One Incontrovertible, Unequivocal, Undeniable Fact Which Refutes the Diary

[rjpalmer]

Remind me - what's the hard evidence against Devereux that makes him such a likely player in your nest of forgers?

There was no nest of forgers--that was just Keith Skinner's clever phrase to make it sound like a modern fake would have involved a vast conspiracy, despite no one every making this claim. Maybe he picked up the idea from Feldman, as he argued the same thing.

Ultimately this comment backfired, because Keith is now forced to theorize about a nest of liars involved in a vast Battlecrease caper--a conspiracy to steal and sell stolen goods that involved Eddie Lyons and at least one other electrician, Anne Graham, Billy Graham, Caroline Barrett, Mike Barrett, and Suzanne and Ron Murphy at the very least, while making a mockery of the accounts given by Tim Dundas and Paul Dodd and Dr. Baxendale.

No thanks.

[Iconoclast]

I do enjoy these walks down Memory Lane.

Yes, I'm sure you do, David. They are possibly all you have left to muse upon in your dotage?

[StevenOwl]

There was no nest of forgers--that was just Keith Skinner's clever phrase to make it sound like a modern fake would have involved a vast conspiracy, despite no one every making this claim. Maybe he picked up the idea from Feldman, as he argued the same thing.

Ultimately this comment backfired, because Keith is now forced to theorize about a nest of liars involved in a vast Battlecrease caper--a conspiracy to steal and sell stolen goods that involved Eddie Lyons and at least one other electrician, Anne Graham, Billy Graham, Caroline Barrett, Mike Barrett, and Suzanne and Ron Murphy at the very least, while making a mockery of the accounts given by Tim Dundas and Paul Dodd and Dr. Baxendale.

No thanks.

Gotcha - so there's no evidence whatsoever against Tony D being involved in the forging of the Diary, yet you're claiming that it's likely he planned it with the Barretts. All good.

[rjpalmer]

The Maybrick of the Diary gets a lot of amusement reading about incompetent police and that he is being reported as a doctor, or a Jew but has no opinion at all about having two earlier murders attributed to him.

To me, it's almost as if the hoaxer is not sophisticated enough to realize that this might be an issue. The diarist also believes that Abberline was the lead detective in the Eddowes investigation---something any Ripperologist worth his or her salt knows is wrong.

It was, however, true of the Michael Caine mini-series--a show that Mike and Anne admitted to having watched. (Also a show that is oblivious to any Ripper murders except the so-called canonical five).

This would be a give away--something that they wouldn't normally want to admit---but only provided that they were sophisticated enough to realize that Abberline wasn't a lone wolf. If they really believed this was historically true, they might not have realized that mentioning the Caine mini-series would be a potential 'tell.'

The diary has the phrase 'Abberline is such a funny little man.' Which is a little odd, because Abberline's pension papers list him as 5' 9 1/2".

Richard Cobb once noted that the phrase 'little man' played a significant role in the latter half of the Michael Caine mini-series. Could the hoaxer have unwittingly or subconsciously remember this and borrowed it?

The phrase 'little man' was significant enough in the mini-series that some bloke posting excerpts on Youtube even refer to the 'little man' in two of the titles.

(10) Jack The Ripper : Convince A Little Man - YouTube

(10) Jack The Ripper : The Little Man - YouTube

[Iconoclast]

Yes, Maybrick's inside knowledge of the case was so overwhelming that he could even quote directly from an internal police inventory list—even mentioning three items in the exact order in which they appeared in that list--despite the document being locked in the bowels of the City of London archives until the mid-1980s.

It was this very fact, pointed out by John Omlor, that forced one former poster named Tom Mitchell to concede the diary was a modern fake clear back in posts #56 and #64 of this thread:

Obviously this was all way before my time on this, The Greatest Thread of All, so I know little about this debate other than what you've posted but I'm genuinely confused as I must be reading the lists wrongly.

Fido (1987) published the Eddowes' list as (curtailed for brevity):

1 piece of White Coarse Linen.
1 piece of Blue & White Shirting (3 cornered). 2 Small Blue Bed Ticking Bags.
1 Tin Box containing Tea.
1 " " " Sugar.
1 Piece of Flannel & 6 pieces of Soap.
1 Small Tooth Comb.
1 White Handle Table Knife & 1 Metal Tea Spoon.
1 Red Leather Cigarette Case, white metal fittings.
1 Tin MatchBox, empty.
1 piece of Red Flannel containing Pins & Needles.
1 Ball of Hemp
1 piece of old White Apron.

According to your theory, this was referenced in a specific order by the hoaxer of the Victorian scrapbook to produce what I can only assume is the following:

Sir Jim,
tin match box empty
*cigarette case*
*make haste*
*my shiny knife*
*the whores knife*
first whore no good

One whore no good,
decided Sir Jim strike another.
I showed no fright and indeed no light,
damn it, the tin box was empty

tea and sugar
*away, pay, did say*
me, plea, be
*tea and sugar paid my fee*
Sweet sugar and tea, could have paid my small
fee ha ha
*then I did flee*
Showed my glee
A kidney for supper

Now I am busy right now so I can't check through any more of the scrapbook than I have but I think I have found the right quotation, and also I don't have time to check back to see what Mr. Omlor actually claimed was the degree of parallel between the two 'lists', but I can obviously quote you where you claim "mentioning three items in the exact order in which they appeared in that list". I'll have to (reluctantly) grant you that there appears to be a reverse 'exact order'. Is this what you meant, I wonder? I guess - if I'm right - the point being made here is that the hoaxer thought "I'll mention the tin match box". And then thought "Oh, I'll also stick in the cigarette case which was above it, but I'll maybe cross it out again just for jolly". And then finally he or she must have thought "Come on, why stick at that, I'll go right back up the list, skipping the white handled table knife, the small tooth comb, the pieces of soap, and the flannel, and stick the tea and sugar in there - there's surely no way anyone could shout 'Hoax!' if they noted a list in reverse which missed out a load of valid items I could have stuck in to my brilliant poem?".

Have I got that about right?

Am I the only one who does not feel whatsoever any frisson of 'hoaxer' about these two 'lists' given above?

Am I the only one who senses that - if these are the two 'lists' to be compared - then a very very very very tenuous (read, incorrect) argument has been made in order to falsely pursue another, wider argument?

I think you should clarify your claims there as those who embody the very spirit of 'Integrity' - as your mentor Harris so honourably showed us all - should leave no doubt in the minds of those you wish to persuade.

6,000 posts later ...

Wow, no wonder this is the greatest thread the Casebook has ever known - it's an honour to post on it! I for one am proud to continue the fantastic work of those who have gone before us in setting the record straight whenever fallacious arguments are made to influence the views of our dear readers.

PS In the UK (and elsewhere), we have evolved an arch and partly-comedic device called irony. It seems to me that I am not the only poster to have deployed it strategically when the moment was propitious!

Ike
A Pleasure to be of Service
It Really is

[rjpalmer]

Yes, Ike, I should have been more overt.

Omlor noted that the three things--the matchbox, the cigarette case, and the knife--are lumped together in the diary.



Here's the list, taken from The Crimes, Detection & Death of Jack the Ripper by Martin Fido (Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1987, page 70) and we see the same lumping.





Reading up the list from bottom to top (reverse order as you note) we see that the match box, cigarette case and knife referenced together in that order.

In your world, this is no biggy--an idle coincidence of no consequence--but what concerned Prof. Omlor is what are the odds?

Knowing your interest in statistics maybe we should give it a shot, for are we to believe that Maybrick took these same three items randomly out of Eddowes' pocket (or more properly pockets) in the darkness of Mitre Square in the same order as they would later be listed at the mortuary?

We can bicker about the exact number, but there were about 60 items belonging to Eddowes that could have been named by the Diarist--those on the list, and those mentioned at the scene of the crime that didn't make the list. (Curiously, 'Maybrick' doesn't name the one's he actually removed from her pockets--such as the buttons and mustard tin) And I'm being easy on you, Ike, in confining myself to 60, as I won't list the rags and the pins and the needles and the buttons independently.

The first item listed by the diarist is a freebee. It's just an item. 1:1.

The second item being lumped with the first would be 59 to 1.

The next after that would be 59 x 58 which is 3422 to 1. Getting nervous yet?

Now, what odds should we attach to the hoaxer using the same contorted grammar of an inventory list for the match box? 'tin match box empty' instead of 'empty tin matchbox'? A thousand to one? Five thousand to one?

I think if I set an empty matchbox on a desk and asked a thousand school kids to list what they were seeing, none of them would call it a 'tin match box empty.'

But I'll be kind and generous and call it 99 to 1. That leaves your odds of this list being random at 338,788 to 1.

And before Caz jumps in with her 'old hoax' musings, no newspaper listed these items in the same order as the police inventory list. And most listed the matchbox not as empty, but containing cotton, let alone in the style of an inventory list.

But of course, here comes the 'poetry' argument for the millionth time. It's not an inventory list, it's Seamus Heaney and Dylan Thomas.

But if this is now going to circle back to statistics, I'm out of here. After reading your ridiculous statistical analysis over last three weeks, I admit that I nearly lost the will to live. I certainly lost the will to talk to Diary Defenders about their use of circular logic.

Have a great day.

[The Baron]

Yes, Maybrick's inside knowledge of the case was so overwhelming that he could even quote directly from an internal police inventory list—even mentioning three items in the exact order in which they appeared in that list--despite the document being locked in the bowels of the City of London archives until the mid-1980s.

It was this very fact, pointed out by John Omlor, that forced one former poster named Tom Mitchell to concede the diary was a modern fake clear back in posts #56 and #64 of this thread:



And



Alas, ultimately, this didn’t dissuade Tom. Even though he was stumped, he struggled on for a few days, still arguing for the diary’s authenticity, almost like a wind-up artist might do, leading Ally Ryder to finally comment:



6,000 posts later, no one knows.

Does anyone know what happened to Tom? Does anyone know?

I do enjoy these walks down Memory Lane.

Serial hoax believers don't just stop, until they are commited to an asylum. or throw themselves in a river




The Baron

[rjpalmer]

Gotcha - so there's no evidence whatsoever against Tony D being involved in the forging of the Diary, yet you're claiming that it's likely he planned it with the Barretts. All good.

No, Caz has me convinced.

Eddie lived on Fountains Road and Tony D lived on Fountains Road that PROVES to any honest, rational person that Tony was connected to the Diary--wasn't that her convoluted, circular argument? Or does it only work in reverse?

Despite the claim that there is no 'evidence' against Barrett, his signed confession is recognized as evidence in a court of law. And supporting evidence is his attempt to buy the raw materials of a hoax -- a blank Victorian Diary-- in the weeks before heading to London. Next throw in the ink being unbonded to the paper, his use of the 'Mr. Williams' alias, modern elements in the diary, etc. etc. It's not hard to see which way the wind bows.

The evidence of Devereux's involvement is not strong, but Devereux was named in the confession, and Devereux had Mike's copy of Tales of Liverpool. What I find particularly intriguing is that when Martin Howells caught Mike unawares, Barrett was particularly eager to distance Devereux from this booklet---even though he had previously used Tony as a provenance and it could have easily been explained away.

That's significant. I think it is likely that Martin was the first person to openly challenge Barrett, but he should have been more forceful and asked more follow-up questions. The cracks were appearing, and for once Mike wasn't able to think quickly.

Why was he so eager not to admit that Devereux had this booklet? Other early diary investigators were following the same scent.

Good-bye.

[The Baron]

His alleged victim in Manchester, where is the first letter of her name on the faked watch?!


He he, the hoaxer forgot completely about her!
To be expected, its all hallucinations.



The Baron

[Iconoclast]

Yes, Ike, I should have been more overt.
But if this is now going to circle back to statistics, I'm out of here. After reading your analysis last three weeks I admit that I nearly lost the will to live.

And as I inferred many times myself, I don't think you were the only one.

And, of course, no one would write 'tin match box empty' in an inventory - they'd write '1 Tin MatchBox, empty', probably (which is almost the same as what Maybrick 'poetically' wrote other than for five qualities in which the two phrasings differed - not bad for just four words!).

In prose, I imagine Maybrick would have written something like 'the tin match box was empty' (which, funnily enough, he pretty much later did when he wrote in prose "Damn it - the tin box was empty").

By the way, I hope you aren't suggesting that Dylan Thomas wrote the Maybrick scrapbook? At least he couldn't have been basing it on Michael Caine's funny little Abberline which I trust you raise for a lazy sake that won't create but only plumb such depths as you?

Ike
Original

Come on MrB - beat that!

[rjpalmer]

At least he couldn't have been basing it on Michael Caine's funny little Abberline which I trust you raise for a lazy sake that won't create but only plumb such depths as you?

Keith Skinner was willing to entertain the possibility that the Abberline of the film could have been a source, or so he led me to believe.

But I don't look to you for insight, Ike, only for laughs.

[Iconoclast]

But I don't look to you for insight, Ike, only for laughs.

You're too kind, sir ...

[StevenOwl]

No, Caz has me convinced.

Eddie lived on Fountains Road and Tony D lived on Fountains Road that PROVES to any honest, rational person that Tony was connected to the Diary--wasn't that her convoluted, circular argument? Or does it only work in reverse?

Despite the claim that there is no 'evidence' against Barrett, his signed confession is recognized as evidence in a court of law. And supporting evidence is his attempt to buy the raw materials of a hoax -- a blank Victorian Diary-- in the weeks before heading to London. Next throw in the ink being unbonded to the paper, his use of the 'Mr. Williams' alias, modern elements in the diary, etc. etc. It's not hard to see which way the wind bows.

The evidence of Devereux's involvement is not strong, but Devereux was named in the confession, and Devereux had Mike's copy of Tales of Liverpool. What I find particularly intriguing is that when Martin Howells caught Mike unawares, Barrett was particularly eager to distance Devereux from this booklet---even though he had previously used Tony as a provenance and it could have easily been explained away.

That's significant. I think it is likely that Martin was the first person to openly challenge Barrett, but he should have been more forceful and asked more follow-up questions. The cracks were appearing, and for once Mike wasn't able to think quickly.

Why was he so eager not to admit that Devereux had this booklet? Other early diary investigators were following the same scent.

Good-bye.

There is no hard evidence against Devereux full stop - it's pure speculation on your part.

[rjpalmer]

There is no hard evidence against Devereux full stop - it's pure speculation on your part.

There's hard evidence against Barrett. He signed a confession and proved beyond any reasonable doubt that he had attempted to buy a genuine blank diary before ever stepping foot in London with the Maybrick Hoax. He identified an unknown passage in the Diary when no one else could--not Shirley Harrison, not Keith Skinner, not Paul Feldman, not Melvin Harris. And the original document examiner found the ink was 'fresh' (unbonded to the paper). Barrett named Devereux, and a book that was integral to Mike's research notes was independently found in Devereux's possession.

But I agree this doesn't prove Devereux was involved, and indeed, he had an airtight alibi: the evidence strongly suggests that he was dead before the physical diary was ever created.

What is your hard evidence against Eddie Lyons or any other electrician?

[Scott Nelson]

Didn't Devereux have a copy of Whittington-Egan's Liverpool Soundings published in the late 1960s? The Diarist described the 1889 Grand National horse race as the fastest ever, which could have been inferred from this book?