Tumblety and Pinkerton

[mklhawley]

What on earth has "Foggy" Dew got to do with Tumblety? Don't you recognize SPEculation when you see it?

Talk about speculation. Of course you will claim he was foggy, because his comment conflicts with your belief. I see no conflict with someone in H-division claiming Andrews was one of the three detectives involved with the JTR case, escpecially when it conforms beautifully with Logan's comment that "Scotland Yard's best man, Inspector Andrews, was sent specifically to America in December 1888" for the Whitechapel fiend. Do you have evidence that Logan is lying just like Home Secretary Matthews, Chief Commissioner Monro, Chief Inspector Anderson, Pinkerton, Littlechild, etc.?

With regards to the West End stuff, wrong thread. Of course you realize that Tumblety's ex-boyfriend Thomas Hall Caine frequented the Beefstake club. Maybe we should start a thread on this.

Mike

[Simon Wood]

Hi Mike,

Many people named Dew are nicknamed "Foggy". My school science master most certainly was. However, the speculation I was referring to was SPE's suggestion that Dew may have had a memory of Andrews carrying out a Ripper connected inquiry in America.

Thomas Hall Caine was indeed a member of the Beefsteak Club, but as his relationship with Tumblety ended years previously it has no bearing on matters.

The Sir George Arthur story is not on the wrong thread, for its similarities in detail call into question the very foundations of Tumblety's claim to have been arrested as a Ripper suspect. For as we know, Tumblety wasn't shy when it came to lifting other people's stories, and often large tracts of their writings, for use as his own personal observations and experiences.

Regards,

Simon

[mklhawley]

Thomas Hall Caine was indeed a member of the Beefsteak Club, but as his relationship with Tumblety ended years previously it has no bearing on matters.

Oh, contraire. His love life with Caine may have ended in 1876, but there is no evidence to suggest his London trips up to 1888 did not involve social visits with Caine, especially when Tumblety stated he visited the Beefsteak Club and its associated Lyceum theater. There is even evidence for Tumblety thoroughly enjoying the theater. Notice the following New York World article (5 December 1888)

TUMBLETY'S PROTEGE TALKS.
HE LIVED WITH THE DOCTOR AND WAS HIS CONSTANT COMPANION.
(Martin H. McGarry) ...Usually he went up to the Morton House, where he pointed out the actors to me and told me who they were and what they did. Sometimes in the afternoons we would drop in to the matinees...


McGarry may have been duped by Tumblety's lies, but this is a first-hand account immune to Tumblety's deception. Notice how Tumblety knew all of the actors by name and their backgrounds. Tumblety seemed to have a passion for theater and London's Beefsteak Club with an old boyfriend having excellent connections with Henry Irving himself, would have been the perfect choice for him. Again, Tumblety claimed to frequent it. This conflicts with your Sir George Arthur story.

By the way, isn't it interesting that the only year records for the Beefsteak Club attendance to go missing is 1888. It certianly sounds like someone in Pall Mall does not want this information out.


Notice the following articles:

Daily Examiner (San Francisco, CA)
Tuesday, 20 November 1888
DR. TUMBLETY.
San Francisco Lets in Light on the Whitechapel Murders.
...A dispatch from London[notice it does not say from New York], published in the EXAMINER yesterday, announced the fact that Dr. Francis Tumblety had been arrested and held on suspicion of being the Whitechapel murderer. He is held on some charge which has been placed against him in order to secure his detention. The dispatch gave his peculiarities and stated that he was well known in New York, Pittsburg and San Francisco...

Daily Examiner (San Francisco, CA)
Friday, 23 November 1888
DR. TUMBLETY.
The London Detectives Ask Chief Crowley About Him [Notice London initiated this].
...Dr. Francis Tumblety, the suspect arrested at London in connection with the Whitechapel murders, is still held by the police of that city, and a good deal of importance seems to be attached to his apprehension. All facts in relation to the suspected "doctor" are being carefully collected, and, as Tumblety was once in this city, there has been considerable telegraphing between the Police Departments of San Francisco and London...


The New York World (4 December, 1888)

…It was just as this story was being furnished to the press that a new character appeared on the scene, and it was not long before he completely absorbed the attention of every one. He was a little man with enormous red side whiskers and a smoothly shaven chin. He was dressed in an English tweed suit and wore an enormous pair of boots with soles an inch thick. He could not be mistaken in his mission. There was an elaborate attempt at concealment and mystery which could not be possibly misunderstood. Everything about him told of his business. From his little billycock hat, alternately set jauntilly on the side of his head and pulled lowering over his eyes, down to the very bottom of his thick boots, he was a typical English detective. If he had been put on a stage just as he paraded up and down Fourth avenue and Tenth street yesterday he would have been called a caricature.

First he would assume his heavy villain appearance. Then his hat would be pulled down over his eyes and he would walk up and down in front of No. 79 staring intently into the windows as he passed, to the intense dismay of Mrs. McNamara, who was peering out behind the blinds at him with ever-increasing alarm. Then his mood changed. His hat was pushed back in a devil-may-care way and he marched to No. 79 with a swagger, whistling gayly, convinced that his disguise was complete and that no one could possibly recognize him.

His headquarters was a saloon on the corner, where he held long and mysterious conversations with the barkeeper always ending in both of them drinking together. The barkeeper epitomized the conversations by saying: "He wanted to know about a feller named Tumblety, and I sez I didn't know nothink at all about him; and he says he wuz an English detective and he told me all about them Whitechapel murders, and how he came over to get the chap that did it."

When night came the English detective became more and more enterprising. At one time he stood for fifteen minutes with his coat collar turned up and his hat pulled down, behind the lamp-post on the corner, staring fixedly at No. 79. Then he changed his base of operations to the stoop of No. 81 and looked sharply into the faces of every one who passed. He almost went into a spasm of excitement when a man went into the basement of No. 79 and when a lame servant girl limped out of No. 81 he followed her a block, regarding her most suspiciously. At a late hour he was standing in front of the house directly opposite No. 79 looking steadily and ernestly.

…Even in the saloons where he often went to drink he was spoken of with loathing and contempt. He must have kept himself very quiet on the La Bretagne, for a number of passengers who were interviewed could not remember having seen any one answering his description. It will be remembered that he fled from London to Paris to escape being prosecuted under the new "Fall of Babylon" act.

Inspector Byrnes was asked what his object in shadowing Twomblety. "I simply wanted to put a tag on him." he replied, "so that we can tell where he is. Of course, he cannot be arrested, for there is no proof in his complicity in the Whitechapel murders, and the crime for which he was under bond in London is not extraditable."


...and you're telling me London did not consider Tumblety a serious JTR suspect when they clearly initiated communitcation with San Francisco and New York and they had a Scotland Yard detective watching Tumblety.

It is clear that Scotland Yard officials were told to never speak about it, and just as Norma posted, no official would have spoken about it for fear of losing their pension.

Sincerely,

Mike

[Simon Wood]

Hi Mike,

" . . . there is no evidence to suggest his [Tumblety's] London trips up to 1888 did not involve social visits with Caine" does not mean that any such visits did involve Caine.

Tumblety having a "passion for the theatre" does not automatically enroll him in the Beefsteak Club.

So what if the 1888 Beefsteak Club records are missing? Tumblety was a regular vistor to London. Why doesn't his name appear in club records from earlier years?

Do you honestly believe the man parading up and down in front of Mrs McNamara's lodging house, wearing a "billycock hat" and "thick boots", looking at once villainous and then "whistling gaily", while dressed in a disguise so complete "that nobody could possibly recognize him" was a Scotland Yard detective?

Andrews and Shore didn't arrive in North America until after the NY World story, so do you think he might have been Inspector Fred Jarvis, who arrived in November?

Regards,

Simon

[sleekviper]

Hi Mike,
I have been watching this closely, and I was thinking that from the actions taken, is it possible that they had the idea that Tumblety was the accomplice to the killer rather than the actual killer? Two things that have me thinking this way; England knows that there is not enough evidence to have an extradition of Francis, so why send a detective? If the hope is to get Tumblety, I would think that there would have been a huge stink about America harboring a monster if they refused to release him with evidence, but this is relatively quiet, and like a stakeout to see who shows up. Second, it should have been a rather brief trip, but it lasts for sometime. Tumblety does kill here, he goes through our system before being sent to England, so staying in the hope that he does something stupid is not going to get him back any quicker. Which begs to question if he actually escaped, or was allowed to assume that he had to see where he would go, and who he would meet. Just a thought.

[mklhawley]

Hi Sleekviper,
Some have proposed this, especially since he usually traveled with a rough looking hired hand. If you look at the very first U.S. newspaper articles about Tumblety, it seems to hint at both possibilities.

San Francisco Chronicle, 18 November 1888, GOSSIP OF LONDON.
Another arrest was a man who gave the name of Dr. Kumblety of New York. The police could not hold him on suspicion of the Whitechapel crimes, but he will be committed for trial at the Central Criminal Court under the special law passed soon after the Modern Babylon exposures. The police say this is the man's right name, as proved by letters in his possession; that he is from New York, and that he has been in the habit of crossing the ocean twice a year for several years…


New York Times, November 19, 1888, THE SAME TUMBLETY.
"His Arrest in London not His First Experience."
The Dr. Tumblety who was arrested in London a few days ago on suspicion of complicity in the Whitechapel murders…


Evening Star (Washington, D.C.), Monday, 19 November 1888, Arrested on Suspicion.
DR. FRANCIS TUMBLETY THOUGHT TO BE CONCERNED IN THE WHITECHAPEL MURDERS.
Dr. Francis Tumblety, who, according to a cable dispatch, was arrested in London on suspicion of being concerned in the Whitechapel murders and held on another charge for trial under the special law passed after the "Modern Babylon" exposures, is known in nearly every large city in this country…


New York World, 19 November 1888, HE IS "ECCENTRIC" DR. TWOMBLETY
The Amercian Suspected of the Whitechapel Crimes Well Known Here.
A special London despatch to THE WORLD yesterday morning announced the arrest of a man in connection with the Whitechapel crimes, who gave his name as Dr. Kumblety, of New York. He could not be held on suspicion, but the police succeeded in getting him held under the special law passed soon after the "Modern Babylon" exposures…


On December 1, 1888, William Smith, the Deputy Minister of Marine in Ottawa wrote to his colleague James Barber of Saint John:
"My dear Barber.... Do you recollect Dr. Tumblety who came to St. John about 1860 and who used to ride on a beautiful white horse with a long tail, and a couple of grey hounds following after him? Do you recollect how he used to canter along like a circus man? And do you recollect that it was asserted that he killed old Portmore, the Carpenter who built the extension to my house and fleeced me to a large extent? Do you recollect how he suddenly left St. John, circus horse, hounds and all, and afterwards turned up at different places in the States and Canada? He was considered by Dr. Bayard and others an adventurer and Quack Doctor. He is the man who was arrested in London three weeks ago as the Whitechapel murderer. He had been living in Birmingham and used to come up to London on Saturday nights. The police have always had their eyes on him every place he went and finally the Birmingham Police telegraphed to the London Police that he had left for London, and on his arrival he was nabbed accordingly…”

The deputy minister’s confidence and detail certainly suggests he received his information from Scotland Yard officials, especially since Chief Inspector Anderson was contacting equivalent city officials in cities Tumblety lived in the U.S. the two weeks prior. The timing and similarity is just too coincidental. Smith’s comment seems to suggest Scotland Yard was looking solely at him.

I certainly would not discount the idea, especially if his motive was that of the subject of the following JRT article: http://www.searchingfortruthwithabro..._Research.html

Sincerely,
Mike

[Wolf Vanderlinden]

Okay Mike, let's try this a third time.

… Keep in mind also that this article came BEFORE the Colonel Dunham interview, thus, not influenced by Dunham’s article as you previously and incorrectly claimed.

What, exactly, are you taking about here? Where did I “claim” that Pinkerton’s views were influenced by Dunham? I don’t remember ever doing this. Please try and explain.

Wolf.

[sleekviper]

Thank you for the info Mike!

[mklhawley]

Tumblety having a "passion for the theatre" does not automatically enroll him in the Beefsteak Club.

Quite intriguing, though, especially when Dr. Jekyl and Mr. Hyde was being shown at the Lyceum theater during the time of the murders.

So what if the 1888 Beefsteak Club records are missing? Tumblety was a regular vistor to London. Why doesn't his name appear in club records from earlier years?

I'm not entirely correct on this one. After reviewing the article once more, a correction needs to be made. 1888 was the only year in which the United Service Club's records are missing and not the Beefsteak club.

The United Service Club was a Pall Mall military club. The George Yard military investigator (Colonel Hughes-Hallett) was a member of this club during 1888. The Colonel was suspicious of a fellow Pall Mall clubman being Jack the Ripper.

A well-known Pall Mall figure was contacted a few years ago. His name is Anthony Lejeune. He is an elderly and respected author. Anthony graciously looked into the old records of the Beefsteak Club when requested. He was asked to check if Tumblety's name was listed in the guest membership records of the Beefsteak Club during the 1880's. (A guest membership was often used by traveling gentleman in Pall Mall in those days, and the membership would be good for a short period of time.) Anthony looked into it, and he discovered that the Beefsteak Club did not preserve their guest membership record books from the 1880's.

Do you honestly believe the man parading up and down in front of Mrs McNamara's lodging house, wearing a "billycock hat" and "thick boots", looking at once villainous and then "whistling gaily", while dressed in a disguise so complete "that nobody could possibly recognize him" was a Scotland Yard detective?

Yes. The Parnell Conspiracy requires multitudes of characters lying and the reporter would have to be another one. There are too many details for the reporter to be lying about the entire story, although I do believe the reporter embellished the "British" digs.

Andrews and Shore didn't arrive in North America until after the NY World story, so do you think he might have been Inspector Fred Jarvis, who arrived in November?

I do not, unless Jarvis was stationed in New York. Note the following article from the Southland Times, 21 October 1889.

SCOTLAND YARD.
…Most of the English detective work in America is done through the Pinkertons agency; but there are always three or four Scotland Yard men in the country watching the dynamite societies and looking after their Irish friends in different parts of the country. One of them, who was stationed in New York last year…”

Sincerely,

Mike

[Wolf Vanderlinden]

Tick, tock, Mike.

Wolf.

[mklhawley]

Okay Mike, let's try this a third time.



What, exactly, are you taking about here? Where did I “claim” that Pinkerton’s views were influenced by Dunham? I don’t remember ever doing this. Please try and explain.

Wolf.

Wolf,

I promised I would reply to this. My point was not that all of Pinkerton’s views were influenced by the Dunham article, but that any article discussing woman-hater (as was Pinkerton’s) was influenced by the Dunham article. Even so, I am mistaken. You did not say this and I should have known because you champion the idea that “woman-hater” in the Victorian Age merely meant homosexual. By extension, you then claim any comments about Tumblety being a woman-hater merely meant that he was a homosexual, although there is clear evidence to the contrary. After all, if the reason why Tumblety was a JTR suspect was due just to his homosexuality, then we should see many more homosexual suspects and we do not. It’s clear with the comments of Pinkerton (“People…always talked of him as a brute, and as brutal in his actions”), Littlechild (“bitter in the extreme, a fact on record”), and my earlier post on aggressive narcissism (http://forum.casebook.org/showthread.php?t=4561) that there is ample evidence to suggest his aggressive type of sexual deviancy was more likely the reason. Of course, I know you disagree with this.

So I wondered to myself why I thought you claimed Dunham was the source of the woman-hater belief and I then realized why. I read your article, On the Trail of Tumblety? Notice how you quote Michael Kauffman, someone you clearly value, yet Kauffman got it completely wrong:

“…Unfortunately, as we shall see, the truth is rather startling.
Michael W. Kauffman’s book American Brutus is a reinvestigation of the Lincoln assassination and has nothing to do with the Whitechapel murders except for one interesting passage dealing with Tumblety. After a brief explanation of Tumblety’s arrest in connection with the murder of the President, Kauffman mentions how Tumblety resurfaced years later in connection with the Ripper murders. Kauffman states “Press coverage of his case brought to light some chilling details, such as Tumblety’s violent hatred for women and his gruesome collection of wombs that he kept in jars. Unfortunately, those stories could all be traced back to one Charles A. Dunham, the convicted perjurer who once went by the name of Sanford Conover” …the same Sandford Conover we met earlier, the pathological liar and master of the black arts of propaganda and false information.”

Maybe you never personally stated this, but you certainly promoted the idea by publishing this and introducing it with “the truth is rather startling”.

Sincerely,

Mike

[Wolf Vanderlinden]

Hi Mike.

Thanks for your confusing, and grudging, explanation – you were, once more, mistaken but by taking part of an article I wrote, that had nothing to do with Pinkerton, out of context, editing that bit so as to lose its intended meaning and then highlighting a quote from another author found within the paragraph then, magically, I “certainly promoted the idea by publishing this and introducing it with “the truth is rather startling”. That’s quite the trick.

By extension, you then claim any comments about Tumblety being a woman-hater merely meant that he was a homosexual, although there is clear evidence to the contrary. After all, if the reason why Tumblety was a JTR suspect was due just to his homosexuality, then we should see many more homosexual suspects and we do not.

It doesn’t surprise me that you’ve missed the point here entirely, or that you’ve ignored Caz’s reasoned thoughts of this very same subject. You seem to like to ask people questions then ignore the answers then ask the same question again (exactly like your friend Palmer). This habit just makes you appear unable to debate the point. Stating that one of the definitions for the term “woman hater” meant homosexual, and I have shown, with examples, that this is true, and stating that Tumblety’s homosexuality was the only reason that Tumblety was suspected (which I don’t believe I ever have said) are two different things.

One merely has to look at Sir Melville Macnaghten’s Memoranda to see what kind of man Scotland Yard considered to be a good suspect. Of the three men he names two were foreigners; two were said to be doctors and all three were said to be insane. Interestingly, their insanity took three different forms. Ostrog was described as being a “homicidal maniac.” Kosminski’s insanity was ascribed to masturbation while Druitt was described as “sexually insane,” meaning that he was (likely) a homosexual (something you have ignored and, apparently, continue to ignore). Both Kosminski and Druitt would be considered “Psychopathia Sexualis” subjects (as Littlechild also stated Tumblety was) because their supposed sexual “deviancies” were seen as forms of insanity. So you are arguing the modern sense of homosexuality rather than the Victorian sense that believed that Tumblety was insane (which is exactly what Pinkerton stated).

It is no wonder, therefore, that Tumblety, a “sexually insane,” to use Macnaghten’s term, foreign doctor with many run ins with the police, would be considered to be a good suspect. It doesn’t prove he was the Ripper, Littlechild himself doesn’t suggest this, but merely a “likely suspect” to policemen who knew nothing about serial killers, had a neanderthalish view of what constituted insanity and who were clutching at straws.

It’s clear with the comments of Pinkerton (“People…always talked of him as a brute, and as brutal in his actions”), Littlechild (“bitter in the extreme, a fact on record”), and my earlier post on aggressive narcissism… that there is ample evidence to suggest his aggressive type of sexual deviancy was more likely the reason.

First off. A psychological “profile” from a non medical layman (checklists like Hare’s are to aid professional mental health experts in a diagnosis only after a patient has been examined and interviewed) is less than useless. Coming from you, even more so.

Second. It’s interesting that you choose two men – Pinkerton and Littlechild – who knew very little about Tumblety and yet suggest that they knew all about his character. As I have pointed out in the past (which you have also ignored) Pinkerton didn’t even know Tumblety’s correct name and he got parts of his life story wrong. Littlechild, who probably never met Tumblety, proves that Scotland Yard didn’t even bother to try and figure out what happened to the man, let alone to investigate his character outside of looking at some police files.

Much of Tumblety’s life has been preserved for us in newspaper articles, books and also official papers dealing with Tumblety’s various legal troubles. Nowhere are the suggestions that Tumblety was “always talked of… as a brute, and as brutal in his actions” or that “his feelings towards women were remarkable and bitter in the extreme,” let alone that this was “a fact on record” in the sense that you mean of an “aggressive type of sexual deviancy.” This does not appear to be “a fact” on any record that we know of. Tumblety’s homosexuality was “a fact on record” however.

Perhaps more importantly I notice that you don’t mention the opinions of police professionals who did know Tumblety and who had known him for years – Chief Inspector Byrnes, of the New York Police Department, and Superintendent Campbell, of the Brooklyn Police Department. Byrnes “laughed” at the suggestion that Tumblety might be the Ripper while Campbell called Tumblety a “harmless crank” and suggested that Scotland Yard had made a mistake in arresting him.

Neither man seems to have taken Tumblety’s suspect status seriously, which is surprising if they believed Tumblety to be, in any way, a danger. In fact, only two days after Tumblety arrived back in New York Police Superintendent Murray and Chief Inspector Byrnes admitted that “Dr. Tumblety was not being watched by the police detectives in this city and that he was at liberty to go where her pleased, as there was no complaint against him at Headquarters.” (The New York Tribune, 5 December, 1888.) An odd thing to say if as you argue, there was “ample evidence to suggest” that Tumblety was considered “brutal in his actions,” had an “aggressive type of sexual deviancy” or that “his feelings towards women were remarkable and bitter in the extreme.”

Wolf.

[mklhawley]

Perhaps more importantly I notice that you don’t mention the opinions of police professionals who did know Tumblety and who had known him for years – Chief Inspector Byrnes, of the New York Police Department, and Superintendent Campbell, of the Brooklyn Police Department. Byrnes “laughed” at the suggestion that Tumblety might be the Ripper while Campbell called Tumblety a “harmless crank” and suggested that Scotland Yard had made a mistake in arresting him.

Neither man seems to have taken Tumblety’s suspect status seriously, which is surprising if they believed Tumblety to be, in any way, a danger. In fact, only two days after Tumblety arrived back in New York Police Superintendent Murray and Chief Inspector Byrnes admitted that “Dr. Tumblety was not being watched by the police detectives in this city and that he was at liberty to go where her pleased, as there was no complaint against him at Headquarters.” (The New York Tribune, 5 December, 1888.) An odd thing to say if as you argue, there was “ample evidence to suggest” that Tumblety was considered “brutal in his actions,” had an “aggressive type of sexual deviancy” or that “his feelings towards women were remarkable and bitter in the extreme.”

Denial's a beautiful thing, eh Wolf. We now know that Tumblety's public persona in the U.S., with his flamboyant style, was purely for business reasons. The only thing the U.S. authorities knew about Tumblety was what Tumblety wanted them to know, except when he got caught with his proverbial pants down (his money got him out of those hots spots, though). Of course they saw him as a harmless quack, but Scotland Yard certainly reached across the Atlantic to get the assistance of these same authorities. If they did take Tumblety seriously, do you honestly think they would telegraph this to the press and let Tumblety know about it?

[Wolf Vanderlinden]

If they did take Tumblety seriously, do you honestly think they would telegraph this to the press and let Tumblety know about it?

As opposed to what they did do? Which was absolutely nothing. Yes, Mike, denial is a wonderful thing to the man with the empty hand.

Wolf.

[DRoy]

I found an interesting comment in a book called The Record of the Class of 1891 of the University of Pennsylvania.

It links Pinkerton's agency with a suspect but it isn't Tumblety. The quote from the book is..."But the expedition will be a complete failure; the English authorities will not allow the champion to land because he has said so many rude things about England, while Bud Hogg will be arrested through the agency of Billy Pinkerton and taken to England on the suspicion of being Jack the Ripper."

If this story is true... and if William Pinkerton felt that Tumblety was a solid suspect for reasons other than him being homosexual, why would his own agency be arresting someone else?

Side note...if this story is true... I find it interesting that they would take Mr. Hogg to England (presumably from Ireland as earlier on the same page in the book it says Hogg was travelling to Ireland). So what did he do in Ireland that lent to him being suspected? And why did Pinkerton have detectives in Ireland?

DRoy