google ngrams

[rjpalmer]

I'm proposing Devereux and Billy Graham because they may have been closest to the source of the current 'edition.'

Hi Scott.

If Billy Graham had been involved, the last thing in the world Anne would have done is to bring Billy's name up in connection with the diary and even invite Paul Feldman and Keith Skinner in to question him. That makes no sense to me.

Anne was leading them away from the truth, not toward it.

[Herlock Sholmes]

You say it’s a hoax by Michael Barrett and yet you’re still trying to prove it’s even a forgery 30 years later with Google Ngrams.

And failing miserably I might add with a mostly irrelevant tool.

So you go back to trying to prove it was Barrett with argumentation that proves nothing.

If you're addressing me, Lombro, I haven't even mentioned Google Ngrams. The diary is a forgery because "one off instance" wasn't an expression anyone could have written in 1888.

I'm also not trying to prove it was written by Barrett. I was just wondering why some people think it can't have been written by Barrett, or by the Barretts jointly. I'm not seeing any good reason to think they can't have done it.

[rjpalmer]

a mostly irrelevant tool.

I’ve been called worse.

[Lombro2]

You say it’s a hoax by Michael Barrett and yet you’re still trying to prove it’s even a forgery 30 years later with Google Ngrams.

And failing miserably I might add with a mostly irrelevant tool.

So you go back to trying to prove it was Barrett with argumentation that proves nothing.

[Herlock Sholmes]

Barrett was either developing, or already had for some time, Wernicke-Korsakoff Syndrome and would have been challenged to compose such a thing from scratch. Even without this disease, I don't think Mike was intellectually up to the task. I also don't think Anne wanted anything to do with it either.

I think what I propose is a simpler solution because in my scenario Mike would have just been handed a completed diary. The proponents of the Mike/Anne-perpetrated hoax have to go through these unanswered scenarios of how, when and where. Many of these adherents can rarely agree on anything.

I'm proposing Devereux and Billy Graham because they may have been closest to the source of the current 'edition.' As I've said before, as lame and cheesy as the diary is, I think there was likely at least one earlier version floating around that came into Devereux's hands and he and others revised it.

Well Scott, we do need to forget Wernicke-Korsakoff Syndrome because there is absolutely no evidence that Mike suffered from this in March 1992, no doctor diagnosed it, and, let's face it, you've basically invented it. So we're left with your own opinion that Mike "wasn't intellectually up to the task" but how do you know what he was intellectually capable of? What's your evidence? Only a few years earlier, he had been a nationally published journalist with a by-line, exclusives, and everything. He'd also created puzzles for a major national children's magazine. Even if Anne had helped him, she could equally have helped him with the diary. Just as Billy Graham and Tony Devereux (before his death) could have helped him with the story. Mike even managed to create mock diary pages which are not too dissimilar from the actual diary. Plus Shirley Harrison who knew him reasonably well in the early 1990s wrote in one of her books that: "Michael Barrett is no fool...he has a taste for quoting Latin phrases culled form a classical dictionary and a knack of collecting unexpected snippets of knowledge from the library".

But where I think your argument is so very unnecessarily over-complicated is that it assumes that, despite a gift from the gods falling into his lap in the form of a completed diary of Jack the Ripper, which looked authentic, Mike's first thought was to create another one!. And, to make it even more complicated, you say he wanted to change the story. But why? Why give himself this problem of doing all this? Why go to all that bother when he had Jack the Ripper's diary in his hands and Doreen Montgomery was red hot keen to see it.? Just because of ego? That doesn't make sense to me, especially bearing in mind that for the plan to be successful no one was supposed to know he was the author. I could just about understand it if he'd identified a serious problem with the diary he'd been given but, as this would require some fairly advanced knowledge and careful study, that seems unlikely.

No, the whole idea of Mike feeling compelled to go the time, trouble and expense of re-doing what had already been done is just too odd and bizarre to accept.

But it seems to me that we've identified the problem here. You don't think Mike was clever enough to have written the diary, even though the grammar is appalling and it contains a number of obvious factual and language mistakes which give it away as a fake. I don't quite see how it's possible to say that he wasn't clever enough when we know so little of what he was like in March 1992, and his wife could easily have helped him, but, if that really was the case, it makes more sense to see him as the project manager for the diary. Perhaps he took a story that had been largely pre-written by Tony Devereux and Billy Graham and got Anne to write it out in an old photograph album which he purchased. So his actual input could have been minimal. Who knows? But the likelihood of his first thought being to recreate the diary in a different form strikes me as slim to non-existent, even with the most massive ego in the world.

[Scott Nelson]

Barrett was either developing, or already had for some time, Wernicke-Korsakoff Syndrome and would have been challenged to compose such a thing from scratch. Even without this disease, I don't think Mike was intellectually up to the task. I also don't think Anne wanted anything to do with it either.

I think what I propose is a simpler solution because in my scenario Mike would have just been handed a completed diary. The proponents of the Mike/Anne-perpetrated hoax have to go through these unanswered scenarios of how, when and where. Many of these adherents can rarely agree on anything.

I'm proposing Devereux and Billy Graham because they may have been closest to the source of the current 'edition.' As I've said before, as lame and cheesy as the diary is, I think there was likely at least one earlier version floating around that came into Devereux's hands and he and others revised it.

[Herlock Sholmes]

Why does it need to be Michael and Anne Barrett?

It doesn't need to be Michael and Anne Barrett, Lombro, but they are the most obvious candidates, and there's no good reason why they couldn't have done it, so the real question is, why do some people feel the need to look elsewhere? Why couldn’t it have been them?

[Lombro2]

Why does it need to be Michael and Anne Barrett?

[Herlock Sholmes]

Why not? Who says so? The way this sorry saga has played out over the years, anything could have happened. People and circumstances you never heard about could have been involved. Just saying...

I don't understand what you are asking me. There is "no evidence at all" that someone other than Barrett created the forgery and gave it to him, is there? The trouble with the approach of "anything could have happened" is that it allows the imagination to run riot. Why isn't the most simple and straightforward solution to the puzzle that the Barretts created it? Why doesn't that answer every question about how it was created? Why does it need Billy Graham and Tony Devereux to have done it?

[Herlock Sholmes]

I've covered the red diary purchase on various posts about my 'theory'. People are making it far too complicated than it actually was. I think Barrett already had the photo album with the diary handwriting in it when he made the request for another Victorian Diary. Since Mike probably didn't have anything to do with the original production of the diary, he simply wanted to try his hand at producing his own version and hand that one over to Rupert Crew. Something he could call his own fake. But he attempted to do this after he had already contacted the literary agency to deliver his substitute version, and by so doing, set himself up with a short deadline as far as: 1) Obtaining a suitable blank diary, and 2) Composing his own story of Maybrick as JTR.

I think this was done purely as ego on Mike's part. He didn't want to simply copy the existing text, he wanted to change the story as well, but it turned out to be harder than Barrett thought. Not only was the red diary unsuitable, so with time running out to find another and Mike lacking the ability to revise a long story, he gave up and turned over the diary he already had.

I don't think Anne had anything to do with the diary, other than handing Mike a partially completed cheque for the purchase of the red diary.

Hi Scott,

Are you sure it's not you who is making this more complicated than it probably was?

You agree that Barrett wanted to create a fake Victorian diary in March 1992, so why couldn't he have obtained an old photograph album after the 1891 red diary proved to be unsuitable and got his wife to write out the text in longhand after obtaining some nibs and ink? Why does there need to have been an earlier version of the fake? What is it about the document we have that makes you think the Barretts couldn't have done it on their own?

And do you really think for one second that Barrett had the slightest ability to conceal his handwriting? Wouldn't he have had to ask Anne for help with his plan that you envisage?

Basically, the thing I'm not getting is why you think your theory is any more likely than what would appear to be the far more simple and straightforward theory that the Barretts did it. Perhaps you can elaborate to help me understand that part.

[John Wheat]

You believe that Mike asked if someone wanted a Ripper Diary and then got a Victorian journal and made it in a month. With no evidence at all. Just a liar with his lies.

And you believe that makes much more sense than someone gave him the Diary first.

Yes obviously. See Herlock's post.

[Lombro2]

Bob Gimlin had a book on Bigfoot.

Joseph Smith had a Bible.

Who would offer those as evidence of them being associated with a hoax? If anyone said either about them, like you do about Mike, I'd have to seriously believe what they had was real.

[Scott Nelson]

There doesn't seem to be any good reason for a forgery created by a modern forger to have made its way into the hands of Michael Barrett. So to the extent you are saying that someone other than Barrett created it, and gave it to him, there is "no evidence at all" for this proposition.

Why not? Who says so? The way this sorry saga has played out over the years, anything could have happened. People and circumstances you never heard about could have been involved. Just saying...

[Scott Nelson]

The thing is, though, Scott, it doesn't explain why Barrett attempted to acquire a Victorian diary with blank pages in March 1992. I often think the simplest explanation is the most likely and what Barrett appears to have been doing was seeking to acquire a Victorian diary in order to fake a Victorian diary. Nothing else makes any sense. So your theory ignores what would appear to be the key evidence which solves the puzzle of the diary. From what I can gather, it seems like you don't think the Barretts could have done it. But why not? Caz can't seem to explain it. Why couldn't it have been the Barretts?

I've covered the red diary purchase on various posts about my 'theory'. People are making it far too complicated than it actually was. I think Barrett already had the photo album with the diary handwriting in it when he made the request for another Victorian Diary. Since Mike probably didn't have anything to do with the original production of the diary, he simply wanted to try his hand at producing his own version and hand that one over to Rupert Crew. Something he could call his own fake. But he attempted to do this after he had already contacted the literary agency to deliver his substitute version, and by so doing, set himself up with a short deadline as far as: 1) Obtaining a suitable blank diary, and 2) Composing his own story of Maybrick as JTR.

I think this was done purely as ego on Mike's part. He didn't want to simply copy the existing text, he wanted to change the story as well, but it turned out to be harder than Barrett thought. Not only was the red diary unsuitable, so with time running out to find another and Mike lacking the ability to revise a long story, he gave up and turned over the diary he already had.

I don't think Anne had anything to do with the diary, other than handing Mike a partially completed cheque for the purchase of the red diary.

[Herlock Sholmes]

You believe that Mike asked if someone wanted a Ripper Diary and then got a Victorian journal and made it in a month. With no evidence at all. Just a liar with his lies.

And you believe that makes much more sense than someone gave him the Diary first.

I don't see what the problem is, Lombro. For a 63 page diary, you only need to write a leisurely two pages a day to complete it within a month. That's easy.

There is, of course, the evidence of Barrett having attempted to acquire a Victorian diary with blank pages in that one-month period. The reason for the blank pages has never been explained other than in respect of a desire to create a forged Victorian diary.

Curiously, Barrett is known to have owned a series of books on English literature in which a very rare quote of Crashaw is found, which is also, by astonishing chance, found in the diary. A quote which Barrett was the only person to identify the source of.

Barrett also owned a book containing two chapters on the Maybrick case.

He is known to have had an interest in true crime.

Barrett's speech can be compared to expressions in the diary. See these two threads in particular:

https://forum.casebook.org/forum/ripper-discussions/suspects/maybrick-james/11197-mike-barrett-interview-september-1995

https://forum.casebook.org/forum/ripper-discussions/suspects/maybrick-james/11202-and-this-is-factual

Anne's handwriting bears certain similarities to the diary handwriting. A few examples can be seen in this thread:

https://forum.casebook.org/forum/ripper-discussions/suspects/maybrick-james/11177-diary-handwriting/page3

In addition to concealing from Shirley Harrison the fact that he had attempted to acquire a Victorian diary with blank pages, he also concealed from her the fact he had once been a journalist.

He gave Shirley Harrison research notes which concealed his knowledge of Bernard Ryan's book about Maybrick.

Against that, there is no evidence whatsoever of where the diary could have come from, if not created by the Barretts in March/April 1992. No one has ever said they'd seen it before that date. No one claims to have discovered it or to have given it to Barrett. There is no evidence at all of its existence prior to March 1992. As a modern forgery, it couldn't have been found under the nailed floorboards of Battlecrease, as some have suggested. There doesn't seem to be any good reason for a forgery created by a modern forger to have made its way into the hands of Michael Barrett. So to the extent you are saying that someone other than Barrett created it, and gave it to him, there is "no evidence at all" for this proposition.