P.C Smith and William West

[Canucco dei Mergi]

Hello all,



Yet this night, even after rain had subsided and it was clear that at least 28 men were on site, we are told, singing upstairs.......not one person is in the yard after Lave, then Eagle, pass through it around 12:40am.

No-one was smoking, no-one needed to use the yard privy, no-one needed some night air, no-one needed to stretch their legs, no-one needed to leave between 12:40am and 1am to go home to the wife, cottagers were awake but oblivious to the yards activities, no-one needed to leave and get ready to go to work....like a Butcher for example, who started their work in the wee hours.....
.

Sincerly, I do not see anything susicious here...but...hey...just an opinion.

That the awoken cottagers didn't hear anything aside from the singing means that there was no noise made in the yard or at least the noise was not loud enough to be heard by them.
But this is not suspicious per se.
It is one of the little mysteries that we should explain with the reconstruction of the crime (valid point for all the 4 first canonical murders).
That using the serial killer scenario, the total lack of noise/screams is difficult to support I essentially agree.

[Canucco dei Mergi]

Is it possible that Goldstein was bringing the cartons to the cigarette makers in the yard, and saw something dangerous looking and just kept "Striding" on by?

Interesting thought. Never came to my mind but very realistic.
I must concede that Goldstein only passing by 'his' club and not stopping might make one wonder...was at least the body already there ?

The problem is that the case can't be solved only by asking (even if the questions are appropriate), after asking one should have at least elements to base any answer on, and in the case of Goldstein, as far goes the little information we have there is not a lot we can answer.

Hello all,

I think its possible that Goldstein saw "the whole thing", as we are quoted Schwartz's testimony was. Although a rather small player in the night, he is only seen glancing "up" towards the club while passing hurriedly, there are some issues that I am not satisfied are fully addressed.

Goldstein was a club member, and had in his Gladstone like bag, empty cigarette cartons. He shows up at around 12:55am, and as it so happens, some cottagers opposite the club wall were still awake at that time, and some were cigarette makers.

Is it possible that Goldstein was bringing the cartons to the cigarette makers in the yard, and saw something dangerous looking and just kept "Striding" on by?

As Tom Wescott has mentioned here, these were young men, hardly grey bearded socialists, Diemshutz was 30, Kozebrodski was 17, and Eagle was 27. Their club was known by police as an "anarchists" club, and in the spring of 1889, they attack policemen in Dutfields Yard with sticks and clubs. Most of the neighbours also mentioned the noise and milling about in the yard after Saturday night meetings past 1am....with "low" men present.

Yet this night, even after rain had subsided and it was clear that at least 28 men were on site, we are told, singing upstairs.......not one person is in the yard after Lave, then Eagle, pass through it around 12:40am.

No-one was smoking, no-one needed to use the yard privy, no-one needed some night air, no-one needed to stretch their legs, no-one needed to leave between 12:40am and 1am to go home to the wife, cottagers were awake but oblivious to the yards activities, no-one needed to leave and get ready to go to work....like a Butcher for example, who started their work in the wee hours.....and Israel Schwartz is walking up to the gates at approx 12:45 to check to see if his wife moved from their Berner St address to the new address........as if she would need 10 or 12 hours to move some suitcases and a chair, or something to that effect.

If.....Schwartz was leaving the club, and in the yard when a man accosts Liz near the wall by the gates, and hurries on out, maybe along with a Pipe smoking man also there, then his statement would be an accusatory one towards someone attending that meeting. That would have closed this club down.

So,....Wess interprets for Goldstein, maybe Schwartz, and the account is now taking place outside the gates, with a drunk man that cannot be connected to the club using his location alone, and the yard contained not one witness, because all remaining people were upstairs singing, or in their cottages with their drapes closed.

-Why didnt Liz pay for her bed before leaving? She had the money from cleaning that day.
-Why would she say she did not know when she might return, after she had already given some velvet to a lodger to hold for her, which would lead one to surmise she had plans at least for that night. Did she mean she might not return to sleep there again, or just that night?
-Why is she wearing an ankle length skirt and a flower on her breast to solicit.....and why would cashous be something she would use when dealing with street people that smell horrible likely.
-Why didnt Eagle and Lave see each other, when their statements have them both in the yard at 12:40am?
-Why did Eagle, who is self described as "squeamish" about blood, tumble "pell-mell" down the stairs to see the murdered woman discovered by Diemshutz.
-Why didnt Police use Schwartz's statement at the Inquest?
-Why do Eagle, Diemshutz and Kozebrodski run out yelling "another" woman has been murdered?
-Why is Liz Stride, if a Ripper victim, unmutilated post mortem?
-Is there anything with respect to the known evidence regarding her murder that precludes someone else with a knife killing her, other than Jack?

Cheers all.

[Canucco dei Mergi]

Anyone standing in the passage, even at it's edge, would be invisible to him.

Totally unsupported and biased deduction (indeed not even a deduction - just air in a balloon).

We do not know if Goldstein saw something or if he didn't.

Since he was a member of the club and came up the street from Commercial Road we could suppose that his intention was to enter the club and that a last minute thought prevented him from doing so.

What could have been (if any) this last minute thought ? Dunno. But he could (could) have been prevented by seeing something in the alley.
Maybe (maybe) the already prostrated victim.

Let us not forget that Goldstein went to the police station only after Mrs Mortimer made her deposition to the police and after that deposition was made known in the newspapers and that he went to the police accompanied by William Wess.

He could have been a very shy guy, shy enough to get scared by seeing a body on the ground.

All this might be BS and Goldstein simply had no intention to enter the club, just passing by to go home.

But the quote here above is nothing less.

Canucco dei Mergi.

[Canucco dei Mergi]

Throat cut between 12:46 and 12:56...but Diemshutz arrives at 1...hmm...

That Diemshitz disturbed the murderer as he was nearing or entering the yard with the cart and interrupted him is and has always been just an hypothetical reconstruction of the events.

That the police advanced it on that same night and that there are still the greatest majority of 'Ripperologues' that support it shows AP Wolf could have been right when he stated in his book that no major advances have been made on the case for more than 100 years.

Clearly the hypothesys is not well supported by circumstances but it is essential for the paladins of the serial killer conception of the affair to explain why 'Jack' had to kill twice that night and why 'he' butchered only the second victim.

They prefer, in the wake of Abberline work of destruction, to lean on this totally unsupported reconstruction instead of building a scenario based on Schwarz direct sight of events.

The doubts casted by Schwarz testimony are the same that arise from Emma Smith's: it doesn't seem that the Whitechapel murders reflect the action of a serial killer but that they instead (as Philip Sugden in a shy but precise way underlines) point in the direction of a conspiracy.

God save us (and Scotland Yard) from that Omen.
Let us all say that Emma Smith is not pertinent to the case and that the testimony of Schwarz was sadly translated from yiddish in a wrong way.

May we bless Elizabeth Long (not the victim, the other one in the Chapman case) that saw one man with one woman.
Let us forget that her testimony is contradicted by two other witnesses (Richardson and Cadosch) and by the medical deductions, let us forget that she presented herself to the police two days after the murder and let us hope people stay naive for the next 200 years.

A serial killer has to have been there and we shall place it there whatever the cost.

Sir, Yes Sir.

Canucco dei Mergi.

[Canucco dei Mergi]

And Wess speaks first at the inquest....why? Why not Kelly? Why not PC Smith? Why not Diemshutz if he finds her? Why not Schwartz?

Wess spoke english very well.
He was much educated and, as some reporters put it when they interviewed him during the great sweating system strike, extremely clever.
He knew the topography of 40 Berner street and internal court very well.
He was there the night of the crime even if not really at the time of the murder.

For question of order and logic the inquest began by describing the place where the murder occurred.

For all the things I said here above he was the most qualified witness to start speaking before the coroner.

That Wess spoke first at the inquest is a normal thing and probably it was decided by the police with the assent of the Coroner (or the Coroner asked to the police to start sending someone who could definitely give a good description of the place). I do not think that smells at all.

For all the rest I agree with you.

Canucco dei Mergi.

[Wickerman]

Hi Trevor.
Perhaps you can explain something about police beats. PC Smith on the Berner st. beat provides us with a list of streets he patrolled.
"it went from the corner of Jowers (Gowers) walk, Commercial-rd, as far as Christian-st, down Christian-st and Fairclough-st as far as Grove-st, then back along Fairclough-st as far as Backchurch-lane, up there as far as Commercial-rd, taking in all the interior streets, including Berner-st and Battey-st."

When we outline this route on a map we can see the streets given are the perimeter he is to walk. What interests me is where he says, "taking in all the interior streets".
I assume he is admitting these interior streets are his responsibility, but, that they are not on his beat, his beat goes around them.
My question then is this, does PC Smith only patrol those interior streets at his discression?

Goldstein was witnessed by Fanny Mortimer walking at a hurried pace and only glancing towards the club. Anyone standing in the passage, even at it's edge, would be invisible to him. Good thought there, Michael, but I think we can rule out ol' Leon as our Jewish police witness.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

If anyone should know that not all ideas offered are winners Tom, its me.

Just a passing idea, I kind of thought that passing the gates would be the only way to see the area shadowed by the open gate door, closest to the wall. And Fanny saw him at around the time the "latest" throat cut was, indicated by Blackwell.

Nice to see you, best regards.

[Tom_Wescott]

Goldstein was witnessed by Fanny Mortimer walking at a hurried pace and only glancing towards the club. Anyone standing in the passage, even at it's edge, would be invisible to him. Good thought there, Michael, but I think we can rule out ol' Leon as our Jewish police witness.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

Heres one to consider,

We know that there was a Jewish Witness that at some point refuses to give witness against a fellow Jew, and we think its Lawende or maybe Schwartz.

If Goldstein, when he passes the gates of a club he is a member of, looks in only to witness the death of Liz Stride by a fellow members hand, wouldnt he have a really good look..and reasons not to identify a fellow club member suspect?

Best regards.

There is obviously much that lies upon Club members shoulders that night, a body found in a yard that is known to have "low-men" and women gathered after an anarchist club's meetings...gee, just like that very night. But on that night, even though the rain had stopped and only around 24 or thirty men can be accounted for inside singing, not one of the almost 75 others that attended were hanging out in Dutfields Yard, and having a smoke or a chat. And in a "deserted" yard, shouldn't Eagle and Lave have been able to see each other, as they stated they were there at the same time, 12:40? If there were others milling about, I could understand.

Throat cut between 12:46 and 12:56...but Diemshutz arrives at 1...hmm...

Witness is going to see if his wife moved that day for him, so he goes to the old address at 12:45 at night when its likely she completed moving some clothes and a few sticks.. if any... of furniture maybe 12 hours before. And there he is...A Jewish Man standing outside a Jewish Mens Club after a meeting why Jews should be Socialists. By co-incidence, of course.

Funny that with not one person in the yard, that Liz and Pipeman were hanging out near the gates. And where was Broadshouldered Man headed...into the yard?

The whole thing smells.

And Wess speaks first at the inquest....why? Why not Kelly? Why not PC Smith? Why not Diemshutz if he finds her? Why not Schwartz?

My best regards all.

[Tom_Wescott]

Jon,

I should tell you that I early on looked at Wess (not West) with suspicion, but my research into him (I have stuff from his personal archives - pretty cool) doesn't show a single iota of reason to suspect he might have been a murderer. It's an entirely different story for some other members of the club and their associates, though. Anarchist circles were jam-packed with nutjobs.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Tom_Wescott]

Where Tom has fallen down in this regard is that he should be claiming that the newspaper in Stride's bonnet was the 'Arbeiter Front'.

This is precisely what Tom DID suggest. The man Smith saw was a young man carrying a 'newspaper parcel' that so happens to fit the dimensions of the Arbeter Fraint precisely (I have copies). I considered long ago that it might have been William Wess, only because he said he left the club with some papers (something he'd HAVE to admit to if he was witnessed) and went to the printing office. However, I don't recall Philip Krantz (who was in the printing office all night) corroborating Wess' arrival. Personally, I think it more likely that the man Smith saw talking to Stride was merely a clubman out handing out their paper, which was circulated for free.

Tom wants the involvement of the IWEC in Stride's murder badly.

I don't have to work too hard on that since her body was found in their yard. If you mean I'm desperate to blame them for her killing, I most certainly am not.

I don't think that is 'smart'.

Then I must surely be on the right track!

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Jon Guy]

And did anyone raise the point, Jon, that Wess never left the grounds of the IWEC and was at all times at least 18 feet away from the gates to the club?

Indeed,AP, it was Tom who pointed this out to me , but I persist with my suspicions of West. If no-one saw him, he was not going to admit speaking to Stride, especially with the public feeling at this time. Too many contradictions. I am not saying he was Strides killer, but there is the possibilty he spoke to Stride.It seems to me that Stride may have crossed the road away from the club as PC Smith passed, as she could have been charged with soliciting if she stood outside the club door.

Below are some of his dubious observations :

Not exactly much noise; but I could hear the singing when I was in the yard.
[Coroner] Did you look towards the yard gates? - Not so much to the gates as to the ground, but nothing unusual attracted my attention.
[Coroner] Can you say that there was no object on the ground? - I could not say that.
[Coroner] Do you think it possible that anything can have been there without your observing it? - It was dark, and I am a little shortsighted, so that it is possible. The distance from the gates to the kitchen door is 18 ft.
[Coroner] What made you look towards the gates at all? - Simply because they were open. I went into the club, and called my brother, and we left together by the front door.
[Coroner] On leaving did you see anybody as you passed the yard? - No.
[Coroner] Or did you meet any one in the street? - Not that I recollect. I generally go home between twelve and one o'clock.

[Cap'n Jack]

And did anyone raise the point, Jon, that Wess never left the grounds of the IWEC and was at all times at least 18 feet away from the gates to the club?