Did BS-man murder Liz Stride?

[Scott Nelson]

It should have been quite easy to find a resident who could say for certain that it was, or was not, there the day before.

Had one been found who could swear it was not there the day before then this witness could have been called at the inquest, instead of asking Halse if it looked fresh.

Well, fear for one thing.

[Michael W Richards]

What I said was that the belief that a certain interpretation of the GSG could cause riots, was one that was a pro-Jewish one. I also said that I don't know what the GSG meant. The only interpretation that would send people over the edge was one that a Jew wrote the graffiti, thereby, showing some sort of connection or pride about the murders. How is any of this some sort of swimming against the stream?

Mike

If a gentile knew that the Berner Street murder involved Jews, and then later wrote the grafitto sarcastically, then he could have been saying " The Jews will not be blamed without good reason" or The Jews are the men that get away with everything". Enough perhaps to incite anger in any anti semitic gentile passing by who sees it. Enough to incite violence. That was the fear of the senior officers.

Just because this area was predominantly Jewish doesn't mean it was exclusively so, Gentiles would have been regulars on the street also...and the feelings in general towards the local immigrant Jew was what the police feared would add fuel to any spark. The "Lipski" preoccupation by the police confirms that position.

Obviously context and the common linguistics of the period factor greatly into any interpretation of that message.

Ill just add to that when people called out "Murder" in the night during that period, it rarely involved an actual murder, or an attempted one.

[Hunter]

It was queries by the Home Office (first mentioned in a marginal comment by Godfrey Lushington on Swanson's Oct. 19th report) that sparked the communications concerning the Lipski comment. There is no evidence that the police had a "preoccupation" with the term, but rather the Home Office instead, to which Swanson and his lieutenants at CID tried to oblige.

[Michael W Richards]

It was queries by the Home Office (first mentioned in a marginal comment by Godfrey Lushington on Swanson's Oct. 19th report) that sparked the communications concerning the Lipski comment. There is no evidence that the police had a "preoccupation" with the term, but rather the Home Office instead, to which Swanson and his lieutenants at CID tried to oblige.

I don't think who started it is more pertinent Hunter, the fact is that the HO and Met and City police...and Parliament were all dealing with the same catastrophic fears when it came to the predominantly Jewish immigrant population, many of whom were Socialists. They were perceived as a real threat, a looming growing, mass of have-nots that might rise up in even greater numbers and with greater violence than on Bloody Sunday a year before. Couple that with the Irish self rule activities and these folks had plenty to be concerned about....a figurative tinder box.

The animosity towards this Jewish population segment in the East End is clear in the press of the day, as were the police fears.

I think the written evidence at Goulston intended to incite anti semitic reaction, perhaps even retaliatory action from outraged Jews, resulting in street violence that couldn't easily be controlled. I also think the writing and the cloth are likely from the same source. The cloth is a signature of sorts, and a way to claim the Eddowes murder, and the message is to distance himself from any culpability for the earlier murder on Jewish Immigrant property. Instead he suggests in a less than literal manner that we might want to look at the Jewish population on site that night for the culprit for that crime.

"The Jewes are not the men that will be blamed for nothing,", or "for no good reason", meaning, "there are reasons to blame the Jews for something".

This would mean that the killer in Mitre Square was aware of the Berner Street murder before writing the message, and would know that the club Jews were scrambling to stay out of any suspicions.

Since its possible the cloth was left there up to almost 70 minutes after the Mitre Square killing, there is ample time to have heard street chatter as the news spread on the streets.

The Mitre Square killer may or may not have been this Jack fellow, but I believe if he wrote the message he probably wasn't very fond of Jews as well.

Cheers

[Tom_Wescott]

That is some damn fine reasoning there, Wickerman.

c.d.

I'm not sure why you and Wickerman are trying to argue against the evidence in order to dismiss the graffiti? There may have been a dozen people who told them it wasn't there the day before, but of course these witnesses would not have been encouraged by the police to speak publicly as the police angle was to promote the graffiti as irrelevant. However, any witnesses who could swear it was an old graffiti would have been trumpeted loudly, but no such person existed. The idea no one saw white chalk on black brick on their own home is very hard to swallow.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Hunter]

Hi Mike,

I don't think its a matter of "who started it" as much as who was "preoccupied "with the term, Lipski, as you say. In this, it is apparent that the Home Office was. The police investigation at this time was widespread and encompassed many avenues of inquiry, which Swanson's report bears out. The officials at the Home Office felt compelled to single out one of them, ironically, because at least Lushington thought Stride's assailant in this instance WAS a Jew.

I doubt there was any concern that a backlash from the Jewish community - at least violence or civil disobedience - was a threat compared to the opposite scenario already exemplified to some degree by the Pizer fiasco.

[c.d.]

Hello Michael,

Can you tell me why the GSG can not be interpreted as being pro Jewish? In other words defending the Jews saying that they are sick of being blamed for everything that happens.

c.d.

[Wickerman]

I'm not sure why you and Wickerman are trying to argue against the evidence in order to dismiss the graffiti?

It is precisely because there is no evidence, the argument is against a belief.

No evidence exists to say who wrote it, when it was written, or why, though no shortage of belief exists to fill that gap.

The idea no one saw white chalk on black brick on their own home is very hard to swallow.

Do you stop to read every piece of graffiti you see, on subway walls, toilet doors, train carriages?
Jews were above all that infantile Gentile provocation, then there is the question of how many could actually read English.

I grew up knowing someone who could speak English fluently, but could not read. Is that so unique?

Jewish people were hardened to this treatment, they were used to it. If you were exposed to contempt, derogatory remarks, and provocative slander, why would you be interested when you see more of the same.
Common sense tells the resident Jew that these words scrawled in chalk are not intended as praise.
Why would they even read it, assuming they could?

[c.d.]

I'm not sure why you and Wickerman are trying to argue against the evidence in order to dismiss the graffiti? There may have been a dozen people who told them it wasn't there the day before, but of course these witnesses would not have been encouraged by the police to speak publicly as the police angle was to promote the graffiti as irrelevant. However, any witnesses who could swear it was an old graffiti would have been trumpeted loudly, but no such person existed. The idea no one saw white chalk on black brick on their own home is very hard to swallow.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

Hello Tom,

What you say makes sense but do we have any record of police conversations with the residents of the building or are you simply speculating?

c.d.

[Batman]

Police on the scene on record said its fresh and would have been rubbed off by the jewish residents/locals there.

Its in double cockney. That's from Fido.

The implications are staggering for those who think JtR was a Jew.

[c.d.]

Police on the scene on record said its fresh and would have been rubbed off by the jewish residents/locals there.

Its in double cockney. That's from Fido.

The implications are staggering for those who think JtR was a Jew.

Hello Batman,

What exactly are those implications?

c.d.

[Batman]

Hello Batman,

What exactly are those implications?

c.d.

You need a Jew blaming the Jews, who can't spell Jews.

[Wickerman]

You need a Jew blaming the Jews, who can't spell Jews.

I can only mention this as a point of interest, but my original post from the late 1990's on the subject is likely on the first Casebook archived disks, I don't have a copy now.

In the late 90's I was searching on a Jewish Forum specifically to see if this word (Jews), written by the people themselves, had a variety of spellings, and to my astonishment one student wrote "Juwes" in a letter to another student.

[Michael W Richards]

I can only mention this as a point of interest, but my original post from the late 1990's on the subject is likely on the first Casebook archived disks, I don't have a copy now.

In the late 90's I was searching on a Jewish Forum specifically to see if this word (Jews), written by the people themselves, had a variety of spellings, and to my astonishment one student wrote "Juwes" in a letter to another student.

I believe their is some relevance to the usage Jon, and I imagine the word originated in that form because of "Judaic" beliefs.

I believe in this case though there are more versions that record Jewes than Juwes.

Cheers