Jack and the Grapestalk

[Simon Wood]

Hi Debra,

Le Grand and Batchelor came late to the Batty Street party. If the Irish Times [17th] is to be believed the police, despite their earlier denial, were in possession of the bloodstained shirt on September 30th.

"A reporter to-day [16th?] elicited the fact that from the morning of the Berner street and Mitre square murders the police have had in their possession a shirt saturated with blood, and they are evidently convinced that it was left in a house in Batty street, by the assassin."

The more I learn, the less I understand.

Regards,

Simon

[Debra A]

I agree the story is far from straightforward, Simon, but for different reasons to you.
I can't understand the need for the police and doctors to all be lying or covering something up in this situation when there may be a simpler reason for what happened, that being the prescence of a criminal, liar, blackmailer and confidence trickster getting involved in this part of the investigation.

Le Grand is reported by the Evening News to have sought out Packer as the first person to begin his investigations with, maybe because he had heard the rumours about grapes being seen in Liz's hand?

It wasn't the last time Le Grand would meddle into the investigations following Liz's murder either. I still find it odd that Sgt White and Thick were reported to have been in possession of a bloodstained shirt from the day after the double event [See Gavin Bromley's article on Mrs Keu'rs lodger,' Is there an echo'] and it had previously been thought police had managed to keep that information well under wraps until the story of the Batty Street lodger broke on the 15th October, until I found a report from the 9th October that said it was Grand and Batchelor who had been investigating a bloodstained shirt left with a laundress at Batty Street.

Let's not forget, Le Grand was not a private detective, he was a criminal who used the persona of a detective to commit crime, why would he behave like a detective in this scenario then?

Just some of my thoughts on the subject anyway.
...don't all shout at me at once

[Simon Wood]

Hi Debra,

There's more to the Packer/Grapes story than meets the eye.

If Sergeant White's story of interviewing Packer on Sunday morning, and recording the details in the notebook given to him especially for the purpose, was true there would have been no need for Scotland Yard to later go into an internal cartwheeling damage limitation exercise following the Evening News article. Also, I don't believe the two detectives White encountered were Le Grand and Batchelor. PIs do not outrank police sergeants, yet White meekly allowed them to take Packer away. And nobody has yet explained how such a dubious character as Le Grand had an entree to the upper echelons at Scotland Yard.

And what was Abberline doing while all this was going on? Reportedly at Scotland Yard, he had to have been in Whitechapel at some point that day in order to co-sign [with Superintendent Arnold] White's H Division report of the affair.

The Evening News pointed out that Packer's story did much to harm the Metropolitan Police, but as far as the press and public were later concerned the cops themselves did nothing to rebut their apparent bungling of the affair.

Enter Doctors Phillips and Blackwell, recalled to the inquest following the Evening News story, to poo-poo the grapes reportedly seen by Diemschitz [though not mentioned by him on Day One of the inquest], Kozebrodski [not called to the inquest] and a news agency reporter.

As a final thought, Packer stated that he was taken to see Eddowes' body on 3rd October. Why was he not taken to see Stride's body until the following day?

It's all very odd and far from straightforward.

Regards,

Simon

[Debra A]

Hi All,

This question is guaranteed to give Tom Wescott a fit of the screaming ab-dabs.

If Matthew Packer's 4th October story was not true, how can it be that on 1st October three people–Diemschitz, Kozebrodski and an agency newshound–were reported to have seen grapes in Stride's hand?

Regards,

Simon

Hi Simon,
Good question, but if the story was true, and those three witnesses really did see grapes in Liz's hand, how come Dr Phillips specifically says at the inquest that he had not found any grapes in the hands of the deceased, and he did not believe that she had swallowed any either?
What had happened to those grapes?

[Adam Went]

Maybe that's where Liz's sixpence went.
Let's also remember that, upon searching, there was a grape stalk found in the grate in the passageway to Dutfield's Yard.
But, like the GSG later that night, it's not really specific to anything.....

Cheers,
Adam.

[caz]

Hi Simon, Tom,

I really don't see why it would be impossible for Liz to have been one of the people Packer saw that evening, unless he is presumed to have had no customers at all, or seen no living soul the whole time he was open for business.

All he said was that he had seen and heard nothing suspicious or unusual. What would have been remotely suspicious or unusual about serving a man with a female companion, if he had no reason to believe, until Le Grand came fishing, that they had any more to do with the murder than anyone else he had seen that day?

Love,

Caz
X

[Tom_Wescott]

I'd have to read the essay again. I don't remember off hand.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Simon Wood]

Hi Tom,

Great minds think alike.

I don't have your 2006 essay, so could you please briefly explain?

Regards,

Simon

[Tom_Wescott]

This was the title of my 2006 essay in Ripper Notes - 'Jack & The Grapestalk: The Berner Street Mystery'. In that essay I answered this very question.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Simon Wood]

Hi All,

This question is guaranteed to give Tom Wescott a fit of the screaming ab-dabs.

If Matthew Packer's 4th October story was not true, how can it be that on 1st October three people–Diemschitz, Kozebrodski and an agency newshound–were reported to have seen grapes in Stride's hand?

Regards,

Simon