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

[rjpalmer]

You are quite right. It's tricky for me to square away. I can't speak for Keith, only he can do that.

Has Keith already done so?

In claiming that he believes, with something like 99% certainty, that the diary came out of Dodd's house, isn't he candidly admitting that Anne had deceived him back in 1994-2002? Which, on a human level, is a rather brave admission.

It wasn't a matter of Anne being "the only game in town," as Caroline likes to claim. He didn't have to go to bat for Anne, and he made no secret about the fact that he believed her. Perhaps he still does in some small way. I don't know.

I think it might be worth your time, and all our times, to carefully study Anne's statements to Paul Feldman as told by Paul Feldman, and to review Paul Daniel's account (in The Ripperologist, reprinted on this website) of his meeting with Anne, Sally, and Feldman, as they discussed Anne's provenance tale and her supposed familial connection to Florence Maybrick.

I'm certainly left with the impression that Anne supported and encouraged Feldman's beliefs in these moments.

Yet--and this is not nice to say---it strikes me that Anne was also two-faced about Feldman. While in Feldman's company she led him along and encouraged his theories.

But when away from Feldman, she joked about his methods and questioned his theories--showing skepticism of them to Harrison and others. This is documented in Inside Story and by Shirley Harrison.

This is significant, and it also puts grave doubts on Caroline Brown's insinuation that Anne went along with Feldman because he had offered to "make her a millionaire."

In reality, Feldman gave Anne very little money and Anne didn't support his theories with anything approaching zeal, even being lukewarm about them on the Bob Azurdia show.

So, no, I don't think Feldman's promise of filthy lucre explains Anne's behavior.

[Herlock Sholmes]

To me your arguments are rational, and I only speak for me.

However, I, too, have never met Anne. But as someone who has met Keith and spent a bit of time with him both virtually and in real life, I believe in his judgments and feelings. He had worked closely with Anne, and he just never got the impression she was playing any game with him as far as I'm aware. You are basically saying he was a victim of her manipulation, but I don't think he ever felt that to be the case. I trust his judgment. He knew her. Again, I speak for my views and don't speak for Keith.

Her behaviour is in line with a master manipulator playing a high-stakes game so as not to lose Keith's confidence. But equally, it is the same behaviour displayed by someone who genuinely does not believe the advert was anything meaningful - another one of Mike's hair-brained ideas based on flawed logic.

I cannot say I trust Anne, but I can't help but feel on this specific issue around the small red diary - I think I do.

I have to say Jay, you're thinking on this issue seems more than a little muddled to me.

In your #1147 you say of the red 1891 diary, "she genuinely did not see it as the smoking gun some on this post think it is."

The only people who claim that the red 1891 diary is a smoking gun are Caz and Ike, because they been desperately trying to argue that Mike's purchase of it proves that he wasn't seeking a Victorian diary to fake the 1888 Ripper dairy.

I've never said that the red diary is a smoking gun, nor has Roger.

The smoking gun is the advertisement placed by Martin Earl on Mike's behalf because it shows us that Mike wanted a Victorian diary with blank pages. The red diary doesn't tell us this. Indeed, on its own, the red diary was easily explained away by the possibility that Mike just wanted it to see what a genuine Victorian diary looked like. This, of course, is exactly what Anne claimed Mike wanted it for. It's only because of the advertisement that we know this isn't the case.

If your reason for trusting Anne on this issue is because "she genuinely did not see it as the smoking gun", that's because it wasn't a smoking gun. It presented no danger to her whatsoever. Further, the date on the cheque she gave Keith suggested that the diary hadn't even been purchased until after Mike had brought the Maybrick diary down to London. So it couldn't have been used to create that diary. Certainly, this is what Keith believed for at least four years after he spoke to Anne. For some reason, she didn't think to tell him that Mike came to her as a late payer and that the payment should have been made in April for a diary received in March. She must have been aware of the significance of this for some months before speaking to Keith because Mike had given her a copy of his affidavit in which he mentioned the reason for the purchase of the diary and had expressly stated it was paid for by a cheque written by Anne. I'm not sure how you think she was supposed to deny that she'd written such a cheque. It seems to me that she did the bare minimum, gave Keith a false reason for why Mike wanted the diary and didn't tell him why the diary was only paid for in May 1992.

More importantly, though, I don't even know what you mean when you say you trust Anne about the red diary. What are you trusting her about? Her claim that Mike bought the diary to see what a Victorian diary looked like? Well that can't be true because we now know what type of diary he was seeking. What else is there to trust her about? So she gave Keith a copy of the cheque which Mike had already described in his affidavit. So what?

Even if she thought that Keith might get in touch with Martin Earl as a result of the cheque, and she knew or suspected that Mike had told Earl that he specifically wanted a diary with blank pages and she feared that Earl would disclose this information to Keith, well so what? Because that's what actually did happen! And how has that caused any problems for Anne? It hasn't, has it? She now simply refuses to speak about the dairy to anyone.

For all these reasons, your posts on this subject seem to me to be illogical and don't make sense but if you want to trust Anne on something, despite believing she lied repeatedly and deliberately about the origins of the diary, I certainly can't stop you.

[erobitha]

Thanks, Jay.

So, if you are comfortable answering, how do you square Keith's judgment about Anne's honesty with your own belief that the diary came out of Dodd's floorboards on 9 March 1992?

I can't be the only one who notices a glaring contradiction. If Keith's judgement about Anne is to be trusted, don't we have to believe that Anne had seen the diary in the late 1960s? And that it was Anne who gave the diary to Tony Devereux, and not Ed Lyons giving it to Mike?

And, unless Anne's name isn't Anne Elizabeth Graham, and that she really did work for MI-5, isn't she a proven deceiver?

I'm not trying to be a wise-arse, but it strikes me as awfully convenient to accept Anne's honesty in this particular instance, especially when cooperation would have allowed Anne to leave a false impression about when the diary had been really ordered.

Nor has anyone attempted to explain why Keith was still telling an audience in 1999 that the diary had been order in May 1992 if Anne had truly stressed to him that it had been "pre-Doreen."

But those are questions you and others will have to ponder and answer to your own satisfaction.

Cheers.

You are quite right. It's tricky for me to square away. I can't speak for Keith, only he can do that.

However, it is important to note that Keith wasn't present at the meeting Feldman had with Anne in the hotel, nor was he present at Billy Graham's "testimony", so he can only go from his own personal interactions with Anne. Which I think is more than fair enough. I trust his judgement on his own experience.

The MI5 thing was a bit of silliness (in my view) by Anne to see how far Paul Feldman would go in believing anything he was told. Why she did that, we can only speculate. And we do.

I have a big question mark over that hotel meeting, how it came about and who instigated what, but it most certainly feels fishy to me. I just don't know if that fish is a Feldman-shaped fish or an Anne-shaped one. June 1994 Mike confesses to hoaxing the diary. In July 1994, Anne claims "in the family" provenance. These cannot be unconnected. It's far too convenient, in my opinion. It would be churlish not to accept the possibility that Anne instigated things, but if I were pushed, I feel Feldman did, and Anne played along. The "master manipulator" Anne theory cannot be ruled out. Neither can just an ordinary woman trying to navigate what was in front of her to her own advantage, possibly taking advantage of an ex-husband she was happy to see the back of. It's these nuances that are fascinating and ultimately crucial.

Anne remains integral to this story, one way or another, whether she likes it or not. I hope something soon prompts her to talk again.

[rjpalmer]

However, I, too, have never met Anne. But as someone who has met Keith and spent a bit of time with him both virtually and in real life, I believe in his judgments and feelings. He had worked closely with Anne, and he just never got the impression she was playing any game with him as far as I'm aware. You are basically saying he was a victim of her manipulation, but I don't think he ever felt that to be the case. I trust his judgment. He knew her. Again, I speak for my views and don't speak for Keith.

Thanks, Jay.

So, if you are comfortable answering, how do you square Keith's judgment about Anne's honesty with your own belief that the diary came out of Dodd's floorboards on 9 March 1992?

I can't be the only one who notices a glaring contradiction. If Keith's judgement about Anne is to be trusted, don't we have to believe that Anne had seen the diary in the late 1960s? And that it was Anne who gave the diary to Tony Devereux, and not Ed Lyons giving it to Mike?

And, unless Anne's name isn't Anne Elizabeth Graham, and that she really did work for MI-5, isn't she a proven deceiver?

I'm not trying to be a wise-arse, but it strikes me as awfully convenient to accept Anne's honesty in this particular instance, especially when cooperation would have allowed Anne to leave a false impression about when the diary had been really ordered.

Nor has anyone attempted to explain why Keith was still telling an audience in 1999 that the diary had been order in May 1992 if Anne had truly stressed to him that it had been "pre-Doreen."

But those are questions you and others will have to ponder and answer to your own satisfaction.

Cheers.

[erobitha]

Hi Jay,

I hope we can have a calm, rational, and non-judgmental conversation, so, in that spirt, can I point out that your first question has been asked and answered many times, including this week? One can keep asking it over and over, but why expect a different answer?

So instead, ask yourself: if it was you, and you were guilty of forgery, what would you have done?

Seriously, mate. What would you have done?

Would you have denied the purchase and risked being caught out as liar by Keith if he traced the purchase without your cooperation? Clearly, Keith had gotten wind of this purchase, or he wouldn't have asked you about it. Wouldn't that have been very risky? And Keith would never trust you again if he found out Earl's name?

Or would you cooperate with Keith, winning his confidence, and trust your ability to convince him it was an innocent or irrelevant purchase? Which would have been a relatively simple matter since you had a cheque stub showing it was purchased in May--after Barrett had brought the diary to Doreen in London. Cooperating would HELP you sow a false trail due to the odd details of the payment.

Seriously. Isn't the choice a simple one--instead of the inherent risks of being an outright liar, Anne trusted her ability to leave a false impression?

As to your second question, two points.

1. Anne herself admitted to being manipulative, which is another oddity.

2. Martin Fido, who was a highly perceptive person, and had access to Feldman's transcripts, also characterized Anne as manipulative. His exact word.

Again, I am not pretending to be holier than thou, or holier than Keith. (And I will certainly never be holier than Tom). I never met Anne Graham, and if I had, maybe I would have been impressed by her, too. But in the cold light of transcripts, she can be seen contradicting herself many times and making any number of highly implausible claims. She also lied outright.

What baffles me is that, if you believe the diary came out of Dodd's house, you must also believe that Anne lied to Keith repeatedly over a period of many years. You must believe Anne coached her father. You must believe Anne made up an oral family tradition of Formby knowing Yapp, unless by some miracle Eddie Lyons sold the diary to a man whose wife had a direct link to Maybrick's household.

As with Caz, in your own theory, Anne is completely untrustworthy. So why ask us if Anne was manipulative? Haven't you answered that question yourself?

Bizarrely, Caz is now so committed to the proposition that Anne was entirely cooperative that she is even willing to question Keith's competence.

Because Herlock's point is a fair one, isn't it? If Anne revealed to Keith that the diary was ordered "pre-Doreen" why in the heck is Keith telling everyone four years later (in 1999) that it had been ordered post-Doreen, ie.,May 1992?

I think we can all agree that Keith isn't a liar and is also careful about trying to get precise dates. He must have appreciated the importance of learning exactly when the diary had been ordered.

So, do you and Caz believe that Keith dropped the baton during this simple assignment, or is it infinitely more likely that Anne Graham deliberately left him with a false impression that the diary had been purchased and ordered in May 1992?

Seriously. Which is more likely?

What evidence is there that Anne ever stressed that she and Mike had been late payers? Are we supposed to believe that it slipped her mind? That Anne didn't remember that vitally important detail or simply forget to relay it to Keith?

You asked, and I've answered. That's all I can do.

What I would ask in return is why you don't see Anne as a subtle manipulator? This is the same person who once told Feldman that her name was not Anne Elizabeth Graham and that she was a former member of MI-5.

Does that strike you as cooperative?

RP

To me your arguments are rational, and I only speak for me.

However, I, too, have never met Anne. But as someone who has met Keith and spent a bit of time with him both virtually and in real life, I believe in his judgments and feelings. He had worked closely with Anne, and he just never got the impression she was playing any game with him as far as I'm aware. You are basically saying he was a victim of her manipulation, but I don't think he ever felt that to be the case. I trust his judgment. He knew her. Again, I speak for my views and don't speak for Keith.

Her behaviour is in line with a master manipulator playing a high-stakes game so as not to lose Keith's confidence. But equally, it is the same behaviour displayed by someone who genuinely does not believe the advert was anything meaningful - another one of Mike's hair-brained ideas based on flawed logic.

I cannot say I trust Anne, but I can't help but feel on this specific issue around the small red diary - I think I do.

[erobitha]

replied to wrong post -

[rjpalmer]

RJ attempted a blindside pat-on-the-back-but-shut-the-****-up-before-you-make-an-even-bigger-arse-of-yourself, but sometimes a juggernaut out of control simply can't be stopped.

1.5 billion, Ike.

1,500,000,000 Amazon customers are disappointed with what they ultimately received in the mail, even in this age of internet photographs, customer reviews, and long, detailed descriptions.

Your job is to convince your readers that Mike, who was an impulsive afternoon drinker, was more cautious and precise while listening on a rotary telephone in 1992 than the people who placed these 1.5 billion orders last year with the advantage of cell phone cameras and internet browsers.

That won't be easy.

What is equally strange is that we skeptics have to constantly remind you lot that criminals and hoaxers take risks.

In the strange world of diary defending, there is no crime, because no one is willing to risk anything. A hoaxer wouldn't risk fitting up Maybrick, because this bloke who has been dead for 100+ years might have an alibi on one of 5 days in 1888. This has actually been argued.

The latest is that Mike wouldn't risk accepting an 1890 or 1891 diary because Mike would have been petrified that a forensic analysis of the paper might find a new material had been introduced into the papermaking process in 1890.

This is the same Mike Barrett who once robbed a lady in broad daylight and then ran into a one-way cul de sac.

Does that strike you as a bloke adverse to risk taking? And who thinks everything through?

You speak of 'special pleading,' but the irrational hurdles that the diary defenders place in the path of the sensible proposition that Mike and Anne were up to no good resemble the same highly unpersuasive special pleadings that one hears from a defense attorney shortly before his or her client is convicted by a jury.

[Iconoclast]

I’m convinced that if we had video footage of Anne and Mike forging a diary someone would suggest that they were rehearsing a play or that they had invented a new game or that David Orsam had hired two people to disguise themselves as Anne and Mike.

And if we had video footage of Mike Barrett handing over £20 (or whatever) in The Saddle to Eddie Lyons with a date stamp of 09-03-1992, you wouldn't attempt one of your famous body swerves?

[Herlock Sholmes]

“I find it sad that this is all someone needs to think they know in order to be rid of such a turbulent beast as the Maybrick scrapbook.”

In terms of ‘sadness’ absolutely nothing…and I do mean nothing, comes remotely close to the utterly desperate and lamentable sadness of the contortions, offences to reason, logic and common sense and the constant attempts at the twisting of reality of these awful and obvious attempts at making excuse after excuse after excuse to prop up this blatantly forged diary. I’m convinced that if we had video footage of Anne and Mike forging a diary someone would suggest that they were rehearsing a play or that they had invented a new game or that David Orsam had hired two people to disguise themselves as Anne and Mike.

[Herlock Sholmes]

I'm not wishing to get back into the pointless semantic circus that is being played in order to explain why Michael Barrett requested an 1890 diary and accepted an 1891 one for a person supposedly writing in 1888 and 1889. What I would like to note is that:

1) We cannot ignore the difference between form and function. We all know that dated books are diaries by default - they don't need to be used to be diaries, they just are diaries. That's because the form of a diary is well-established. We also know that almost anything you can write on can become a 'diary' by dint of the purpose it then serves (it's function).

2) I can see no reason to think that Michael Barrett - in the pre-internet age especially - would have been so liberal in his request for an 1880-1890 diary if he thought for a moment that what he might get back might be a simple notebook which had one or more entries in for the 1880s or 1890. Reason tells me that - if he imagined for a moment that that would be possible - he would simply have done what the rest of us would have done and asked for an unused or partly-used document from 1880 to 1890 with at least twenty blank pages.

3) On being told that Martin Earl had an 1891 diary, I consider it literally asinine to then suggest that Barrett did not ask if there were any tell-tale signs on it which would reveal that it was self-evidently an 1891 diary and that '1891' was printed all over it - on every single page of the sections for entries.

4) This argument seems to hang for some people not on the asking for an impossible date and then accepting another (as it would for people who are not seeking to make an argument where none exists) but on the request for at least twenty blank pages (the convenience of bias, eh!). Indeed, at least one poster has asked the question and stated his conclusion thus, "The only question is, and always has been: why did Mike so badly want a Victorian diary with blank pages. As I've said, the question answers itself." which is simply untrue, the question most certainly does not answer itself, it simply answers the bias of the person who posted it. Given the evidence of a man apparently unsophisticated in semantic weaving seeking an impossible diary and then accepting one, the far more plausible answer to the question, above, would be, "Because he already had one". If any poster is struggling to understand why this is a very strong possibility, I refer you to my posts of old.

I might also politely point out that I was being kind when I used the term 'some people', above, as the truth is that we are not being inundated with the conventional cacophony of posts in support of this particular poster's position regarding what we all understand a diary to be and what a non-diary document might be turned into. This suggests very strongly to me that he - and he alone - is pursuing a losing argument that none of the usual suspects is willing to embarrass themselves in support of. RJ attempted a blindside pat-on-the-back-but-shut-the-****-up-before-you-make-an-even-bigger-arse-of-yourself, but sometimes a juggernaut out of control simply can't be stopped.

I find it sad that this is all someone needs to think they know in order to be rid of such a turbulent beast as the Maybrick scrapbook.

What the hell is "an unused or partly used document from 1880 to 1890"? What a mad request that would have been! I'm quite sure that neither Earl or anyone who read such an advertisement would have understood what that was directed towards. Enough of this crazy hindsight re-wording of the advertisement, it's getting nowhere.

The fact that you may find it "literally asinine" that Mike didn't ask Earl certain questions means nothing. You seem to have forgotten that Earl hadn't seen the diary so wouldn't have been able to answer a single question about it. No doubt he read out to Mike a description he'd been given by his supplier and that was all he had to work with.

You continue to spout nonsense by speaking of "an impossible date". Even Caz has admitted (in #1142) that 1891 was not an impossible date for an 1888 diary. I've provided actual examples which demonstrate how an 1891 diary could have been used to create a fake 1888 diary. In response, you've provided nothing. Not one single piece of objective empirical evidence about what a historical diary would be expected to look like.

The question as to why Mike so badly wanted a Victorian diary with blank pages does answer itself. You've certainly not provided any alternative answer that comes even close to making sense. Saying he "already had one" does not explain it in any way. It's pretty much the opposite of an explanation!

[rjpalmer]

My question is, why would Anne openly assist Keith in trying to source the cheque book stub for the payment of the diary if she was in on it? Surely that's letting the fox into the hen house, isn't it? She is either so calculating and manipulative that anything is possible, or she genuinely believed she had nothing to hide or fear from Mike's strange advert?

Hi Jay,

I hope we can have a calm, rational, and non-judgmental conversation, so, in that spirt, can I point out that your first question has been asked and answered many times, including this week? One can keep asking it over and over, but why expect a different answer?

So instead, ask yourself: if it was you, and you were guilty of forgery, what would you have done?

Seriously, mate. What would you have done?

Would you have denied the purchase and risked being caught out as liar by Keith if he traced the purchase without your cooperation? Clearly, Keith had gotten wind of this purchase, or he wouldn't have asked you about it. Wouldn't that have been very risky? And Keith would never trust you again if he found out Earl's name?

Or would you cooperate with Keith, winning his confidence, and trust your ability to convince him it was an innocent or irrelevant purchase? Which would have been a relatively simple matter since you had a cheque stub showing it was purchased in May--after Barrett had brought the diary to Doreen in London. Cooperating would HELP you sow a false trail due to the odd details of the payment.

Seriously. Isn't the choice a simple one--instead of the inherent risks of being an outright liar, Anne trusted her ability to leave a false impression?

As to your second question, two points.

1. Anne herself admitted to being manipulative, which is another oddity.

2. Martin Fido, who was a highly perceptive person, and had access to Feldman's transcripts, also characterized Anne as manipulative. His exact word.

Again, I am not pretending to be holier than thou, or holier than Keith. (And I will certainly never be holier than Tom). I never met Anne Graham, and if I had, maybe I would have been impressed by her, too. But in the cold light of transcripts, she can be seen contradicting herself many times and making any number of highly implausible claims. She also lied outright.

What baffles me is that, if you believe the diary came out of Dodd's house, you must also believe that Anne lied to Keith repeatedly over a period of many years. You must believe Anne coached her father. You must believe Anne made up an oral family tradition of Formby knowing Yapp, unless by some miracle Eddie Lyons sold the diary to a man whose wife had a direct link to Maybrick's household.

As with Caz, in your own theory, Anne is completely untrustworthy. So why ask us if Anne was manipulative? Haven't you answered that question yourself?

Bizarrely, Caz is now so committed to the proposition that Anne was entirely cooperative that she is even willing to question Keith's competence.

Because Herlock's point is a fair one, isn't it? If Anne revealed to Keith that the diary was ordered "pre-Doreen" why in the heck is Keith telling everyone four years later (in 1999) that it had been ordered post-Doreen, ie.,May 1992?

I think we can all agree that Keith isn't a liar and is also careful about trying to get precise dates. He must have appreciated the importance of learning exactly when the diary had been ordered.

So, do you and Caz believe that Keith dropped the baton during this simple assignment, or is it infinitely more likely that Anne Graham deliberately left him with a false impression that the diary had been purchased and ordered in May 1992?

Seriously. Which is more likely?

What evidence is there that Anne ever stressed that she and Mike had been late payers? Are we supposed to believe that it slipped her mind? That Anne didn't remember that vitally important detail or simply forget to relay it to Keith?

You asked, and I've answered. That's all I can do.

What I would ask in return is why you don't see Anne as a subtle manipulator? This is the same person who once told Feldman that her name was not Anne Elizabeth Graham and that she was a former member of MI-5.

Does that strike you as cooperative?

RP

[Iconoclast]

I'm not wishing to get back into the pointless semantic circus that is being played in order to explain why Michael Barrett requested an 1890 diary and accepted an 1891 one for a person supposedly writing in 1888 and 1889. What I would like to note is that:

1) We cannot ignore the difference between form and function. We all know that dated books are diaries by default - they don't need to be used to be diaries, they just are diaries. That's because the form of a diary is well-established. We also know that almost anything you can write on can become a 'diary' by dint of the purpose it then serves (it's function).

2) I can see no reason to think that Michael Barrett - in the pre-internet age especially - would have been so liberal in his request for an 1880-1890 diary if he thought for a moment that what he might get back might be a simple notebook which had one or more entries in for the 1880s or 1890. Reason tells me that - if he imagined for a moment that that would be possible - he would simply have done what the rest of us would have done and asked for an unused or partly-used document from 1880 to 1890 with at least twenty blank pages.

3) On being told that Martin Earl had an 1891 diary, I consider it literally asinine to then suggest that Barrett did not ask if there were any tell-tale signs on it which would reveal that it was self-evidently an 1891 diary and that '1891' was printed all over it - on every single page of the sections for entries.

4) This argument seems to hang for some people not on the asking for an impossible date and then accepting another (as it would for people who are not seeking to make an argument where none exists) but on the request for at least twenty blank pages (the convenience of bias, eh!). Indeed, at least one poster has asked the question and stated his conclusion thus, "The only question is, and always has been: why did Mike so badly want a Victorian diary with blank pages. As I've said, the question answers itself." which is simply untrue, the question most certainly does not answer itself, it simply answers the bias of the person who posted it. Given the evidence of a man apparently unsophisticated in semantic weaving seeking an impossible diary and then accepting one, the far more plausible answer to the question, above, would be, "Because he already had one". If any poster is struggling to understand why this is a very strong possibility, I refer you to my posts of old.

I might also politely point out that I was being kind when I used the term 'some people', above, as the truth is that we are not being inundated with the conventional cacophony of posts in support of this particular poster's position regarding what we all understand a diary to be and what a non-diary document might be turned into. This suggests very strongly to me that he - and he alone - is pursuing a losing argument that none of the usual suspects is willing to embarrass themselves in support of. RJ attempted a blindside pat-on-the-back-but-shut-the-****-up-before-you-make-an-even-bigger-arse-of-yourself, but sometimes a juggernaut out of control simply can't be stopped.

I find it sad that this is all someone needs to think they know in order to be rid of such a turbulent beast as the Maybrick scrapbook.

[Herlock Sholmes]

Yes. What do you not understand by Anne's admission to Keith that she thought the red herring - sorry, the red diary affair - began "pre-Doreen"?

That would have helped him and let him know that although her cheque stub was dated 18th May, she thought Mike's attempt to obtain this genuine Victorian diary had dated back to before 13th April, when Doreen was sufficiently impressed by what she saw to set the publishing wheels in motion. I can't see how "pre-Doreen" could reasonably be interpreted to mean after that date, or why Anne would have used those words if that is what she wanted to imply.



That's absolutely fine with me, Herlock. The less they both knew about it, the more Anne knew she didn't know, when giving Keith the means to find out everything there was to know.

Assuming Mike knew at the time who he was going to call, and what he was going to ask for, it doesn't matter to me how little he knew about the procedure, or how many people might become directly involved in the search, or how widely his request might be broadcast, but it ought to have mattered to anyone attempting to source the raw materials for faking Jack the Ripper's diary. Forewarned is forearmed, but if it is pretty much a certainty that Anne knew considerably less than Mike could have told her, or ever did tell her, about who he contacted and what he had actually asked for, she was arguably in more danger from what she didn't know about it, if she had helped Mike to turn a photo album, bought from an auction sale, into Maybrick's diary, after the red diary had to be rejected for being 'very small'. Even Mike must have realised the folly of revealing to Alan Gray that it had 365 printed dates in it for the year 1891.

A call to 'M Earl', when Anne was able to retrieve the cheque with the name of the payee, was bound to reveal details that she didn't know in 1995, but if Mike had had forgery in mind she'd have known it, and would have been enabling Keith to uncover potentially incriminating evidence. Her best bet in that case would have been to call Mr Earl herself to ascertain all the facts. Assuming she didn't do that, she may have considered the tiny 1891 diary, with all its 1891 dates, to be proof positive, if anyone should need it, that it had not been purchased to fake Maybrick's diary, so she was more than happy to hand it over along with the means to investigate further. Had she destroyed it, Mike's description of it as merely being 'very small' might have been left in limbo, with no physical evidence to challenge his claim that it had been purchased for forgery purposes.

If Anne telling Keith in 1995 that "the red diary affair" began "pre-Doreen" was supposed to mean that Mike had purchased the red diary before 13th April 1992, and you can't see any other interpretation, why didn't Keith Skinner understand this? Do you think he's stupid?

Not only did he question Mike in 1999 on the basis that he was lying about the red diary, because the cheque showed he bought it post-Doreen, but he wrote a letter to Ripperologist, which I've already quoted from, suggesting that the date of the cheque showed Mike was lying about needing it to forge the Ripper diary because he bought it post-Doreen.

Surely the issue is not when the "red diary affair" began but the date on which Mike purchased the red diary. As to that, Keith was quite clearly misled for many years because he thought it had only been purchased post-Doreen.

I repeat what I said about Anne: "I do wonder why she didn't help him and let him know that although the cheque was dated 18th May 1992 this was because it was a late payment and the 1891 diary had been received some weeks earlier." Unless Keith Skinner is unable to comprehend plain English, Anne clearly did not inform Keith that the cheque was dated 18th May 1992 because it was a late payment and the 1891 diary had been received some weeks earlier.

I asked you have any thoughts on that and you clearly can't give me a reasonable answer.

The rest of your post is too convoluted for me to follow. The only point I'll pick up on is that when Mike was telling Gray the story of the red diary, it wasn't in his possession and he may not have seen it for years. Going from memory, the main thing that Mike might well have remembered about it was that it was too small. Perhaps because it was his immediate reaction when it arrived. I can't see why he wouldn't have told Gray about the dates printed on each page. It just seems like a memory issue to me.

[Herlock Sholmes]

Er, no. Agreeing to purchase something over the phone is not the same as actually purchasing it. I'm pretty sure Mike Barrett of all people would have appreciated the difference even if you don't or if Martin Earl considered it a done deal. It was probably not even a binding contract to complete the purchase if Mike's spoken agreement over the phone was not recorded. If Anne hadn't honoured an agreement by Mike to purchase it - you know, with actual money - it would not have been a purchase, but a case of Mike receiving goods under false pretences, which is not a world away from receiving suspected stolen property. Maybe you think Mike was not the sort of chap to go back on any spoken, or gentleman's agreement, and risk the consequences.

The reason Mike didn't raise it as an issue with Martin Earl would be simple enough if the 1891 diary was never intended to be used for faking Maybrick's and he would still have asked to see it regardless of how it was described. If he stuck it in a drawer with the invoice and forgot all about it when arrangements were being made for him to take the scrapbook to London and nothing else mattered, then yes, I can see why Anne was so cross about having to bail him out when she learned about the overdue payment for an 1891 diary he didn't need, which he had 'agreed' to purchase unseen.

Caz, you seriously need to read what Martin Earl told you more carefully.

At the time Mike asked Earl to send him the diary he then agreed to purchase it.

We've already been over this. Earl said:

'Normally one would ask for payment with [the] order so in this case it is likely that the customer specifically wanted to see it before sending payment. Given the time taken before the cheque was sent to us it is highly likely I had to chase it, probably by phone. From memory normal settlement time was the standard 30 days so I would have chased up after that period.
Customers could always return items if they were not as described.'

So, if the diary was as had been described, Barrett could not have returned it. He'd thus obviously already agreed to pay for it. Legally, he was on the hook.

What is it about this process that you don't get? It's very straightforward Caz.

I don't know what you mean by "not a binding contract". Earl would have sent Mike an invoice along with, or immediately following, the diary. Failure to pay an invoice will lead to a county court judgment being entered against you. Full stop. It's one of the most straightforward legal processes which happens every day of the week.

All the hypotheticals about what might have happened if Mike had done this or Anne had done that more than 30 years later - things which did not happen - are absolute madness.

We remain in a situation where Mike had been seeking a Victorian diary with blank pages in March 1992 before anyone alive, inside or outside of 12 Goldie Street, is known to have seen the diary of Jack the Ripper. He then agreed to purchase (sight unseen) a Victorian diary with blank pages. For whatever reason, he didn't pay for it immediately, but, when he was chased, he knew it had to be paid for, so did Anne. That's it.

The only question is, and always has been: why did Mike so badly want a Victorian diary with blank pages. As I've said, the question answers itself. A discussion about Martin Earl's enforcement practices is the height of irrelevance and, despite the late desperate attempt to get something out of Earl to show that Mike wasn't seeking a diary to create a forged Ripper diary, that plan failed absolutely.

[Herlock Sholmes]

But you just said in post #1114 "Because the evidence isn't available, Scott.

Not everyone wants to invent stuff and speculate without evidence in this case."

So what evidence were you talking about?

I guess it just matters whose evidence one wants to believe. Or if it's even "evidence."

If could do me the favour of not quoting me out of context, Scott, you could save me having to waste my time with posts like this one.

In my #1114 I was clearly talking about your request in #1051 for John to tell you "who conceived the story, who wrote it in the diary, when and where?"

That is what I was saying there's no evidence for.

That's why in #1074 I said to you:

"You wanted John to tell you who conceived the story. Well how can he possibly know that? How can anyone?"

You insisted in #1111 that you wanted "just brief answers" and I repeated that you are asking for things he can't possibly know, hence "the evidence isn't available". By which I obviously meant the evidence as to who conceived the story.

You then (in #1123) turned the discussion to a completely different issue, namely the assumed belief of John, RJ and myself (but "suspicion" might be a better word) that Mike and Anne wrote the diary.

In response to this, I'm saying there is evidence and that all the evidence points to Mike and Anne having written it.

But we don't know all the finer details like who originally conceived it. How can we? There is no evidence about it.

I hope I’ve cleared this point up?

Your additional question, incidentally, as to who likely "wrote it in the diary, when and were", was, I have to say, somewhat daft considering that the obvious Cluedo answer is Anne Barrett in March/April 1992 at 12 Goldie Street. Did you really need John to tell you this?