Fake!

[Cogidubnus]

Oh god

Dave

[spyglass]

Not quite...but he's damn close!!!

[Jenni Shelden]

What constitutes proof? I genuinely mean this because I gave up thinking it could be proved to the satisfaction of myself to any degree long ago.

[Jonathan H]

The key to the scams involving both the 'Diary' and then the watch was to work out how scientists test for age in both, and make sure those conclusions would be ambiguous.

That's what they started with as the Hitler 'Dairies' showed that they had to get the forensics 'right', and the 'Majestic12' documents showed that they would have to avoid, as much as possible, give-away anachronistic features.

It is not true that I have called the hoaxers lazy or shoddy, but they were crude (eg. the watch was an obvious over-reach) and made errors based on inaccurate secondary sources.

Some of the passionate invective launched by the pro-Diaryists reminds me of the emotive claims on behalf of Anna Anderson, who falsely claimed to be Anastasia Romanov.

It was obvious from the start that she was an imposter, but people said she would not lie, that her ears and feet matched, and she knew things only a member of the court could know (because certain courtiers told her hoping to access the frozen family fortune.)

Yet like the 'Diary' not being in Maybrick's handwriting so too Anderson had an obvious, glaring flaw; she lacked proficiency in the Russian language.

DNA posthumously exposed her scam but there are, as with the 'Diary' and Roswell and Bigfoot, still believers -- who need to believe.

http://www.freewebs.com/anastasiafranziska/legendofannaanderson.htm

[Jonathan H]

http://newsfeed.time.com/2012/08/08/possible-da-vinci-painting-found-in-scotland/?iid=nf-article-trend-now

[Tempus omnia revelat]

It might take some time, though, as I'm not only dealing with infrared film,

Infrared film in connection with the MJK photographs? Do you quite have any idea how ridiculous that is?

Don.

Dear Supe,

I'm not entirely sure why you think that using infrared film in the case of the MJK photograph is ridiculous. I have used infrared film at thr PRO for many years now and the results have been very encouraging. I certainly have test photos of the MJK photograph that show distinct letters and shapes on the partion wall that would otherwise have remained hidden.

I presume, as you are commenting, that you have some knowledge in the field of infrared luminescence. In which case you should know that with correct conditions many interesting results can be achieved.

If you don't try, Supe, you will never know. And that means we will all be here on this site for another one hundred years, wondering who Jack the Ripper was.

[Jonathan H]

To Tempus

I'm not wondering.

I accept the reliability of a primary, police source from 1914, though the solution was first veiled to the public in 1898 -- and in the Edwardian Era -- but the 1914 source matches critical primary sources from 1891, and from 1888.

[caz]

Hi Jonathan,

Could we possibly leave poor Monty out of this thread before it becomes polluted with Thames water like so many others? Thank you.

Mind you, it doesn't bode well for your pet theory to see all this guff you spout about the diary and watch hoaxers knowing in advance all about the available scientific tests and what would or could be done to try and date the writing. I've read some piffle in my time but this is up there with the worst of it. Have you not bothered to read anything about the testing: what has been tried; who has commissioned what; who has actually paid for it and so on?

Some of the wilful ignorance around here takes the breath away.

But carry on, because it only makes Druitt look even more dead in the water than he did before you dragged the poor sod up again.

Love,

Caz
X

[Tom Mitchell]

Hi Jonathan,
Could we possibly leave poor Monty out of this thread before it becomes polluted with Thames water like so many others? Thank you.
Love,
Caz
X

And on that note ... Jonathan, you really should have a read of Sugden's 'Complete History' which - whilst typically biased and dismissive of the diary - cogently illustrates to us the perils of believing anything the police chiefs ever said in their memoirs or languidly scribbled in their margins in old age. There isn't a single shred of evidence that points to any of the 'canonical' suspects, and certainly not Druitt whose only crime on record was that of impeccable bad timing for his suicide.

In my original post, I listed a host of examples which point towards or point away from Maybrick as Jack. Unforgivably, I forgot to include two further examples.

In Harrison's original text, she published a copy of the Telegraph's Oct 6 1888 photofit of Jack, and by anyone's interpretation the likeness to James Maybrick is remarkable. It has been said that Harrison compared this photofit with a picture of Michael Maybrick, and actually I suspect it was Edwin Maybrick, but either way, the photofit does actually resemble James in a way which only wild coincidence or absolute guilt can explain.

The second example comes from Feldman's 'Final Chapter' (p108 in my original paperback) where the London Echo of Sept 1 1888 is quoted:

WHO IS JIM?
There is another point of some importance upon which the police rely. It is the statement of John Morgan, a coffee-stall keeper, who says that a woman, whose description answers that given to him of the victim [Nichols], called at his stall - three mnutes walk from Buck's Row - early yesterday morning. She was accompanied by a man whom she addressed as Jim ...

There are literally no limits on how many male names John Morgan could have heard. But he didn't hear the victim address a man called 'Montague'. And he didn't hear the victim address a man called 'Michael' [Ostrog]. And he didn't hear the victim address a man called 'Francis' [Tumblety]. It was 'Jim'. You absolutely could not make that up, could you?

I haven't rated these examples - that was just a bit of sport - but I certainly now include them because they fundamentally point towards a man called Jim looking like Maybrick [Oct 6 photofit], and dressing like a man of some wealth [Hutchinson's statement] witnessed on three separate occasions in connection with the canonical victims.

None of this proves Maybrick to be Jack, but the collected circumstances point to Maybrick in a way which no other suspect can come even vaguely close to. This is why - to quote a phrase - Maybrick remains the most popular suspect on this Casebook.

PS If anyone posts a reply along the lines of 'So what - there must have been tens of thousands of men called Jim in London in 1888', I think I will finally give up the chase ...

Tom

[Scott Nelson]

I cant see the point of starting a new thread when there are at least two already in existance.

Have you checked the archived threads? There's a lot more than a few.

[Jonathan H]

To Tom Mitchell

Snap! By coincidence I was in a bookshopt oday and discovered a copt of Sudgen.

I will start a thread explaining why this [excellent] writer's take on Macnaghten and Druitt is well written but superficial and incomplete, but suffice it is to say it comes down to this:

1. Sudgen is unaware of the 'West of Enalgand' MP identification because it only happened in 2008. This broke the old paradigm, of innocent Montie and forget Mac, because it shows that Macnaghten did have access to a source of 'private infromation' who knew the police chief and knew the Druitts. That the notion of Montie as the fiend, right or wrong, originates not from Mac's supposed confusion, but from Dorset -- from a wing of the murderer's surviving relations.

2. Sudgen quotes Sims and Griffiths but not completely, and so the analysis here is still-born. For example, he does not notice that Griffiths changed the Druitt 'family' into 'friends' -- in effect hid them -- or that Sims added further fictitious material about the 'drowned doctor'; that a discreet, deflective game with potentially libellous data is being played out here.

3. Sudgen does not analyse thoroughly Mac's memoirs. Therefore he misses that Macnaghten has pulled back from the murder/self-murder slam dunk conjunction, or that in leaving out 'Kosminski' and Ostrog he was agreeing with the future demolition of them as viable suspects by secondary sources such as ... Sudgen.

In other words I think Sudgen is as wrong about Druitt as you must think he was about the 'Diary'.

But I will now continue this debate on a Sudgen-Druitt thread.

[Jonathan H]

To Tom Mitchell

I will need time I don't have just right now to put my case that Sudgen, while an excellent writer and very entertaining, is fundamentally flawed.

But what I can say is that you and I see it from reverse-mirror image positions: I think he is hopeless on Druitt -- his Macnaghten is nothing more than a cipher -- but is very pithy and pertinent on the 'Diary'.

[Bridewell]

Mjd

Hi Jonathan,

Could we possibly leave poor Monty out of this thread before it becomes polluted with Thames water like so many others?

Apparently not.

Regards, Bridewell.

[Casebook Wiki Editor]

It is almost twenty years now since the Maybrick diary was first published, and an entire realm of research, argument, debate, and misinformation has been constructed, deconstructured, analysed, and criticised; and yet still we approach the third decade of the puzzle with the only piece of evidence in the Jack the Ripper canon routinely marginalised.

I just want to complement you for a series of insightful posts. As you may or may not know, I will be giving a talk at the York conference next month entitled "An Inconvenient Book: Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About the Diary Tests But Were Afraid to Ask". I will undoubtedly cheat and talk about some of the notable textual "errors" you've done a fine job of analyzing.

The "error" I have the toughest time explaining is the placement of MJK's breasts on a table. The rest don't cause me much angst.

[Stephen Thomas]

The "error" I have the toughest time explaining is the placement of MJK's breasts on a table.

What's the quote for that in the 'diary'?

Looks like somebody had perused the McCormick book.