Who were they?

[Iconoclast]

Sorry, Ike. You're simply too naive and slow-on-the-uptake to deal with any longer. This will have to be my final response for the day, if not the summer.

Just cut to the chase, RJ.

The existence of the red diary had obviously leaked.

Had it leaked? I'd have to check my notes but I don't recall the diary being mentioned until Mike's January 1995 affidavit?

We know Barrett would mention it in his 1995 affidavit.

And there it is! Man in terrible emotional state tells large porky about why he purchased an irrelevant 1891 diary. So, now the news about the diary has definitely leaked (almost three years after he first sought it) despite claiming he'd been trying to reveal the hoax since December 1993 in that very same January 1995 affidavit.

Setting aside your own well-rehearsed naiveté and lack of concern about its existence, others, including Keith, were evidently eager to learn the details of this extraordinary purchase. So somehow, having learned about the maroon memo book's existence (note: isn't that one of the questions your good friend Lord Orsam has addressed to Keith?) he quizzed Anne Graham about it.

So, yes SHE WAS FORCED BY CIRCUMSTANCES TO GIVE AN ACCOUNT OF IT. She hadn't brought up the purchase on her own.

And she willingly gave Keith her account. "Mike said he wanted to know what a genuine Victorian diary looked like. Would it help if I got you the original cheque stub and even a copy of the relevant statement from my bank, Keith? If I do, would you remove the nipple-crushers, please? You've forced everything out of me now."

Why was she forced? Well, as already explained at least 1,000 times, the red diary HAD been purchased by Mike and Anne, so if she simply denied it, she would run the risk of its existence being proven by another means--Barrett obviously being able to recall he received it from Martin Earl in Cambridge, as duly reported in his affidavit (which Keith had not yet known about).

But she wasn't 'forced'. She appears to have happily given Keith what he asked for. I get on a bus. Did the bus driver force me to get on the bus? Keith asked about the 1891 diary. Was he - by dint of Anne's helpful response - therefore forcing her to reveal what she knew? Or could she have just 'got off the bus' had she wanted to? "Sorry, Keith, I honestly don't recall that. I vaguely recall Mike ordering something and I ended up having to pay for it because he hadn't, and boy was I mad at him, but in all honesty if I ever knew what it was, I don't recall now". There you go, she's off the bus and waiting for a different one.

All of this should be abundantly obvious, but you instead like to play the three-shell game, over and over and over.

Saying that something should be abundantly obvious when it is not? Now that is forcing someone to do something!

It's old, Ike. It's stale.

Yawn.

Your arguments are loopy and unconvincing.

Oh God, he's talking to himself again.

I almost miss John Omlor's purple dragon

Jesus, he's having sexual fantasies!

--it seemed less childish by comparison

That'll be the pot texting the kettle again, there, then. Oh God, he's wet himself ...

From now on, I'm joining John Wheat and the other one-line hecklers. It saves time. "It's all ****."

I can give you their address, RJ, but also you could Google it under 'Carstairs'.

[jmenges]

This thread is starting to annoy. Clean it up.
And I don’t want to see any more substituting words with asterisks in ways that leaves me no choice but to see it as a personal attack.
I deleted the last post.

JM

[rjpalmer]

Had it leaked? I'd have to check my notes but I don't recall the diary being mentioned until Mike's January 1995 affidavit?

Sorry, Thomas. I am withdrawing from the conversation. You're too slow on the uptake and are content with endlessly playing the three-shell game.

It is reported on page 237 of Ripper Diary: the Inside Story that Keith Skinner quizzed Anne Graham about the maroon memo book in August 1995.

Yet, Caroline Brown has reported (many times, I might add) that Keith first learned about Mike Barrett's affidavit on 22 January 1997. (If you doubt this, chase down the appropriate posts for yourself, or see the "Silence of Ann" at Orsam Books).

So, who leaked it? How did he find out about it?

Personally, I don't care all that much. The fact is, circumstances forced Anne to cough up the goods.

What I find particularly childish about your suggestion that I am challenging KS's "integrity" (I merely doubt his conclusions) is that you are the one who has challenged the integrity---repeatedly---of such diverse figures as Maurice Chittenden, Kenneth Rendell, Dr. David Baxendale, Stewart Evans, Melvin Harris, Nick Warren, and most recently, Martin Fido, who you claim was 'on the fence' about the hoax's authenticity but wouldn't say so publicly because he feared it would damage his academic standing. That's an allegation of intellectual dishonesty and cowardice.

You've been requested to submit proof of this numerous times, and your silence has been duly noted. As such, I don't take any of your allegations seriously.

There have been enough games for one summer, Thomas, and as we're merely annoying the moderators, let's agree to pull the plug.

[Iconoclast]

It is reported on page 237 of Ripper Diary: the Inside Story that Keith Skinner quizzed Anne Graham about the maroon memo book in August 1995.
Yet, Caroline Brown has reported (many times, I might add) that Keith first learned about Mike Barrett's affidavit on 22 January 1997. (If you doubt this, chase down the appropriate posts for yourself, or see the "Silence of Ann" at Orsam Books).
So, who leaked it? How did he find out about it?

So, what I read from this is that you claimed it had leaked and then you mentioned Mike's January 1995 affidavit which read for all the world that you were claiming the 'leak' happened before the affidavit and so I queried this and your rebuttal was to say that Keith asked Anne about the 1891 diary some six months AFTER Mike's affidavit.

I don't think my dear readers are entirely stupid, RJ. I think that they will see that there is no evidence of a 'leak' before January 1995 at all. Mike described the 1891 diary in his January 1995 affidavit and Keith quizzed Anne six months later so evidently he had been told about it (the diary) by then otherwise it would have been impossible for him to have discussed it with Anne. It wasn't a requirement for him to have known where the 'leak' came from, and whether he did or did not know where the 'leak' came from, AND ANYWAY the issue at hand is whether Anne was 'backed into a corner' and 'forced' to spill the beans with the implication that she had proactively chosen to hide the truth from the world until Mike let the truth out. There is absolutely no evidence whatsoever that she was compelled to 'confess all'. She did so perfectly willingly which utterly contradicts your one-theory view that it was a crucial part of the Barretts' planning to hoax the 'diary' of Jack the Ripper.

Just cutting through all the words, here, RJ, and the multiple sidetracks. Anne sang like a bird and appeared to lose no sleep over helping Keith to understand when she paid for the diary. She even provided the cheque-stub and a copy of her bank statement which she had to request from her bank. None of this smacks me as a broken criminal finally unburdening themselves because they have been forced to yield their secrets at last.

[Iconoclast]

Oh - peachy - Keith has emailed me with the following!

Had it leaked? I'd have to check my notes but I don't recall the diary being mentioned until Mike's January 1995 affidavit? [IKE]

I thought the same as you. Here's my note from July 5th 1995...

PF [Paul Feldman] phoned and asked me to make a note that last week, before he went to Liverpool, Mike Barrett had phoned saying Ann had bought a Victorian diary in 1991 (!) for which he (Barrett), had the receipt. PF asked Anne about it - and Anne said, yes, she had bought a Victorian pocket diary - and still has it. I believe we later established that Mike had been round to see Anne in December 1994 asking for the red diary? But as far as I can see Anne did not have to do anything when I later chatted to her about the diary in August 1995. It was only because she kept her old cheque books and bank statements that Shirley and I were able trace Martin Earl, but Anne could simply have said she had thrown away all of her documentation. Had she done so I would have left it at that most likely even though I was never fully convinced by Anne's explanation that Mike had probably bought it to see what a Victorian diary looked like. By the time of my C&D interview with Mike in April 1999 I was under the impression that the red diary had been purchased in May 1992 because that was where the evidence of the cheque stub and bank statement and a photocopy of the cheque itself led me. It was not until later on in 1999 that Shirley and I were able to establish that Mike had made the enquiry in March 1992. But it was still a puzzle as to why Mike had left it so late to find out what a Victorian diary looked like if it had been in his possession since Spring 1991? To this day I'm not even sure if Anne ever knew about that advertisement which Mike had placed? I only got to it in December 2004 whilst working for Bruce [Robinson].

Best Wishes

Keith

[rjpalmer]

Oh - peachy - Keith has emailed me with the following!

PF [Paul Feldman] phoned and asked me to make a note that last week, before he went to Liverpool, Mike Barrett had phoned saying Ann had bought a Victorian diary in 1991 (!) for which he (Barrett), had the receipt.

Why the exclamation mark (!), if I might ask?

I'm always curious why Team Diary thinks it significant when Barrett gets a year wrong, as if this is some extraordinary occurrence? Should we find meaning in this, and perhaps use it to ignore the fact that there is nonetheless documented evidence that Barrett went shopping for a blank diary--'with at least 20 blank pages'--in the weeks before any trustworthy eyes saw the Diary?

I wouldn't think so, yet again and again we see a strange obsession about the dates given by an alcoholic when we have better information at our disposal. I always think I can hear a walnut shell scooting across the table when this happens...

Let me just remark that some weeks ago I came across the following message to me from KS. I thought I'd better clip it:




Yes, I did indeed notice that KS had the wrong year, but it never occurred to me that this was anything more than a mild, garden variety mistake that could happen to anyone. I certainly did not conclude from it that the events Keith was describing did not happen.

It has possibly been noted at least a dozen times by David Barrat that in the handwritten draft of Mike's sworn affidavit the zero in the year 1990 had been crossed through and replaced with a 1. This means Barrett was only a few months off in his reckoning. Barrat also notes that Mike corrected this error during the infamous Cloak and Dagger interview. There is nothing here that should interest us. It's just more shuffling of the walnut shells.

I was never fully convinced by Anne's explanation that Mike had probably bought it to see what a Victorian diary looked like.

Nor am I convinced.

And once I saw Martin Earl's advertisement with my own eyes, Anne's already questionable rationale truly smelled to high heaven.

Yet, just take a look at the fierce, accusatory resistance that Ike gives me for drawing this conclusion...or even raising it as a valid issue. Only a daft reject from the Lord Orsam's Clown Car would dream of drawing any conclusions from it, so I'll scoot over and let you in if you like, Keith. There's plenty of room for both of us!

It's quite a juggling act. We are told by a number of theorists--though not necessarily by Ike who tends to shift the walnut shells around as rapidly as possible--that Anne lied and lied repeatedly to not only Keith, but to Feldman, Doreen, Shirley, Carol etc., about having seen the diary as a teenager and having hid it from Mike for years, etc. etc.

Yet, question anything Anne says in any other context, and suddenly she as honest as the Virgin Mary.

To be blunt, it's difficult to get one's head around.

Enjoy your summer, boys.

P.S. Seeing that Ike has KS within earshot, this would be a handy time to confirm what evidence there is that Martin Fido was secretly on the fence about the diary's authenticity but didn't reveal this out of fear of reprisal from the academic community. I trust Ike's readers will be eager to gauge the accuracy of this allegation.

[FISHY1118]

I think John wheat said it best " The diary is a fake "

I've yet to read any evidence on this thread that changes that sentiment.

[PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR 1]

I think John wheat said it best " The diary is a fake "

I've yet to read any evidence on this thread that changes that sentiment.

It is the only diary I have heard of that does not contain a single date.

[erobitha]

It is the only diary I have heard of that does not contain a single date.

Apart from the one at the very end.

We use the word diary as short hand but it is a journal in a scrapbook.

[Al Bundy's Eyes]

Well there's a lot to unpack there, RJ, except that we aren't Keith Skinner so unless he emails me with a comment, I can't answer for him. Nevertheless, he has famously stated that if we all knew what he knew (about the timesheets for March 9, 1992) that we would all draw the conclusion that the scrapbook came out of Battlecerease House. I can't see any reason why he would have changed his mind in the intervening years so I suspect (assume) that he does believe it came out of Battlecrease but - for it to have been the Jack the Ripper's authentic confessional - it would have had to miraculously come out of James Maybrick's old home but have been written by Monty Druitt so I take it as read that he thinks it came out of Battlecrease House on the morning of March 9, 1992, but that he doesn't believe it is the authentic work of Jack the Ripper (whoever Jack was).

Hi Ike,

I'll start by stating for the record, I have the utmost respect for Keith Skinner. Like probably every poster on this forum, his books sits on my shelf along side Sugden and Begg for good reason. But you've highlighted what, for someone like myself who isn't too heavily invested in the Maybrick diary, is an ongoing source of frustration. If we knew what he knew. Keith's had full access to all the interviews with everyone connected with the Battlecrease provenance, reached the conclusion that that seems to be the most plausible source for the diary, and has stood by that belief ever since. But he's never actually put it out there, in full, and let's face it, never will. So all we on the outside get are occasional extracts and are expected to take everything at face value. That's not good enough. And as you rightly point out, your assuming he hasn't changed his mind. We don't know because we don't hear from him, which is a great shame.

Personally, I'd be open to seeing his full explanation for believing in the Battlecrease provenance, let's face it, Mike Barrett did a poor job of exposing his own hoax, so maybe there is something in it? I don't know, and I'll never reach that conclusion until all the interviews are made available.

[Iconoclast]

It is the only diary I have heard of that does not contain a single date.

I cannot tell whether you are having a laugh or not, I really can't. It's really hard to work out as normally you're super-sensitive and unbearably serious and then you go and post what looks for all the world like some sort of weak joke? So I'm not sure whether your post requires an answer?

Okay, I'm going to go with the assumption that you are serious so - in response - if you could just remind us where in the Victorian scrapbook it claims to be a diary that would allow us to clarify things for you.

Cheers.

[Iconoclast]

Hi Ike,

I'll start by stating for the record, I have the utmost respect for Keith Skinner. Like probably every poster on this forum, his books sits on my shelf along side Sugden and Begg for good reason. But you've highlighted what, for someone like myself who isn't too heavily invested in the Maybrick diary, is an ongoing source of frustration. If we knew what he knew. Keith's had full access to all the interviews with everyone connected with the Battlecrease provenance, reached the conclusion that that seems to be the most plausible source for the diary, and has stood by that belief ever since. But he's never actually put it out there, in full, and let's face it, never will. So all we on the outside get are occasional extracts and are expected to take everything at face value. That's not good enough. And as you rightly point out, your assuming he hasn't changed his mind. We don't know because we don't hear from him, which is a great shame.

Personally, I'd be open to seeing his full explanation for believing in the Battlecrease provenance, let's face it, Mike Barrett did a poor job of exposing his own hoax, so maybe there is something in it? I don't know, and I'll never reach that conclusion until all the interviews are made available.

Hi Abe,

I was referring solely to Keith's awareness of the timesheets for March 9, 1992, which he was unable to discuss or publish due to it being Bruce Robinson's research material for They All Love Jack. Robert Smith first published this information in his first 25 Years.

For the record, there is more testimony out there that strongly supports a Battlecrease provenance for the scrapbook and some of it has certainly already been published. One of the most compelling testimonies comes from Tim Martin-Wright who reported in 1994 (?) that he had been offered the opportunity to buy the 'diary of Jack the Ripper' in 1991 or 1992 (he hasn't been able to formally confirm the year) but that he missed out because "it was sold on a pub in Anfield". Martin-Wright has impeccable credentials and makes a totally trustworthy witness. His story was recounted - as I recall - in Ripper Legacy: Inside Story.

Overall, the evidence pointing to Battlecrease House makes Anne's provenance profoundly weaker in comparison.

I believe that all of this will be made available in good time.

[Iconoclast]

Why the exclamation mark (!), if I might ask?

I'm always curious why Team Diary thinks it significant when Barrett gets a year wrong, as if this is some extraordinary occurrence? Should we find meaning in this, and perhaps use it to ignore the fact that there is nonetheless documented evidence that Barrett went shopping for a blank diary--'with at least 20 blank pages'--in the weeks before any trustworthy eyes saw the Diary?

I wouldn't think so, yet again and again we see a strange obsession about the dates given by an alcoholic when we have better information at our disposal. I always think I can hear a walnut shell scooting across the table when this happens...

Let me just remark that some weeks ago I came across the following message to me from KS. I thought I'd better clip it:




Yes, I did indeed notice that KS had the wrong year, but it never occurred to me that this was anything more than a mild, garden variety mistake that could happen to anyone. I certainly did not conclude from it that the events Keith was describing did not happen.

It has possibly been noted at least a dozen times by David Barrat that in the handwritten draft of Mike's sworn affidavit the zero in the year 1990 had been crossed through and replaced with a 1. This means Barrett was only a few months off in his reckoning. Barrat also notes that Mike corrected this error during the infamous Cloak and Dagger interview. There is nothing here that should interest us. It's just more shuffling of the walnut shells.





Nor am I convinced.

And once I saw Martin Earl's advertisement with my own eyes, Anne's already questionable rationale truly smelled to high heaven.

Yet, just take a look at the fierce, accusatory resistance that Ike gives me for drawing this conclusion...or even raising it as a valid issue. Only a daft reject from the Lord Orsam's Clown Car would dream of drawing any conclusions from it, so I'll scoot over and let you in if you like, Keith. There's plenty of room for both of us!

It's quite a juggling act. We are told by a number of theorists--though not necessarily by Ike who tends to shift the walnut shells around as rapidly as possible--that Anne lied and lied repeatedly to not only Keith, but to Feldman, Doreen, Shirley, Carol etc., about having seen the diary as a teenager and having hid it from Mike for years, etc. etc.

Yet, question anything Anne says in any other context, and suddenly she as honest as the Virgin Mary.

To be blunt, it's difficult to get one's head around.

Enjoy your summer, boys.

P.S. Seeing that Ike has KS within earshot, this would be a handy time to confirm what evidence there is that Martin Fido was secretly on the fence about the diary's authenticity but didn't reveal this out of fear of reprisal from the academic community. I trust Ike's readers will be eager to gauge the accuracy of this allegation.

Crikey, RJ - 272 words on the pretty irrelevant subject of a stray exclamation mark! It would be tempting to think you were deflecting a little there which is surely not like you. I mean, I think Lincoln's Gettysburg address wasn't very much longer, was it?

Just to clarify a little more detail around the mooted 'leaking' of the small maroon 1891, Melvin Harris obviously knew too by January 5, 1995, so between him and Mike, it would inevitably reach Feldman's ears and then Anne's. So technically, Mike had 'leaked' its existence before Anne was asked about it, so Keith's knowledge of it was clearly not dependent upon his simultaneous knowledge of Mike's little-publicised January 5, 1995, affidavit. By giving Keith the cheque, Anne gave him the means to find out all anyone knew to date at that time about the maroon diary, so there was no more for Mike (or anyone else) to 'leak' after that. She may or may not have known about the advert or she may have known about the advert but not its contents, but that's very much consistent with the point. If she knew Mike was trying to obtain a book to house their hoax, she was handing Keith the means to find potentially damning details about his efforts. You will spin it some other way (or rival Kennedy's Berlin address with a long diatribe on 'Ich bin ein comma' or some other such call-to-arms for all grammarians the world over to rise up against their oppressors) but nothing that you say can introduce any sort of subterfuge into Anne's actions (and yet through your own unique Muddy Address, you will strive to, I have absolutely no doubt).

For the record, I have Keith's notes regarding his waterboarding of Anne in August 1995:

"Anne's recollections re Victorian diary - thinks it was pre Doreen - thinks Mike got it by phoning up Yellow Pages - he wanted to see what a Victorian diary looked like. All Anne can clearly remember is having to pay £20 for it - is going to search her cheque stubs. 3.30PM - Anne phoned back - has been looking at statements and old cheque books. Between 17th May 1992 and 21st May 1992 there is a stub which says £25 book. Anne is going to see whether bank can identify who cheque was payable to."

Looks like I was wrong about Anne having to get a duplicate statement - but, rather, that she needed a copy of the cheque.

Yet, Caroline Brown has reported (many times, I might add) that Keith first learned about Mike Barrett's affidavit on 22 January 1997. (If you doubt this, chase down the appropriate posts for yourself, or see the "Silence of Ann" at Orsam Books).

None of this makes any odds given that Keith has now clarified that he learned of the 1891 maroon diary from Paul Feldman who had heard it from Mike. Keith has assured me that Feldman made no mention to him (Keith) of Mike's January 5, 1995, affidavit which explains why Keith was still in the dark about that affidavit until a few days over two years later (January 22, 1997). The issue of why Anne did not mention it to Keith is the stuff of other threads or else this thread but not right now (I'm trying to reduce any possible encouragement for you to deflect, Muddy).

Ike

[Iconoclast]

I wonder, dear readers, how much less obviously-a-fraud the Victorian scrapbook would appear to those on this site without Muddy the Mud Boy's constant re-imagining of the details to suit the detractors' arguments?

[caz]

Well, forgetting the fact that there is utterly no evidence that Eddie found the diary, or even knew Barrett, let alone sold the diary to him, let's think it over.

Utterly no evidence? None so deaf as those with selective hearing, eh?

According to your own theory, Mike 'waved' Martin Earl's invoice for a tiny, blank or nearly blank memo book 'under Eddie's nose'--and this was enough for Eddie to relinquish the priceless Diary of Jack the Ripper for twenty-five quid. A most curious method of assessing the value of a document...

No, that is not a theory I currently entertain, but RJ would know that if he didn't have highly selective hearing.

Instead, Eddie hung on to The Diary of Jack the Ripper (yes, I refuse to use your convenient phrase 'the old book')...

As RJ would know, if he didn't suffer from chronic selective hearing, it is not my phrase, convenient or otherwise, but one that has been used routinely by more than one interviewee who has spoken about "the old book" found by Eddie Lyons during a wiring job. Keith's partner, who was present at some of the interviews, later remarked on the use of the phrase long before I did. So I will continue to refer to it as "the old book" [which it clearly is, as opposed to a diary] in the context of Eddie's find, and if it pains RJ to hear it, he can just switch on his selective hearing again.

...patiently waiting to sell it to an unemployed and penniless drinker, whose wife held the purse strings, and, not irrelevantly, a man with the loosest set of lips in all of Merseyside. A most curious choice for a customer of stolen goods.

And when was Eddie meant to have learned all this about Mike? "Nice old book you got there, lad. Jack the Ripper, eh? Nobody's going to fall for that! Where did you get it? Is it dodgy? Okay, 'nuff said. I tell you what. Everyone around here knows about my contacts in the auntie queer... old book world and what have you, so I'm your man if you need to find a discreet buyer. I'm happy to look after that side of things for you. Oh, and before I nip off to make a very important phone call, there's a chap called Roger, writing on the internet thirty years from now, who expects me to warn you that I'm an unemployed and penniless drinker, whose wife holds the purse strings and, best of all - and this will make you chuckle - I'm a man with the loosest set of lips in all of Merseyside. Couldn't be further from the truth, lad. Trust me. You won't be sorry".

If you want to go with that story, feel free. I don't think historians will be queuing up around the block to accept it. It's destined to end up in the same Ripperological rubbish bin that holds Joseph Sickert's stories and the theories of William Le Quex.

No, I'm happy to go with RJ's take on things. He's much better at Mersey Ferry tales.

Love,

Caz
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