One Incontrovertible, Unequivocal, Undeniable Fact Which Refutes the Diary

[erobitha]

* In retrospect, Anne, was any of it worth it?

No.

Great post Ike!

Imagine if Anne did "come clean", as you outlined above, my word she would have a lot to explain.

Those who truly believe it was a shabby Barrett and Graham hoax must clearly have all of the answers already.

I await to see their response to each point you raised.

[Iconoclast]

I await to see their response to each point you raised.

Cheers, ero b. I'm sure there must be many other questions we would want to put to Anne, but these were the ones I thought of yesterday as I ploughed through the unravelling pages of my original copy of Robert Smith's 25 Years (I feel if I mention this often enough, he'll eventually offer to send me his own copy, suitably signed, obviously).

Reading my post again, I noticed a few typos, chief amongst which was the following:

• Given that the limited medical history of the Maybrick children implied that James Junior was the more sickly child, why did you decide to have Maybrick fretting that young Gladys was ill ‘again’?
• How did the two of you react when subsequent research by others showed that a letter dated March 1889 referred to Gladys being ill ‘again, she worries me so’?

These question obviously should have read:

• Given that the limited medical history of the Maybrick children implied that James Junior was the more sickly child, why did you decide to have Maybrick fretting that young Gladys was ill ‘again, she worries me so’?
• How did the two of you react when subsequent research by others showed that a letter dated March 1889 referred to Gladys being ill ‘again’?

Anyway, dear readers, please do share with us all the questions you would want to ask of Anne Graham during this mooted one-off interview after she confesses to her and Mike's terribly inept and shabby hoax which risked so much, destroyed so much, and which delivered for them apparently so little bar unhappiness and unwelcome attention. Can I suggest that someone starts with one I wish I'd thought of before posting - namely, "What was your happiest moment in this entire exercise?".

Ike

[Mike J. G.]

No.

Great post Ike!

Imagine if Anne did "come clean", as you outlined above, my word she would have a lot to explain.

Those who truly believe it was a shabby Barrett and Graham hoax must clearly have all of the answers already.

I await to see their response to each point you raised.

Allo, Ike, Ero...

I'm not really sure what response you're waiting on, considering that these are supposed to be hypothetical questions for a hypothetical interview with Anne. Unless the question is: "if you were Anne, how would you approach these questions...?"

Going with the idea that Anne/Mike had nothing to do with the penning of the diary, and depending on what particular provenance you personally support, a similar set of questions could be asked...

Why so many varying stories of provenance?

If the diary had been in your family for decades, why bother to say otherwise?

If it came out of Riversdale road, how did it get into the hands of Mike?

Did Mike mention how it had gotten from Riversdale, to an unknown branch of John Moore's university in the city centre, to the Saddle pub, and into your home?

Was any information given to Mike regarding the university visit? Who inspected the diary at this university, and what was said?

Did Mike mention why the diary, which had been deemed potentially important enough to take into a university to be looked at by an expert (?) was essentially handed over to him for basically nothing?

Knowing that the writing in the diary didn't match yours or Mike's, why put forward the idea that you hoaxed it at all when you knew that said writing would likely be investigated?

If you had nothing to do with the creation of the diary, why then claim to have hoaxed it when you knew that you had nothing with which to back it up and surely also knowing that such things would be investigated?

What was Tony Devereux's involvement with the diary and can you think of any reason why his family would deny having ever seen it?

There's a million other questions that could be asked, but ultimately, we're never going to have this interview with Anne, are we?

Whether you believe that Anne, Mike and/or Tony had anything to do with it, or nothing to do with it, the fact remains that lots of contradictory stories were told that subsequently muddied the already murky waters.

If it came out of Riversdale, why is the timeline so odd? Who took it to John Moore's university? What building did they actually take it to, as there's more than one university in town and it's not often you can just ring them up and pdy a visit without an appointment. Who did they speak with and why hasn't this person ever come forward to corroborate this particular story?

Every provenance in this saga raises questions, really, doesn't it?

You've got to assume that this unknown person, at the unknown university building, didn't think much of the diary at all, as the electrican who felt it necessary to take it there then went on and handed it to an alcoholic in his local pub for essentially nowt.

As for the questions regarding why anyone would pick Maybrick as a candidate... Well unless you truly believe that he was JtR and he literally did pen the diary in one of his many different hands... (lol) then that's exactly what somebody did, isn't it? They chose Jim. Why choose anyone? The beauty of Ripperdom is that you can chuck any name in there and unless said person was proven to be a million miles away, you've not got a lot to go on.

I'm not sure what relevance "Ja" "ck" has as far as Jim's initials go... Unless you contend that Jim not only was Jack but he also wrote the Ripper letters in yet another of his many different hands... (Seriously?) It's pretty "out there" to claim that Maybrick's initials are some sort of clue, as you'd have to then make the claim that Maybrick was the one who came up with the moniker, which would mean you'd have to believe that he wrote the letter and would thus surely have to believe that Maybrick was capable of writing in multiple different hands which is frankly absolutely ludicrous and isn't supported by any evidence whatsoever.

It's either a coincidence that the beginning and end of Jim's initials spell Jack, or you're implying that he came up with the moniker, which isn't very likely, and he penned the Ripper letters, which is also very unlikely.

At the end of the day, the only person who could clear some of this stuff up is Anne, and she's not talking... So we're left to speculate.

The believers will believe and the deniers won't... There's not enough evidence either way to suggest that one party is correct. There's a lot of circumstansial evidence that it wasn't written by Jim, and there's no real evidence that Jim ever cut an unfortunate up in the East end, Manchester, or behind the Poste House after a bag of Charlie and a flaggen of Stella.

We're never going to get much of a resolution on it, and the diary doesn't seem to hold the attention of a great many people, in "Ripperology" or otherwise, save for a bunch of us weirdos.

Ciao,

Aigburth's most beloved son,

Michaelangelo.

[rjpalmer]

Hi Thomas.

We do not have the luxury to interrogate Anne Graham, and I suspect we never will, but I encourage you, Jay, Mike, and Caz (and Keith, too, if he's peeking in), to reread the following extraordinary account of Anne being questioned in 1996 by Paul Daniel, then editor of The Ripperologist. I found it quite fascinating to reread it in light of recent claims made about the diary coming from under the floorboards of Dodd’s house. Claims that Keith Skinner believes he can prove in a court of law; which Caz Brown has said she is 100% certain are true; and which your own good self have estimated to be the correct answer, laying odds at over 38,000 to 1.

I'll make a brief comment afterwards that may have some relevance to your questions.

__


Sunday 10th November, 1996. Ten minutes to six. I was walking up Abercorn Place -- yes, the very street where John William Smith Saunders, one of the 'insane' medical students investigated by Chief Inspector Abberline, had lived at No 20 -- and then across Abbey Road, just down from the famous studio brought into our consciousness by The Beatles, and on towards a block of nineteen-thirties art-deco flats. I entered a hallway large enough for a roller-rink and took the lift to my destination.

I had been invited by Paul Feldman to interview Anne Graham, from whom the controversial Diary of Jack the Ripper had originated. As it happened, it turned out not to be an 'interview' at all, but an extremely pleasant, if thoroughly exhausting, evening spent in the discussion of the provenance of the Diary and all the research that had been undertaken, and the documents and evidence that had been discovered, towards the proof of it's authenticity, and Anne's connection to the Maybrick family.

Although I had taken a Dictaphone and camera, I quickly realised it would not be appropriate to ask to use them. I was to be allowed to see, hear, judge, and even relate, but not to have the backup of anything 'on record.' This I could understand, for Paul's book Jack the Ripper: The Final Chapter would not be published by Virgin until next April -- still six months away. When the evening was over, I did not feel at liberty to reveal any of the information I had been given, but merely to give an outline as to what took place, and my overall impressions of the situation and evening.

Paul Feldman I had met before, but could hardly say I knew. Carol Emmas, his researcher, I had also met previously, and become friendly with. Anne Graham I had seen only in the picture with her then husband, Mike Barrett, and their daughter Caroline, reproduced in Shirley Harrison's book The Diary of Jack the Ripper. She did not resemble the picture in the slightest. Wearing a long black dress, with short dark hair, round face, she was the epitome of the unexceptional. There was the familiar Cilla Black inflections in her strong Liverpool accent, and as the evening progressed, I realised she was an intelligent woman. But I also had the strong impression she was completely bored with the whole 'Ripper' saga.

Anne is currently working on her own research for a book about Florence Maybrick, and the intriguing possibility that Florence might have been her great-grandmother. And throughout the whole evening I heard nothing to make me doubt the validity of this investigation. The string of coincidences, curious connections, tangible proofs, photographic likenesses, were simply too many (and too lucky) for anyone to have concocted. They were too interwoven and tangled. They matched up with, and touched on, so many areas that a faker, however sharp, deft, and devious could not possibly have had the good fortune to marry together, and would have soon enough given himself away by some minutely detailed error.

In the four hours I spent with Paul, Anne and Carol, I had the results thrust at me of as many years, and more, of research into the Diary's provenance. By the end I was mentally exhausted. Unable to remember names, details, intricacies of complicated family connections -- it all became a blur. But I was left with the undeniable belief that for any and every query, question, challenge or argument that doubters might put forward in dispute of the Diary's authenticity, there was a completely rational and convincing answer or explanation for each one -- backed up with concrete and tangible evidence.

Paul's discourse was almost stream-of-consciousness, leaping from the time delay, for example, between Elizabeth Stride's attack and her actual murder, as reported by Schwartz, to the street in which James Maybrick's mistress, or wife, Sarah Ann had lived in Whitechapel. He would start relating the search for a piece of information, and Anne would pick up the story and finish it. Occasionally Carol would tell a story of her own, of how she came across a certain piece of vital information.

There was absolutely no indication of collusion. The evening was so informal, and so crammed with information that there was no possibility that it could have been stage-managed, or rehearsed, or faked, for my benefit.

I saw documents, signatures, photographs, videoed interviews, letter comparisons, even correspondence so sensitive that it can never be published. I saw three albums of photographs relating to the Graham/Maybrick family. There were more. In these albums were pictures of people dating from the last century to the present time. All different, but all bearing an unmistakeable stamp of similarity; a down-turn at the edge of the mouth; a sameness in the eyes; a slight point on the eyebrows; an undefinable gauntness; all so similar to the face of the woman sitting on the couch opposite me, that I could not doubt that they were related. Anne Graham had the same down-turned mouth, a plumper, rounder face but it also carried the same undeniable gauntness. The evening's conversation and the evidence I saw, made clear that the provenance of the Diary and the Graham/Maybrick link were inextricably inter-connected.

One other thing became abundantly clear, and this was that people, and this includes intelligent and experienced authors and researchers, simply do not read the words in front of them. By that, I mean they do not observe the actual subtleties of the real meaning of the words. This is difficult to explain. If I say, for example, 'I have based my writing on the original documents...' I might be criticised for including something not in the original documents. My words have not been correctly understood, because I have not been correctly understood, because I have left myself leeway by saying only that I have 'based' my writing on the original documents.

Paul Feldman was more generous with the sharing of his research information than anyone could have rightfully expected. I was a stranger, and outsider if you will, and had been shown, and told, serious information that has yet to be made public. I felt very privileged. When the book is finally released and all the facts I was privy to and more, are published, I believe the provenance of the Diary will be extremely hard to disprove.

Exhausted, I left the apartment at about ten o'clock, with the deep impression that, unbelievably, the riddle of Jack the Ripper is closer to being solved than it ever has been before. The one common factor of all the previous 'suspects' has been an author's lack of factual evidence to conclusively prove his case. In the present instance, the staggering amount of researched evidence could very well turn around all the views put forward in the last hundred and eight years.


--Paul Daniel, The Ripperologist.

---


Please make special note of Daniel's comment:

"The string of coincidences, curious connections, tangible proofs, photographic likenesses, were simply too many (and too lucky) for anyone to have concocted. They were too interwoven and tangled. They matched up with, and touched on, so many areas that a faker, however sharp, deft, and devious could not possibly have had the good fortune to marry together, and would have soon enough given himself away by some minutely detailed error."

He sounds convinced.

And yet, dear Ike, ‘concocted’ is precisely what you, Jay, and Caz believe these ‘interwoven and tangled’ proofs to be—complete concoctions! And I must say, Old Chap, that I'm inclined to agree with you!

Edith and Elizabeth Formby; Billy Graham’s tin box; Alice Yapp; the gravestone of the mysterious 'Flynn' that Anne used to visit as a child; the moving of the diary from room to room to thwart Barrett's inquisitive eyes—all of these 'interwoven and tangled’ webs are simply a collection of lies and misinformation or (in Feldman’s case) self-delusion.

In reality--or at least according to your reality--the diary came from under Paul Dodd’s floorboards on 9 March 1992 and Anne didn’t know any more about it true origins the King of Siam did!

Except, of course, that her husband had brought it home one day from the pub and later stormed over to Eddie Lyons’s house---as later widely publicized in Feldman’s own book.

In brief, according to your own theories, Anne was lying through her teeth during the whole of the evening described by Mr. Daniel, sometimes completing Paul Feldman's sentences for him, and putting on one hell of a charade...not just for Mr. Daniel, but for her own romantic partner, Paul Feldman, and for her good friend and co-author, Carol Emmas

How do you propose to explain this extraordinary conduct?

[Iconoclast]

I'm not really sure what response you're waiting on, considering that these are supposed to be hypothetical questions for a hypothetical interview with Anne. Unless the question is: "if you were Anne, how would you approach these questions...?"

Well, in truth, the questions are simply those which I would personally put to Anne if she ever backed-up the belief of Lord Orsam & The Acolytes and came out and confessed to having been involved in the production of the Victorian scrapbook. I personally believe that those questions demonstrate conclusively that she was not involved on any level and they are therefore designed to illustrate that belief - for, if you can illustrate it in theory, you can argue that you have actually illustrated it in practice (i.e., whether Anne were to confess or not).

Going with the idea that Anne/Mike had nothing to do with the penning of the diary, and depending on what particular provenance you personally support, a similar set of questions could be asked...

Why so many varying stories of provenance?

One of the greatest Myths of Maybrickology, Mike. There was only one 'story of provenance': that was the bit from Mike ("I got the diary from Tony Devereux") and then the extended version from Anne ("...after I gave it to Tony Devereux to give to Mike"). So that is backed-up partly by Mike then fully by Anne and then fully by her father, Billy. Now, I don't believe that provenance for a moment but it was - for the record - the only provenance ever offered for authenticity by Mike Barrett. Obviously, Mike then said he fabricated the scrapbook but that's not really a provenance, is it? It's not a provenance because it doesn't lead to authenticity - it leads to inauthenticity.

The far more likely alternative 'provenance' is not really a provenance at all because Mike never once suggested it happened. That, of course, is the Battlecrease House 'provenance' but that's only ever been argued by those who are not Mike Barrett (for example, me) so we can't add that to your mooted 'varying stories of provenance' because the guy who brought it to the public's attention did not make that claim. You can't say that Mike's proferred provenance is weakened because people who were not Mike suggested a different possible provenance.

If the diary had been in your family for decades, why bother to say otherwise?

Why do you ask this question? Anne Graham never once - to my knowledge - said otherwise?

If it came out of Riversdale road, how did it get into the hands of Mike?

Dear God, man, are you struggling to keep up here or what?

Did Mike mention how it had gotten from Riversdale, to an unknown branch of John Moore's university in the city centre, to the Saddle pub, and into your home?

Mike never spoke of the mooted visit to the university - that was the rumour put about by the electricians not by Mike. It may or may not have happened on March 9. It may or may not have happened on March 10. It doesn't matter, though, because Mike never said it happened.

Was any information given to Mike regarding the university visit? Who inspected the diary at this university, and what was said?

That has never been established though the university has stated that a visit took place. Unfortunately, the details are hopelessly sketchy so there is no reason to start arguing that particular visit had anything to do with the Battlecrease electricians.

Did Mike mention why the diary, which had been deemed potentially important enough to take into a university to be looked at by an expert (?) was essentially handed over to him for basically nothing?

Mike only ever said he got it from Tony Devereux at some point in 1991 so - no - he did not ever to my knowledge discuss this story which he appears to have known nothing about.

Knowing that the writing in the diary didn't match yours or Mike's, why put forward the idea that you hoaxed it at all when you knew that said writing would likely be investigated?

I think you've just partly rephrased one of my questions to Anne, there, Mike. Make your own up, eh?

If you had nothing to do with the creation of the diary, why then claim to have hoaxed it when you knew that you had nothing with which to back it up and surely also knowing that such things would be investigated?

Well, in this alternative reality where Anne Graham does confess to having hoaxed the scrapbook, it's really Lord Orsam's Everything, Everywhere, All at Once moment as it's a hypothetical situation designed to illustrate the profoundly unlikely probability that Anne Graham did have any such involvement. In this scenario, your choice of words ("why then claim to have hoaxed it") is utterly irrelevant because we are behaving here as though she made the claim and meant it because it was true.

What was Tony Devereux's involvement with the diary and can you think of any reason why his family would deny having ever seen it?

None whatsoever. This ought to answer your second question too.

There's a million other questions that could be asked, but ultimately, we're never going to have this interview with Anne, are we?

Well not according to Lord Orsam, RJ Palmer, and other such deluded, desperate commentators. According to them, Anne Graham was at the very heart of a hoax so - if they are right - why should she not one day come out and confess and give that one final interview?

Whether you believe that Anne, Mike and/or Tony had anything to do with it, or nothing to do with it, the fact remains that lots of contradictory stories were told that subsequently muddied the already murky waters.

You're back playing The Myth Game. There were no 'contradictory' stories therefore no muddying of 'the already murky waters' (though Muddy the Mud Boy tries hard to achieve this on a regular basis). See above if your short-term memory is ****.

If it came out of Riversdale, why is the timeline so odd?

It's only 'odd' if the scrapbook ever went to John Moore's or any other university and if you are the sort of person who thinks taking such a document to a place of learning is 'odd'. We don't know if it did so you don't need to build it into your deconstruction with such convenient certainty.

Who took it to John Moore's university? What building did they actually take it to, as there's more than one university in town and it's not often you can just ring them up and pdy a visit without an appointment. Who did they speak with and why hasn't this person ever come forward to corroborate this particular story?

Enough with the university, already! We don't know if the scrapbook ever went to a university but we do know with absolute certainty that it had nothing to do with Mike Barrett.

Every provenance in this saga raises questions, really, doesn't it?

There's only one provenance in the formal sense, and we have dealt with that, above. There are theories based upon information which has subsequently come to light but Mike Barrett (nor Anne Graham, obviously) have ever come up with one.

You've got to assume that this unknown person, at the unknown university building, didn't think much of the diary at all, as the electrican who felt it necessary to take it there then went on and handed it to an alcoholic in his local pub for essentially nowt.

I'm sensing that you are ever so slightly hung-up on the unevidenced university story. Try your theory again but skip the unevidenced university bit and see if it fits a bit better in your head this time.

As for the questions regarding why anyone would pick Maybrick as a candidate... Well unless you truly believe that he was JtR and he literally did pen the diary in one of his many different hands... (lol) then that's exactly what somebody did, isn't it? They chose Jim.

The degree of implausibility of a candidate rather obviously begs the question, "Why choose him?". Not all candidates are equal, and James Maybrick as a candidate for Jack the Ripper was way down the ranking (not equal first as you might have us believe).

Why choose anyone?

Because - other than Simon Wood - most Ripperologists have actually suggested a candidate on the grounds that Jack the Ripper actually existed.

The beauty of Ripperdom is that you can chuck any name in there and unless said person was proven to be a million miles away, you've not got a lot to go on.

That's actually the beauty of everything, everywhere, all at once. For every mystery, you are welcome to claim all manner of bizarre explanations. For Jack, we can name anyone we want (as long as they were of killing age in 1888). That doesn't make every candidate equally plausible or equally implausible. there's a spectrum based upon plausibility and Maybrick was way down that list, and yet - as my questions to our hypothetical Anne show - he somehow managed to fit right in there time and time and time and time again (pardon the pun, if you got it).

I'm not sure what relevance "Ja" "ck" has as far as Jim's initials go.

Which really worries me because you are presumably happy with the idea that someone, somewhere, thought to make of James Maybrick a Jack the Ripper and you don't find it even mildly surprising that his name starts with 'Ja' and ends with 'ck'. Why did Jack give himself the name 'Jack'? Well, we don't know, do we? So any candidate who potentially;lly offers us a reason for his choice of nom de plume helps us to estimate his plausibility as the murderer.

.. Unless you contend that Jim not only was Jack but he also wrote the Ripper letters in yet another of his many different hands... (Seriously?) It's pretty "out there" to claim that Maybrick's initials are some sort of clue, as you'd have to then make the claim that Maybrick was the one who came up with the moniker, which would mean you'd have to believe that he wrote the letter and would thus surely have to believe that Maybrick was capable of writing in multiple different hands which is frankly absolutely ludicrous and isn't supported by any evidence whatsoever.

I don't think you should be too quick to assume that people can't write in multiple hands. This one has been illustrated many times before with Peter Kürten usually cited as evidence for a mass murderer doing exactly that.

It's either a coincidence that the beginning and end of Jim's initials spell Jack, or you're implying that he came up with the moniker, which isn't very likely, and he penned the Ripper letters, which is also very unlikely.

If Jack the Ripper was James Maybrick then James Maybrick 100% came up with the moniker 'Jack the Ripper'. I hope you see that? You move 100% certainty to 0% certainty because you assume that Maybrick was not Jack. That's a self-fulfilling prophecy, pally.

At the end of the day, the only person who could clear some of this stuff up is Anne, and she's not talking... So we're left to speculate.

Quite the opposite. By asking the hypothetical Anne the questions I did, I show rather clearly the utterly implausible case anyone puts forward when they suggest Anne Graham had anything to do with the creation of the Victorian scrapbook. You're just left speculating because your brain ain't caught up yet.

The believers will believe and the deniers won't...

Until they no longer can ...

There's not enough evidence either way to suggest that one party is correct.

I put it to you that you cannot possibly know everything you need to know to make that claim.

There's a lot of circumstansial evidence that it wasn't written by Jim, and there's no real evidence that Jim ever cut an unfortunate up in the East end, Manchester, or behind the Poste House after a bag of Charlie and a flaggen of Stella.

Well there's his ******* confession in his scrapbook, for Christ's sake. I'm sure you're not keeping-up here.

We're never going to get much of a resolution on it, and the diary doesn't seem to hold the attention of a great many people, in "Ripperology" or otherwise, save for a bunch of us weirdos.

And yet - it is worth noting - that one of 'us weirdos' is almost certainly correct so perhaps people should pay more attention to us?

Ciao, Aigburth's most beloved son, Michaelangelo.

Ciao.

Aigburth's least heard-of son,

Ike

[rjpalmer]

Why do you ask this question? Anne Graham never once - to my knowledge - said otherwise?

"Bullsh#t!"

(Not my words---but Anne's to Harold Brough).

"He said he got it from Tony and that's all I know."

Are you struggling to keep up, Ike?

[Iconoclast]

"Bullsh#t!"

(Not my words---but Anne's to Harold Brough).

"He said he got it from Tony and that's all I know."

Are you struggling to keep up, Ike?

So she held back what she later added, but she didn't divert from Mike's provenance either to Harold Brough nor later to Paul Feldman. We can argue semantics here if you like. I'll grant you the blindingly-obvious - that she either lied to Brough or else she told the truth to Brough (both are possible, and the latter the more likely) but she did not give a different account to Mike's other than that she got it from her father which, of course, Mike did not know about (as she told it).

I ain't struggling one iota, RJ. I've never been more on top of my game here ...

[rjpalmer]

I'll grant you the blindingly-obvious - that she either lied to Brough or else she told the truth to Brough (both are possible, and the latter the more likely) ...

So, she lied. Don't sugar coat it, Old Man. And give up the semantic games. It’s not a dichotomy. In either case, she lied to someone.

If she lied to Brough, she lied to Brough.

If she told the truth to Brough, as you suspect, it is even more remarkable, because that means she later lied and lied elaborately to Feldman, to Harrison, to Daniel, etc. (See previous post, #9394)

You can't have it both ways.

Shirley Harrison tried the semantic shuffle on p. 279 of The American Connection.

"I did not feel that Anne had lied. She just evaded the truth."

(Try that one in a confession booth or in the back of a squad car!)

But, in Shirley’s defense, she had already dismissed the Battlecrease/Fat Eddie provenance that you are so eager to promote, so she had a better claim to suspension-of-disbelief than you do.

By contrast, you’re playing both sides.

I ain't struggling one iota, RJ. I've never been more on top of my game here ...

Game is right, Ike. You're what they call a 'player.'

If your bromance with the Fat Eddie/floorboard provenance burns out, you'll have a clear path back to Anne's arms.

That's the motive behind these semantics. Also known as 'Plan B.'

And this exposes the weakness of the Miracle on March 9th. You don’t believe it yourself. If you did, you’d have no problem admitting that Anne’s behavior to Paul Daniel, Paul Feldman, Carol Emmas, Keith Skinner, etc., was ‘beyond the beyonds.’

And then you'd also have to admit that you don't have a credible explanation for it.

[Iconoclast]

In either case, she lied to someone.

There is absolutely no doubt that Anne has lied at some point. Let he or she who is without sin, and all that, but are we hanging her out to dry because she has potentially used an evasive untruth to Brough or a necessary untruth to Feldman? Brough had no God-given right to hear the truth from Anne Graham or anyone else. She was entitled to lie if she wanted to. It's not (yet) a crime. It's a human, all-too human trait known down all of the generations. People lie. Hold the front page. Psychologists have shown clear evidence that those who lie strategically will tend to succeed in life (as a general rule of thumb). Once she had sought to take control of the narrative away from her steaming drunk husband by claiming that the scrapbook came from her own family, she had to lie (if, of course, it wasn't true) to Feldman and to Azuria and the television audience and to everyone else who ever asked her about the truth of it. Get over it, man - it's not the issue here!

I hadn't realised your post was addressed to me so I didn't read it, but I now have and I am left wondering about exactly what Paul Daniel was shown and told to get him so excited that evening 'round at Feldman's place. He obviously felt the whole was greater than the sum of its parts, and he must have done otherwise Lord Orsam's evisceration of my brilliant Society's Pillar I was at least partly misplaced. Orsam mocked the photographs I took from Feldman which I suggested (as Feldman had suggested and which Daniel appears to have been sold on) gave strong reason to think that there was an obvious familial resemblance between Florence Maybrick, William Graham, and his daughter Mary Graham. Now, I don't know which way I am to think about these photographs. Daniel sounded overwhelmed by the similarities whereas Orsam claimed that similarities in older age were common (as though we all morph into one another as we get older). The irony is that this all just argues in favour of authenticity of the scrapbook which is obviously not your intention but nevertheless leads me to that radical conclusion.

And the greater irony is that this is all irrelevant to the present discussion anyway. Muddy the Mud Boy has struck again. I listed all the questions I would ask of Anne Graham if - as you and Orsam believe - she created a hoax with her hapless Mike, and I did so in order to illustrate how implausible such a confession would be if she ever made it. Rather than address that, Muddy played to his strengths and dived straight into the mud by talking about something completely different - as if articulating some obscure and highly-tangential sideshow might detract from an awkward post, using distraction as a tactic. One might even say using it strategically.

You can't have it both ways. Shirley Harrison tried the semantic shuffle on p. 279 of The American Connection. "I did not feel that Anne had lied. She just evaded the truth."

Shirley was referring to Anne's confession on Feldman's tape of July 31, 1994, not to Anne's comment to Brough. I really wish you wouldn't do that, Muddy. You've attempted to support your 'argument' (whatever it is - where I do struggle to keep up is usually in following the twists and turns of your convoluted reasoning to reach a conclusion you had already determined in advance) by citing something someone said in an entirely different context. Shirley was making an honest point - Anne had not lied to Shirley, she had simply been economical with the truth.

But, in Shirley’s defense, she had already dismissed the Battlecrease/Fat Eddie provenance that you are so eager to promote, so she had a better claim to suspension-of-disbelief than you do.

Again, you distort the actualités for your obvious advantage. Shirley's comments regarding a possible Battlecrease provenance were made before 2004 (and not made public until 2017) when Skinner and Atkins discovered that the timesheets showed the work on Battlecrease House had happened on the very morning of the fatal 'phonecall to Doreen Montgomery. If she had known that, she may well have changed her tune when 'American Connection' was published in 2003. To date Anne's views on the Battlecrease connection are not known.

Game is right, Ike. You're what they call a 'player.'

Seriously, RJ, you're confusing me with someone who gives a ****.

If your bromance with the Fat Eddie/floorboard provenance burns out, you'll have a clear path back to Anne's arms.

A more honest comment would be that I have not excluded the possibility that Anne has been telling the truth all these years even though the miracle coincidence of the 'double event' of March 9, 1992, causes my highly-attuned statistical brain to favour it overwhelmingly. Amazing coincidences can happen and I don't know for certain that one didn't on March 9, 1992, so I cannot in all conscience discard entirely the possibility that Anne's extended provenance was actually the true one after all.

That's the motive behind these semantics. Also known as 'Plan B.'

Just because you've plucked a few choice quotations and events from the mud and moulded them together doesn't make a coherent artefact or indeed argument.

And this exposes the weakness of the Miracle on March 9th.

See what RJ is doing here, dear readers? It's been in the background the whole time. He and Orsam absolutely hate the March 9, 1992, 'double event' and - much like Florrie's initials on Kelly's wall - would do absolutely anything to be rid of it. So a truly awful, tenuous, mud-laden 'argument' leads to the convenient conclusion that evidence suggesting authenticity of the Victorian scrapbook should be discarded. Thank God you all have me to keep you right and keep RJ honest, as they say.

You don’t believe it yourself.

Oh, I thought I did, but you'd know better, I guess, Muddy?

If you did ...

And I do.

... you’d have no problem admitting that Anne’s behavior to Paul Daniel, Paul Feldman, Carol Emmas, Keith Skinner, etc., was ‘beyond the beyonds.’

Well, here's the rub, RJ. I wasn't there so it's really hard to get to the bottom of what Daniels actually witnessed.

And then you'd also have to admit that you don't have a credible explanation for it.

They say (incorrectly, mind) that the eskimos have thirteen words for 'snow'. How many do we think RJ has for 'mud'?

Ike

[rjpalmer]

Hi Ike.

Somewhat unexpectedly, your meandering and evasive post reminded me of an old Don Henley song.

"Anne is cooking up a provenance in the kitchen sink, and all he wants to do is dance, dance, dance."

I don't know if that song ever made it across the pond?

Either way, you clearly know how to dance to it!

Orsam mocked the photographs I took from Feldman which I suggested (as Feldman had suggested and which Daniel appears to have been sold on) gave strong reason to think that there was an obvious familial resemblance between Florence Maybrick, William Graham, and his daughter Mary Graham. Now, I don't know which way I am to think about these photographs. Daniel sounded overwhelmed by the similarities whereas Orsam claimed that similarities in older age were common (as though we all morph into one another as we get older). The irony is that this all just argues in favour of authenticity of the scrapbook which is obviously not your intention but nevertheless leads me to that radical conclusion.

Clarification, dear sir.

Your great statistical brain--second only to your keen 'psychologist's ear'--convinces you that the diary came from under Paul Dodd's floorboards on March 9th, which means that Anne Graham knows Jack-all about the diary and hadn't seen it in 1970, nor Billy Graham in 1950, and all this Formby/Yapptrap is pure invention.

At least one would assume so…

Yet, perhaps not, for you characterize this four-hour charade described by Paul Daniel–including the ‘photographic evidence’ produced by Feldman and Anne—as "arguing in favour of authenticity."

Err...come again?

How so?

What are you suggesting? That both provenances are true? That somehow, in your own mind, you can reconcile and ‘marry’ these two opposing forces?

How would this work?

1. Anne Graham managed to sneak inside Dodd’s house prior to March 9th, lift the floorboards, and deposited her ‘in the family’ diary underneath? And then, boomerang-like, it found its way back to Goldie Street via a Barrett/Lyons swap meet?

2. Eddie discovered a diary hidden for 100+ years and—through luck, fate, or the hand of an All-Seeing God—just happens to ‘fence’ it to a man whose father-in-law was the direct descendant of the illegitimate child of Florence Maybrick, and who, at the same time, ended up with a step ‘ganny’ or ‘granny’ who was also a friend of Alice Yapp?

Is that the idea? What odds would your statistical mind place against this happening by sheer chance?

See what RJ is doing here, dear readers? It's been in the background the whole time. He and Orsam absolutely hate the March 9, 1992, 'double event' and - much like Florrie's initials on Kelly's wall - would do absolutely anything to be rid of it.

I can’t speak for Orsam, but why would I care that Dodd had some work done on his house on 9 March 1992? He seems to have been a man that had quite a lot of work done on his house.

You seem to be overly impressed that this happened on the same day that Barrett found a sympathetic literary agent—an activity that could have been spread out over several days or weeks. We don’t know how many ‘misses’ Mike may have made—only the one ‘hit,’ so there’s also an element of confirmation bias, coupled with the rather blasé fact that some electrical work commenced at the same time. As the diary does not mention floorboards, there is no 'coincidence' except what your own mind invents.

What strikes me most, however, is that despite all your 'sound and fury' about these floorboards, you clearly aren't convinced that anything happened that day, since you're still open to the possibility that the diary really came from Anne and Billy Graham via Elizabeth Formby. If you had the conviction of a Caroline Brown, for instance, you'd readily wash your hands of Ms. Yapp and Ms. Formby. That you still give lip-service to this entirely different provenance undermines whatever facade of confidence you exhibit when you plump for this earthshattering 'coincidence' of March 9th.

I don't think there is any more to say than that.

[rjpalmer]

Well, here's the rub, RJ. I wasn't there so it's really hard to get to the bottom of what Daniels actually witnessed.

Come on, Ike, is that the best that you got?

We know what Daniel (not Daniels) didn't witness.

He didn't witness Anne Graham saying "my ex-husband Mike brought the diary home around 9 March 1992 (several months after Tony's death) and that's all I know about it. I recall that he later went over to someone's house by The Saddle and raised a ruckus. I think he said the man was an electrician."

Instead, Daniel writes " Anne is currently working on her own research for a book about Florence Maybrick, and the intriguing possibility that Florence might have been her great-grandmother.”

We also know that Daniel is aware of all the Graham-Formby-Yapp claptrap, and writes:

“[Paul Feldman] would start relating the search for a piece of information, and Anne would pick up the story and finish it.”

This is an account of Anne actively promoting the same 'in the family' theory that would soon appear in Feldman’s The Final Chapter.

And I’m not muddying the waters, nor changing the subject. I’m just reporting the news and am curious how you intend on reconciling this news with your own beliefs, and what bearing Daniel's account may have on the questions you propose to ask Anne Graham. Think it through, Old Man. Many of your questions are along the lines of "why would Anne have done such a thing?" Yet, confronted with the account given by Paul Daniel, you seem to have no interest in explaining why she is behaving the way she is behaving if, as you believe, the diary came from under Dodd's floorboards.

Why do you give a damn what I or Orsam think? What is your explanation for Anne's behavior?

Here's something Caz Brown wrote to me a few years back on the ‘handwriting thread,’ that might help you see the dilemma Daniel’s account poses:

I have very little doubt that Anne could tell us more if she so wished, but she did say, when we last interviewed her for Ripper Diary, that this was the last time she would speak about it. That was rather unfortunate because it did - and does - raise suspicions that she had something to hide. As you know, since the book was published, we had reason to look again at the old electrician rumours, which, if true, make a liar out of Anne every bit as much as if she really had authored or penned the diary.

Do you see the dilemma now?

Some people aren’t quite as good at juggling contradictions as other people and might be wondering what distinguishes a woman who could lie this elaborately to people she had become friendly with—Feldman, Emmas, Skinner, etc.--- and the behavior of a person who ‘really had authored or penned the diary.’

And it gets worse the more one thinks it over, because let me remind you of something.

Paul Feldman was desperate to find a legitimate provenance to save his film deal. DESPERATE. And yet Anne, who had supposedly become close to him, never once whispered in his ear that Mike had brought the Diary of Jack the Ripper home from the pub in March/April 1992?

How can that be?

Even if Anne knew next to nothing, and didn't know diddly about Eddie, what she did know would have been invaluable nonetheless. All she had to tell Feldman is that the Formby/Yapp connection was an invention, that she hadn’t seen the diary as a young woman, that Mike had come home with the diary several months later than she claimed--in March/April 1992--which would have allowed Feldman to work his way back around to the Dodd provenance, or follow other lines of inquiry instead of wasting his time on her malarky. It could have theoretically saved his film deal...

...yet never a peep.

To my mind, that is damning and requires an explanation, Ike. Yet no one seems to offer any sensible explanation for Anne’s extraordinary behavior.

I hope this explains my unwanted intrusion on your thread. Now we can presumably return to the dead air that this thread exhibited over the past 10 weeks. As Mike comments, it's just us eight or nine 'weirdos.' No one else seems to give a damn, having dismissed the diary thirty years ago. So, if you want to discuss it, it would probably be in your best interest to quit insulting the few people who are willing to discuss it. Or maybe not. It's your call. Cheers.

[Iconoclast]

Hi Ike.
Clarification, dear sir.
Your great statistical brain--second only to your keen 'psychologist's ear'--convinces you that the diary came from under Paul Dodd's floorboards on March 9th, which means that Anne Graham knows Jack-all about the diary and hadn't seen it in 1970, nor Billy Graham in 1950, and all this Formby/Yapptrap is pure invention.

You use the term 'convinces you'. I guess I must have said I am 100% convinced that the scrapbook came from out of Battlecrease House on March 9, 1992?

If I have not stated that I am 100% 'convinced, then you have just muddied the waters again. Let me at least offer today's position (thought you'd like that - in future you can quote "Let me at least offer today's position" so that our dear readers will think my convictions shift daily - just remember to cut out the parentheses). I believe that the 'double event' of March 9, 1992, is such a statistical freak that it must surely be true - let's say 95%+ sure (for sake of an enumeration of my conviction).

That's not 100%, note, so it's not 'convinced'. Clearly, I have been reckless in the past regarding my beliefs.

Yet, perhaps not, for you characterize this four-hour charade described by Paul Daniel–including the ‘photographic evidence’ produced by Feldman and Anne—as "arguing in favour of authenticity."

Err...come again?

How so?

What are you suggesting? That both provenances are true? That somehow, in your own mind, you can reconcile and ‘marry’ these two opposing forces?

The only face you muddy here is your own, RJ. Our dear readers are more than capable of understanding that having two possibilities for the cause of an event does not mean that both possibilities have to have happened for the event to have occurred. Obviously, only one is needed. If you have two options, though, that's quite a luxury, wouldn't you say?

You seem to be overly impressed that this happened on the same day that Barrett found a sympathetic literary agent&#8212 ...

Anyone who claims that they are not impressed that the 'double event' occurred is either not hot on statistical probability or else is simply in denial.

What strikes me most, however, is that despite all your 'sound and fury' about these floorboards, you clearly aren't convinced that anything happened that day, since you're still open to the possibility that the diary really came from Anne and Billy Graham via Elizabeth Formby.

No, I'm not convinced. There is obviously room for error here. The most earth-shattering coincidence may very well have happened on March 9, 1992. If that were ever proven to be the case, we'd then be able to move on from that possibility. It would be to Plan B, but it would certainly be to Option B. That is the luxury of those who believe the Victorian scrapbook is authentic.

I don't think there is any more to say than that.

I think the sensible reader would disagree most keenly.

[Iconoclast]

He didn't witness Anne Graham saying "my ex-husband Mike brought the diary home around 9 March 1992 (several months after Tony's death) and that's all I know about it. I recall that he later went over to someone's house by The Saddle and raised a ruckus. I think he said the man was an electrician."
Instead, Daniel writes " Anne is currently working on her own research for a book about Florence Maybrick, and the intriguing possibility that Florence might have been her great-grandmother.”

I am convinced that - having told her original story to Paul Feldman's telephone message recorder - she would have had to stick with that. If Daniel was convinced, good for him. I wasn't there, I wasn't convinced. By the way, of course it wasn't Paul Daniels. If it had, that would have been magic ...

We also know that Daniel is aware of all the Graham-Formby-Yapp claptrap, and writes:
“[Paul Feldman] would start relating the search for a piece of information, and Anne would pick up the story and finish it.”
This is an account of Anne actively promoting the same 'in the family' theory that would soon appear in Feldman’s The Final Chapter.

And that is why Daniel's tale comes from an argument for authenticity.

And I’m not muddying the waters, nor changing the subject. I’m just reporting the news and am curious how you intend on reconciling this news with your own beliefs, and what bearing Daniel's account may have on the questions you propose to ask Anne Graham. Think it through, Old Man. Many of your questions are along the lines of "why would Anne have done such a thing?" Yet, confronted with the account given by Paul Daniel, you seem to have no interest in explaining why she is behaving the way she is behaving if, as you believe, the diary came from under Dodd's floorboards.

No, no, no, no, no. Muddy, you have to stop doing this! My questions to Anne were 100% predicated upon her coming out and confessing at last to your beliefs, not mine!!!!

Why do you give a damn what I or Orsam think? What is your explanation for Anne's behavior?

My explanation for Anne's behaviour is that she acted in a way which argued to Paul Daniel for authenticity, though unfortunately we have no better record of this event than his own memory.

Paul Feldman was desperate to find a legitimate provenance to save his film deal. DESPERATE. And yet Anne, who had supposedly become close to him, never once whispered in his ear that Mike had brought the Diary of Jack the Ripper home from the pub in March/April 1992?
How can that be?

Lord knows, perhaps she did. And maybe she and Feldman felt that Anne's version would be more convincing than that version of Mike's (if there was one). I don't know, RJ, but my not knowing does not argue for inauthenticity.

To my mind, that is damning and requires an explanation, Ike. Yet no one seems to offer any sensible explanation for Anne’s extraordinary behavior.

I think I literally just did that.

I hope this explains my unwanted intrusion on your thread. Now we can presumably return to the dead air that this thread exhibited over the past 10 weeks. As Mike comments, it's just us eight or nine 'weirdos.' No one else seems to give a damn, having dismissed the diary thirty years ago. So, if you want to discuss it, it would probably be in your best interest to quit insulting the few people who are willing to discuss it. Or maybe not. It's your call. Cheers.

The lack of an audience does not mean the show is ****, RJ.

[rjpalmer]

No, I'm not convinced. There is obviously room for error here.

Thanks, Ike. Nor is anyone else convinced...nor should they be. Accept for Caz, who has stated she is 100% convinced, so perhaps I should redirect this thread to her.

I can't be the only person to notice that the Lyons provenance went from there being enough documentation to prove it in a 'court of law.'

To enough documentation to prove it 'to the court of history.'

To 'my preferred provenance.'

To 'possibly a coincidence.'

To 'maybe Anne Graham has told the truth, after all.'

Which I suspect many readers will interpret as 'I haven't the faintest idea what is true, but I believe that Mike and Anne didn't write it, though I can't really give a coherent reason why I believe that, beyond my own psychological insights into their personalities, though I am at the same time willing to admit that Anne Graham could have been deceiving us all over a period of many months, and of course that Barrett was also a liar, which however doesn't to my mind suggest that he or she would have stooped to creating this hoax, nor did they have the combined talents to do so.'

It all comes across as rather subjective.

Having followed this saga for many years, I think the above is a fair assessment of where the majority of the diary enthusiasts now stand, but you can rewrite the above if you want to make it sound less wishy-washy. Good luck with your thread. I also can't help noticing that the JFK assassination thread has received nearly 2,000 posts in 2 months, which means it is on pace to surpass the 'Greatest Thread of All' before the end of autumn. It took you 14 1/2 years to reach #9403, and I, for one, will feel great regret if you are forced to come up with a new slogan. For your sake, I hope that interest in the grassy knoll wanes, so you remain at the top of your perch. Cheers.

[rjpalmer]

Lord knows, perhaps she did. And maybe she and Feldman felt that Anne's version would be more convincing than that version of Mike's (if there was one). I don't know, RJ, but my not knowing does not argue for inauthenticity.

Paul Feldman knew the truth, but lied to his own researchers and to his readers? He simply passed on Anne's story because he thought it sounded 'convincing' even though he knew it was bogus?

If I had suggested that--and who know, maybe I did suggest it somewhere in the past--Caz Morris and/or Keith Skinner would have thrown a fit.

But I suspect you'll get a pass, Ike!