One Incontrovertible, Unequivocal, Undeniable Fact Which Refutes the Diary

[erobitha]

Hold on buddy, your barkin up the wrong tree there.

Go read the inquest testimony again and stop ignoring what was said .
I choose what is evidence and relevant .

So get down off your high horse.

The diary is a fake and James Maybrick isn't ripper . Deal with it

I'm discussing ALL of the C5 murders, not just the one that you feel makes your best case, with one specific inquest testimony. You at least agree Jack was a serial killer? So look at what all the doctors said across the C5. He was one murderer.

I've never claimed the dairy is genuine, but your trolling ways should not go unchallenged.

[FISHY1118]

I'm discussing ALL of the C5 murders, not just the one that you feel makes your best case, with one specific inquest testimony. You at least agree Jack was a serial killer? So look at what all the doctors said across the C5. He was one murderer.

I've never claimed the dairy is genuine, but your trolling ways should not go unchallenged.

Oh excuse me ''F'' out of me , Is that what they call it these days when someone strongly objects to an opinion regarding a perticular topic on a public forum ? ill keep that in mind next time i see one of your post doing the same thing . [ you know, one troll to another kinda thing]

[erobitha]

I'm discussing ALL of the C5 murders, not just the one that you feel makes your best case, with one specific inquest testimony. You at least agree Jack was a serial killer? So look at what all the doctors said across the C5. He was one murderer.

I've never claimed the dairy is genuine, but your trolling ways should not go unchallenged.

One for the Mike Barrett fans.

[Iconoclast]

Oh excuse me ''F'' out of me , Is that what they call it these days when someone strongly objects to an opinion regarding a perticular topic on a public forum ? ill keep that in mind next time i see one of your post doing the same thing . [ you know, one troll to another kinda thing]

Fishy,

I don't mean to be overly critical here - but what are drinking pals for if they can't be honest with one another? I wonder if your arguments would be stronger if they were couched in proper English? You know, using proper English spellings and grammatical conventions?

Now, if English is not your first language, I applaud you (I only have Geordie as a second language - when once it was my first - so I genuinely admire all those who write with varying degrees of fluency in my lucky language), but that doesn't really excuse the shocking lack of adherence to standardised grammatical forms such as the use of spaces, commas, capitals, proper nouns, improper nouns, etc. that you habitually display and which therefore makes some of your arguments a right old challenge to follow cogently.

I'm probably just being a complete and rather vindictive snob (and I'll apologise in advance if I am - it is not my intention here; and - if it were - I would have ventured to say this a long time ago) but I can't take your positions as seriously as I take others due to your apparent inability to type coherently.

Could you take a little bit more time so that your thoughts are better represented than they currently are? Maybe use a spellchecker (come on, we all do it - even the seemingly infallible Lord Orsam of Chigwell pays homage to the red squiggly lines).

I say this fondly and mean no offence though I accept in advance your opprobrium should it be forthcoming.

Ike
Chief Inspector
Linguist Department
Whottlington-on-the-Whottle Police Force

[Iconoclast]

One for the Mike Barrett fans.

Definitely one for the album, ero b!

[FISHY1118]

Fishy,

I don't mean to be overly critical here - but what are drinking pals for if they can't be honest with one another? I wonder if your arguments would be stronger if they were couched in proper English? You know, using proper English spellings and grammatical conventions?

Now, if English is not your first language, I applaud you (I only have Geordie as a second language - when once it was my first - so I genuinely admire all those who write with varying degrees of fluency in my lucky language), but that doesn't really excuse the shocking lack of adherence to standardised grammatical forms such as the use of spaces, commas, capitals, proper nouns, improper nouns, etc. that you habitually display and which therefore makes some of your arguments a right old challenge to follow cogently.

I'm probably just being a complete and rather vindictive snob (and I'll apologise in advance if I am - it is not my intention here; and - if it were - I would have ventured to say this a long time ago) but I can't take your positions as seriously as I take others due to your apparent inability to type coherently.

Could you take a little bit more time so that your thoughts are better represented than they currently are? Maybe use a spellchecker (come on, we all do it - even the seemingly infallible Lord Orsam of Chigwell pays homage to the red squiggly lines).

I say this fondly and mean no offence though I accept in advance your opprobrium should it be forthcoming.

Ike
Chief Inspector
Linguist Department
Whottlington-on-the-Whottle Police Force

Ok Ike ,ill translate from my Aussie slang to proper English just to help you out, ok ? [as a drinking pal of course.]

Firstly, Yes an error . ''Excuse me the ''F'' out out me'' Should have been ''Excuse 'the' 'f#%!' out of me'' im sure you can at least figure what the f means.

Its used here in Aust when someone is genuinely shocked at what somebody has said ,it was my response at being accused of trolling by Erobitha.

Im sure on the odd occasion i mispell words, who doesnt ? .[Is the question mark ok there ? ] But i wouldnt have thought my points of view were that difficult to understand overall .

Ill take your request under advisement ,and because you seem sincere about it ill do my best to comply.

[Scott Nelson]

However, as for all the reasons which Ike outlined, this concept of Mike being handed a golden provenance does not make any logical sense. It only makes sense if Mike planned on using it.

That or he wanted something so ambiguously close to a provenance that it would be enough to muddy waters with people like me thirty years down the line. Again, for what purpose that would have suited him I have no idea. The second Mike indicated the Battlecrease provenance his claim on it would be null and void. If it came out of Battlecrease then legally it is Paul Dodd’s property.

Why would Mike even want to risk that in the slightest?

Hi Jay,

I don't think Mike had any intention of ever using the Battlecrease provenance. He maintained that he got the diary from Devereux. Based on what Lyons had heard about a document having been found there years before, he gave Mike the confidence he needed to verify it was about Maybrick and to call Crew.

[Scott Nelson]

Ike, here's a few brief responses in bold.

Okay, Scotty, let's play around with that idea ...

Technically, this scenario could have been the correct version. Lyons could have mentioned to Barrett in The Saddle on March 9, 1992, that he had been working that morning on the floorboards of James Maybrick's old home at 7 Riversdale Road.

FIRST SCENARIO

If Barrett had received the scrapbook from Tony Devereux (or someone else) in 1989 (as has been proposed) or whenever then he could have gone home and rang Rupert Crew Ltd. because he realised that Lyons had just handed his scrapbook the perfect provenance back to James Maybrick.

The problem with that is three-fold:

1) Barrett never once mentioned this in any of his confessions; and
2) If he had mentioned this, he would have had to face the prospect of his having to give up his precious scrapbook because it evidently belonged to Paul Dodd; and
3) It truly would have been - as you yourself acknowledge - an astonishing coincidence if the guy who had received the scrapbook from Tony Devereux (at some point, obviously, before his death in August 1991) then was the guy who Lyons told the tale of his morning to in The Saddle on March 9, 1992.

As I suggested to Jay above, Mike may have never been intending to use the Battlecrease provenance publicly. It may not have been a coincidence if Lyons knew Mike had the diary before March 9th.

SECOND SCENARIO

If Barrett had already created the scrapbook by March 9, 1992, then he could have gone home and rang Rupert Crew Ltd. because he realised that Lyons had just handed his hoaxed scrapbook the perfect provenance back to James Maybrick.

Yes, except Mike didn't create the scrapbook. He rang Rupert Crew because he then felt confident enough to know the scrapbook was about James Maybrick.

The problem with that is three-fold:

1) Barrett never once mentioned this in any of his confessions; and
2) If he had mentioned this, he would have had to face the prospect of his having to give up his hoaxed scrapbook because it evidently now looked as though it belonged to Paul Dodd; and
3) It truly would have been an astonishing coincidence if the guy who had hoaxed the scrapbook of Jack the Ripper by James Maybrick then was the guy who Lyons told the tale of his morning to in The Saddle on March 9, 1992.

No coincidence here. Lyons already knew Mike had it. Mike then arranged for Eddie to meet Robert Smith because Mike thought Eddie would support his (Lyons) earlier provenance story of a workman finding the diary in Dodd's house years earlier, but all Lyons said was that he heard something was thrown in a skip. Mike, irritated by Eddie's lack of forthcoming, later confronts him at his doorstep.

THIRD SCENARIO

If Barrett had had a light-bulb moment, he could have hurried home to ring a literary agent and then set about creating the scrapbook on March 9, 1992.

The problem with that is three-fold (at least!!!):

1) Barrett would have had to have jumped from James Maybrick's floorboards coming-up to "I could turn celebrity murder victim, Liverpool-based, James Maybrick into Jack the Ripper" and there's no obvious reason why anyone on the planet would have suddenly done so; and
2) Barrett never once mentioned this in any of his confessions; and
2) If he had mentioned this, he would have had to face the prospect of his having to give up his hoaxed scrapbook because it evidently belonged to Paul Dodd.

In this, and the other scenarios, Mike risked public knowledge of the Battlecrease provanance.

I sort of addressed this before. I think Mike intended to use Devereux's diary to create his own version for self-aggrandizement, but found it too difficult to do with the time constraint he imposed on himself and gave up. Mike always said it came from Devereux, so perhaps he wasn't too concerned about a Dodd lawsuit. But who knows how Barrett reasoned things out?

FORTH SCENARIO

Lyons found the scrapbook under Maybrick's floorboards on March 9, 1992, and sold it to Mike Barrett in The Saddle later that day.

Problems with that:

1) None whatsoever because it is so blindingly-obviously what actually happened.

Yes, it could have happened that way. But I thought Dodd denied any floorboards had been lifted on that day.

Applying Soothsayer's Razor, it seems pretty obvious to me which is the intuitively least awkward scenario to endorse, though - of course - everyone is entitled to hold dear to whichever one they either feel the evidence supports or else they desperately hope was the true version.

As I said, this is a working theory. It tried to incorporate many of the things you, Caroline, Jay, RJ Palmer and others have said over the years. I've undoubtedly embarrassed myself by not having read enough source material and mixing up timelines somewhat.

[Iconoclast]

Ike, here's a few brief responses in bold.

As I said, this is a working theory. It tried to incorporate many of the things you, Caroline, Jay, RJ Palmer and others have said over the years. I've undoubtedly embarrassed myself by not having read enough source material and mixing up timelines somewhat.

Thanks for the responses, Scotty.

I do sense a scintilla of potential truth in your imaginings though I would make three points.

So, just to clarify, Mike has the scrapbook (perhaps from Tony D) perhaps from work completed in 1989. He meets Lyons in the pub on March 9, 1992, and Lyons mentions he has been working in the old Battlecrease House that morning. Armed with this knowledge (and having already established for himself that the author of the scrapbook is intended to be James Maybrick), Mike decides this is a propitious moment to approach a literary agent. So far so good.

Mike never mentions this to anyone by way of credible provenance, but I guess for you that would be because he would not want Paul Dodd to have a claim on the scrapbook. Again, so far so good.

He seeks a similar document from Martin Earl because he thinks he can write his own version (and thus perhaps keep the original to himself). When he gets the 1891 diary, he realises that that is unrealistic (in the extreme) so he decides to plough on with the actual scrapbook. Again, it fits the known evidence.

For the record, I don't think Dodd denied that floorboards had come up on March 9, 1992, though that is irrelevant if your version is correct.

Off the top of my head, I can't think of any obvious reason why this scenario could not be the truth, but I will need to ponder on it a little further.

I guess, whether your version or my version is correct (if one of them is), they lead to similar end points - the unravelling of the mystery of who Jack the Ripper was.

Allegedly ...

(Just thinking about Fishy's blood pressure.)

[Scott Nelson]

Thanks for your due consideration Ike. Just for clarification, I don't know specifically what was said when Lyons and Barrett met with Robert Smith. I thought the story of something being thrown into a skip could have been from 1977 or thereabouts, which is when I think the (old) diary could have been found in Dodd's house, if it was found there. That's when the floorboards may have come up. From there, somebody picked it out of the skip (I'm assuming there was one there for the job in 1977) and took it to the local newspaper office because they didn't know what else to do with it (and they weren't the ones who threw it in).

Devereux finds it on some stock shelf and takes it home and writes his own version.

...now look what you did....

[erobitha]

Thanks for your due consideration Ike. Just for clarification, I don't know specifically what was said when Lyons and Barrett met with Robert Smith. I thought the story of something being thrown into a skip could have been from 1977 or thereabouts, which is when I think the (old) diary could have been found in Dodd's house, if it was found there. That's when the floorboards may have come up. From there, somebody picked it out of the skip (I'm assuming there was one there for the job in 1977) and took it to the local newspaper office because they didn't know what else to do with it (and they weren't the ones who threw it in).

Devereux finds it on some stock shelf and takes it home and writes his own version.

...now look what you did....

I don’t know if this will ultimately prove to be the correct theory, but just to add that I believe there was a clearance of some kind of the house in the 70s and number of items ended up in an antiques shop. I’m going purely on third hand information I remember seeing on a now defunct website. It was some kind of Southport locals bulletin board.

I believe a writing desk was part of that of which the suede bag I.M JACK with an old key inside was allegedly found.

I can’t corroborate any of the above being true but some pictures of the bag were shared, but most people on here dismissed it.

My main concern with your scenario is why would anyone just sit on it for decades? It’s one of the same issues I have with Anne’s provenance. If you have this thing purported to be Jack the Ripper’s diary, do you not at least try and get it authenticated / dismissed by some kind of expert?

Aldo, Eddie Lyons just telling Mike he was working on Maybrick’s house does not offer him anything new. He could have been aware of Maybrick’s house and the story of James Maybrick being poisoned. Or are you saying he had the rippers diary but no idea who James Maybrick was until Eddie told him he had been working on his house? Putting two and two together?

[Iconoclast]

This case does so love a good coincidence ...

[StevenOwl]

Thanks for your due consideration Ike. Just for clarification, I don't know specifically what was said when Lyons and Barrett met with Robert Smith. I thought the story of something being thrown into a skip could have been from 1977 or thereabouts, which is when I think the (old) diary could have been found in Dodd's house, if it was found there. That's when the floorboards may have come up. From there, somebody picked it out of the skip (I'm assuming there was one there for the job in 1977) and took it to the local newspaper office because they didn't know what else to do with it (and they weren't the ones who threw it in).

Devereux finds it on some stock shelf and takes it home and writes his own version.

...now look what you did....

The problem we have here is that the first on-the-record mention of a Diary of Jack the Ripper being found in Liverpool is March 9th 1992. I simply do not believe that if the scrapbook was in someone else's hands (or was being/had been forged) prior to that date, that nobody said anything about it to anybody else.

edit: Obviously Mike and Ann have both offered up stories which have the Diary in Goldie Street (and elsewhere) prior to that date, but as yet there's nothing to back up either of those claims.

[Iconoclast]

The problem we have here is that the first on-the-record mention of a Diary of Jack the Ripper being found in Liverpool is March 9th 1992. I simply do not believe that if the scrapbook was in someone else's hands (or was being/had been forged) prior to that date, that nobody said anything about it to anybody else.

edit: Obviously Mike and Ann have both offered up stories which have the Diary in Goldie Street (and elsewhere) prior to that date, but as yet there's nothing to back up either of those claims.

I concur, Owly. If I had a scrapbook in my possession and it purported to have been written by, say, Lord Lucan, post his disappearance, would I still be holding on to it twenty, thirty, or forty years later? I doubt it. I doubt I'd hold on to it for more than a few hours before ringing a literary agent to ask if they would be interested in seeing what I thought might be the diary of Lord Lucan. If I had reason to think the scrapbook had been nicked from somewhere or someone, I might even pick that moment to seek a similar item which I could claim was the one I had if the polis came a-knocking.

[rjpalmer]

I might even pick that moment to seek a similar item which I could claim was the one I had if the polis came a-knocking.

A "similar item."

The jokes write themselves.