Diemschutz arrival

[Michael W Richards]

Reviewing the many reports of what Diemschitz says, it is not clear where he was at precisely 1:00 am.
In most cases we think he entered the yard at 1:00, but he clearly acknowledges only seeing the time as he passed Harris's Tobacconist shop up on Commercial Rd, seconds if not minutes earlier.

"....and returned home exactly at one o'clock on Sunday morning. I noticed the time at Harris's tobacco shop at the corner of Commercial-road and Berner-street. It was one o'clock."
I.P.N. 6 Oct.

We can see Diemschitz (or the reporter), does not distinguish between passing Harris's shop at 1:00, and pulling into Dutfields Yard at 1:00.
Admittedly, there is only a short time difference between the two, but 1:00 at Harris's shop could translate to 1:01 or 1:02 at Dutfields Yard, and that is assuming Harris's clock was correct.

Diemschitz arriving a little after 1:00 would be more consistent with PC Smiths estimate of him passing the top of Berner St. at 1:00 before he was called by witnesses.

Therefore, even though you say Louis's time is marked in stone, it is only at best, the time he passed Harris's shop.

Regards, Jon S.

Hi Jon,

Actually, I didnt endorse Louis's timing, I only said "Louis also had a clock available to him to mark a time in stone."

I said it that way because Louis actually had the opportunity to choose a time and use the clock as a reference point to validate his claim,...but in reality we have no way of knowing precisely when he arrived home. We have only his word on that.

Something Ive been trying to contest.

Cheers Jon

[Wickerman]

Hi again,

I think we need to clarify what kind of filter can be applied to these witnesses to sort out who among them had the best chance of an accurate guess on the time... within a 5 minute range lets say.

I believe witnesses that gave statements that had access to clocks or timepieces at 12:30am or later can be considered potentially valid accounts. Unless they had some reason to manufacture a time. Issues like Spooner are harder to rely on due to the fact that he made his way to the Beehive from the closed pub leisurely, so I believe his last reliable time was at the pub as it closed. But his guesstimate of the time does roughly coincide with Issac Kozebrodski's time given within the hour of the event, and Heschbergs time. And both of those members times disagree with the Israel Schwartz story, and both came from inside the club where clocks would have been visible. If Liz Stride was cut near the earliest time estimated then Spooner would not have still seen blood flowing if he arrived in the passageway using the times Louis provides, sometime shortly after 1am.

Fanny was in her house, presumably, she had a timepiece she referred to there. PC Smith had a watch. Brown had a clock to refer to.

Louis also had a clock available to him to mark a time in stone.

Reviewing the many reports of what Diemschitz says, it is not clear where he was at precisely 1:00 am.
In most cases we think he entered the yard at 1:00, but he clearly acknowledges only seeing the time as he passed Harris's Tobacconist shop up on Commercial Rd, seconds if not minutes earlier.

"....and returned home exactly at one o'clock on Sunday morning. I noticed the time at Harris's tobacco shop at the corner of Commercial-road and Berner-street. It was one o'clock."
I.P.N. 6 Oct.

We can see Diemschitz (or the reporter), does not distinguish between passing Harris's shop at 1:00, and pulling into Dutfields Yard at 1:00.
Admittedly, there is only a short time difference between the two, but 1:00 at Harris's shop could translate to 1:01 or 1:02 at Dutfields Yard, and that is assuming Harris's clock was correct.

Diemschitz arriving a little after 1:00 would be more consistent with PC Smiths estimate of him passing the top of Berner St. at 1:00 before he was called by witnesses.

Therefore, even though you say Louis's time is marked in stone, it is only at best, the time he passed Harris's shop.

Regards, Jon S.

[Michael W Richards]

Witnesses estimates of time

Hi again,

I think we need to clarify what kind of filter can be applied to these witnesses to sort out who among them had the best chance of an accurate guess on the time... within a 5 minute range lets say.

I believe witnesses that gave statements that had access to clocks or timepieces at 12:30am or later can be considered potentially valid accounts. Unless they had some reason to manufacture a time. Issues like Spooner are harder to rely on due to the fact that he made his way to the Beehive from the closed pub leisurely, so I believe his last reliable time was at the pub as it closed. But his guesstimate of the time does roughly coincide with Issac Kozebrodski's time given within the hour of the event, and Heschbergs time. And both of those members times disagree with the Israel Schwartz story, and both came from inside the club where clocks would have been visible. If Liz Stride was cut near the earliest time estimated then Spooner would not have still seen blood flowing if he arrived in the passageway using the times Louis provides, sometime shortly after 1am.

Fanny was in her house, presumably, she had a timepiece she referred to there. PC Smith had a watch. Brown had a clock to refer to.

Louis also had a clock available to him to mark a time in stone.

What happens quite often in these discussions is a disregard for times given by some witnesses based on the assumption that few had watches or could properly estimate the time. However, if someone is asked what transpired 45 minutes earlier and they have a fixed point in time to reference, then they likely can recall events and actions quite accurately...if thats their intention.

Cheers

[Michael W Richards]

I was going to comment on Toms need to rebut arguments with childlike petulance, but thanks for doing so for me Dave.

I didnt say that the young couple were on the street Tom, I posted a press piece that stated the young woman said she and her man were at the intersection, not 50 yards from the Berner Gates, about 20-25 minutes before they heard the "alarm" from the club.

If it was 20 minutes, then that puts her and her young man where Brown saw a couple at the time he says he saw one,..again, without any color on either of them. It also suggests the young couple remained in the vicinity, perhaps not on the same spot, until the alarm was sounded. Yet they heard or saw no Israel Schwartz altercation, or anyone fleeing, nor did they mention hearing or seeing an approaching cart.

Neither did Fanny...yet she could hear something as benign as bootsteps while not at her door.

Best regards

[Cogidubnus]

Michael is stirring trouble. I have demonstrated before that there was no young couple anywhere on the street at 12:45, and he knows this.

You say it's so Tom...but with respect you also claimed Errata was only 1/8 Jewish (and haven't had the common courtesy to apologise for that crashing gaffe yet) so who should I be believing, Michael, a correspondent I've personally always found courteous, or yourself who resorts all too readily to the "Turdburger"?

Just asking...

All the best

Dave

[Colin Roberts]

Delete!

Wrong Thread

[Wickerman]

James Brown:
"....the man had a long coat on, which came very nearly down to his heels. I believe it was an overcoat...... I could not say what kind of cap he had on,.....the man was about 5ft 7in in height. He appeared to be stoutish built.

Israel Schwartz:
"...He says he was taller than the other, but not so stout, and that his moustaches were red.....
Second man age 35, ht. 5ft 11in. Comp. Fresh, hair light brown, moustache brown, dress, dark overcoat, old black hard felt hat wide brim, had a clay pipe in his hand."

There isn't whole lot of common detail to go on, even if we accept "stoutish" for "not so stout". And, wearing an overcoat at night was not so unique for that time of year.
There isn't enough to declare them to be the same man, but neither can we say with any confidence they were not. Again its purely a matter of preference.

Regards, Jon S.

[Tom_Wescott]

Glengarry GlenTurdburger

Michael is stirring trouble. I have demonstrated before that there was no young couple anywhere on the street at 12:45, and he knows this. Fanny Mortimer spoke with a woman after the body had been found, and this woman said she had been out there with her man earlier. This young woman was later interviewed and stated it was much earlier than 12:45 that she and her man were out walking.

The couple that James Brown saw were most likely Stride and another man, quite possibly Pipeman, given the timing and the coat.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Wickerman]

While re-reading some press clippings I cam across this one, and I think it may contain the answer to a mystery regarding Strides murder. The Evening News of Oct 1st, 1888.

"When the alarm of murder was raised a young girl had been standing in a bisecting thoroughfare not fifty yards from the spot where the body was found. She had, she said, been standing there for about twenty-minutes, talking with her sweetheart, but neither of them heard any unusual noises."

To me this addresses fully whom James Brown likely saw that night.

Michael.
You will find the Echo, 1st Oct. expands on that story a little..

It is established almost beyond doubt that the poor creature met her death some time between twelve and one o'clock. And yet no one seems to have heard a struggle, or a groan, or the slightest indication of what was going on. From twelve o'clock till half-past a young girl who lives in the street walked up and down, and within twenty yards of where the body was found, with her sweetheart.

"We heard nothing whatever," she told a reporter this morning. "I passed the gate of the yard a few minutes before twelve o'clock alone. The doors were open, and, so far as I could tell, there was nothing inside then." "I met my young man (she proceeded) at the top of the street, and then we went for a short walk along the Commercial-road and back again, and down Berner-street. No one passed us then, but just before we said "Good night" a man came along the Commercial-road; and went in the direction of Aldgate."

The trouble is, Brown's sighting is approximated to have been 12:45 am., but, when he went to the Chandlers shop it might have been 12:30 when he saw them. He doesn't say he passed them twice, so I would ask, did he see them on his way to the shop, or on his return from the shop? There could be 15 minutes between his travels out and back.

Details aside, yes I think Brown saw this same couple. Naturally, Tom thinks I'm wrong

Personally, I think its close enough given the tendency for witnesses to badly estimate the times they gave.

Regards, Jon S.

[Errata]

We Jews? Seriously? Aren't you like 1/8th Jewish or something? You're something else, Errata. You really should be writing fiction.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

Umm.. no. All Jewish. Bat Mitzvah-ed and everything. Two Jewish parents, Jewish sister.... Now my mother converted from Catholicism before she married my Dad, so I have a Scottish Catholic half of the family, but according to Judaism, and the way I was raised, I'm 100% Jewish. Hebrew school from the age of three to the age of 18, I read from the Torah on big family occasions, keep the holidays but mostly at my father's insistence, can ask for basic implements in Hebrew, automatic citizenship in Israel. So yeah. We Jews.

Not sure why you thought otherwise. Perhaps you are thinking of someone else?

I should write fiction though. I think I'd be good at it, though I think I probably lack the requisite concentration, and ability to finish things I start.

[Michael W Richards]

While re-reading some press clippings I cam across this one, and I think it may contain the answer to a mystery regarding Strides murder. The Evening News of Oct 1st, 1888.

"When the alarm of murder was raised a young girl had been standing in a bisecting thoroughfare not fifty yards from the spot where the body was found. She had, she said, been standing there for about twenty-minutes, talking with her sweetheart, but neither of them heard any unusual noises."

To me this addresses fully whom James Brown likely saw that night. She places herself at the location he saw the couple, at about the same time.

It also states that a neighbor 2 doors down, (Fanny), said the following..

"It appears that shortly before a quarter to one o'clock she heard the measured, heavy tramp of a policeman passing the house on his beat. Immediately afterwards she went to the street-door, with the intention of shooting the bolts, though she remained standing there ten minutes before she did so. During the ten minutes she saw no one enter or leave the neighbouring yard, and she feels sure that had any one done so she could not have overlooked the fact. The quiet and deserted character of the street appears even to have struck her at the time. Locking the door, she prepared to retire to bed, in the front room on the ground floor, and it so happened that in about four minutes' time she heard Diemschitz's pony cart pass the house, and remarked upon the circumstance to her husband."

In that piece she hears the bootsteps just before 12:45...(what about Israel?), she goes to the door and is only at the door for about 10 minutes just after that, and that she heard the pony and cart after she locked up and was in bed.

Since she did not see any cart and horse approaching while at the door, in fact she was taken on how deserted the street was, it seems to me she could in no way verify whose cart she heard.

Cheers

[Tom_Wescott]

We Jews? Seriously? Aren't you like 1/8th Jewish or something? You're something else, Errata. You really should be writing fiction.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Errata]

Thanks for re-iterating the clubs ethnic make-up Tom, the meetings speech by Eagle that night was "Why Jews should be Socialists", a recurring theme.

We Jews have a fine tradition of socialism. Eastern European Jews had been practicing forms of socialism for about a hundred years at that point. So it's really no surprise that we dominated the movement in England. We knew the advantages. We had benefited from socialism. Of course in the Pale we really didn't have any access to a free market economy, so it made more sense there. Thus the speeches. Jews were bailing on socialism once they realized that there was no barrier to them becoming as successful as they wanted to be. Which is why Jewish socialism changed in the 1920s or so to a demand for socialized government services instead of pure socialism.

BUT despite the popular opinion of the day, you can't be a socialist and an anarchist. I mean, it would be interesting to see how they might try to work it out, to have goods and services distributed by no central authority whatsoever. I imagine it would look something like a Marx brothers film.

[Michael W Richards]

Thanks for re-iterating the clubs ethnic make-up Tom, the meetings speech by Eagle that night was "Why Jews should be Socialists", a recurring theme.

I would imagine that Diemshitz and Eagle and Wess and some others relied on income derived from memberships and meeting fees, that in and of itself could be a motivation for ensuring the club stay out of this murder mess.

Ive begun to feel that Israel Schwartz may just have altered the location of what he says he saw, if for example Israel attended the meeting, and while he was leaving via the side door he witnessed the altercation he describes inside the passageway. When BSM pulls at Liz and she falls, if she did so on the spot she was killed, that might well have been the murder commencement.

Cheers

Best regards

[lynn cates]

stuck in a rut

Hello Tom. The "ruts" were merely a basis for estimating width--all from a discussion I had read.

If there were ruts, Dimshits may have had a devil of a time with his cart, given the recent rain.

Cheers.
LC