More Tumblety in the Evening Post

[David Orsam]

In-camera describes court cases, parts of it, or process where the public and press are not allowed to observe the procedure or process.

Now what part of that do you not understand ?

The part I don't understand is all of it, in the sense that I don't understand why you are telling me this at all. I asked you to provide evidence in support of your statement that indecency cases were "normally" held in camera. I most certainly did not ask you to provide me with the basis of the legal authority of a magistrate to hold committal proceedings in camera, nor an explanation of what "in camera" means, so I cannot understand why you have done so. For the reasons GUT has already pointed out to you, you have simply not answered my question. Further:

1. Whatever document you were quoting from in #55 it was most certainly not the Indictable Offences Act 1848. Far be it for me to explain standard referencing procedure to you but, with the greatest respect, it is essential that, if you quote from a document, you provide the reference to the actual document you are quoting from, not the document you would have liked to have quoted from, nor the document that has been referenced or summarised in whatever book or article you took the quote from. Believe it or not, I think this golden rule even applies to internet postings.

2. If that is really all you are able give me in answer to my questions then I am absolutely bound to conclude that the correct answer to my first question "Can you supply more evidence of this Trevor?" was "No" and the correct answer to my second question "how does that even begin to support the statement that "committal for these types of offences were normally held in camera"?" was "It doesn't".

3. Let's cut to the chase and avoid any further nonsense. Clearly, what you were trying to say (or should have said) in response to my post #39 was: "One possible reason why the committal hearing of Tumblety was not reported is that the magistrate had the discretion to hold the hearing in camera". That would have avoided a pointless waste of time on all sides.

[David Orsam]

If Abberline disclosed that to the reporter himself then that would be primary.

If the reporter was told that by another source secondary !

voila simple !

Trevor – in no way does that answer follow on from, or bear any relationship to, the post of mine to which you are purporting to respond. My post was only one sentence ("Trevor will surely describe that as an uncorroborated newspaper report by an American reporter who appears to be guessing in any case") and, if you actually read it, you will see that at no point do I refer to the issue of what are primary and secondary sources.

The point I was making was that you have elsewhere refused to accept information from single uncorroborated newspaper articles, so that, if you were being consistent, there is no way you would rely on the Quincy Daily Journal report as evidence to support the claim that committal hearings for indecency offences were "normally" held in camera, especially in view of the fact that I have given you an example of a committal hearing for an indecency offence from 1886 which was not held in camera.

As for the Quincy Daily Journal article itself, even if the reporter had said that Abberline disclosed information to him, I assume you would not necessarily believe it, but, in any event, the article does not state that any information came from Abberline. On the contrary, it says that Abberline was "seen" in the private room of the magistrate. From this single observation, the article then goes on to speculate that "it is thought the case was tried privately" when that can't possibly be correct because the magistrate could not "try" such a case, only commit it for trial.

Further, this is apparently a report relating to the Cleveland Street Scandal and that scandal involved Very Important Persons – the Quincy article itself refers to "Two men of high social standing" - so one cannot sensibly extrapolate anything from any cases arising out of this scandal and say that this is how things were "normally" done.

[Wickerman]

G'day Jon

As I said everyone that have ever spoken to, who has qualifications in history, including Dr's Lecturers and Professors says that any Newspaoper article published at the time is Primary.

Can you explain how a novel is primary if a newspaper report isn't?

I sure can't.

When a newspaper published an article on the first year anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic, reviewing the sinking in the writers own words, the newspaper is not a Primary source.
Yet, in this same newspaper we have the story of the fire at the docks overnight where the reporter was present, in this case the newspaper is a Primary source.

It cannot be both at the same time, which is why I say it is not the newspaper that is to be regarded as the Primary document, it is the article of concern within.
This is why it is essential to determine what the subject matter is and that due to the fact a newspaper contains a wide range of stories, it cannot itself be regarded a Primary source simply because it is a newspaper.

A novel can contain factual information, yet the story is fictional. Exactly what this novel is supposed to be a Primary source for must be cleared up first. Simply calling a novel a Primary source is incorrect.

The last fictional story I read was The Alienist (though some Ripper books I have read since would better fit that category). Although there are factual elements within this fictional story, the novel itself is not a Primary source, and cannot be regarded as such.
However, if research was conducted on some factual element within the story then that subject, or more properly, the work conducted by the author to included a factual background may be regarded as a Primary source for that specific issue, not the story as a whole, therefore not the novel itself.

I think what we are missing in this is the comment, "may contain".
A newspaper, like a novel, or even a tabloid, "may contain" information which, depending on the contents and how it was written, could be regarded as a Primary source.

[PaulB]

Whatever you say Paul, after all you are looked on as one of the gods in Ripperology so when you speak all must listen. Perish the though that you a god could ever be wrong about anything connected to Ripperology.

You stiil fail to address the points made, make no effort to defend your position, and you are still profoundly ignorant about history and historians. But you can be what you want to be. That's fine. But in simple terms newspapers are still primary sources.

But, hey, you have now resorted to sarcasm,

[Trevor Marriott]

Ah, and so Trevor Marriott fails to address the points made, makes no effort to defend his position, throws out small and insignicant insults, and tells me I am not what I never claimed to be. All to be expected. Sadly.

But newspapers are in simple terms still primary sources.

And Trevor is still profoundly ignorant about historians and history.

Whatever you say Paul, after all you are looked on as one of the gods in Ripperology so when you speak all must listen. Perish the though that you a god could ever be wrong about anything connected to Ripperology.

[PaulB]

Well maybe you should use it sometimes in a positive way but I would suggest you stick to being a historian, an Ellery Queen you are definitely not !

Ah, and so Trevor Marriott fails to address the points made, makes no effort to defend his position, throws out small and insignicant insults, and tells me I am not what I never claimed to be. All to be expected. Sadly.

But newspapers are in simple terms still primary sources.

And Trevor is still profoundly ignorant about historians and history.

[Trevor Marriott]

And as an investigator you failed. You put your blinders on, as many investigators do and are now ignoring authoritative evidence. We see it all the time.

In your case, you must deny the reality of Assistant Commissioner Anderson personally involving himself in the case during the peak of the investigation. You still haven't explained why he would do this for a no nothing American quack when any kind of evidence from the US would do absolutely nothing specific to the charges (on the charge sheet) of four gross indecency cases; all misdemeanor charges. And to see Littlechild's letter explains just what the articles claim; the issue was Tumblety as a Ripper suspect.

Get the 'prime suspect' part out of your head. He clearly was on the short list. Here's the problem, since you reject Scotland Yard taking him seriously, at least in November and December 1888, your conclusion about him being JTR can only be one answer; but that answer is based on a false premise - Scotland Yard never considered him a suspect.

Regardless, the issue is not if Tumblety was JRT or not, it's if Scotland Yard considered him a suspect and the answer, based upon AUTHORITATIVE evidence, is yes.

As I've stated (and you ignored) a dozen times, your argument is also biased, because you claim 'secondary sources' are wrong in Tumblety's case, yet the very same source (NY World news cable on Nov17) was the only source about Sir George Arthur and you published this event as a reality.

It was not I that invented Tumblety as a prime suspect, but he was invented quite wrongly, long before I became interested in this case. False and incorrect information was used to prop him up, which you and others swallowed hook line and sinker.

From then on the Tumblety`ites were born who will now not die for some reason despite him being eliminated.

Despite your repeated use of newspaper reports, you nor anyone else has come up with any scrap of evidence to show he should have been regarded as a prime suspect, or that he was free the night Mary Kelly was murdered, or that he has any involvement in any of the murders.

At best, based on the incorrect Littlechild material provided he should be regarded as nothing more than a person of interest.

Take the blinkers off come back to Planet Earth !

I am not going to continue to engage in pointless arguments with you and others that have been misled by what you have read and how you interpret material put before you.

[Trevor Marriott]

No, Trevor. You are flat out wrong.



No, Trevor, no historian (or thinking person I know) would necessarilly use every scrap of information, and they certainly wouldn't use inaccurate information, to construct a picture of Tumblety or anything else.



You should know, but evidently don't, that the proper assessment and evaluation of source materials is precisely what historians do and are trained to do, along with setting that material in a proper historical context.



In this particular case, apert from a very few scattered references in official documents and a letter, the only source of information about Tumblety are newspapers. Don't use them and your knowledge of Tumblety is zilch. That's like taking all the witnesses to a crime and no talking to them.

Sure, some newspapers are unsafe and unreliable, but it is the historian's job to study each and every report and as best he can determine and assess its accuracy and its place in the developing picture.



You seem to imagine that as a retired policeman you are bringing special investigative skills to the table and that these distinguish you from, say, historians. Well, except for the specialist knowledge of how police work today, you don't.

Try to understand this, Trevor. There is nobody left alive who can tell you first hand about what happened in 1888. There are no witnesses you can question. Not even the geography is the same. Everything has gone. But the past does speak to you. It speaks to you in newspapers, books, and documents. And that’s the only evidence you have, Trevor, and those newpapers, books and documents are called sources. Sources are our only witnesses to the past and assessing and evealuating and prioritising and contextualising and understanding them is what the historian does.



Also, you again demonstrate your profound ignorance.



Yes, an unknown killer or killers murdered women in 1888. 1888 is the province of the historian.



Yes, Trevor, I have the knowledge and the expertise to assess and evaluate the source material about Tumblety.

Well maybe you should use it sometimes in a positive way but I would suggest you stick to being a historian, an Ellery Queen you are definitely not !

[PaulB]

Well once again we will disagree.

No, Trevor. You are flat out wrong.

I fully understand that you as a Historian lets say specifically interested in Tumblety will gather and use all what is known and recorded, whether that be primary or secondary whether it be accurate or not in building up a picture of him.

No, Trevor, no historian (or thinking person I know) would necessarilly use every scrap of information, and they certainly wouldn't use inaccurate information, to construct a picture of Tumblety or anything else.

The role of an investigator is to assess and evaluate all of that material in an attempt to find out what is accurate and what is not, and what evidence if any there is from that to point to him being regarded as a prime suspect, and equally to try to find evidence to eliminate him.

You should know, but evidently don't, that the proper assessment and evaluation of source materials is precisely what historians do and are trained to do, along with setting that material in a proper historical context.

This is important because those who seek to propose Tumblety as a prime suspect continually use newspaper articles to prop up their theory and as we know the newspaper articles are unsafe and unreliable, but these researchers will not accept this fact and keep quoting the fact that they are primary sources when they are not.

In this particular case, apert from a very few scattered references in official documents and a letter, the only source of information about Tumblety are newspapers. Don't use them and your knowledge of Tumblety is zilch. That's like taking all the witnesses to a crime and no talking to them.

Sure, some newspapers are unsafe and unreliable, but it is the historian's job to study each and every report and as best he can determine and assess its accuracy and its place in the developing picture.

I will listen to you as a historian, but will you listen to me as an investigator?

You seem to imagine that as a retired policeman you are bringing special investigative skills to the table and that these distinguish you from, say, historians. Well, except for the specialist knowledge of how police work today, you don't.

Try to understand this, Trevor. There is nobody left alive who can tell you first hand about what happened in 1888. There are no witnesses you can question. Not even the geography is the same. Everything has gone. But the past does speak to you. It speaks to you in newspapers, books, and documents. And that’s the only evidence you have, Trevor, and those newpapers, books and documents are called sources. Sources are our only witnesses to the past and assessing and evealuating and prioritising and contextualising and understanding them is what the historian does.

Maybe not because investigators results go a long way to damage what historians want to believe.

Also, you again demonstrate your profound ignorance.

Although the events of 1888 are historical, they dont detract from the fact the an unknown killer or killers murdered women at that time. Those crimes still remain unsolved so there is always going to be a cross over and a conflict between historians and investigators unless the two can work together.

Yes, an unknown killer or killers murdered women in 1888. 1888 is the province of the historian.

I would not profess to be an historian, but would you profess to be an investigator with sufficient knowledge and expertise in assessing and evaluating evidence in relation to whether Tumbley was ever a prime suspect or whether he could have been JTR ? There are only a handful on here that would be able to do so.

Yes, Trevor, I have the knowledge and the expertise to assess and evaluate the source material about Tumblety.

[mklhawley]

Well once again we will disagree.

I fully understand that you as a Historian lets say specifically interested in Tumblety will gather and use all what is known and recorded, whether that be primary or secondary whether it be accurate or not in building up a picture of him.

The role of an investigator is to assess and evaluate all of that material in an attempt to find out what is accurate and what is not, and what evidence if any there is from that to point to him being regarded as a prime suspect, and equally to try to find evidence to eliminate him.

This is important because those who seek to propose Tumblety as a prime suspect continually use newspaper articles to prop up their theory and as we know the newspaper articles are unsafe and unreliable, but these researchers will not accept this fact and keep quoting the fact that they are primary sources when they are not.

I will listen to you as a historian, but will you listen to me as an investigator ?

Maybe not because investigators results go a long way to damage what historians want to believe. Although the events of 1888 are historical, they dont detract from the fact the an unknown killer or killers murdered women at that time. Those crimes still remain unsolved so there is always going to be a cross over and a conflict between historians and investigators unless the two can work together.

I would not profess to be an historian, but would you profess to be an investigator with sufficient knowledge and expertise in assessing and evaluating evidence in relation to whether Tumbley was ever a prime suspect or whether he could have been JTR ? There are only a handful on here that would be able to do so.

And as an investigator you failed. You put your blinders on, as many investigators do and are now ignoring authoritative evidence. We see it all the time.

In your case, you must deny the reality of Assistant Commissioner Anderson personally involving himself in the case during the peak of the investigation. You still haven't explained why he would do this for a no nothing American quack when any kind of evidence from the US would do absolutely nothing specific to the charges (on the charge sheet) of four gross indecency cases; all misdemeanor charges. And to see Littlechild's letter explains just what the articles claim; the issue was Tumblety as a Ripper suspect.

Get the 'prime suspect' part out of your head. He clearly was on the short list. Here's the problem, since you reject Scotland Yard taking him seriously, at least in November and December 1888, your conclusion about him being JTR can only be one answer; but that answer is based on a false premise - Scotland Yard never considered him a suspect.

Regardless, the issue is not if Tumblety was JRT or not, it's if Scotland Yard considered him a suspect and the answer, based upon AUTHORITATIVE evidence, is yes.

As I've stated (and you ignored) a dozen times, your argument is also biased, because you claim 'secondary sources' are wrong in Tumblety's case, yet the very same source (NY World news cable on Nov17) was the only source about Sir George Arthur and you published this event as a reality.

[Trevor Marriott]

There are no "sides" Trevor. Trying to understand the past is history. The investigators are the people properly equipped to do that job and they are historians.

Well once again we will disagree.

I fully understand that you as a Historian lets say specifically interested in Tumblety will gather and use all what is known and recorded, whether that be primary or secondary whether it be accurate or not in building up a picture of him.

The role of an investigator is to assess and evaluate all of that material in an attempt to find out what is accurate and what is not, and what evidence if any there is from that to point to him being regarded as a prime suspect, and equally to try to find evidence to eliminate him.

This is important because those who seek to propose Tumblety as a prime suspect continually use newspaper articles to prop up their theory and as we know the newspaper articles are unsafe and unreliable, but these researchers will not accept this fact and keep quoting the fact that they are primary sources when they are not.

I will listen to you as a historian, but will you listen to me as an investigator ?

Maybe not because investigators results go a long way to damage what historians want to believe. Although the events of 1888 are historical, they dont detract from the fact the an unknown killer or killers murdered women at that time. Those crimes still remain unsolved so there is always going to be a cross over and a conflict between historians and investigators unless the two can work together.

I would not profess to be an historian, but would you profess to be an investigator with sufficient knowledge and expertise in assessing and evaluating evidence in relation to whether Tumbley was ever a prime suspect or whether he could have been JTR ? There are only a handful on here that would be able to do so.

[Monty]

Heh,

Pretty conclusive then.

Thank you. :-)

Monty

[Debra A]

Thanks Debs,

Please bear with me, as Im unaware of the Postal Service Appointment Books but...

...Given the date difference between Tumblety and the scandal (not much mind), do these books cover the 1888 period?

Cheers
Monty

1737 to 1969 Neil.

[Monty]

Hi Neil
Good thought but looking at the Postal Service Appointment Books (in which the names of all the telegram boys who were involved in the Cleveland St scandal do appear) there are none of the names associated with Tumblety's charge.

Thanks Debs,

Please bear with me, as Im unaware of the Postal Service Appointment Books but...

...Given the date difference between Tumblety and the scandal (not much mind), do these books cover the 1888 period?

Cheers
Monty

[Monty]

There are no "sides" Trevor. Trying to understand the past is history. The investigators are the people properly equipped to do that job and they are historians.

Hear hear.

Monty