One Incontrovertible, Unequivocal, Undeniable Fact Which Refutes the Diary

[rjpalmer]

Well, I don't think there is much point in our discussing this further, Caz, but since I am here:

It might also be useful to direct your questions to Wild himself, as only he could offer clarification regarding his findings and conclusions.

Yes, thanks. It seems to be a reoccurring theme, doesn't it?

No one back in the day seems to have asked the appropriate questions, so we (or rather I) am left to chase down people years after-the-fact, once the trail has gone cold.

I did check this possibility, but the last reference I found to Dr. Wild was clear back around 2004 and it said that he had retired from Bristol. That's nearly twenty years ago; I suppose he might still be walking the earth--I hope so. But if not, I'll just have to shrug my shoulders at this report as 'impressive' but unconvincing--just like Martin Fido did all those years ago.

But hey, if you and Jay and Ike are happy with it, why do you care what anyone else thinks? True, it would be nice to convert the skeptics, but since our reasonable questions are only met with contempt, that's not likely to happen, is it?

The fact remains that Wild stated that the embedded brass particles were from the engraving tool.

This is an oversimplification.

For this "fact," Wild referenced Turgoose. He was relying on what Turgoose had already posited:




And what did Turgoose write in 1993?





"It would seem..." and they "appear to have come" strikes me as rather hesitant phrasing for a scientific report.

It doesn't sound like he is entirely certain.

But then, some people like to ask questions, and others don't.

I get that.

RP

[caz]

Fused with the gold? This is a complete invention of yours; please point us to the appropriate section of Dr. Wild's report where he states the particle was fused.

The brass particle was embedded (stuck) in the scratch. It was not fused to anything.

Wild attempted to date the particle by 'etching' off microscopic layers of its surface. It was only after 45 minutes that he detected zinc oxide.

Since brass is an alloy made out of copper and zinc, this told him that he was now down to the metal (and below the surface corrosion), which, in turn, suggested the particle had been corroding for some years provided it had been kept in a 'normal environment,' (his phrase) which, I assume would also mean non-exposure to chemicals, etc.

1) nowhere does he tell us how much corrosion could be expected from a piece of brass that had been blackened by various chemicals. Would we expect different results? Or the same results? Was this question even posed? Since brass can be etched with ferric nitrate (to give one example) it seems to me that its corrosion necessarily would be quite deep.

2) nowhere does either Wild or Turgoose mention any reason why the particle couldn't have been already corroded ('with age') before it dislodged itself from the engraving tool and became buried in the scratch, nor is it even definitely proven (to my satisfaction) that these particles came from the engraving tool. They could have done, but how do we know that?

These are questions that should have been asked. Clarification was needed on a number of points. Were appropriate questions asked? Did Wild answer them? What had the Johnsons asked and/or told Wild that might have affected his comments?

It's not even clear who subsidized this examination. Feldman heavily implies it was Albert Johnson but Harrison claims she paid for it.

Introducing the matter of who commissioned and paid up front for the testing just muddies the waters and tells us nothing about how and when the engravings might have been made. We do know that Albert engaged a solicitor and, unlike Mike Barrett, took his financial responsibilities seriously.

RJ would have us think that Wild and Turgoose had no idea what they were being asked to try and establish and why. They must have known it concerned whether the engravings could have been made as long ago as 1889, when Maybrick was alive, and how easily they could have been faked in modern times to give that impression. They would have been looking for any clues that might point away from a 'decades old' conclusion. Like anyone else at the time, they'd have been aware of the pitfalls of being too enthusiastic in the wake of the Hitler Diaries, and were no doubt aware of the Maybrick diary and its own struggles with authentication. There would have been every reason to remain strictly objective and not be swayed one iota by who was paying and what they hoped to learn. If Wild and Turgoose could have found an easy and justifiable way to explain how anyone could have made those engravings long after Maybrick popped his clogs, they'd have done so. Baxendale thought he'd found himself an easy way out with the diary ink and he took it, running to the Sunday Times for the succour he knew he'd find there.

Look how many reputations have been called into question or even trashed whenever anyone has not immediately rolled over, following the Hitler Diaries embarrassment, and gone for the shabby hoax option every time. Can't be easy in this game to rock the boat and refuse to join the gang.

[caz]

So, as far as I am concerned, all the usual snide commentary aside, what you and Ike are really saying, is "Yes, we know this is a discussion board, but let's not discuss it. Please don't ask any uncomfortable questions, because we don't have the answers. We just believe!"

And still we get no sensible discussion out of you, and no answers to the questions repeatedly asked, concerning the process by which you believe Robbie [or Albert, or Val, or baby Daisy?] planned, engineered and executed this bandwagon hoax between April and May 1993, including that Maybrick signature, which could have fooled Maybrick himself.

These questions must be beyond uncomfortable for you, and it's a bit rich to claim that others 'just believe' stuff, when that's all you've got - your belief that the two people who examined and reported on the watch must both have been out of their depth when they concluded that engravings made by a chancer in 1993 could have been put there a century earlier.

Yes, we could all have done with a third opinion, from someone qualified to challenge or confirm those of Wild and Turgoose, but we are where we are, and neither of us is qualified to provide that third opinion.

[caz]

No, this is not at all what I was implying.

Something was used to scratch the watch. Turgoose suggested it was a brass 'inscribing tool' and that pieces flaked off from this implement and became lodged in the base of the scratches.

He did qualify this assumption. He stated "it would seem" that these were brass particles" and it "appeared" as though they came off the inscribing tool. Wild took his word for it, suggesting the particle in question came from a 'brass engraving tool.'

As you know, not everyone immediately accepted that Turgoose was correct--Harris wondered if the particle could have been introduced into the scratched during polishing the watch. I don't see why this is impossible.

All I was pointing out is that the watch was 18 carat gold, which is 2.8 on the Mohs scale. Brass is 3.0. My only point is that it would be unusual for someone to think of using brass to inscribe gold and silver; a harder metal would be more common and more appropriate, which could give credence to Harris's theory that the particles found their way into the scratches by some other means.

I don't know that it matters all that much, since I've yet to see any reason why a hoaxer at any time between 1888 and 1992 couldn't have scratched the watch with an already corroded implement, and I don't think anyone else is able to discount this possibility, either.

I really don't think Melvin Harris had any more idea about the possibilities than you or I have - or my cat Monty for that matter.

You can speculate and wonder to your heart's content, but Wild and Turgoose did not suggest the brass particle could have found its way into the base of an engraving by some other means. Wild didn't have to take Turgoose's word for the suggestion of a brass inscribing tool, but he did agree with it. And it's clear that Wild thought the particle would need to have been implanted deliberately to give the effect he observed, of one introduced naturally a very long time ago.

And why between 1888 and 1992? That would be fine as far as I'm concerned - any time before 9th March 1992 in fact.

But you need your hoaxer to have done it with his old corroded tool between April and May 1993, or bang goes your Barrett hoax.

[caz]

I didn't realize that the deeply studied science of scratches on the inside cover of watches had established "experts."

But I see that Ike has now entirely abandoned his previous admission that Maybrick could have used a corroded tool and is now even refusing to ask intelligent questions of those who had conducted these brief studies.

His faith is deeply moving. Amen, brothers and sisters.

One thing I've discovered in my studies is that most scientists have had no training in what might be called forgery or hoax-making.

We've seen this in connection with the alleged scarf that allegedly belonged to Kate Eddowes that allegedly had the alleged seminal fluid of Aaron Kosminski on it--allegedly.

Dr. J seems to have accepted pretty much everything he was told by his client and conducted his analysis based on that premise.

If we are not willing to question the findings of this "expert," than we can safely assume that it was Aaron Kosminski and not Sir Jimmay Maybrick who killed Kate Eddowes.

And who is Ike to question the "expert" opinion Dr. J?

The case has been solved: Kosminski dunnit.

Can we apply this to Baxendale while we are at it?

Did he compare his findings with the ink on genuine handwritten Victorian documents? Or was he happy to presume - until challenged on this very point - that no examples could exist that might react like the diary ink?

To his credit, he didn't try to suggest that the diary might easily have been written as recently as early April 1992. He left that one to the amateurs who came along years later.

[rjpalmer]

Or was he happy to presume - until challenged on this very point - that no examples could exist that might react like the diary ink?

By amateurs, you mean? Smith and Harrison, or are you thinking of someone else?

I'll have more to say about Baxendale in the future--never fear.

[Iconoclast]

Well, I don't think there is much point in our discussing this further, Caz, but since I am here:
But hey, if you and Jay and Ike are happy with it, why do you care what anyone else thinks?

Well I can't speak for Caz nor for ero b, but I can speak for myself and - in a sense perhaps - speak for Drs. Turgoose and Wild.

We probably can accept the fact that no-one thought to ask Turgoose or Wild what they thought the likelihood was that a modern hoaxer had - inadvertently perhaps - used an aged implement to make those engravings. Given that we have no evidence of it, we should probably accept that no-one did.

But Turgoose argued that the engravings were likely to be more than tens of years old and that only a highly-skilled hoaxer could have created this impression artificially. He does not lean on the particles when forming his conclusion. He explicitly states that the engravings could have been produced recently and artificially aged "but this would have been a complex multistage process, using a variety of different , with intermediate polishing or artificial wearing stages" (there's a wee buit more but this will suffice for now).

This - of course - is why some idiot in the past was compelled to argue that an amateur could have aged those engravings with a spot of vigorous rubbing using an old pair of underpants. Well, we all do, don't we? We all gazump the experience of metallurgy 'experts' where engravings are concerned - confounding all of their training and instinct - by skipping the really complex bits and just resorting to a pair of your ma's old drawers.

Wild, on the other hand, made more of an issue of the fact that embedded in the aged engravings were particles, the specific one of which he examined happened to be corroded as if by age. If the engravings they were embedded in were many tens of years old, then so must the particles (corroded or otherwise), Wild may have recklessly assumed. Our idiot this time pipes up with another much simpler rationale: the particles were embedded in the engravings recently, using an already corroded implement.

I'm willing to accept that Wild did not exclude this latter possibility based upon both Turgoose's and his own understanding that the evidence pointed firmly towards the engravings themselves being many tens of years old, but that's not the same as arguing that it is therefore true that the particles could have been embedded with an already corroded implement. I guess it could be true, and no-one thought to ask Wild whether he had considered the possibility of it being true.

The critical bit of the foregoing is that these gentlemen argued that the evidence pointed to the engravings being many tens of years old unless they were created recently by a science which would be well beyond the average Joe.

The particles were corroded and the inference was possibly made that this was further evidence of age, but we don't yet have a categorical understanding of whether or not it would be possible for corroded material to be embedded into gold using an aged implement, but whether it can or it can't, we still require the expertise and equipment to make new engravings look old, and a pair of old underpants does not fall under that heading.

Ike

[rjpalmer]

Our idiot this time pipes up with another much simpler rationale: the particles were embedded in the engravings recently, using an already corroded implement.

It takes an idiot (like me, presumably) to ask whether the inscribing tool could have been already corroded?

Well, then I guess the early diary detectives must have been sub-idiots, because I'm seeing no evidence that they even asked.

But when I do I ask...I'm an idiot.

It's got a nice circularity to it, Ike, I'll give you that! 'Ask no questions, and you'll be told no lies,' is what my grandmother used to say.

But would I listen?

The critical bit of the foregoing is that these gentlemen argued that the evidence pointed to the engravings being many tens of years old unless they were created recently by a sciencewhich would be well beyond the average Joe.

Using a corroded implement and then polished the watch multiple times qualifies as a "science"?

Well, that's hard to dispute, Ike, but dispute it I must, because as you know, I live in "visceral terror" that the diary and watch came out of Battlecrease on March 9th, 1992.

I know, because I've been told so.

[rjpalmer]

He explicitly states that the engravings could have been produced recently and artificially aged "but this would have been a complex multistage process, using a variety of different , with intermediate polishing or artificial wearing stages"

You left out a word, Ike. "Tools" (that might get a giggle out of Ero). A variety of different tools.

I never understood why a variety of different tools is supposed to be so daunting. I've restored and polished antiques. Doesn't one always use multiple tools?

You also left out another phrase from the Turgoose report:

“any definition of number of years has a great degree of uncertainty and to some extent must remain speculation.”

Wow. Not merely uncertainty, but a great deal of uncertainty.

Who would have thought so from reading your what you and Caz have written?

Have a nice day, Ike.

[Iconoclast]

It takes an idiot (like me, presumably) to ask whether the inscribing tool could have been already corroded?

The 'idiot' was referring to whomsoever first came up with the idea of the casual hoaxer polishing-out the engravings to make them look old and using a corroded implement. I actually had Melvin Harris in mind - not you - as I had it in my head that it was he.

And the reason why I exclude you from 'idiot' status is that I was wrong to call Harris an 'idiot' concerning the potentially corroded implement as I had just acknowledged in my post that we do not yet know for certain that this is not possible. I think the 'idiot' was because I was thinking about Harris and if he was an idiot for the former than logically he'd still be an idiot when the latter occurred, even though it would not have been for that reason.

Well, then I guess the early diary detectives must have been sub-idiots, because I'm seeing no evidence that they even asked.

That is true, it would appear (that no-one asked), but I suspect that that was because it was the age of the engravings which was seen to be the crucial piece of evidence, and the aged particles just appeared to back that up (and may indeed back that up - we just don't know yet, it would appear).

But when I do I ask...I'm an idiot.

As I say, I did not have you in mind when I used the term, but I do accept that you couldn't have been had I been referring to you as I was in the midst of a small logic-fail (not fully thinking through the implications if the 'idiot' was not the same person who came up with the old lady drawers theory).

Using a corroded implement and then polished the watch multiple times qualifies as a "science"?

No, definitely not. You have misunderstood what I wrote. I was referring to the science that was defined by Turgoose and Wild not the 'science' defined by whoever came up with the knickers strategy.

Well, that's hard to dispute, Ike, but dispute it I must, because as you know, I live in "visceral terror" that the diary and watch came out of Battlecrease on March 9th, 1992. I know, because I've been told so.

Don't sweat it, RJ. I live in visceral terror that the scrapbook didn't despite my brave claims to the contrary.

Ike

[Iconoclast]

You left out a word, Ike. "Tools" (that might get a giggle out of Ero). A variety of different tools.

Very good - shot myself in the foot there, RJ, but pleased to see you're keeping-up despite the medication.

I never understood why a variety of different tools is supposed to be so daunting. I've restored and polished antiques. Doesn't one always use multiple tools?

**** knows, RJ.

You also left out another phrase from the Turgoose report:
“any definition of number of years has a great degree of uncertainty and to some extent must remain speculation.”
Wow. Not merely uncertainty, but a great deal of uncertainty.
Who would have thought so from reading your what you and Caz have written?
Have a nice day, Ike.

Wonderful echoes of the courtroom scene in A Few Good Men, but I don't think you should be allowed to get away with this hugely-selective bit of chicanery, RJ. This is what Turgoose says about his speculation:



Cutting to the chase, I don't think anyone could read the above as "I'm honestly a bit unsure about the age of the engravings and therefore you might just want to infer they were inscribed in the last few weeks or months, Wac".

Ike
Ever Vigilant

[caz]

By amateurs, you mean? Smith and Harrison, or are you thinking of someone else?

I'll have more to say about Baxendale in the future--never fear.

Oh good. I trust you have more confidence in Baxendale's conclusions than he did.

The fact that he was made to cave in and moderate his initially strong opinions by mere amateurs, and even waived his fee on condition that Robert Smith agreed not to publish his report, would tend to indicate that he had less confidence in his own abilities to date handwriting reliably than you would like to believe.

[Iconoclast]

You may remember, dear readers, the awful fuss on the message boards over the expression 'bumbling buffoon' in the scrapbook?

I happened to mention it to a brown bear who is also a fount of knowledge the other day and - quick as a flash - he said 'bumble' would surely have been used as a verb soon after Charles Dickens published Oliver Twist, featuring Mr Bumble. It struck me then that fictional characters might be intuitively aligned in their thinking - whilst possibly skilfully extracting marmalade sandwiches for sustenance - for this appeared to be a rather insightful comment? To bumble and what have you and all that. Perhaps later to evolve rather naturally and quickly (given how English works) into 'bumbling' as in "You appear to me to be bumbling, Paddington, old boy, albeit not entirely in the original idiomatic sense of being necessarily pompous and incompetent".

I was slightly sceptical because famously nobody had seemed able to produce any historical written examples that would fit the bill, but I looked up Mr Bumble from Oliver Twist and found that his character did give rise to the noun Bumbledom which seemed a promising start:

Definition of bumbledom (Merriam-Webster)
The actions and mannerisms of pompous but inefficient government officials
Example: "a strain of mild obstinacy exquisitely calculated to infuriate the self-important bumbledom of that time" — G. M. Trevelyan.

History and Etymology for bumbledom
Bumble, a parish beadle in Oliver Twist + English -dom

Sir Jim's scathing references to Dr Hopper could easily fit the definition, so frankly I now have no problem at all with anyone coming up with a 'bumbling buffoon' in Victorian times even if it joined the multiplying ranks of those expressions - such as 'freshly picked carrots' - which doggedly refused to enter the record sufficiently for Google Ngrams to detect any earlier than it presently does.

No, honestly, you're welcome.

Ike

[caz]

I could not have put that better myself, Ike.

[No doubt I'd have bumbled my way through it.]

Aren't Newcastle doing splendidly in the Premier League, by the way?

Love,

Switchy
X

[Iconoclast]

I could not have put that better myself, Ike.

[No doubt I'd have bumbled my way through it.]

Love,

Switchy
X

Well you're very welcome Switchy. To me, it's like a service I provide. Insight Inc. and what have you.

Aren't Newcastle doing splendidly in the Premier League, by the way?

I do feel there's not enough Newcastle chat on the Casebook. What's wrong with everyone? I do so love the bumbling buffoonery of Steve Bruce as he led us on a path towards disaster. He described Eddie Howe as "the fella that got Bournemouth relegated" which is deeply ironic under the circumstances given where he was leading us but also deeply disingenuous given that Howe had 'got them relegated' by a single point which shouldn't have happened had Hawkeye worked properly in the first game back after the pandemic, in a season with a ridiculous number of injuries, having got them to the Promised Land from the very depths of the old Division Four and kept them romping in the honey for a number of seasons, punching consistently above their historical weight.

And, yes, Newcastle are doing spectacularly now!

Ike
Inspector
Insight Inc.