Miscellaneous Newspaper Accounts

[mklhawley]

Greetings all,

The above comments from Joe and John are from the Ripper Writers website. What strikes me is that this particular stablekeeper would be just the kind of person Francis Tumblety would associate with. He was a young male military officer in good social standing. I'm sure this is probably where he kept his white horse and grayhounds.

Sincerely,

Mike

[mklhawley]

The following is Joe Chetcuti's and John Spanek's responses to that Pittsburgh Dispatch article:

Joe Chetcuti's:

Mike looked into an Irish-American cemetery in Washington DC and found some people buried there named Keliher. Out of them all, this one particular man deserved attention:

James Keliher 1837-1902, wife Honora Keliher 1840-1912.

I took this information to our genealogist Bill Amos, (a man who I highly recommend to all Ripperologists) and Bill found a 'James Keliher' in the Washington DC section of the 1860 U.S. Census. He was a 22 year old engineer in the U.S. Army.

His father was listed as the owner of livestock stable valued at $30,000.

The 'James Keliher' who testified that he knew Tumblety during the Battle of Bull Run was described by the Pittsburgh Dispatch as a stablekeeper in the Washington DC area. The James Keliher who Bill Amos found in the 1860 U.S. Census came from a family that owned a large livestock stable, and that same James Keliher was listed as having been in the U.S. Army just prior to the outbreak of the Civil War.

The Pittsburgh Dispatch's James Keliher and the James Keliher who Bill Amos discovered appear to be a match. If so, then the testimony that Keliher gave before a Washington DC judge in November 1890 originated from a decent foundation.

Before we go any further, we should say that this research is not an antagonistic attack on those who say that Sanford Conover lied when he claimed that he met Tumblety at the Battle of Bull Run in July 1861. The argument that those people bring up is that "Tumblety wasn't at the Battle of Bull Run because a New York City magazine printed a general reference about Tumblety in its July issue. So therefore it must be assumed that Tumblety was in New York and not in the Washington area in July 1861."

Once again, this research into James Keliher wasn't made for the sake of supporting Conover's claim. And it should be mentioned that there were two Battles of Bull Run. The second one occurred in August 1862. Keliher didn't specify which of the two Battles of Bull Run he knew Tumblety from.


Followed by John Spanek's:

Next week, we will display a Civil War era document on this Ripper Writers' thread. That government document revealed the official reason why Francis Tumblety was arrested in St. Louis in May 1865. Appreciation goes to Bill Amos for his assistance with this.

Any thoughts?

Sincerely,

Mike

[mklhawley]

Tumblety & The Battle of Bull Run

Greetings all,

I recently posted a Pittsburgh Dispatch article on the Ripper Writer's web site, which commented on a Stablekeeper Keliher testifying under oath he saw Francis Tumblety at the Battle of Bull Run:

Pittsburg Dispatch, November 19, 1890

TUMBLETY RESURRECTED
The Man Who Was Thought to be Jack the Ripper Satisfies the Judge That He is Right, and is Discharged From Custody [from a staff correxpondent.]

WASHINGTON, November 18. – Dr. Francis Tumblety, who gained some notoriety during the excitement caused by the operations of “Jack the Ripper,” and who made himself notorious in Pittsburg some time since, was a defendant in the police court this morning, “Suspicious person” was the charge made against him by Detective Horne. The doctor is a large man, who wears glasses. He was well dressed, and did not present any outward signs of a vagrant. Some years ago the doctor resided in this city, where he practiced his profession and sold herb medicine. When arrested last night the officer found on him considerable money and some jewelry - in all more than $3000 in value.

Detective Horne gave evidence of the arrest after having seen the defendant several times under suspicious circumstances. Stablekeeper Keliher gave evidence as to the defendant’s character. He said that he knew the doctor during the war, and during the battle of Bull Run he (the doctor) was very active in helping the sick and the wounded. He had always known the doctor as a good citizen. Saloon Keeper Harvey also gave evidence as to the doctor’s good character during the war. About ten years ago he missed the doctor, and did not see him again until about ten days ago.

The defendant testified in his own behalf that he was waiting for a car at Seventh and Pennsylvania Avenue last night, when he heard two young men talking about New York. They were talking when Detective Horne came along them and stopped near them. Witness denied the charge against him, and denounced the arrest as a shocking outrage.

On cross-examination, witness said that he was never charged with a similar offense in England to that indicated by the officer, and that he was not mixed up in a scandal implicating certain lords. He said that some newspapers attempted to say that he was “Jack the Ripper,” but that was a silly statement, to which he paid no attention.

Sincerely,

Mike

[aspallek]

Just a note to say I was at St. John's Hospital here in St. Louis today, making a call on a patient. St. John's is were Tumblety died in 1903. The hospital is still very much in operation and thriving, though obviously not in the same location as in 1903. That location is now in downtown St. Louis while the present hospital location is in the suburbs. Just kind of a strange feeling to have a Ripper connection right here!

[caz]

Hi c.d,

Nice one.

Of course, the pair of brass rings allegedly among old Tumblebum's effects would have been all too easy to acquire, if he fancied leaving a little something behind with which to tease Scotland Yard over the brief chapter in his colourful life entitled 'My Whitechapel Adventure'.

Love,

Caz
X

[c.d.]

And if Tumblety killed Mary after all of that, he had a pair of brass ones no doubt about it.

c.d.

[aspallek]

Missouri Newspapers to be included in Chronicling America

According to the Missouri Historical Society Library, digitized Missouri newspapers are to be included in the Chronicling America Library of Congress database by Fall 2009.

http://www.loc.gov/chroniclingamerica/search_fulltext_advanced.html

[aspallek]

Apologies if this has been posted before. It seems to indicate that Tumblety was first detained on suspicion of being the Whitechapel murderer on the basis of his hatred toward women and practice of collecting medical specimens (!) and then later re-arrested on the gross indecency charge.

Baltimore Sun 26 June 1904:

[Mayerling]

Hi Andy,

I'm not sure, but Genral Frank Blair served in the war with Sherman in Georgia and on the march to the sea (which takes care of 1864 to December). He came from a distinguished Missouri Family. His father Francis Preston Blair Sr. was an advisor to Andrew Jackson in his Presidency as a member of Jackson's "Kitchen Cabinet". Blair Sr. was a newspaper editor. His older son, Montgomery Blair was the Postmaster General of the U.S. from 1861 to 1864, when he resigned to enable Lincoln to reorganize his cabinet. Frank (technically Francis Preston Blair Jr.) remained in the army until 1865, and subsequently became a Democrat again - he was nominated for Vice President by the Democrats in 1868 with Horatio Seymour of New York as the Presidential Candidate - and they were defeated by Ulysses Grant and Schuyler Colfax. General Blair was also a witness (in 1870) of part of the events that occurred after the bludgeoning murder of Mr. Benjamin Nathan of New York in his brownstone home on Fifth Avenue and West 23rd Street (Blair was in the Fifth Avenue Hotel across the street, and saw the two sons of Mr. Nathan running out of the house asking for help from the public or the police).

[Mr. Nathan was Vice President of the New York Stock Exchange, and his brother-in-law was Justice Albert Cardozo of the New York State Supreme Court. The murder was never solved. Mr. Cardozo (who later resigned from the bench when he was linked to the Tweed Ring) would name his infant son
Benjamin Nathan Cardozo in honor of his dead brother-in-law. Benjamin Cardozo (of course) is the famous jurist who became a member of the U.S. Supreme Court in the 1930s.]

Montgomery Blair was the grandfather of the actor Montgomery Cliff. If you compare their photographs, their eyebrows and foreheads look remarkably alike.

Unfortunately, except for all this information about the Blairs and their relatives, I know nothing about the General's Secretary.


I have never found proof of a connection between David Herold and Dr. Tumblety. However, when not going hunting, or helping John Wilkes Booth,
Herold did work as a messanger boy/delivery boy/assistant for a Washington druggist.

Jeff

[aspallek]

The Albany (NY) Journal, 28 November 1888:

[aspallek]

Albany Journal, 30 November 1888

HE REMEMBERS TUMBLETY
Mr. Smith Describes the Man arrested
for the Whitechapel Murders

Mr. Arden Smith, manager of Edward Arden company, now playing at Jacob and Proctor's theatre, who was with Gen. Frank P. Blair through the war as his private secretary, and in (years undecipherable) clerk to the military committee of the house of representatives, and residing in Washington, remembered on reading in Wednesday's JOURNAL the account of the local and other exploits of Dr. Tumblety, who is under arrest in London on suspicion of being the Whitechapel murderer, that the same fellow was located in Washington in those years. "As I remember him," said Mr. Smith to a JOURNAL reporter today, "he was a man of over six feet in height, 29 or 30 years old, dressed in extremely loud attire and singular as it may seem he rouged his cheeks and colored his eyebrows. He had also a very long moustache. He had his quarters in Brown's hotel at Pennsylvania avenue and Seventh street. He had a big greyhound with him and an attendant named Harold, the same young man who was afterward hanged for his connection with the assassination of Lincoln. While in Washington Tumblety was never known to speak to anyone but Harold, who followed him about like a spaniel. He bore a very unsavory reputation while there.