Was Annie Austin a Ripper Victim?

[DJA]

Incompetence.

[seanr]

Do you think in his 35 years in the boxing industry which he did not consent to being published and included supplying prize money for boxers (from post #22 here https://www.jtrforums.com/forum/gene...hy-photo/page2). Do you think he got involved in gambling?

Well, MrBarnett you've only gone and done it... you found the generational link from McCarthy to acknowledged gangsters of the next generation such as Jack Spot and Charles Sabini, with an extra spice of weirdness with William Brogdon Jnr (the son of the Chief Constable of Great Yarmouth, addressee of the strange 14 Dorset Street letter).

[drstrange169]

>>‘Matches’ plural? Tell me more. <<

In 1901, it was reported that McCarthy had "backed boxers" for over 30 years. I'm not very good at maths, but doesn't that stretch back further than his pleading guilty in the illegal boxing match court case in 1882?

[drstrange169]

>>And perhaps you could explain how these matches (plural) were illegal.<<

Maybe the fact that he pled guilty to the 1882 one might be an indication.

[MrBarnett]

One single conviction for having some involvement in a prize fight which may have been just about technically illegal becomes a history of involvement in ‘illegal boxing matches’ (plural) and makes him a million times more evil than the Krays.

Numerous examples of his philanthropic work are held up as further proof that he was a wrong ‘un. Of course he gave to charity, he was a criminal mastermind.

I sincerely hope none of you gents are ever called for jury service.

[MrBarnett]

Ah, but there was that one boxing match that got out of hand.

[MrBarnett]

The fact that someone didn’t just compare McCarthy to the Krays, but described them as babies in comparison to him shows what we are up against. At some point in their Ripper education some folks came to the conclusion that Jack was a real wrong ‘un and no amount of evidence to the contrary or absence of proof to support their view will sway them from it.

Scotty’s idea of a ‘rent collector’ is an interesting variant of this condition.

[MrBarnett]

The ‘illegal’ boxing match generated a considerable amount of discussion.

[MrBarnett]

Cont’d 1.

[MrBarnett]

Cont’d 2.

[MrBarnett]

Cont’d 3.

[MrBarnett]

Cont’d 4.

[MrBarnett]

Ronnie and Reggie must be green with envy.

Torture, murder, long firm fraud - child’s play compared to having something to do with a boxing match where the gloves were (allegedly) insufficiently padded.

What a monster Jack McCarthy was. He was almost certainly personally responsible for all the 11 WM and the criminal mastermind behind every crime that occurred within a 5 mile radius of his lair in Dorset Street.

[MrBarnett]

Part of the damning evidence in this case was that some of the spectators shouted encouragements to violence such as ‘Go to it, Sugar’ - no doubt under instruction from McCarthy (:-))

I’ve heard it through the East End underworld grapevine that McCarthy was often late in returning his library books. What a villain!!!

[seanr]

The transformation of our understanding from mild mannered Grocer's Shop owner and landlord, to a man who was invited senior policemen's retirement do's and the head of a business empire which included multiple lodging houses, an over 30 year career as the 'unspoken' backer of local boxers and eventually becoming the 'principal propreitor' of one of London's largest boxing venues (a fact which is mentioned in a couple of articles in 1911, but then seems disappears from the historical record...), will naturally lead to questions.

We know that there was organised crime in the East End in the 1880's. There were illegal gambling dens, protection rackets at the Cambridge Music Hall and tobacco smuggling operations which can only have been possible with an organised criminal element. But where are they in the historical record? - they are strangely absent.

There were undoubtedly crime and criminals around Jack McCarthy in all his activities. Illegal gambling in boxing, prostitution in lodging houses, some of which if he did not directly or intentionally profit from, but he undoubtedly did profit from them.
Then we have men in his employ, certainly Henry Buckley and possibly Billy Austin, who have an ability to be a bit violent with knives and other weapons. And now it turns out he may have directly employed Jack Spot during the early stage of his career. We do now have him in a direct business relationship with Dick Burge, a major player in a strange and extremely organised embezzlement operation (which by the time he's publicly doing business with Jack McCarthy, he's served his time and he is, of course, a reformed man).

Those who deal with criminals might take care lest they thereby become a criminal. Perhaps in his dealings between the world's of the police, legitimate business and the East End underworld which was always close by, he managed to stay whiter than white. He must have been a savvy business man to have stayed successful for so many years. Questions as to the nature and extent of his business empire, I maintain, are very much historically valid.