The Diary—Old Hoax or New?

[caz]

Some do, others don't, Scotty - so it comes down to personal opinion.

That is not nearly enough to make a case for Anne Graham being willing or able to commit fraud to keep her husband happy, by disguising her handwriting over 63 pages. When Mike took the diary to London, who stood to gain most financially from its publication, if not Mike, Shirley and Robert Smith? What would have been in it for Anne in March/April 1992, to make it worth the risk of exposure and a prison sentence, and the repercussions for her young daughter? What experience and expertise did she have with literary hoaxes, to make her believe she could succeed where the fakers of the Hitler and Mussolini Diaries failed?

Love,

Caz
X

[Scott Nelson]

OK thank you Caroline. Does anybody see a similarity between Ann Graham's handwriting and that in the Diary?

[caz]

Hi Scotty,

Melvin was furious when his suspected penman's name came out publicly, so at the time it appeared that he was afraid of a potential libel action, as he had no actual evidence that Kane was involved. It was all groundless speculation and suspicion, based on the flimsiest circumstantial evidence.

If the diary author disguised his/her handwriting, and therefore couldn't be conclusively identified, that may explain why Melvin didn't dare name the suspect himself. Accusing a living person on the sole basis that their handwriting can't rule them out as a fraudster [which could have applied to pretty much any literate English speaker alive at the right time] must surely be a risky business.

Love,

Caz
X

[Scott Nelson]

Melvin Harris made a cryptic comment years ago -- maybe it was a post on this site or in one of his essays. He said "Lay off of Kane." What could he have meant by this? Kane was an old man then.

[caz]

Inside Story is a must-read, and I'm disappointed that lovely Caz no longer posts on these boards; I'm sure I speak for most when I say, 'Come back Caz, your deep knowledge and your sense of fair play are very much missed. As is your sense of humour, a rarity here these days.'

Grahan

Hear hear Graham - it is a national scandal that Caz no longer posts on Casebook and I for one demand action by the powers that be.

What do we want? Caz posts!
When do we want them? Now!

Okay, fingers crossed …

Ike

Cheers chaps, but I don't remember ever going away - not for very long anyway. Just a couple of Maybrick threads from last year, including this one, which I've only just caught up with.

They can't get rid of me that easily.

Love,

Caz
X

[caz]

Hi Graham,

Quite right - respect is due, your No. 2 spot in the Orsam rankings is both worthy and meritful (the spell checker doesn't like this word so I've added it to my dictionary to get rid of that tiresome red underline). I only mentioned c.d.'s 3rd place because he/she mentioned it themselves. To date, Caz hasn't commented on her respectable 4th place, but I have no doubt that being out of the medal places will drive her on in the future !

The future starts now, in that case! I've only just read about my 'respectable' 4th place in Orsam's heart last summer, and can only hope to be on the podium soon, if not already.

Love,

Caz
X

[caz]

Hey! I got mentioned by name in David's article. Well I'll be damned. Number 3 on the list I might add and in front of Caz. Take that Caz! I didn't think I was that important but the buttons are now flying off my inflated chest. My immediate response is to devote my life to reading countless obscure plumbing journals to prove David wrong. On second thought I'll just politely ask David to research the first usage of the expression "go pound sand up your ass."

c.d.

First I've heard of this, c.d. Mind you, I'm only 14 months late to the party.

Love,

Caz
X

[caz]

I honestly think that to suggest the Diary was written by Bongo Barrett is more ludicrous than to suggest it was written by Maybrick. And surely if Barrett created the Diary then he's also responsible for the watch, so we now have him being capable of embedding old metal particles in the watch in such a way as to fool experts, and then selling the watch to a jewellers shop in the hope his engravings will be discovered and back up the Diary? And if he created (or was part of the nest of forgers who created) both then why make the signature on the watch match JM's but not the one in the Diary?? Did Barrett ever speak of the watch or Albert Johnson on record? Just wondering what his thoughts were.

Hi Steven,

Finally catching up with this thread after a looong absence...

Mike Barrett did tell private investigator, Alan Gray, during a recorded conversation, that he put the scratches in the watch himself, but those who profess to be 100% satisfied that he told the truth about his part in the diary's creation, and that anyone who doubts it must be stupid, have been a lot less forthcoming concerning his claim to have hoaxed the watch too. I can't think why.

I can't recall Mike saying much if anything about Albert Johnson. However, I was once in Anne's company, with Albert and Val Johnson in the same room, and I asked her what she thought about the watch, and what she had gathered about it from the Johnsons, who were not quite in earshot. She looked a bit flustered, muttering something non-specific before going off to talk to someone else. I got the distinct impression she had never had that conversation with the Johnsons, and had no intention of having it now, with anyone. I found this odd, considering her own story regarding the diary. If I knew it to be genuinely decades old, I'd have been extremely interested in the watch and what the Johnsons felt about it.

Anne's reaction could be taken in two ways. If she had helped create the diary in the early 1990s, she'd have known the watch was a bandwagon hoax from 1993, with a Johnson at the centre of operations. If she suspected the diary had been stolen and sold on to Mike in March 1992, she may have suspected the watch had been stolen from the same place, and sold on to Albert later the same year.

Either way, it might explain Anne's reluctance to engage with me or the Johnsons about it.

Love,

Caz
X

[Iconoclast]

Do masons actually admit to anyone being a member of their order? I ask, because ages ago there were rumours about a member of the Royal Family - was he a Mason, or what - and as far as I can recall the masons kept mum about the matter.

Graham

Whether they do or they don't, I can't imagine they see any obvious benefit to them from doing so so I would err on the side of they tend to keep schtum.

I'm probably one, for goodness sake (they've never denied it, after all).

I'll bet He Who Must Not Be Named is one. Hopefully not in the Lower Whottlington on the Whottle Order, where I am most likely to be inducted if it turns out I'm not already one.

Ike
Future Funny Handshake Boy

[Graham]

Hear hear Graham - it is a national scandal that Caz no longer posts on Casebook and I for one demand action by the powers that be.

What do we want? Caz posts!
When do we want them? Now!

Okay, fingers crossed …

Ike

I'm wid yez on dat, Ted.

Graham

[Graham]

He has conclusively proved James Maybrick was indeed a mason, despite the masons claiming he wasn't. Fishy stuff indeed

Do masons actually admit to anyone being a member of their order? I ask, because ages ago there were rumours about a member of the Royal Family - was he a Mason, or what - and as far as I can recall the masons kept mum about the matter.

Graham

[Iconoclast]

Inside Story is a must-read, and I'm disappointed that lovely Caz no longer posts on these boards; I'm sure I speak for most when I say, 'Come back Caz, your deep knowledge and your sense of fair play are very much missed. As is your sense of humour, a rarity here these days.'
Grahan

Hear hear Graham - it is a national scandal that Caz no longer posts on Casebook and I for one demand action by the powers that be.

What do we want? Caz posts!
When do we want them? Now!

Okay, fingers crossed …

Ike

[erobitha]

I started reading Robinson some time ago, but after a while began to wonder if I had sufficient life-force left at my time of life to finish it. Have juts dug it out again for another bash.

Inside Story is a must-read, and I'm disappointed that lovely Caz no longer posts on these boards; I'm sure I speak for most when I say, 'Come back Caz, your deep knowledge and your sense of fair play are very much missed. As is your sense of humour, a rarity here these days.'

Grahan

I know Robinson points the finger at Michael Maybrick and I am just getting to that part of the book. I am skeptical but will remain open minded. In the first half the book he sets the premise of "What if the police didn't want to find the Ripper?" and looking at the world of Jack The Ripper through that prism, does give a whole different slant to proceedings. Factor in the equivalent of today's rolling 24 hour news and social media outrages with the height of the newspaper press in London at the time, and you get a sense the higher levels of the London police forces might have been more pre-occupied and concerned on simply covering their own proverbial arses. The link to masonry is also well-documented I know originally by Stephen Knight, but Robinson's research goes much deeper. Once you are willing to be open-minded to these concepts, suddenly the coronor inquests, the witnesses called and the destroying of vital evidence such as the Galston Street Graffito - you begin to sense he may well have a very valid point. What if the killer was a mason and such revelation would not only make a mockery of the police force, but also the very fabric of the highest levels of the establishment who took masonry astoundingly seriously. Not a new angle, but very well explored by Robinson. He has conclusively proved James Maybrick was indeed a mason, despite the masons claiming he wasn't. Fishy stuff indeed.

[Graham]

I started reading Robinson some time ago, but after a while began to wonder if I had sufficient life-force left at my time of life to finish it. Have juts dug it out again for another bash.

Inside Story is a must-read, and I'm disappointed that lovely Caz no longer posts on these boards; I'm sure I speak for most when I say, 'Come back Caz, your deep knowledge and your sense of fair play are very much missed. As is your sense of humour, a rarity here these days.'

Grahan

[Iconoclast]

Erobitha,

you make a good point. As you say, Ted Bundy wasn't even suspected until he was arrested (for something else, I believe), and Dr Bodkin-Adams was a well-respected avuncular GP to the upper middle classes of Eastbourne. I note you omitted John Christie - he too was well-liked by those who knew him. There's Haig, the acid-bath murderer also, a suave playboy-ish figure before whom ladies of a certain swooned. Where the Ripper is concerned, I have to admit I'm no expert in the 'history' of suspects, but of those suspects known actually to have existed, it seems like Montague Druitt is the only 'respectable' one. It does sometimes seem to me that some Ripperologists are still looking for a cloaked and masked shadowy figure with a wide-brimmed hat and flashing eyes, showing just a glimpse of his curved-bladed dagger. Maybe this is an unfair assessment, but not I think wholly inaccurate. Unfortunately, Erobitha, open-mindedness is something of a rare commodity in Ripperology, as I think you're finding out.

All the best with your investigations.

Graham

PS: in spite of what certain posters on here have said of him, you ought to read Feldman's book as soon as poss.

Yes indeed, you should probably read Feldman first followed by Harrison's American Connection (which was an update to her - and the - first Maybrick book). Then look at Inside Story. You were quite right to say that Robinson has not had full credit for his astonishing level of research, though it is probably fairer to pass your praise (and mine) onto researchers such as the indefatigable Keith Skinner as it was they (as usual in these cases) who did all the hard yards.

Cheers,

Ike