The Diary—Old Hoax or New?

[Iconoclast]

I do think that if Mike penned it, and could prove it, then he would have done so.

This is a point I have made before regarding Mike's facile January 5, 1995 affidavit. If he had genuinely had any sort of role to play in the creation of the scrapbook and the text, his affidavit would not have been the nebulous, unprovable, slightly unhinged (the linseed oil!) version that we got. It reads like a man who had no idea whatsoever how the scrapbook ended up in his hands (or he didn't want to confess what he really knew about how it ended up in his hands) and was simply humouring Mishter Gray who wanted to humour Mishter Harriz.

The linseed oil and drying the scrapbook in the oven without any apparent damage to it occurring or any lingering evidence of his having done so is - as I say - the apex of his unhinged tale.

Monday, April 13, 1992
Shirley Harrison: "Is it me or is there one hell of a whiff of linseed oil in the room?"
Mike [thinks]: "Damn, I knew I should have used extra virgin olive oil".

[rjpalmer]

I can hear the police sirens now tearing down Anne's street in January 1995 with a Black Maria packed with indignant polis seeking to right the terrible wrongs of a woman who had committed the unforgivable crime of the century the day she married MJB.

You're the one who believes Anne is a pathological liar, Ike.

It's right there in your own theory.

According to your own theory, after Anne joined Feldman's team in 1994 (and despite having been 'free and clear' of Barrett for months) she spent the next eight years lying to everyone around her about the diary and must have even coached her own elderly father to lie to them, too.

[rjpalmer]

The linseed oil and drying the scrapbook in the oven without any apparent damage to it occurring or any lingering evidence of his having done so is - as I say - the apex of his unhinged tale.

What is this?

[Iconoclast]

What is this?

Well, I don't know what it is, RJ, but I'm confident (though not certain) of what it's not. Let us remind ourselves of what Barrett claimed:

When I got the Album and Compass home, I examined it closely, inside the front cover I noticed a makers stamp mark, dated 1908 or 1909 to remove this without trace I soaked the whole of the front cover in Linseed Oil, once the oil was absorbed by the front cover, which took about 2 days to dry out. I even used the heat from the gas oven to assist in the drying out.

Now, he was very explicit about having soaked the whole of the front cover in linseed oil and that it had taken two days to dry out (it must have been seriously soaked) - even needing to effectively bake it in the oven - but we see no after effects of such a process.

I'm sure someone will inform me what the damage is to the top left of the inside front cover, but that's irrelevant because the sort of damage I was referring to was the warping I would have anticipated from soaking the front cover in linseed oil. Now, I'm no oilist - perhaps such a scrapbook would be utterly resistant to damage from so much oil? Do we have anyone who reads these posts who could clarify it for us?

Is it truly possible to soak such a document in oil and leave no trace in the structure of the cover?

I'm happy to live and learn so - if we have any oil-on-old-Victorian-scrapbooks experts out there, please speak up!

[rjpalmer]

I'm sure someone will inform me what the damage is to the top left of the inside front cover, but that's irrelevant

I can't agree that it is 'irrelevant,' Ike.

Barrett, a man that would tell six different versions of the same event before he had had his morning shave, described removing a "maker's stamp" from the inside front cover.

I can't recall that any photograph of the inside front cover has ever been made available to the public, but from what we see in the image below there does appear to be quite extensive (and strangely dark) damage in the location indicated by Barrett, and it would be interesting to know what, if any, forensic examination has been conducted on this damaged area. The brown patch could conceivable be glue, but what on earth is all that black staining?

You'll no doubt recall that Dr. Baxendale and others noticed a rectangular impression on the flyleaf of the photo album consistent with the size of photographs that were popular between World War I and World War II, and I believe one can just barely make out this faint rectangle (marked in red) on the flyleaf.

But what the nasty stain on the endpaper/inside cover represents (indicated by the blue arrows) has never, to my recollection, been explained.

It's hard to understand why James Maybrick or a contemporary hoaxer would remove something from the cover--why would they bother?--- but one can readily imagine the necessity of a modern hoaxer to do so. If it indicated the maker of the photo album the company could be traced, and this would help in determining its age. As would a pasted-on sticker that indicated, say "Laurence Smith, 212 Oak Drive, Wallasey," which would help trace the previous owner.

I view this damage and staining with curiosity and not a little suspicion.

Linseed oil is the same as flaxseed oil. There are grades of it that are nearly odorless.