Vote the Diary

[Spider]

A lot of money went Mr Barretts way believe me not bad when all he wanted was to be able to buy a green house but the whole thing got out of hand .

It is 'relatively' little in terms of publishing rights etc, wasn't it about £40k total? No idea what publishing books would bring.

If it were a forgery it didn't work out financially for the forgers that's for sure and Mr. Barrett certainly wasn't capable of undertaking it.

Regards

[pinkmoon]

I think that, had the 'diary' been a later forgery then the forger/nest of forgers would have been traced. An earlier forgery would be more difficult to trace.
At the end of the day, it has caused nothing but misery, conflict, ill health and divorce for many involved in it.
It has made little money (except in publishing books) for anyone, including any alleged forgery author and ultimately changed hands for a nominal £1.
A pretty pointless forgery if it is ;-).

Regards

A lot of money went Mr Barretts way believe me not bad when all he wanted was to be able to buy a green house but the whole thing got out of hand .

[GUT]

I think that, had the 'diary' been a later forgery then the forger/nest of forgers would have been traced. An earlier forgery would be more difficult to trace.
At the end of the day, it has caused nothing but misery, conflict, ill health and divorce for many involved in it.
It has made little money (except in publishing books) for anyone, including any alleged forgery author and ultimately changed hands for a nominal £1.
A pretty pointless forgery if it is ;-).

Regards

I'm not so sure about the "making little money" part.

[Spider]

I think that, had the 'diary' been a later forgery then the forger/nest of forgers would have been traced. An earlier forgery would be more difficult to trace.
At the end of the day, it has caused nothing but misery, conflict, ill health and divorce for many involved in it.
It has made little money (except in publishing books) for anyone, including any alleged forgery author and ultimately changed hands for a nominal £1.
A pretty pointless forgery if it is ;-).

Regards

[MayBea]

Then, of course, the Diary would never have gotten any attention. The same goes for the watch.

The lack of proven origin hurts every theory.

Of course if it was real and was kept by a family, that was either ignorant of what it actually contained, and maybe forgot about it, or was ashamed of the implications for the family, its origins, journeys, and connection to the family would remain a mystery.

Wouldn't the direct trail, leading back to a forger, be easier to track?

[pinkmoon]

The diary should like the recent shawl business not have been given so much attention untill it could have been proved where it originated from

[Spider]

I must be one of the few who believe in the 'diary' 100% all day long, or at least one of the even fewer that dare stand up and admit to it on this site, considering the amount of anticipated tirades faced in reply ;-)

The 'diary' was on poor footing from the start with it's dubious introduction, but putting this to one side my thoughts are, that the diary originated from Battlecrease House, making it's way to Ann Graham's family from her fathers step mother via a servant at Battlecrease.
When Maybrick say's in the 'diary' he will "place this where it will be found", there is only one place it could logically have been put. Maybrick couldn't risk it being found whilst bedridden and so must have kept it with him, if he lived it was safe, if he died it didn't matter.
The 'diary' was probably placed under the mattress. Had a family member found it, then it would have been destroyed. In all likelihood it would have been found by the lowliest servant of the house charged with changing the bed linen after Maybrick's death.

Regards

[Pcdunn]

All I know is I'm confused by all the stories of this diary or scrapbook, whatever.
There's the story we read back in the day, about buying it in a pub.
Then the purchaser said it was forged, and he did it.
Then the same guy retracts this story (or his lawyer does, same thing).
Next, his wife says she had it in the family, and this has a version where a family member got it from a servant at the Maybrick house ( a little "Downton Abbey" theme music sting here, please) OR her Dad had it for ages from HIS family...

Sigh... I voted for old hoax, because everyone and his sister was writing hoax Ripper letters to the papers back in Jack's time (Ive even read one in a Leadville, Colorado newspaper), and it makes sense that someone would try a bigger hoax, whether as a prank, a frame-up, some sort of "party piece" for giggles, who knows... But a hoax. To judge from the letters, many Victorians had a strange sense of humor...

[Graham]

Fairly obvious that he hasn't, I'd say.

G

[Kaz]

Yes of course it does. Surely you can work that one out - unless you don't even know the basics.

Love,

Caz
X

Has this character ever read a diary book of 'any' description?

[caz]

Well, does it?

Yes of course it does. Surely you can work that one out - unless you don't even know the basics.

Love,

Caz
X

[caz]

Hi caz,I was very surprised when I asked Mr Barrett about the watch I was expecting him to waffle on for hours but all he did was shrug his shoulders look bemused and say "don't f####### know".I'm firmly of the opinion he knows nothing about this watch.One last thing I know Mr Johnson who discovered this watch was in the merchant navy as was Mr Barrett.

I agree that Mike knows no more about the watch than we do. And there has never been the slightest evidence that the Barretts and the Johnsons knew each other until after both diary and watch hit the news. I can't imagine something like that could have been kept quiet for all this time, knowing how Scouser tongues wag. And I mean that affectionately. I love Liverpool.

Love,

Caz
X

[caz]

How do we know that the watch, with it's Maybrick markings, appeared before the 'Diary' was published?

Io be specific can I--or anybody else--access the published source that shows, eg. by it's date, that it debuted before this [modern] hoax of the 'Diary' was launched and then flopped?

The watch, complete with its markings, was first shown to Robert Smith in early June 1993. The content of the diary was first published in facsimile and transcript form in Shirley Harrison's book, in October 1993. In fact there is a photo of the watch and its markings in that very book.

QED

Love,

Caz
X

[Jonathan H]

Well, does it?

[caz]

So, if it did come out of Battlecrease then Anne Graham is lying, or hopelessly misinformed--have I got that straight?

That rather depends on when it came out of Battlecrease, doesn't it?

Love,

Caz
X