one-off" duty.'

I assumed this to mean a duty that, like the 1922 'job', was not one performed on a regular or routine basis, but I'm happy to be corrected.

In the diary, it's a slap that 'Sir Jim' assures Florie will not be repeated.

Oddly, another controversial phrase from the diary: 'top myself', was found by Gary Barnett in a newspaper article from the 1870s, and this was indeed an example of prison usage! A prisoner had talked about 'topping himself', meaning to hang himself, just as 'Sir Jim' does in the diary. The objection has now changed, from the phrase not being recorded until the late 1950s [the expert was only 80 years out], to the real James Maybrick not being familiar with the prison slang of his generation. I doubt he was familiar with murdering and mutilating prostitutes in crime-ridden Whitechapel either, but he is portrayed as a master criminal in the diary, so why not give him an interest in the lingo to go with it?

Love,

Caz
X

[Iconoclast]

What's the point in having a mind if you make it up before you have all the facts and can never change it?

Now that made me laugh out loud, Caz, though I hate it when someone comes up with a line I wish I'd had the wit to think of ...

[Iconoclast]

I swear that when I referred the other day to Aldridge Prior, the hopeless liar, I had not yet read any of your own references - or indeed seen the wonderful picture of Aldridge himself.

Now that is seriously weird! When I saw your post, I drew the obvious conclusion (seemed a reasonable thing to do - I wouldn't have expected Aldridge Prior to be in everyone's thoughts) - and how wrong I was!

Now, I wonder if there could be a lesson in there for us all (on all sides of this debate)? Maybe what seems really obvious isn't always?

Note to self: Send our aristocratic friend a cheeky wee Howler with that little gem in ...

[caz]

Feldman, p. 143.



Little Caroline Barrett "remembered her dad pestering Tony."

How could little Caroline have remembered her dad pestering Tony about the diary, if Tony was deceased before the diary ever made it to Goldie Street?

Are you saying she did remember her dad pestering Tony, which would have been prior to August 1991, and she did remember the day when her dad first brought the diary home, which would have been before that, and did remember the row her mum and dad had about it, which would have been many months later, when Tony was indeed deceased?

If not, what would be your explanation for what young Caroline was actually recalling, if anything, and when the events happened?

I can't make sense of her recollections because I don't personally believe Mike did pester Tony about the diary. But at least I can make sense of them if she recalled her dad pestering someone, shortly after bringing the diary home, and her mum and dad rowing around the same time - events close together in time and directly connected, not separated by many months and only indirectly connected if at all. What's in a man's name, to a youngster recalling traumatic events from a year ago?