For what reason do we include Stride?

[APerno]

This seems to be a very large leap to me. In the midst of a series of prostitute murders, where the police hadn’t previously connected the potential murderer to the location, why would they start now when another prostitute was found murdered? Why didn’t they wrap the body in a sheet and chuck it onto the back of Diemschutz cart for him to dump a couple of miles away whilst a club member washed the blood away?

Because that is a much tougher act, (than merely lying) to put together at the last minute; they may not have been able to come up with a fool big enough (at that time, three murders in) willing to travel around Whitechapel with a dead whore in his 'trunk.' -- BTW I am not an advocate of this conspiracy theory, it seems a 'large leap to me' as well.

[Harry D]

Schwartz' statement puts the victim off premises when first assaulted, by someone who was likely a Gentile, by virtue of the Lipski remark. It was almost certainly meant to infer it was directed at Israel, not Pipeman...remember he had an interpreter...and that is the best possible scenario for the Jewish immigrant Anarchists who ran the club. Off site gentile.

Exactly. The usage of "Lipski" from the attacker alone was meant to incriminate a gentile. I expect that Schwartz may have received this epithet first-hand and called on it when inventing this little incident.

Btw, I'm not suggesting that Stride's murder was a conspiracy. She may have been killed by a club member, the Whitechapel murderer, or anyone else. I just believe that Schwartz's testimony was a deliberate attempt to divert any possible suspicion from the Jewish socialists. Moving the body was far too risky. If they had been caught transporting the body they would've been banged to rights. They weren't stupid.

[Herlock Sholmes]

Because that is a much tougher act, (than merely lying) to put together at the last minute; they may not have been able to come up with a fool big enough (at that time, three murders in) willing to travel around Whitechapel with a dead whore in his 'trunk.' -- BTW I am not an advocate of this conspiracy theory, it seems a 'large leap to me' as well.

You’re probably right Aperno. I suppose that it would depend on how desperate they were. I just can’t see the need for a conspiracy here.

[c.d.]

Would the club cover up for a member that they knew was Stride's killer? Club loyalty was one thing but presumably these members had mothers, sisters and daughters.

c.d.

[Harry D]

Would the club cover up for a member that they knew was Stride's killer? Club loyalty was one thing but presumably these members had mothers, sisters and daughters.

It doesn't work like that, CD. In the real world, minorities tend to protect their own. They won't rat each other out.

[Herlock Sholmes]

It doesn't work like that, CD. In the real world, minorities tend to protect their own. They won't rat each other out.

This can certainly be true Harry but can we say that this with total confidence? What I mean is that, on finding a body outside the club (a murdered woman that could very well have been a club members wife/girlfriend/sister/mother) they would have lied about the circumstances. Wouldn’t it have been possible that a few consciences might have spoken out?

Another point that I’d like to make is this: (and I haven’t read all of the thread so I don’t know Michael’s reasoning on this) how confident would the members have been that their efforts weren’t just a waste of time? This whole plan would have been created in such a short space of time, why would this prove to the police (or lead the members to believe) that Diemschutz didn’t just disturb a club member just after he’d cut Stride’s throat?

[Michael W Richards]

Would the club cover up for a member that they knew was Stride's killer? Club loyalty was one thing but presumably these members had mothers, sisters and daughters.

c.d.

If you recall cd, Morris was originally scheduled to speak at the club that night, and there were threats that forced then to cancel that and instead allow Eagle, who regularly gave a speech why Jews should be Socialists, to speak again that night. I suspect that its possible they may have had hired security that couldnt be cancelled, I think Morris backed out late in the week. That puts non-members, and maybe non Jews, likely in that alleyway.

"Israel leaves via the kitchen door at around 12:40 and sees a security guy manhandling a woman inside the gates, near the wall. The man yells at him "Lipski", which was known to have been used derogatorily towards Jews,..there may have been another member smoking a pipe there...(people were known to be in the alley after meetings according to neighbors), and Schwartz scoots past him out into the street. The security man gets pissed at the woman who has turned her back on him and starts out for the open gates, grabs the woman and chokes her, then cuts her throat and drops her, her head 6 inches from the gate. Louis arrives just after or as this happened, near 12:45, his horse shies, and he notices what has gone on. He calls for people inside the club as Eagle arrives back at the club, to assess what happened and what to do. Louis sends out Issac by himself to look for help. Shortly after 1 he and Eagle also head out, with a story between them that Louis had just arrived back at the club. Unfortunately they were not able to convey that story to any other members, or Spooner, which is why 3 people say they were with Louis and by the dying woman at around 12:45, and why Issac says he was sent alone by Louis and Louis says they went together. Fanny Mortimers statement is assurance that Louis did not arrive at 1 as he stated emphatically."

That's about where I am coming from. Even if it wasn't a club member that did the deed, they would still have to protect themselves.

[Abby Normal]

This can certainly be true Harry but can we say that this with total confidence? What I mean is that, on finding a body outside the club (a murdered woman that could very well have been a club members wife/girlfriend/sister/mother) they would have lied about the circumstances. Wouldn’t it have been possible that a few consciences might have spoken out?

Another point that I’d like to make is this: (and I haven’t read all of the thread so I don’t know Michael’s reasoning on this) how confident would the members have been that their efforts weren’t just a waste of time? This whole plan would have been created in such a short space of time, why would this prove to the police (or lead the members to believe) that Diemschutz didn’t just disturb a club member just after he’d cut Stride’s throat?

exactly HS
Its nonsense. all they had to do was move her body a few feet out of the yard-they even had a diemshitz cart right there. and the thought that they came up with this convoluted conspiracy on the spur of the moment and everyone agreed is ridiculous.

[Michael W Richards]

This can certainly be true Harry but can we say that this with total confidence? What I mean is that, on finding a body outside the club (a murdered woman that could very well have been a club members wife/girlfriend/sister/mother) they would have lied about the circumstances. Wouldn’t it have been possible that a few consciences might have spoken out?

Another point that I’d like to make is this: (and I haven’t read all of the thread so I don’t know Michael’s reasoning on this) how confident would the members have been that their efforts weren’t just a waste of time? This whole plan would have been created in such a short space of time, why would this prove to the police (or lead the members to believe) that Diemschutz didn’t just disturb a club member just after he’d cut Stride’s throat?

It would seem quite a few people saw the woman lying there before the police arrived and apparently no-one recognized her for one, and the people who created the notion were employed by the club, and therefore the only ones who would have lost income if it closed. Not everyone did align with those 2 men, as Ive said until my fingers bleed, 3 people said they were by Louis and the dying woman at around 12:45.

I would think Israel Schwartz tried to tie up some loose ends Sunday night, being a friend of Wess's, and translated by Wess, since he was unable to speak English. Since there is absolutely no evidence any interruption occurred, and physical evidence that says she was cut perhaps 5 minutes before Louis says he arrived or longer and was still untouched after she was dropped there, (like the same length of time Kates killer took to do all that cutting, IF Lawende did see Kate), there is no physical evidence that happened either.

The club was thought by police to harbor Anarchists, not just Socialists, and these members attack police with clubs less than 6 months later on that same property, why you and so many others wish to see these as men of "conscience" rather than the fringe criminal element they were is beyond me personally, but surely anyone can see that Jewish Immigrants were despised in much of the East End at that time, likely due to the extraordinary numbers of them that had recently immigrated. Thats why they gathered in the same areas and houses, for safety and the comfort of their own. Anderson suggests one Jewish witness refused to identify a suspect in the crimes because he was also Jewish. So, Where would he get an idea like that, huh?

The Club members knew the hostility in the area towards them, they knew their less than ideal reputation with the police and neighbors, and in just a few hours graffiti is erased because it seemed to represent anti Jew sentiment to the highest officials, and that it was thought to have been a boiling kettle issue.

How this find was perceived was vital to their survival.

[APerno]

exactly HS
Its nonsense. all they had to do was move her body a few feet out of the yard-they even had a diemshitz cart right there. and the thought that they came up with this convoluted conspiracy on the spur of the moment and everyone agreed is ridiculous.

I agree, but with that understood, IMHO we need to recognize that everything a club member may have offered was going to be guided by the 'Jewish concerns' MR's conspiracy theory suggests. I personally doubt they planned anything and likely reacted in the manner we would expect from anyone when a murder occurs outside your door, but once they started talking there may very well have been an unwitting conspiracy (sorry for the oxymoron) to watch what was said, even to the point of lying at any particular moment if the individual thought it the best course. I think we have to believe that the Jewish situation guided their cooperation.

An earlier post suggested that Wess served as a translator for Schwartz; I was unaware of this, but it does open the door for all kinds of mischievous behavior in the translation and Wess was a serious activist.

Does anyone know the details regarding Wess and Louis and how much impact their involvement affected Schwartz's testimony? I didn't really understand what the post was suggesting.

[Michael W Richards]

I agree, but with that understood, IMHO we need to recognize that everything a club member may have offered was going to be guided by the 'Jewish concerns' MR's conspiracy theory suggests. I personally doubt they planned anything and likely reacted in the manner we would expect from anyone when a murder occurs outside your door, but once they started talking there may very well have been an unwitting conspiracy (sorry for the oxymoron) to watch what was said, even to the point of lying at any particular moment if the individual thought it the best course. I think we have to believe that the Jewish situation guided their cooperation.

An earlier post suggested that Wess served as a translator for Schwartz; I was unaware of this, but it does open the door for all kinds of mischievous behavior in the translation and Wess was a serious activist.

Does anyone know the details regarding Wess and Louis and how much impact their involvement affected Schwartz's testimony? I didn't really understand what the post was suggesting.

Regarding Wess and Louis, both had jobs that were at that location, and we know courtesy of Debra here at Casebook that a connection between Wess and Schwartz exists from Paris a few years earlier, so to wonder whether Schwartz's statement was tailored to not hurt Louis or Wess or the club is fair speculation. Besides, I suspect the reason he was there at that time was because he attended the meeting and was at the club, not coming back from the market he left to go to at noon, and leaving his wife not only to move all they owned by herself but to settle in also. We don't know where Israel lived that morning, might it have been a cottage in the passageway? Might he have owed a debt to the club for that?

As far as a broad conspiracy goes, its clear it was limited to only a few witnesses, because 3 people, (2 club members) dispute the time the body was found...as per Louis's account only, 1 disputes the time Louis arrived..as per Louis's account only, and 1 club member says he was sent out alone to seek help by Louis...which disputes Louis account and adds a third undocumented party sent out for help.

[JeffHamm]

Exactly. The usage of "Lipski" from the attacker alone was meant to incriminate a gentile. I expect that Schwartz may have received this epithet first-hand and called on it when inventing this little incident.
...

Except Schwartz's original story was that "Lipski" was shouted to Pipeman not at him. Through questioning by the police he admitted that he couldn't be sure. If the club members are quickly putting together a conspiracy to deflect suspicion from a Jewish club and/or the Jewish population in general, you don't include a Jewish named member of the murder team in your cover story. And this part of Schwartz's statement did direct suspicions towards the Jewish population. For example, in Evans & Skinner, page 131 there's the following from The Home Office records:

The statement of Schwartz that a man who was in the company of Eliz. Stride 15 m. before she was found dead, & who threw her down, addressed a companion (?) as "Lipski" seems to furnish a clue and ought to be followed up. The number of "Lipskis" in Whitechapel must be limited. If one of them were identified by Schwarz [sic] it might lead to something of importance.
17 Oct./88.

and on page 132, we have the following letter, dated 29 Oct, 1888 that was sent to the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police from the Home Office, and marked "confidential"

Sir,
With reference to your letter of the 24th Inst. enclosing a report as to the steps taken to detect the perpetrator of the recent murders in Whitechapel, I am directed by the Secretary of State to say that he observes that a statement has been made by a man named Schwartz to the effect that he had heard a person who was ["in the company of" - deleted] pulling about a woman identified as Elizabeth Stride 15 minutes before the murder off Berner Street took place ["speaking" - deletd] call out "Lipski" to an individual who was on the opposite side of the road ["by the name of 'Lipski'" - deleted]
["Mr. Matthews presumes that this" - deleted]
It does not appear whether the man used the word "Lipski" ["was used" - deleted] as a mere ejaculation, meaning in mockery I am going to "Lipski" the woman, or whether he was calling to a man across the road by his proper name. In the latter case, assuming that the man using the word was the murderer, the murderer must have an acquaintance in Whitechapel named Lipski.
...
"

As we can see, Schwartz's statement did exactly the oppoiste, it pointed towards the Jewish population, and given his statement, could do nothing but that.

Sir Charles Warren later informs HO and the SofS how it has been determined that "Lipski" is used as a derogatory term towards Jews, and that it was probably directed at Schwartz, not pipeman in his letter of Nov 6th, 1888 (page 135).

Sir,
With reference to your letter of the 29th ulto. I have to acquaint you, for the information of the Secretary of State, that the opinion arrived at upon the evidence given by Schwartz at the inquest in Elizabeth Stride's case is that the name "Lipski", which he alleges was used by a man whom he saw assaulting the woman in Berners [sic] Street on the night of the murder, was not addressed to the supposed accomplice but to Schwartz himself. It appears that since the Lipski case it has come to be used as an epithet in addressing or speaking of Jews.

...

It was only because the police worked out that Schwartz's original statement was unlikely to be correct, that Schwartz was mistaken in whom "Lipski" was directed to, that it becomes suggestive of a Gentile murderer. But that doesn't change the fact that the original story Schwartz told implicated a Jew as a potential accomplice, which is exactly what the conspiracy theory is supposed to be trying to prevent.

What I do find interesting, though, is that in that last letter, the following bit "...the opinion arrived at upon the evidence given by Schwartz at the inquest in Elizabeth Stride's case..." sounds like Schwartz gave evidence at the inquest, but there's nothing by him in any of the reports I've seen, and the summing up by the Coroner has no indication of Schwartz's testimony. It might make sense if some comma's are missing, but then we have an extra "at", something like this "...the opinion arrived at, upon the evidence given by Schwartz, at the inquest in Elizabeth Stride's case...", meaning the opinion about Schwartz's police statement was arrived at based upon the inquest testimony, but I feel like I'm torturing the language to get it to say that.

I think this must just be a mistaken detail by Warren, in that the evidence wasn't given at the inquest but during an interview with Schwartz.

- Jeff

[Harry D]

Except Schwartz's original story was that "Lipski" was shouted to Pipeman not at him. Through questioning by the police he admitted that he couldn't be sure. If the club members are quickly putting together a conspiracy to deflect suspicion from a Jewish club and/or the Jewish population in general, you don't include a Jewish named member of the murder team in your cover story. And this part of Schwartz's statement did direct suspicions towards the Jewish population. For example, in Evans & Skinner, page 131 there's the following from The Home Office records

It could be that the added ambiguity over whether "Lipski" was directed at Pipeman or Schwartz actually lent the story an air of credibility. Better to obfuscate the truth of what happened than try to play it too on the nose.

It's over 130 years after the fact and people are still believing Schwartz's version of events, so it obviously got the job done.

[Harry D]

all they had to do was move her body a few feet out of the yard-they even had a diemshitz cart right there. and the thought that they came up with this convoluted conspiracy on the spur of the moment and everyone agreed is ridiculous.

Except for, you know, the blood.

And imagine if some random passer-by got around the corner to see a bunch of Jews rolling a corpse onto the street.

[JeffHamm]

It could be that the added ambiguity over whether "Lipski" was directed at Pipeman or Schwartz actually lent the story an air of credibility. Better to obfuscate the truth of what happened than try to play it too on the nose.

It's over 130 years after the fact and people are still believing Schwartz's version of events, so it obviously got the job done.

Schwartz's original story wasn't ambiguous though. His report was that "Lipski" was shouted to pipeman. The ambiguity, if you will, arose from police work - they determined that his interpretation was probably wrong.

That's way too complex for a conspiracy theory. Look, I'm not saying Schwartz's statement must be viewed without caution, or anything like that (in fact, the conspiracy theory says we should view it as fabrication; the police at the time say we should view some of it as misinterpreted; and eye witness testimony is notoriously inaccurate; etc). What I'm saying, though, is that when viewed as part of a conspiracy to deflect attention from Jews, his story, as told, is shockingly bad - in fact it is unable to do anything but attract attention the very group that is supposed to be trying to divert attention away from. The conspiracy theory skewers itself on the very evidence it puts forth. Therefore, the conspiracy theory is flawed. But showing the conspiracy theory as flawed does not automatically mean Schwartz is gospel either, we can still question the validity of his testimony, but what he said refutes him being set up by the club to deflect attention away from the Jewish population - because what he said can only do the opposite. To suggest that a conspiracy, put together in a few minutes after a body was found, would include so subtle a detail as "but the cops will work out that Lipski was directed as Schwartz and not as he initially claims, at an accomplice" is getting into chem trails, and Area 51 level of silliness. Schwartz's statement refutes such a conspiracy, but that doesn't mean his statement isn't to be questioned in other contexts.

- Jeff