My journey from skeptic to believer

[Dictionary Brown]

So Michael Barrett confessed to forging the diary at a time when he was drinking heavily & under a lot of stress. The opinion seems to be that he wasn’t capable of creating such a document himself & therefore must have had help. So, in effect, he was either a front man for someone & had no input in the content of the diary or he was more involved than that & had some input.

Or maybe he truly didn't know anything before Tony gave him the diary. I haven't met Michael Barrett, so I can't say, but Pinkmoon on the forum and others who have met him, (even those that believe the diary is a fake) seem to think he's not the type of guy capable of such a forgery, or even the kind of person you'd want to be the front man for your complex scheme. Maybe it is all Anne Graham's doing, but scrutiny of her obviously hasn't led any investigators to any nest of forgers. I believe that if there were any modern nest of forgers, it would HAVE to be traced through Michael, Anne, Albert Johnson or Tony Devereux.

That's where the anti-diary crowd has done their argument a disservice, I believe. They don't say the diary is a masterful forgery, they say it is a cheap and obvious fake. If it's so obviously a fraud, and the forgers so sloppy in their work, then it should be fairly easy to track them down through the family, friends and business connections of Graham, Barrett, Johnson and/or Devereux. As I pointed out before, the forged Hitler diaries were sussed out very quickly and with little effort.

If he was drinking a lot & under stress once it had become public, I think he would have spilled the beans & at least told someone that he was just a patsy for either one or many people. I guess my point is that if you’re in that much of a state you’d open up wouldn’t you?

I would, even if it was just to clear my conscience. He tried to claim he forged the diary apparently to try and get back at his wife. It's very sad that so much of the diary's history is caught up in personal relationship drama.

The other fact I would point out is that time seems to be running out for any modern forgers to profit from the diary. It appears that the only way for forgers to profit now would be to reveal their scheme, and even that revelation would be of dubious value considering how little traction the diary itself has gotten in the zeitgeist.

The other thing is that it’s probably impossible now to do any further tests on the diary as every man & his dog has touched it.

I hope not. I keep hoping that every five years or so that passes, some scientist will devise a new ink and paper test and find something that tells us more about when it was created and how.

Supposedly there's some other information about the origin of the diary floating around out there, but so far as I can see it hasn't yet come to light. I'll definitely be interested to hear about it when/if it does.

[Hannibal Hayes]

Paul Feldman appeared to do a lot of research on Anne & her family, at his own cost & his book is a convincing argument to the diary being genuine & that is the whole point of it - anyone writing a book uses every trick to manipulate the reader to believe the words they are reading. I don’t suppose anyone else has researched the Barrett’s background purely because they don’t need to. The non-believers won’t because they don’t need to & the believers possibly can’t due to the cost/time involved or they feel that it is case closed due to the diary content. Stalemate.

We cannot believe anything that Michael Barrett says due to his alcohol intake & his dislike for his wife. Anne Barrett stands by her story that she gave it to Tony D to give to Michael.

With regard to any profit made, I’m not totally sure how much any individual who owned the diary made. The publishers were probably the biggest winners? Anyone know any different?

And then there’s the watch. Again, how much testing has actually been done on the watch? All I know is the information in Feldman’s book.

The Hitler diaries were a different thing altogether & carry more historical interest than the JtR diary so will have had extensive & quick tests carried out on them.

[caz]

The Hitler diaries were a different thing altogether & carry more historical interest than the JtR diary so will have had extensive & quick tests carried out on them.

Hi HH,

I think that's slightly unfair. The tests (numerous and extensive) on the Maybrick diary's ink and paper began in the summer of 1992, very shortly after Mike Barrett first brought it to London. The fact that all have thus far proved inconclusive does not necessarily mean less effort or expertise have gone into them. It could either indicate smart forgers who learned from the Hitler diaries how not to quickly expose their scam and earn themselves a spell in prison, or merely an older date for the writing which might naturally resist all scientific attempts to date it.

In short, it should be much easier to expose handwriting of recent origin than to date decades old examples with accuracy. For me, that explains why the Hitler diaries fell at the first hurdle while the Maybrick diary keeps on running - or limping if you prefer. If it is decades old, that may never be proved, and it certainly wouldn't make it any more likely to be genuine. If it had been created shortly before Mike Barrett gave it up for testing I have very little doubt that it would have died a quick and painless death.

Love,

Caz
X

[pinkmoon]

Paul Feldman appeared to do a lot of research on Anne & her family, at his own cost & his book is a convincing argument to the diary being genuine & that is the whole point of it - anyone writing a book uses every trick to manipulate the reader to believe the words they are reading. I don’t suppose anyone else has researched the Barrett’s background purely because they don’t need to. The non-believers won’t because they don’t need to & the believers possibly can’t due to the cost/time involved or they feel that it is case closed due to the diary content. Stalemate.

We cannot believe anything that Michael Barrett says due to his alcohol intake & his dislike for his wife. Anne Barrett stands by her story that she gave it to Tony D to give to Michael.

With regard to any profit made, I’m not totally sure how much any individual who owned the diary made. The publishers were probably the biggest winners? Anyone know any different?

And then there’s the watch. Again, how much testing has actually been done on the watch? All I know is the information in Feldman’s book.

The Hitler diaries were a different thing altogether & carry more historical interest than the JtR diary so will have had extensive & quick tests carried out on them.

Good evening,I get a bit annoyed when certain people who had a lot to do with the dear diary been published claim they made no money out of this .I have seen first hand some of the money Mr Barrett earned from this and I actually feel sorry for him in a way I think the whole thing just got out of hand the diary should never have been published untill it's origins had been proven.I would like to point out that Caz is one of the few people connected with the diary that I think has acted with any integrity.

[Hannibal Hayes]

Hi Caz,
Fair comment – you know much more than I do about any tests that have been carried out. I would say though that smart forgers would need to be very smart to pass any test & would need to know what specific tests would be carried out. No disrespect to Michael B but I doubt it would be the average man in the street. No-one can predict any future tests that will be carried out either. I think inconclusive is the key word.

Again, there are knowledgeable people on here who know who profited out of the diary & I can only accept their contributions. However, I doubt someone (Michael B for example), would want to boast about it if he’s done well out of it but then, if he’s overtaken by alcohol, he may not be able to keep quiet.

[London Fog]

I fell in love with the diary the first time I saw the videos. I have since come to consider another theory as more of a possibility, though I still keep an open mind about the diary, and many other possibilities, as well.

I will say this. If the writer of the diary was a 13 year old, then he/she must have been a savant.

[MayBea]

Sam Flynn may have been succumbing to hyperbole. But I'm not exaggerating when I say the "13 year old" "posh-talker" of today is the 50 year old serial killer of yesterday!

Kudos for keeping an open mind, LF. The onus, I believe, is on everyone to keep an open mind and do research and "Rubik's Cube" the puzzle.

[FISHY1118]

[QUOTE=Boris Godunov;n432343]Number 6 has happened.



This happened. Barrett confessed it was a hoax. You can find a transcription of the affidavit here on the site.

So given that, will you now go back to being a skeptic?


From a previous thread back in 2014 , makes interesting reading

[Al Bundy's Eyes]

Thanks. I hope Soothsayer returns as well. He had a lot of good points to make and some valuable insight.

I wonder whatever happened to him?