The Diary — Old Hoax or New or Not a Hoax at All?​

[Herlock Sholmes]

I'm honestly stunned that you keep asking me this because 1) Caz is not my ******* wife who is actually the only person on the planet I answer to however scared of both of them I happen to be, and 2) I actually agreed with Caz many posts back that - in principle at least - an 1891 diary could be used for an 1888 diary (but it would obviously not be an actual 1891 diary with '1891' printed on every single page, clearly!).



I don't need you to tell me, thank you - that's blindingly obvious to everyone. It's either Victorian or it may be Edwardian. Don't be so full of your knowledge just because you think you know it all. Others can still know it all too.



No, you're just trying to be clever and you're ******* it all up badly. A Victorian scrapbook - from 1888 or any other year Victoria was alive - could have obviously held photographs from World War 1. Where's the curiousness in that? Why do you assume that Barrett - in this scenario that patently didn't actually happen - was stupid enough to think like you are thinking? I don't know why I'm even entertaining this desperate stretching - it didn't happen!



He had a good month to think about what story he was going to tell after Gray had warned him during his hospital stay that they would need lots of detail when he came to write his affidavit. Being a brilliant author, he must have decided to say it held WW1 photographs (we know that because he actually said that). I think he came up with some tale about a photograph of a donkey at a grave too, if I recall correctly. Being a brilliant author (and freelance journalist), he must have figured telling the story that way would be even more believable to the gullible masses. Doesn't mean he assumed the scrapbook was not potentially or actually Victorian!



See my earlier comment, I can believe it. In the general case, it's possible. Just not in this specific case where the customer was being told he was being offered an 1891 diary and he just makes a load of assumptions about whether it is suitable or not when he simply could have asked for clarification. We all know that Mike Barrett routinely acted stupidly, but exactly how stupid do you think he was just a few days before he wrote a hoaxed record of James Maybrick's thoughts which has kept us all arguing about its authenticity some 33 years later?



I think your argument fell apart at "you're pretending not to be able to understand it", don't you?

I need to record this statement for posterity:

"I actually agreed with Caz many posts back that - in principle at least - an 1891 diary could be used for an 1888 diary (but it would obviously not be an actual 1891 diary with '1891' printed on every single page, clearly!)."

You do realize you've just admitted that Mike could quite reasonably and understandably have purchased an 1891 diary to use for his fake 1888 Ripper diary if he didn't know that 1891 was printed on every page, right?

With there being no evidence at all that Mike was told over the telephone that 1891 was printed on every page of the diary that he was being offered sight unseen (and Keith Skinner not even including that statement in his own full and detailed description of the diary despite knowing its significance to the forgery claim) it is game over.

Thank you for playing, Ike.

[Scott Nelson]

If you would only concede straightforward propositions from the start, and not mis-state and mis-interpret my posts, such extended humiliations of you as I was forced to post in my #1483, wouldn't be necessary.

Who was forcing you? Those "humiliations" were quite extensive and probably time-consuming to collate. Typical in style to what I remember reading in Barrat's articles. You don't suppose, do you...

[Iconoclast]

After all, to remind you of what you prefer to ignore, the only actual evidence we have of what Mike Barrett thought a diary looked like is in the large black leather bound volume which had no date on the cover and not a single printed date on any page. Yet he told Doreen it was a "diary".

When did he tell Doreen Montgomery that the scrapbook which you claim he didn't get until March 31, 1992, was a 'diary'? Is he on the record as saying this after March 31, 1992, or did you just make that up?

This is not a trick question. I genuinely don't know. I only know he said he called it a 'diary' when he rang in early March, long before you think he had seen and purchased the scrapbook.

[Iconoclast]

Because you will never be satisfied with anything less than 100% proof.

This speaks volumes about your approach and explains a great deal. Is there truly any other form of proof than the 100% kind?

[Iconoclast]

... your "dear readers" (who are as imaginary as your fictional conversations) that I was saying something I wasn't.

Are you having a laugh? Have you seen the views the threads I contribute to get? I'm the ******* Beyonce of the Casebook, mate.

[Iconoclast]

You do realize you've just admitted that Mike could quite reasonably and understandably have purchased an 1891 diary to use for his fake 1888 Ripper diary if he didn't know that 1891 was printed on every page, right?

I think your earlier post tells us all we need to know - for you, 23% proof is proof enough. Under those rules, you definitely win at Semantics.

[Iconoclast]

Who was forcing you? Those "humiliations" were quite extensive and probably time-consuming to collate. Typical in style to what I remember reading in Barrat's articles. You don't suppose, do you...

Yes, you do, Scotty. As do I ...

[Iconoclast]

You're pathetic, Tom.

You’re hurt, RJ, I get it, but you’re striking out at the wrong guy. You’ve asked me many times for stuff you know I’ve said I don’t have the authority to give. I’ve even ignored your questions on this one to save having to answer them truthfully. I’m sorry if it wasn’t the truth you were hoping to hear but - next time - ask the organ grinder himself, you know his email address.

[Herlock Sholmes]

Who was forcing you? Those "humiliations" were quite extensive and probably time-consuming to collate. Typical in style to what I remember reading in Barrat's articles. You don't suppose, do you...

Hi Scott,

It was circumstances which forced me to humiliate Tom Mitchell. Not pleasant but it had to be done.

Don't you worry about how I spend my time, mate

What is it you don't suppose? Too scared to finish a sentence? Or worried that you're about to say something utterly absurd?

[caz]

I'm afraid I can't see the distinction between Mike buying it and Anne buying it, which you seem to be making. Surely Anne paid for the diary at Mike's request.

I'm not sure why I am meant to care if you see no distinction between Mike buying the red diary and Anne buying it. According to Anne, she had been so annoyed when she learned that Mike was being chased for payment that she wrote out the cheque [she thought it was for £20 when recalling this in 1995], signed it and threw it at Mike, telling him to fill out the payee's name himself. She could have been lying to Keith of course, but Roger Palmer's suspicion was that Anne delayed paying for it until after 13th April so it would appear that it was bought too late for forgery purposes - in which case she'd have been the one to blame for Mike going down on record as a 'late payer'. Palmer also mockingly asked whether Anne was in the habit of giving Mike blank cheques, already signed so he could make them out for whatever figure he fancied, but Keith's notes make it clear that she knew the figure to within £5 and also that Mike had been chased for payment, even if that was pretty much all she did know, or as much as Mike had chosen to tell her.

Do you think that Mike could possibly have thought that Victorian diaries only came in one shape, size and colour and were only sourced through a second-hand telephone bookseller in Oxford? If not, how could he possibly have judged "the availability to any practical joker in 1992 of suitable items for faking Jack the Ripper's diary?" from a single Oxford second-hand telephone bookseller only being able to locate an 1891 diary with blank pages? Surely it would have told him nothing.

Well apparently, Mike did think - or hope - that Victorian diaries only came in one size: large enough for Jack the Ripper's bumper book of ripping yarns, or for recording Maybrick's musings if you prefer, over 15 months of two consecutive years, and could only be sourced through a second-hand telephone bookseller in Oxford, if that's what he had promised to show Doreen on 9th March, but had yet to create one. There is no evidence of any previous, nor indeed future attempts to source anything suitable. He only claimed to have attended an auction sale in January 1990, but there is no evidence for him doing so at any time, and he surely would have put it in the affidavit if he had tried to source one from anywhere else. Yet he would presumably have had more than five minutes before calling a literary agent to think about his minimum requirements if the diary text had been sitting smugly on his word processor, and to look into potential sources of something suitable to house it. The argument that he left this crucial part of the process until after he had got Doreen interested, to save him the expense and presumably the effort of even thinking, if she said there was no market for that sort of thing [???], or just fobbed him off with a thanks but no thanks, doesn't really work because she could have done that at any time, right up until 8th April when the arrangements were finally confirmed in writing. She was a woman and a businesswoman, who could have changed her mind if her priorities changed while Mike was busy doing his belated homework.

Conversely, if he had only just seen the scrapbook when he leapt into action and called Doreen, he'd have been calling Martin Earl on a whim, before he knew what he had, and would learn that Earl was 'unable to source any Victorian diaries from 1880 to 1890 with blank pages' within a couple of weeks of his request, but at least one for 1891 had been located without too much trouble, so in theory a prankster could have obtained something similar from another source that was a year or two older - until of course the red diary arrived and proved itself in practice to be anything but similar to the diary he ended up taking to London just a few days later.

Further, you seem to have forgotten that the advertisement placed on his behalf asked primarily for an unused Victorian diary. How would an unused, totally blank Victorian diary have enabled him to make any kind of comparison with the Ripper diary containing 63 pages of written entries?

I haven't forgotten. An unused diary for 1891 would have had to be provably for that year from the seller's point of view, and not merely have a handwritten date somewhere with no diary entries to go with it, or the description would have been highly misleading. The seller would have known this, even if Mike had no real clue what to expect and didn't ask. Moreover, an unused diary for 1891 didn't need to have 63 pages of written entries in it, just to compare its physical suitability for a prankster with the partly used scrapbook claiming a date in 1889 for its final entry.

Then there's Roger's point. If he obtained the 1891 diary for the purpose of researching whether the Ripper diary was a forgery, why didn't he share the results of his research with Shirley with whom he'd signed a collaboration agreement? Why didn't Anne, who also signed the collaboration agreement, ever mention it? If Mike had thought it was important to compare a genuine Victorian diary with the Ripper diary, why not tell Shirley all about it?

Er, because it would look rather odd that it had supposedly taken months to think of undertaking this research, and Mike only did so at the eleventh hour when Doreen had expressed her interest in seeing the one he had claimed to have in his possession since the middle of 1991? They could hardly admit that Mike had launched straight into this research within a day or two of seeing the diary and calling Doreen, because he suspected someone was having a laugh at his expense, could they? Tony Devereux had died back in August 1991, so he'd already had his last laugh.

I'm afraid I don't understand your question: "And for the last time, Mike didn't 'order' a diary from the period 1880-1890, did he?" That is precisely what he asked for but none were available from Martin Earl. So I just don't know what you're getting at. Nor do I know what you mean by "for the last time".

Okay, so I could have written: 'For crying out loud' instead. Mike asked for a diary for 1880-90 but was happy for Martin Earl to order one for 1891, regardless of how it was described to him, as long as he could see it before paying. Are you happy now?

I very much doubt it. I'm beginning to think I should give you some slack, in case you are seriously unwell. You challenge and question every little thing, while appearing to think that everything you write, whether it's in the form of an argument, an opinion or a question, deserves to be addressed but is beyond challenge. It makes your arguments and opinions on any subject, when you know you don't have all the facts, rather pointless if this is all you can ever bring to a debate.

As for your question: "And he wasn't asked to send any money, before a diary for the wrong year - 1891 - was sent to him, was he?" I've already dealt with this but have to pick you up on your claim that 1891 was "the wrong year". It was not "the wrong year". It was certainly outside the decade Mike had originally asked for, but an 1891 diary could, of course, have been used to fake an 1888 Ripper diary, as I've already demonstrated in my posts to Ike. This should be uncontroversial.

How could 1891 have been the right year for any of Maybrick's musings? Would you have said the same if Mike had asked for an 1891 diary in the first instance? If you mean it would not have been an impediment for your theoretical 1992 forger, if only it wasn't already an enormous impediment on so many levels waiting for Mike to see just how enormous, then Ike's auntie's nuts come into play again. It's a totally pointless argument for the sake of argument and nothing to do with the reality.

You can ask Martin Earl how he dealt with defaulters in his business, and it's odd that you or Keith didn't already enquire of him about this, but it's all totally hypothetical. We know what in fact happened. For whatever reason, Mike didn't pay for the diary within the 30 day required period and Anne paid for it in May. There's nothing more to this. It tells us nothingwhatsoever about why Mike wanted the diary in the first place.

Hooray! Indeed it doesn't. It certainly doesn't tell us that Mike wanted the diary for forgery purposes and was disappointed to find it 'very small' and unfit for that purpose. Only you would find it odd if those of us involved in the email correspondence didn't ask Martin Earl a hypothetical question about what he would have done in a 'can't pay/won't pay' situation, if there hadn't been a little woman in the picture with the means to do the right thing.

Your question about whether Mike and Anne could have seen a way out of paying for the diary is just ridiculous. You might as well ask me why they didn't shoplift all their groceries every week and carry out insurance frauds for a living. Honestly, Caz, by May, Barrett was legally obliged to pay for the diary and failure would have just led to a county court judgment being obtained against him and the subsequent arrival of the bailiffs at 12 Goldie Street. Paying the £25 was the most sensible option, and indeed, the only realistic one

Bailiffs? Are you having a laugh at your readers' expense? Mike went on to have his home repossessed because he wasn't paying the mortgage after Anne left him, despite the thousands of pounds rolling in from sales of Shirley's book. In the best George Best tradition, he spent a lot of money on booze and anything but the roof over his head, and the rest he just squandered. While Anne evidently cared very much about Mike owing £25 and being chased for it while they were together, would Mike have given two hoots if she hadn't been around, or didn't feel obliged to cover his debts? Would she have been prepared to pay regardless of the price? How much would have been too much?

[caz]

This speaks volumes about your approach and explains a great deal. Is there truly any other form of proof than the 100% kind?

Ha ha, it must be catching. A while ago, I seem to recall Palmer referring to 'more conclusive proof' of something or other connected with the science, as if proof wasn't already conclusive by definition. It ain't proof if you need more of it, and if it is proof you don't need opinion or argument.

It's like the horrible trend for saying: "one hundred and ten percent, mate!" or, in some instances: "a million percent".

Love,

Caz
X

[caz]

What a ridiculously long way of admitting that you should have written that Anne would likely have assumed that her disguised Victorian handwriting didn't resemble Maybrick's than known it. You already admitted (in #1127) that "known it didn't resemble Maybrick's" wasn't the best way of putting it, so god only knows why you've come back to defend it Caz.

Touched a nerve, did I, Mr Banks?

If you insist on being the master debater around here, then God knows you only have yourself to blame when it's acknowledged.

[caz]

Another point to note is that Mike stated for his affidavit that Anne had asked him recently for the red diary and he had meekly handed over this potentially crucial evidence to her, depriving himself of the chance to show it to Alan Gray, along with the receipt, when he was crying out for some hard evidence of what Mike was claiming. God alone knows why Mike would have done such a thing, or why Gray would not have been seriously unamused if he believed it, but I don't believe for one second that Anne didn't already have the diary in her possession.

This was either a blatant lie, which could not be put down to the drink combined with a faulty memory, and Alan Gray totally misunderstanding what Mike was saying and typing something entirely different, or Mike really did have the red diary until shortly before the affidavit was prepared, in which case the argument that he could only recall its 'very small' size by January 1995 and Precious Little Else [he must have known that girl intimately] goes up in smoke.

It's all too convenient to keep repeating that the affidavit isn't important, but the devil is in the detail and when arguments are made that depend on Mike having lied outright one minute, or told the God's honest truth the next, it becomes important or the arguments themselves will be meaningless.

One reason for Mike to lie about Anne asking him for the red diary would be that he was blaming her for stupidly purchasing something for their hoax that was 'very small' and no use, so he had to take over and find something that would work. He couldn't claim that time was pressing if Tony Devereux was supposedly still alive at the time, even if 1990 was not another blatant lie. We know it was a blatant lie that Anne had purchased a very small diary by mistake, because she only paid for it, while Mike was solely responsible for its size, along with everything else that would have made it 'no use' if forging Maybrick's diary had been the goal. Alan Gray would have found it hard enough to believe that Mike would knowingly have purchased an 1891 diary, let alone Anne. But Mike over-egged the pudding by claiming that he had the red diary and Anne naturally wanted it back in the wake of his very public forgery claim because it was evidence of her own involvement. It makes no sense that he'd have handed it to her on a plate in those circumstances.

[caz]

Well this is very interesting, Caz. So you think that Mike, in scrutinizing the original diary, noticed that the handwriting of the diarist resembled the handwriting of his wife in some respects? Well he must have got rather frustrated that he kept saying that the dairy was in his wife's handwriting and not a single bloody person manged to spot what he'd seen. And he didn't even bother to tell anyone about those little similarities either. It wasn't until years after his death that the similarities were even noticed.

Then you answered your own question because Mike could, like everybody else until years after his death, have noticed no resemblance between the writing in the diary and his wife's handwriting. But no, I don't seriously think that Mike did notice anything of the sort. It was more a case of wondering whether you thought he would or should have done, if it is pretty obvious to amateur hoax busters on the internet in 2025, who were not married to Anne for twenty years.

If Mike thought there was a resemblance in April 1992, when he was supposedly watching Anne at work on his own composition, he couldn't have been that worried about early exposure.

If he saw a resemblance by the second half of 1994, which he had not previously noticed, he could have brought it to Alan Gray's attention when they were doing the old hoax-busting shuffle together, with four left feet.

But at least you now appear to have answered one of the questions that I've been dying to know your answer to.

You accept that those similarities exist!

Hallelujah and praise the Lord.

I'm sorry that you were 'dying' to know my answer [that's a bit weird in any sense], but appearances can be deceptive and I don't recall accepting the existence of 'those' similarities, whatever you are referring to, in so many words. If I had, it wouldn't just 'appear' to you that I had answered your question and got a patronising pat on the back for my pains. You usually demand far more clarity than that before you start praising a Lord other than the big O.

p.s. The signature is a joke - an obvious one I thought. Strange isn’t it that all that I’ve had to do is post on the subject of the diary to become an instant enemy there to be insulted. You and Ike. Maybe I should have applied for membership before posting?

You must be used to it by now, considering all the grief you have complained about getting on topics unrelated to this one, where you have similarly treated anyone who doesn't see things your way to endless unproductive rants about you being right and not understanding how they can possibly fail to agree.

But forgive me for not recognising your 'obvious' attempt at being a comedian. It always looks so unintentional in your posts. There must be no end to your talent, but that would be the case if there was no beginning to it. Maybe it's the way you tell 'em.

[Herlock Sholmes]

Hi Herlock,

Why would I give a rat's arse if it was a Londoner, rather than a Scouser, whose reference to a 'Bumbling Purveyor' of inane doggerel appeared in print in November 1888?

The original argument was that the dictionary stated the word was obsolete by then, except for certain regional dialects. It was clearly still being used, as Gary's examples [plural] prove, so I'm not sure why it matters where it cropped up.

The only thing that matters to me is that the word's supposed obsolescence had previously been used as sound evidence that the Barretts had 'tripped over' by putting it in their diary to describe Maybrick's doctor. He is referred to as a 'buffoon', which nobody could have had a problem with, and is also described in the diary as a 'meddling' buffoon, which could give a hint as to the intended meaning of 'bumbling' to refer to the same person - but only the author could tell us what they had in mind.

I can only repeat, for anyone still not getting it, that if the Barretts put the 'bumbling' in the diary they dodged a bullet, because the word was alive and kicking in 1888, if not widely seen in print, and could therefore have referred to anyone felt to be deserving of the adjective, regardless of what meaning was attached to it.

Sorry, Caz, I missed this post at the time.

The answer to your question is that I have no idea why you'd give a rat's arse if it was a Londoner rather than a Scouser who referred to a "Bumbling Purveyor". You'll have to tell me.

All I know is that you wrongly attributed this phrase to a "theatre man from Liverpool" and a "Liverpool theatre man" when it was an agent in London.

Facts, as you once told me, is facts.

The Barretts, as forgers, did not "dodge a bullet" because the expression "bumbling buffoon" is quite evidently a twentieth century one, with no place in a journal supposedly written in 1888.

Not that it matters one jot because the appearance in that journal of the expression "a one off instance" proves beyond doubt that it wasn't written in 1888.