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[caz]

I didn't ignore the 1885 example at all, Caz. In fact, it's pertinent to my observation about capitalization. You will note that the headline of the letter is "RAILWAY BUMBLE" not "RAILWAY BUMBLING". Why is that? The letter writer speaks of "bumbling" not "bumble". Except that a poem is included in the letter which says, "And placid sits old Bumble/While all the people grumble". Old Bumble appears to have been a well known caricature based on the Mr Bumble character of Dickens to represent the type of fussy official pomposity that has always been the definition of Bumbledom. So my reading of the letter is that the writer is complaining about the railway officials who didn't get people home on the train and the newspaper understood this. I'm suggesting, therefore, that the "bumbling" of the letter writer carried a different meaning to the way we would understand it today. I'm also suggesting that Maybrick wouldn't have thought to use it about Dr Hopper because he wasn't an official in any sense of the word.

There now. And to think I might have got some sort of grudging apology for the bollocking I got for even daring to suggest that the humble word 'bumbling' might have been used in 1888 as a direct or indirect nod - however misplaced - to Mr Bumble and Bumbledom.

Instead I find Herlock still trying to claim he was right all along, and that black is really white, when the letter from 1885 is staring out at us both in black and white, and its headline [hello!] has the impertinence to be in capital letters: RAILWAY BUMBLE, as if that has any relevance to anything. It's clear that if the author of the letter, EYE WITNESS - also in capitals signifying sod all - used the word 'bumbling' [with a small b] as a direct nod to the Old Bumble in the adage just four lines above, whose name Herlock himself concedes was arguably based on Mr Bumble, then I was not so far wide of the mark with my original observation.

I'm not saying that Maybrick himself would have used the same word to describe Dr Hopper's bedside manner, but the diary author evidently thought he could have done, and it now appears that they were not wrong, as we have an example from 1885 of a complaint about the way the day trippers were treated by the railway staff.

I'm not sure it matters whether the intended meaning of 'bumbling' in either case was 'bumptious' or 'bungling' or a combination of both: officious railway staff herding passengers onto a train to the wrong destination, or a family doctor pulling rank over a patient by loftily dismissing their genuine aches and pains as merely imagined. The sentiment appears to be much the same. 'Sir Jim' also writes about Dr Hopper's meddling, when complaining of 'too many interfering servants'. Any more of it and the buffoon would 'soon feel the edge' of his 'shining knife'. The doctor was there to serve the patient, not dictate to him - just like any bumptious council official or station-master getting - er - above their station.

Harold Shipman is a prime example of a family doctor who pulled rank over his patients to treat them to an immediate death sentence.

I think you misunderstand my question about how the diary got into Barrett's hands. That question is premised on the fact that the diary was written after 1945. See my question to you in #161 of the "Hoax" thread on 29th January to which I've yet to receive a response. (It said: But the evidence is overwhelming that the diary is a late twentieth century forgery so how for the live of all that is pure and holy did such an item get into Mike Barrett's grubby hands?)The explanation I've seen is that it was taken from Battlecrease by Eddie Lyons on March 9th, 1992, which is usually on the basis that Maybrick or someone else in the late 1880s put it under the floorboards. What I want to know is how did it get there at some point after 1945? I'm aware of what you said to Mike JG in #174 of the Hoax thread but it's not clear what time period you were referring to. So I would welcome an answer from you to my question.

Please have some manners and wait for me to get round to catching up with all the active threads. I do have a life away from this place. If there is a question there that has not been addressed before and merits an answer from me, I will do my best, but where did you get the impression that the Battlecrease evidence is 'usually' explored on the basis that Maybrick or someone else in the late 1880s put it under the floorboards? The evidence 'does what it says on the tin' but no more, and it all relates to the double event of 9th March 1992 and the documented events thereafter. There is literally nothing known about the diary before that date, but if we are meant to ignore all the evidence we do have, because what went before is completely unknown, why does that not apply to the Barrett Hoax theorists, who also have no evidence for what went on before that date, and make up for their lack of evidence afterwards with speculation and suspicion?

Love,

Caz
X

[Herlock Sholmes]

There now. And to think I might have got some sort of grudging apology for the bollocking I got for even daring to suggest that the humble word 'bumbling' might have been used in 1888 as a direct or indirect nod - however misplaced - to Mr Bumble and Bumbledom.

Instead I find Herlock still trying to claim he was right all along, and that black is really white, when the letter from 1885 is staring out at us both in black and white, and its headline [hello!] has the impertinence to be in capital letters: RAILWAY BUMBLE, as if that has any relevance to anything. It's clear that if the author of the letter, EYE WITNESS - also in capitals signifying sod all - used the word 'bumbling' [with a small b] as a direct nod to the Old Bumble in the adage just four lines above, whose name Herlock himself concedes was arguably based on Mr Bumble, then I was not so far wide of the mark with my original observation.

I'm not saying that Maybrick himself would have used the same word to describe Dr Hopper's bedside manner, but the diary author evidently thought he could have done, and it now appears that they were not wrong, as we have an example from 1885 of a complaint about the way the day trippers were treated by the railway staff.

I'm not sure it matters whether the intended meaning of 'bumbling' in either case was 'bumptious' or 'bungling' or a combination of both: officious railway staff herding passengers onto a train to the wrong destination, or a family doctor pulling rank over a patient by loftily dismissing their genuine aches and pains as merely imagined. The sentiment appears to be much the same. 'Sir Jim' also writes about Dr Hopper's meddling, when complaining of 'too many interfering servants'. Any more of it and the buffoon would 'soon feel the edge' of his 'shining knife'. The doctor was there to serve the patient, not dictate to him - just like any bumptious council official or station-master getting - er - above their station.

Harold Shipman is a prime example of a family doctor who pulled rank over his patients to treat them to an immediate death sentence.



Please have some manners and wait for me to get round to catching up with all the active threads. I do have a life away from this place. If there is a question there that has not been addressed before and merits an answer from me, I will do my best, but where did you get the impression that the Battlecrease evidence is 'usually' explored on the basis that Maybrick or someone else in the late 1880s put it under the floorboards? The evidence 'does what it says on the tin' but no more, and it all relates to the double event of 9th March 1992 and the documented events thereafter. There is literally nothing known about the diary before that date, but if we are meant to ignore all the evidence we do have, because what went before is completely unknown, why does that not apply to the Barrett Hoax theorists, who also have no evidence for what went on before that date, and make up for their lack of evidence afterwards with speculation and suspicion?

Love,

Caz
X

The point was that if "bumbling" was a nod to Mr Bumble and Bumbledom in 1888, it would have related to the pretentious inefficiency of petty, pompous officials because that's what Bumbledom means. With Dr Hopper not being an official, it wouldn't explain its use by the diary author in 1888.

But you might have missed that I said on more than one occasion that it doesn't matter. And this was for two reasons:

1. The inherent implausibility of the diary author in 1888 being the first known person in history to use the expression "bumbling buffoon" which is not then known to have been used again for over fifty years in circumstances where we can see that the word "bumbling" (which probably didn't even exist in the United States at the time) was popularized by Timemagazine in the 1920s and was then suddenly used a lot in the UK due to Stanley Baldwin having been described as the "bumbling Baldwin".

2. The use of "one off instance" by the diary author proves that the diary is a modern fake, so it's a waste of time and space discussing the theoretical use of the other anachronisms in the diary, just as it's a waste of time and space discussing all the factual errors made by the diarist.

To answer your question about the floorboards. I got the impression that the Battlecrease evidence is "explored on the basis that Maybrick or someone else put it under the floorboards" largely from reading the posts on this Forum but also from Robert Smith's book. You surely can't be denying that there is a widely held belief that the diary was found under the floorboards by an electrician on 9th March 1992. For that to be true someone must have put the diary under the floorboards in the first place. If you don't believe this theory yourself perhaps you might want to say so to avoid confusion.

I do have manners incidentally, Caz. When I said that I had yet to receive a response to #161 of the Hoax thread (which I posted on 29th January), it was a statement of fact, not a complaint or criticism. You have, however, replied in that thread to posts I've made after29th January (for example you replied to my #165 in your #186 and my #184 in your #254) so it seemed a reasonable thought that you weren't ever going to reply to my #161, but I gave you the benefit of the doubt in suggesting that you might still get round to it. It strikes me as a critical question. If the diary is a modern forgery, which we know it is because of the inclusion of "one off instance", how did it get into Michael Barrett's possession in 1992? It's something that I've never seen a plausible answer to. The floor is yours, however, if you want to do it now.

[caz]

I'm afraid I don't understand that answer, Caz. Surely everyone is different. I'm not (I think) capable of robbing a bank or committing a fraud or murdering someone but plenty of other people are. So how does my capability affect the capability of anyone else? And how can your own capabilities possibly affect the capabilities of the Barretts? Also I understand you to say that you accept that someone might have forged the diary. So you must think that someone could have been capable of doing it, even if you're not.

If anyone has said the diary was written over "a wet weekend" I must have missed that. I wasn't aware anyone was suggesting it. I'm certainly not.

As for Mike Barrett's capabilities, didn’t Ike accept on another thread that once Mike's diary pages were lightly edited, with spelling and grammar corrected, they were very similar to what we find in the diary? If Anne performed the same editing role, why couldn’t Mike have written the diary? Many authors have been known to dictate rather than write, haven't they, and Mike could speak English so I can't see why he couldn't at least have spoken the diary text with his wife improving it. I mean, seriously, how can we rule out that possibility?

Would you - Herlock - consider yourself to have been capable of committing fraud by creating the Maybrick diary that emerged in 1992? By yourself, or in collaboration with someone whose character and personality were totally at odds with your own?

That's the question. I know I am not made of 'the right stuff'. But were the Barretts, either separately or together? They were real people, not chess pieces, so if you don't know whether they were made of 'the right stuff', because you never met them or got to know them, then Houston Herlock, you have a problem.

If I were you, I'd take your 'one off' gold watch into the sunset with you, as you posted last night:

The diary is a very obvious forgery. No further discussion as to its genuineness or otherwise is required.

Obviously, whoever wrote the bloody thing had the means, motive and opportunity and proved themselves capable, because they did it. What you don't know, any more than I do, is who composed the original text, who held the pen and whether their intention was fraud - as in financial gain - or something else entirely.

Enjoy your retirement from Diary World.

Love,

Caz
X

[Herlock Sholmes]

Would you - Herlock - consider yourself to have been capable of committing fraud by creating the Maybrick diary that emerged in 1992? By yourself, or in collaboration with someone whose character and personality were totally at odds with your own?

That's the question. I know I am not made of 'the right stuff'. But were the Barretts, either separately or together? They were real people, not chess pieces, so if you don't know whether they were made of 'the right stuff', because you never met them or got to know them, then Houston Herlock, you have a problem.

If I were you, I'd take your 'one off' gold watch into the sunset with you, as you posted last night:



Obviously, whoever wrote the bloody thing had the means, motive and opportunity and proved themselves capable, because they did it. What you don't know, any more than I do, is who composed the original text, who held the pen and whether their intention was fraud - as in financial gain - or something else entirely.

Enjoy your retirement from Diary World.

Love,

Caz
X

I find your question about my own capabilities a very strange one, Caz. Everyone has different capabilities. Some people rob banks, some commit frauds, some sell drugs etc. If the way you approach this issue is to look at your own capabilities, decide that you're not capable of having forged the Maybrick diary and conclude that, therefore, the Barretts also couldn't have done it, I would suggest that you're looking at this completely the wrong way.

It's also strange that you refer to a "collaboration with someone whose character and personality were totally at odds with your own". It seems to me that you're talking of the possibility of Mike collaborating with his wife. Someone who decided to marry him! Someone who must have liked at least some aspects of his character and personality at one time. Couldn't it also be said that they collaborated over the Celebrity articles? And if Anne's role was simply to write out the text at Mike's dictation, it wasn't much of a "collaboration" was it? So my answer is that I can't see any reason why Anne wouldn't have assisted her husband in creating that diary.

I agree that the question is whether the Barretts were "the right stuff". So what's the answer? I would suggest the answer is that none of us knows. Which means we have to allow for the possibility that they were the right stuff.

I also agree that we don't know who wrote it but where I think I disagree with you is in saying that we can rule out the Barretts, if, indeed, that is what you are saying. I see no good grounds for ruling them out. They are the obvious candidates and no others outside their immediate circle have even been proposed, to my knowledge

[caz]

Let me try and explain this to you in as simple terms as possible, Lombro.

in 1888, to the extent it can be called "a term", the words "one off" didn't mean what they mean today, or what they meant in the 1980s/90s.

When you think about it, "one off", by itself, doesn't contain any meaning of uniqueness or unrepeatability. If anything, you'd think it would mean taking one thing away from another.

But in 1888 a patternmaker would speak in their own jargon of casting [any number] off. If they were casting only one item, they would refer to casting one off but they wouldn't have said that they were casting a one off because no such thing existed.

Equally, in 1888, an engineer would talk of needing an item [any number] off, so if they needed one item they would say that they needed "one off". But they wouldn't have said that they needed a one off of that item. And, indeed, there could have been thousands or even millions of that particular item in existence of which they only needed one.

So it doesn't matter if you were a manufacturer or a cotton merchant, you didn't speak of anything as a one off.

By the early 20th century, due to the fact that casting one off had become quite common, as had jobs involving casting one off, patternmakers started to speak of "one off jobs" and "one off patterns".

But that language was still just technical jargon, only found in technical journals.

Slowly the concept of a one off job made its way into the general English language and, for example, adverts can be found in newspapers placed by employers during the 1930s looking for men experienced in one off jobs. Whether normal people understood what this meant at this time is difficult to say but probably not (although it doesn't matter). However, in the 1940s the concept started to spread and we find references to "one off products" in magazines for car enthusiasts so it may well be by this time that normal people understood the concept of "one off" as it applied to manufactured products.

We know that in 1946 a writer compared a unique Scotsman to a "one off job" which he expressly said was a term used by engineers.

It is only after this that abstract events and occasions started to be described as one offs so that, for example, people would refer to doing something once and once only a "one off instance". The first known example of this at the moment is from 1958 when Tatler magazine referred to "one off efforts". Then, in 1959, a Portsmouth newspaper spoke of a "one off event". So, finally, the figurative or metaphorical use of the term had entered the English language. No doubt it was used before 1958 but clearly not before 1946.

Everything I've said above is supported not only by recent research but also by the Oxford English Dictionary, books about phrase origins and, indeed, by Dr Kate Flint of Oxford University.

I hope this helps you in your endeavour to discover whether the diary is genuine or a modern fake.

The answer is that it is a modern fake.

Wasn't Dr Kate Flint the academic who claimed that 'top myself' first appeared in print in 1958?

That was considered at the time to be the equivalent of 'one off'.

It took Gary Barnett to find the expression in print way back in the 1870s.

I understand the usage of 'needing one off', or 'casting one off'.

I'm wondering how the expression would have been used in a whole sentence, including the item to be cast. For instance, could the owner of a ship building company have called his main engineer into the office and said:

"I need ships' propellers for RMS Posthouse post haste. Can you get the men to cast two off?"

Is that the sort of thing?

Would it have been impossible for the engineer to have gone back to his team and said: "Right lads, you've got a two off job to do"?

Or would that have had to wait for some bright spark to come out with it in the 20th century?

If the engineer had good ears he might have heard the same bright spark say under his breath: "I wish the boss would 'eff off'."

It wouldn't have ended there, though. More and more propellers would be cast in the future.

In the diary, 'Sir Jim' lies to Florie when assuring her he will not hit her again. That's the 'unique' bit right there at the end. Done and dusted.

The one off job needed on that particular occasion was to raise his hand to her. Not unique at all.

[caz]

We have been talking about the diary's use of words or phrases, but what about punctuation? I'm thinking about the modern use of multiple exclamation or question marks, hyphens, etc. Especially punctuation used as shorthand- the # used for "number", or @.

One example that I pay particular attention to is what's often called the "grocer's apostrophe"- apostrophes used to indicate plurals, which has become prevalent in the Internet Generation. Apostrophes are properly used to show either deleted letters in contractions or possession. And there are few things in languages EASIER than making plurals in English- add "-s", or "-es" or if the word ends in "y", change the "y" to "i" and add "es". (Words like mouse/mice, goose/geese, media, millennia, etc. are loan words from other languages and follow different rules.) I've found examples of this as early as the 1940s, but not earlier. (Dammit, I've found examples in books by Isaac Asimov, of all people! Frankly, I tend to put THAT down to poor editing.)

Are there any cases of this sort of thing in the Diary?

Afternoon C. F.,

The diary contains surprisingly few apostrophes and few if any contractions - which I have always found a little strange.

People may tell you it's because the Barretts would not have been confident about using them correctly, although the diary author didn't even consult a dictionary for their spelling, which I also found strange.

But there is at least one noteworthy exception, where so many modern writers of all abilities get their apostrophes in a twist, but where our diary author didn't 'trip over':

'I am still thinking of burning St. James's to the ground
I may do so on my next visit.'

The transcript which accompanied the diary to London is a faithful copy of the above two sentences, except that the Barretts did at least type a full stop after the first.

One might have expected a modern writer to put:

'I'm still thinking of burning St. James' to the ground.'

Love,

Caz
X

[Herlock Sholmes]

Wasn't Dr Kate Flint the academic who claimed that 'top myself' first appeared in print in 1958?

That was considered at the time to be the equivalent of 'one off'.

It took Gary Barnett to find the expression in print way back in the 1870s.

I understand the usage of 'needing one off', or 'casting one off'.

I'm wondering how the expression would have been used in a whole sentence, including the item to be cast. For instance, could the owner of a ship building company have called his main engineer into the office and said:

"I need ships' propellers for RMS Posthouse post haste. Can you get the men to cast two off?"

Is that the sort of thing?

Would it have been impossible for the engineer to have gone back to his team and said: "Right lads, you've got a two off job to do"?

Or would that have had to wait for some bright spark to come out with it in the 20th century?

If the engineer had good ears he might have heard the same bright spark say under his breath: "I wish the boss would 'eff off'."

It wouldn't have ended there, though. More and more propellers would be cast in the future.

In the diary, 'Sir Jim' lies to Florie when assuring her he will not hit her again. That's the 'unique' bit right there at the end. Done and dusted.

The one off job needed on that particular occasion was to raise his hand to her. Not unique at all.

I think you're mistaken about Dr Kate Flint, Caz. I don't think she claimed that "top myself" first appeared in print in 1958. What I think she said, but please correct me if I'm wrong, was that its use wasn't recorded until 1958, which was correct. In other words, that's when its use was first noticed and recorded by the Oxford English Dictionary. And I think that remains the position. It demonstrates how utterly implausible it is for it to have appeared in an 1888 diary, albeit not literally impossible.

There are a number of problems with your theoretical discussion about a theoretical boss saying that his men had "a two off job to do". The first is that there is no evidence that this was ever done or said. On the contrary, with the 1893 example we have of its use, it wasn't used that way. The second is that it would only have meant that they were casting two propellors. It follows that if they were doing a "one off job, it would only have meant they were casting one propellor. So it would have meant nothing more than a quantity. No meaning of uniqueness is necessarily, naturally or inherently in there. Why would there be? In any case, there was already an existing expression in the nineteenth century for what was later called a "one off job" which was "a special job", so that's what it would have been referred to as. The third problem, which is the biggest one, is that, even if people spoke of "one off jobs", which they didn't, you seem to be thinking that the author of a diary in 1888, somehow familiar with this (theoretical) manufacturing jargon, would have understood that to mean a unique job which won't be done again (as opposed to, say, an expensive job) and then to have been the first person in the world to metaphorically or figuratively apply the concept of a one-off job to the idea of a more abstract unique event such as hitting his wife and then using that expression as if it was a perfectly commonplace one in the English language as opposed to one he'd literally just invented on his own. And we have to think that it just sat there in the diary with no one seeing or hearing it, other than his wife, who strangely appears to have had no problem understanding what he was talking about, but completely separately, just like "bumbling buffoon", "top myself" and to a lesser extent "spreads mayhem", evolved over many years (as, in this case, the general public became familiar with the concept of "one-off" over a fifty year period) to become a common English expression.

You might as well be asking me if the fairies might not have come down to earth to write the diary, Caz.

So my considered answer is that no way is what you're saying even remotely possible.

[caz]

The point was that if "bumbling" was a nod to Mr Bumble and Bumbledom in 1888, it would have related to the pretentious inefficiency of petty, pompous officials because that's what Bumbledom means. With Dr Hopper not being an official, it wouldn't explain its use by the diary author in 1888.

Splitting those hairs again I see.

We are talking about a hypochondriac, being told by a pompous ass, in his official capacity as the patient's GP, that his pain was all in the mind.

How was this a blunder by a modern author, when it's the same definition of 'bumbling' as used by the eye witness in 1885, to describe some pompous ass, in his official capacity as a member of the railway staff, for herding the paying passengers onto the wrong bloody train??

By your definition, if Dr Hopper wasn't an 'official', nobody on the railway staff could have been either.

Move on, Herlock. This is beginning to look like you can never concede even the tiniest point, which would be unfortunate.

I do have manners incidentally, Caz. When I said that I had yet to receive a response to #161 of the Hoax thread (which I posted on 29th January), it was a statement of fact, not a complaint or criticism. You have, however, replied in that thread to posts I've made after29th January (for example you replied to my #165 in your #186 and my #184 in your #254) so it seemed a reasonable thought that you weren't ever going to reply to my #161, but I gave you the benefit of the doubt in suggesting that you might still get round to it. It strikes me as a critical question. If the diary is a modern forgery, which we know it is because of the inclusion of "one off instance", how did it get into Michael Barrett's possession in 1992? It's something that I've never seen a plausible answer to. The floor is yours, however, if you want to do it now.

There are three ways in which Mike Barrett could have got his hands on the old book. We have:

1) The Devereux Theory

2) The Auction Theory

3) The Battlecrease Evidence

So if you have decided not to retire yet after all, Herlock, perhaps you could have a bash at this one yourself: how did the old book get into Mike's hands?

I'd prefer your answer to be evidence based rather than theoretical.

And before anyone mentions that stupid bloody advert again, let me remind you that it wasn't worded in the right way to produce 'the right stuff' for forging Maybrick's diary, and even if it had been worded differently and had produced the right raw materials, any forgery created from it and subsequently published would have led straight back to the forger.

Love,

Caz
X

[Herlock Sholmes]

Splitting those hairs again I see.

We are talking about a hypochondriac, being told by a pompous ass, in his official capacity as the patient's GP, that his pain was all in the mind.

How was this a blunder by a modern author, when it's the same definition of 'bumbling' as used by the eye witness in 1885, to describe some pompous ass, in his official capacity as a member of the railway staff, for herding the paying passengers onto the wrong bloody train??

By your definition, if Dr Hopper wasn't an 'official', nobody on the railway staff could have been either.

Move on, Herlock. This is beginning to look like you can never concede even the tiniest point, which would be unfortunate.



There are three ways in which Mike Barrett could have got his hands on the old book. We have:

1) The Devereux Theory

2) The Auction Theory

3) The Battlecrease Evidence

So if you have decided not to retire yet after all, Herlock, perhaps you could have a bash at this one yourself: how did the old book get into Mike's hands?

I'd prefer your answer to be evidence based rather than theoretical.

And before anyone mentions that stupid bloody advert again, let me remind you that it wasn't worded in the right way to produce 'the right stuff' for forging Maybrick's diary, and even if it had been worded differently and had produced the right raw materials, any forgery created from it and subsequently published would have led straight back to the forger.

Love,

Caz
X

The 1885 example is distinguished because of the inclusion of the "Old Bumble" poem whereby the letter writer must have been flagging that the railway officials were Old Bumbles otherwise it doesn't make any sense. But, like I've said numerous times now, and you've never acknowledged, it doesn't matter Caz.

As for the three theories you present for how the diary could have got into Mike Barrett's hands - if those are the only three - we can rule out what you refer to as "The Battlecrease Evidence" because that "evidence", such as it is, to the extent you're referring to Brian Rawes' account (which is the only evidence of which I'm aware of some kind of discovery at Battlecrease in 1992 other than of an old newspaper) says that something (not necessarily an old book) was found under the floorboards, while a fake diary created after 1945 couldn't realistically have been placed under those floorboards which were nailed down, so we can eliminate that one.

Which leaves us with "The Devereux Theory" and what you call "The Auction Theory", although I think it's better described as "The Barretts' Theory" because it's only Mike Barrett who tells us the photograph album was purchased at an auction and, as you know, I don't rely on anything Mike Barrett says.

So which one is it? Devereux or the Barretts? Or maybe it was both, with Devereux helping Mike draft the thing before his death. Perhaps that's the answer and we can all do other things?

[Scott Nelson]

How about Devereux and Billy Graham writing the diary in Graham's photo album and Billy taking it with him before Devereux's death. Graham then gives it to his daughter, who gives it to Mike? There's no direct evidence of this, but is it improbable?

[Herlock Sholmes]

How about Devereux and Billy Graham writing the diary in Graham's photo album and Billy taking it with him before Devereux's death. Graham then gives it to his daughter, who gives it to Mike? There's no direct evidence of this, but is it improbable?

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?