If Schwartz Lied ...

[JeffHamm]

Oh, sorry, I just realise I've used the term "testify" for at least some statements not given at the inquest (i.e. Fanny Mortimer's). Just take "testify" above to mean "we have it recorded somewhere" and not to mean recorded anywhere official, like a police statement or at the inquest. I can't go back and edit it anymore to correct such subtleties.

Oh, and while the BST times are listed to the second, this isn't because we can truly estimate to that level of precision, but if I round each one, this just introduces successive rounding errors. I keep the seconds on the basis that this will minimize the error at each step because a few extra seconds of additional error of the estimate at one step gets "cancelled" by a few extra seconds being removed at the next step when error would go the other way. Errors of estimations like these tend to vary, with some positive and some negative, but if we round at each step, then the successive estimates become more, rather than less, accurate.

- Jeff

[JeffHamm]

Hi all,

Ok, I've had a go at trying to put together a timeline of events. I'm using Dr. Blackwell's watch as the standard time, meaning, witness statements of times are based upon other clocks and so we would expect some error due to their clock reading differently from Dr. Blackwell's. Presumably, though, the times shouldn't be hugely different, but a difference of 10 minutes between two clocks would not be unexpected. So, what I've been doing is trying to work backwards from Dr. Blackwell's time of arrival when we know his watch read 1:16. BST is "Blackwell Standard Time", so the recreation times are all stated in BST, and I'll do my best to explain what I've done. I chose a clock-sync error of +-10 minutes (as I had mentioned that in earlier posts, I stuck with it). When working backwards, to estimate times in BST, if someone stated a duration (i.e. x minutes later event A happens), then I translated their estimated duration using the average for that estimated duration (the table at the end of this post). If they estimated a range (X-Y minutes), I averaged the table values for X-Y minutes. When people described their movements (went from A-B), I measured that distance on the maps, and used 3.1 mph for walking, 2.5 mph for a PC on their beat, and 6.1 mph for people running. That would give me an estimated duration for their actions. Then, I could compare the recreation time for their actions to their statement of what time they said they did these things. And if the recreation time (which is in BST) and their statement of the time (which is not in BST) fall within the clock sync error range, then I consider the recreation to be reasonable.

Another test of the reasonableness of the recreation is when two events get assigned an estimated time in BST values, and we also have someone involved in those events present that as a duration (x minutes). I then compare the estimated interval in BST with their testimony. And if the BST interval falls within the range for the X minute estimate (i.e. is between the min and max value in the table), then the recreation is considered within tolerances.

Finally, George has indicated he did a recreation of the Deimshutz "pony shy until start of search", and that he found this required about 1 minute and 50seconds. I'm using his results for that estimation.

I started with what serves as the initial "core" of the recreation, which starts with Blackwell's arrival, and now with George's information, works back to Deimshutz's arrival. This is what I presented earlier, but I've reduced some of the ranges I presented then to singular points in time by using the midpoints, and using the exact table values rather than being lazy and rounding to nearest minutes. Nothing major changes, just the time details follow a consistent methodology.

All Times Stated are in BST (Blackwell Standard Time);

All Witness Statements thought to be clock based times are viewed as consistent if within a clock-sync error of +-10 minutes.

All Witness Statements with regards do a duration or interval length are viewed as consistent if within the range shown in the Table at the end. If a duration is required to continue the estimated time line, the average duration will be used. If multiple witnesses state different values for the same duration, the average of their adjusted durations will be used. Given the skew associated with the ranges of durations (the max is much further from the average than the minimum) we would expect, overall, for more of the errors to be below the mean than above the mean, but I am unable to estimate what the ratio should be as the exact form of the skewed distribution is unknown and so I am unable to determine how far above the median the mean, average, is likely to be located).

Here is the core of the recreation:
1:16: Dr. Blackwell arrives at scene

1:13:35: Johnson arrives at scene (duration 3-4 minutes later -> 2m 25s, ave of two adj. durations)

1:04:45: PC Lamb Arrives (an adjusted duration to 8m 50s; ave of 10-12m estimate)
NOTE: recreated time between Spooner & PC Lamb’s arrival is 2m 24s. Spooner estimated 5 minutes, which ranges from 1m 38s to 15m 06s, with an average of 3m 37s. Recreation interval well within acceptable limits.

1:03:33: PC Lamb alerted by “runners”

1:02:21: Runners start heading from yard, north towards Commercial Road
Returned from Fairclough
Spooner arrives at Scene

1:00:34: Runners head out south toward Fairclough
NOTE: James Brown testifies that at about 12:45 he sees a man and woman by the Board School on Fairclough, and believes the woman was Stride. He estimates 15 minutes later he hears cries of “Police”, from people moving towards Gove Street (15 min has a range of 6m 13s to 37m 56s, and an average of 12m 33s; given his 12:45 is not in BST, the combination of clock-sync error and estimation error, means his statement is consistent with the recreation times, but it is impossible to tease apart the sources of error in order to translate his 12:45 BST; if we, however, use his duration estimation and work back from our runners, it would suggest he walked past at
12:48:01, and that difference is well within clock sync error ranges).

12:58:24: Diemshutz’s arrival (based upon George’s 1m 50s recreation of pony shy->heading out
NOTE: Diemshutz testifies to arriving at 1 o’clock based on different clock. Recreated BST well within clock sync error range

Building upon the Core:

PC Smith testifies as follows:
“It takes me from 25 minutes to half an hour to go round my beat. I was last in Berner-street about half-past 12 or 12:35. At 1 o’clock I went to Berner-street in my ordinary round. I saw a crowd of people outside the gates of No. 40. I did not hear any cries of “Police.” When I got there I saw Constables 12 H. R and 252 H. I then saw the deceased, and, on looking at her, found she was dead. I then went to the station for the ambulance. Dr. Blackwell’s assistant came just as I was going away.”
So, we know he arrives after PC Lamb (1:04:45 BST), and before Johnson’s arrival (1:13:35 BST). We also know he carries out a few activities at the scene, though from what he describes, those could be done fairly quickly, which could suggest he arrives closer to Johnson than PC Lamb, but not necessarily.

We do not know what clock PC Smith bases his time stamp on. His description of the time of his last patrol as “half-past 12 or 12:35” suggests that is not the Harris clock at the top of Berner Street, as if it were he would not have to state a range. George has interpreted this 5 minutes as indicating the time interval for his patrol of Berner Street. While I can’t rule that out (at 2.5 mph, regulation patrol speed, going up and down Berner’s street would take about 4 minutes, so Geoge’s idea is defendable). However, the phrasing to me does not come across that way as I would think it would have been stated as “I was last in Berner-street between 12:30 and 12:35”, rather than including “about” and using “or”. As such, I’m treating his testimony as indicating he did not use the Harris clock to time-stamp his patrol.

Also, the time 1 o’clock in his testimony is within the statement “At 1 o’clock I went to Berner-street …”, and not “At 1 o’clock I was at Berner-street …”. This testimony is as recorded in The Times, which is what I have access to. There may be conflicting reports in other papers, as is commonly the case. His patrol description starts with “Jower’s-Walk” (sic; Gower’s Walk), which at regulation speed is about 2m 23s away from Berner Street. Therefore, it sounds to me like he updates his time a Gower’s walk, and at 1 he started heading towards Berner’s Street, making his arrival at the top of it around 1:02:23 (his time, not BST), and as he would pick up the pace due to the activity, arrives at the scene at 1:03 (his clock time, not BST). A 25-30 minute typical patrol round would place him there at 12:32:23-12:37:23, which fits well with his stated estimated times. I suggest, therefore, that PC Smith arrives at between roughly 1:05 and 1:06 BST, with the difference between his time and BST reflecting clock-differences (I’ll put it at 1:05:30, midway in that range).

This would place his previous patrol (in BST) entering Berner Street between 12:35 and 12:40, so we’ll estimate that to be 12:37:30 (BST).

Fanny Mortimer:
She testifies she goes out for about 10 minutes after hearing what she takes to be a police man pass by. A 10 minute estimate translates to 7m 56s, but has a range of 3m 48s -27m 00s. If we give PC Smith a bit of time to get out of her view, that would place Fanny Mortimer on her door step between 12:39 and 12:47 (BST), during which Goldstein passes. Also, James Brown doesn't pass until 12:48:01, which is why FM didn't see him. Testimonies are lining up and consistent once all adjusted to BST.

Schwartz Incident:
It is recorded as having occurred at 12:45, but that’s not in BST. We know FM did not see this event, so either it happens before she came out, or after she went back inside. Given her statements tend to suggest there wasn’t a huge gap between what is likely to be PC Smith’s patrol and her going out, I would suggest this event occurs after her goes in. So after 12:47 BST, but it must happen before Deimshutz arrives, at 12:58:24 (BST).

The Schwartz event, as described, would require no more time than it would take for him to walk along Berner’s Street from Commercial to Fairclough (and a bit less, as he indicates he runs the last bit). That distance is 415 feet, and at 3.1 mph, that requires 1m 31s. We have a window of time well beyond 1m 31s between Fanny’s going back inside and Deimshutz’s arrival. It is also within acceptable clock sync error. Given the amount of time required, it seems likely James Brown goes past before the Schwartz incident. That reduces the window to be after 12:48:01 and before 12:58:24 (BST). We still have over 10 minutes within which to fit a 1m 31s event.

So, if B.S. is Stride’s killer, it places her death between 12:48:01 and 12:58:24, BST.

This gives us the what I would suggest is a reasonable start at a recreation of the events with all of the times in BST:

I'm presenting this in reverse chronological order, error of the time estimates should be viewed with increasing caution as we move down the timeline (the previous errors will compound) but so far everything remains within tolerances.

*** recreation of events in BST ****************

1:16: Dr. Blackwell arrives at scene

1:13:35: Johnson arrives at scene
PC Smith Leaves to fetch ambulance

1:05:30: PC Smith Arrives

1:04:45: PC Lamb Arrives

1:03:33: PC Lamb alerted by “runners”

1:02:21: Runners start heading from yard, north towards Commercial Road
Returned from Fairclough
Spooner arrives at Scene

1:00:34: Runners head out south toward Fairclough
This is heard by James Brown, whose testimony places this at 1o'clock (non BST)

12:58:24: Diemshutz’s arrival (based upon George’s 1m 50s recreation of pony shy->heading out

{ Time window for Schwartz Incident }

12:48:01: James Brown sees a man and woman (Stride?) by the board School;

12:47: Fanny Mortimer goes inside (FM estimated about 4 minutes later she heard a pony and cart go by. The recreation has an 11 m 24 gap. The range for 4 minute estimates span from 1m 15s to 12m 31s, so while on the long side, the recreation is still within acceptable limits).

{ Time window for Goldstein to walk down Berner Street }.

12:39: Fanny Mortimer goes outside

12:37:30: PC Smith’s previous patrol of Berner’s Street

*** End of recreation time line ******************

I'm sure not everyone will agree with some of the decisions I've had to make, but that's the nature of these things. There are, I believe, some other witness statements we could try and work with. I expect that sooner or later something will arise that won't fall within the tolerance levels, but that's to be expected.

- Jeff

Here's the table I've used for the duration estimations again.

[GBinOz]

Unless we have a study on clock discrepancies in the Victorian era to guide us that range of error will be a personal choice.
- Jeff

Hi Jeff,

Second post may be of interest.
https://www.jtrforums.com/forum/the-...ime#post120389

"Without being able to go back with his barrow, and view things ourselves, we also can't be sure if the angle from which he viewed the clock influenced the apparent position of the hands."

Interesting. The original building still stands. If I lived in or near London I would go on site and try to recreate the event. Any volunteers?

Cheers, George

[NotBlamedForNothing]

Dr. Blackwell states he used his watch to note the time of his arrival, so I'm comparing it to his testimony.

I asked what you're comparing Blackwell's time to. Are you comparing Blackwell to Blackwell?

I chose 1 because that's a disputed time, and there are those who argue the searches must have been much sooner, and others who argue they could have started a few minutes later. So, I started at one (which, if you note, would mean Deimshutz's 1 would have to be wrong in the strictest interpretation). And, in the last construction, I didn't actually start at 1, I started at 1:16 and worked backwards from there, and we got to the same thing, searches starting around 1.

I see George has done some sort of recreation of the "pony shy", and came up with about 1m 50 seconds for Deimshutz's actions. Give him a few more seconds to run in side and get a few people, and start the searches, and a discovery time of 12:57-58 seems about right. 2-3 minutes is easily explained by different clocks, so there's nothing implausible about Diemshutz's arrival time, or any of the other testimonies I've mentioned.

1am is the disputed time of arrival, not the beginning of the search. Once this difference is accounted for, Lamb arrives too late for Eagle to reach Leman street by 1:10.

An estimated time of 6 minutes means you have to consider times as short as 2 minutes 2 seconds (let's just call it 2 minutes) and out to past 17! Duration estimations can be way out. In what we worked about above, I think we're in the 2-3 minute range, which is within the expected margin of error. So, there's no problem to address.

So if we use a number at one end of that range, there is no problem to address.

Blackwell's watch is the standard being used here; it can't be ahead of itself. All other clocks can be faster or slower than Blackwell's, but Blackwell's clock is the standard by which all the times I'm talking about are compared.

If 1am is the disputed to time, and we have a PC stating he is at the top of the street at the same time, then it seems fairly sensible to use that time as the standard, rather than a watch being viewed a quarter of an hour later. There is no reason to suppose that Smith's knowledge of the time is less accurate than Blackwell's pocket watch.

[JeffHamm]

Hi Herlock,

I’ll ask everyone this.

Accepting that nothing is certain, fixed or set-in-stone, would you accept this proposition?:

Of all of the various times mentioned by the various Berner Street witnesses the likeliest to have been correct would have been Dr Blackwell’s. I would also include in this point that as a professional man he would have been likely to have attempted to have kept his watch as accurate as possible?

A secondary one would be:

Apart from accusations of dishonesty (completely unfounded imo) would you agree that a man who saw a clock and appeared confident of his ability to tell the time from it would be more likely to have been correct than other witnesses who were estimating based on their last (unrecorded) sighting of a clock?

I see it may be a while before you get this, but nonetheless, I would generally agree that Dr. Blackwell's time is perhaps the best one to use as our standard reference. I say standard reference rather than "correct" to avoid implying that somehow his watch is correct in the absolute sense (i.e. bang on GMT). However, his time of 1:16 was taken for the express purpose of recording the time of his arrival at the scene, and it was based upon him viewing his clock. His assistant, Johnson, also testified that Blackwell arrived at 1:16, which to me implies Johnson probably was asked to record the time as Blackwell read it off his watch and prepared to get to work.

The only other person that I can think of that states they used a clock was Deimshutz. However, his use of the clock was just to inform him with regards to what time it was as he was coming home after work. His purpose, therefore, requires a less precise noting of the time, and it is common for people to read analogue clocks to the nearest 5 minute mark (so things like 12:58-1:02 tend to all get noted as "about 1 o'clock"). When Deimshutz had to recall the time of his arrival, he's going to recall what he noted, not the actual positions of the hands as he saw them at the time. As such, despite his confidence, I think we can only be confident that he saw the clock reading somewhere between 12:58 and 1:02. Without being able to go back with his barrow, and view things ourselves, we also can't be sure if the angle from which he viewed the clock influenced the apparent position of the hands.

None of the other stated times include a statement about referencing a clock specifically. Spooner at some point I think references leaving a pub when it closed. We've taken that to mean 12:00. While the pubs may be required to close at 12:00, I'm not sure if that meant everyone out at 12:00 or last orders at 12:00. If last orders were to be served by 12:00, then Spooner could very well have left 10-15 minutes (or more) after 12:00. When he's recreating his time estimates, if he benchmarked to 12:00 because he knows that when the pubs closed, and didn't factor in finishing their last drinks, etc, he could very well be off in his subsequent calculations.

While we can be pretty sure that the police PCs would have a clock at some point in their beats which they used to ensure they were patrolling at regulation speed, and to update themselves with regards to the time (particularly around closing time, when there would be the expectation for increased trouble I'm sure), none of them have stated where that clock was, or how often they checked it (every round would be my guess, but a PC familiar with their route might not check every round, particularly if nothing much was going on).

So, in my view, the most reliable statement of time, with regards to it being what the clock actually read, and where the person was when they read it, is Dr. Blackwell's watch. All other times, even those based upon clocks, will likely differ by some margin of error from BST (Blackwell Standard Time). If we use BST to reconstruct the "time" of the events, then we can compare a witnesses stated time, or their estimation of an interval, to BST. If a stated time falls within a range considered acceptable due to "clock sync error" (and I think +-10 minutes would be fair, though some may be more conservative and prefer a +-5 range of error; that's a personal choice. Unless we have a study on clock discrepancies in the Victorian era to guide us that range of error will be a personal choice. I would advise making a choice before examining things, though, as otherwise one will tend to make a personal choice that best suits their theory rather than choose a theory guided by their belief in clock-sync errors).

If we can work backwards from Dr. Blackwell's arrival time, working out "travel times" based upon distances people moved and average speeds (walking is about 3.2 mph, a PC on the beat is around 2.5 mph, and someone running is 6.1 mph; pony and cart is around 4mph I believe). That allows us to estimate people's arrival and departure times but of course there will be an error range for those estimates as well. With those arrival and departure times estimated, we can also look at any statements people made about durations (i.e. X arrived Y minutes after Z). If we've been able to estimate, in BST, X's and Z's arrival times, then we can compare the estimated interval (Y) with our reconstruction's interval. Knowing that interval estimations tend to overestimate the duration of shorter intervals, and are highly variable, we can use the Table I posted, which draws in information from a study that was examining the reliability of eye witness type estimations of event durations and was the most related to the types of things we're doing that I could find. If the reconstructed interval falls within the range associated with the stated estimate Y, then our reconstruction would be viewed as consistent with the testimony.

As we work further and further backwards in time though, we drift further and further from our reliable benchmarked time, and we introduce error with each and every estimation. At some point, those errors will have compounded enough that we reach the limit of how far back we can get. I'm not sure where that point will be, but I'm hoping we can work a bit further back than Deimshutz's arrival (which, in BST, looks to be around 12:58; a trivial difference of 2 minutes from his stated 1 o'clock, absorbed even by a conservative +-5 minute clock desync criterion).

We've got FrankO's very nice presentation of the time line in terms of the likely sequence of events. We've got Dr. Blackwell's precise recording of his point of arrival at the scene, and we've got some information about the ranges of errors associated with people's estimation of temporal durations. I'm hopeful that a reasonable reconstruction can be created. It won't be "the truth", but we can never know that, but I think it will be one that fits the vast majority of the statements (meaning within acceptable ranges of error). We have enough witnesses and sources of information that themselves conflict that we should expect some of the statements not to fit, but there shouldn't be too many of them if our reconstruction is sufficiently accurate to be a good description.

- Jeff

[Scott Nelson]

Blackwell -- yes.

Man who saw clock -- yes.

[Herlock Sholmes]

I’ll ask everyone this.

Accepting that nothing is certain, fixed or set-in-stone, would you accept this proposition?:

Of all of the various times mentioned by the various Berner Street witnesses the likeliest to have been correct would have been Dr Blackwell’s. I would also include in this point that as a professional man he would have been likely to have attempted to have kept his watch as accurate as possible?

A secondary one would be:

Apart from accusations of dishonesty (completely unfounded imo) would you agree that a man who saw a clock and appeared confident of his ability to tell the time from it would be more likely to have been correct than other witnesses who were estimating based on their last (unrecorded) sighting of a clock?

[Herlock Sholmes]

Hi Herlock,

Not Eagle, Gilleman.

Cheers, George

Of course. Forgot him.

[JeffHamm]

Hi Jeff,

Thank you for that wealth of information. You are to this forum what the Oracle of Delphi was to the ancient Greeks.

A schizophrenic drug induced babbler of incoherent ramblings? hmmm, you may have something there! ha ha

Without questioning the results of the study in any way, I have to confess to some surprise at seeing an estimate of 20 minutes could actually range from 9 to 48 minutes. If we were able to gather all times and apply corrections for errors and to convert to GMT, which of course we are not, we would probably arrive at a timeline that nobody anticipated.

I know. I think we all like to believe we're really good at things, but once you actually start testing human memory for things like this, we're a dumb as a bag of rocks. To be fair, most of the estimates are at least in the right ball park. I do suspect the distribution has a pretty long tail for the over estimations. If we used those ranges, seriously, almost everything would overlap, and the room to shift things around would be so large we could create an entire time line that looked nothing like the numbers people said, but still fit within the margins of error. The best we can do is reconstruct what we can based upon the averages, and then any bits left over need to be fitted in, see if the time our recreation "time allotted" falls in the acceptable range of a person's estimated duration.

As you are no doubt aware, there were some differences between Blackwell's surgery clock and his pocket watch, as well as the newspaper reports:-

Daily Telegraph:
Mr. Edward Johnson: I live at 100, Commercial-road, and am assistant to Drs. Kaye and Blackwell. On Sunday morning last, at a few minutes past one o'clock, I received a call from Constable 436 H.
Mr. Frederick William Blackwell deposed: I reside at No. 100, Commercial-road, and am a physician and surgeon. On Sunday morning last, at ten minutes past one o'clock, I was called to Berner-street by a policeman. My assistant, Mr. Johnston, went back with the constable, and I followed immediately I was dressed. I consulted my watch on my arrival, and it was 1.16 a.m.

Times:-
Edward Johnston said:- I live at 100, Commercial-road, and am assistant to Drs. Kay and Blackwell. About five or ten minutes past 1 on Sunday morning, I received a call from constable 436 H.
Mr. Frederick William Blackwell said, - I live at 100, Commercial-road, and am a surgeon. At 10 minutes past 1 on Sunday morning I was called to 40, Berner-street. I was called by a policeman, and my assistant, Mr. Johnson, went back with him. I followed immediately I had dressed. I consulted my watch on my arrival, and it was just 1:10.

But I concede that regardless of the time benchmark adopted, there are going to be contradictions.

Yes. While the Times has 1:10 for his arrival, Johnson testifies that Blackwell arrived at 1:16, and given the DT has Dr.B. testifying he arrived at 1:16 as well, I'm asuming the Times 1:10 is an error.

You said "So, that means we have to have Diemshutz arrive, check the body, and get people to start things. Those events would require some time. If you think those probably could be done in a minute then according to Dr. Blackwell's watch, that would suggest Diemshutz arrives at 12:59. If you think those events would take 2 minutes, then 12:58. If you think those things took 15 minutes, then 12:45."
FWIW I actually did a re-enactment of pony shie to searchers exiting the gate at it came up as 1 minute and fifty seconds.

Oh, that's worth a lot. I think that makes perfect sense. That would place Deimshutz's arrival at 1:58 BST (Blackwell Standard Time )

You said "I've chosen a very narrow clock de-sync window, not because I think that's accurate (the real window is probably larger), but because we're dealing with such small differences in times when comparing various theories that if we were to accurately represent the error ranges of all of these measures I rather suspect we would end up with a clock range error closer to 20 minutes wide (+- 10 minutes)"
I am some what gratified with this comment. When I made a similar suggestion it was not well received.

Cheers, George

Yah, frustration can kick in. Generally we want to think in definite statements - they said 6 minutes so it has to be 360 seconds exactly! The idea that maybe only 3 minutes went by, or maybe it really was 15, is hard for some to accept. But both of those times are inside the acceptable range. We're dealing with probabilities, and what looks definite is really a range, whether the person testifying states a range or not. Even clock times produce a range once you start dealing with multiple clocks. That's why I'm trying to work backwards, using BST, and then seeing if stated clock times look reasonable given they're from a different clock.

If we want to create a timeline, we have to choose one clock as the standard. My preference is Blackwell, because his time records his arrival time, so we know where he was at that time, and what he had just completed (his journey there). After that, we just keep working backwards as best we can.

- Jeff

[JeffHamm]

Hi NBFN,

So what are you comparing Blackwell's time to? If Diemschitz has nothing to do with it, why did you chose 1am as the starting point for the search, and not say, 12:55 or 1:05?

Dr. Blackwell states he used his watch to note the time of his arrival, so I'm comparing it to his testimony. Johnson also states that Dr. Blackwell arrived at 1:16. Johnson being Blackwell's assistant may have been the one to write the notes while Blackwell dictated, so Johnson probably wrote down the time Blackwell told him after consulting his watch. Obviously I don't know for a fact that happened, but it would be the type of thing an assistant might be asked to do.

I chose 1 because that's a disputed time, and there are those who argue the searches must have been much sooner, and others who argue they could have started a few minutes later. So, I started at one (which, if you note, would mean Deimshutz's 1 would have to be wrong in the strictest interpretation). And, in the last construction, I didn't actually start at 1, I started at 1:16 and worked backwards from there, and we got to the same thing, searches starting around 1.

I see George has done some sort of recreation of the "pony shy", and came up with about 1m 50 seconds for Deimshutz's actions. Give him a few more seconds to run in side and get a few people, and start the searches, and a discovery time of 12:57-58 seems about right. 2-3 minutes is easily explained by different clocks, so there's nothing implausible about Diemshutz's arrival time, or any of the other testimonies I've mentioned.

The round trip from the yard to Lamb and back, assumes that Eagle did just that, but this ignores Spooner's ~6 minutes of subjective time, prior to Lamb's arrival. So that would have the search starting at between about 12:58 and 12:59:30.

An estimated time of 6 minutes means you have to consider times as short as 2 minutes 2 seconds (let's just call it 2 minutes) and out to past 17! Duration estimations can be way out. In what we worked about above, I think we're in the 2-3 minute range, which is within the expected margin of error. So, there's no problem to address.

So I would say as early as 12:56, and even that is assuming Blackwell's watch is not ahead of time.

Blackwell's watch is the standard being used here; it can't be ahead of itself. All other clocks can be faster or slower than Blackwell's, but Blackwell's clock is the standard by which all the times I'm talking about are compared.

I'm only interested in what we suppose Blackwell's watch read. I assume that the police would have used clocks that were known to be kept to an accurate time. The discrepancy between Smith's testimony and the calculated time(s) of Lamb's arrival, suggest that Blackwell's watch was not reading the correct time.

We know Blackwell's watch read 1:16 when he arrived at the crime scene. When I say "Deimshutz's arrival at 1:57-8" I mean by Blackwell's watch. Deimshutz's testimony of 1 o'clock is based upon a different clock, so his stated time is not Blackwell Time. But, such a discrepancy may just reflect Deimshutz's clock and Blackwell's clock are out of synch, by roughly 2 or 3 minutes.

- Jeff

[Al Bundy's Eyes]

Hi Jeff,

I just had another look at Smith's beat as addressed here: https://www.casebook.org/dissertatio...iths-beat.html

From Smith's account at the inquest, his beat started at the intersection of Commercial and Gower's Walk and headed east along Commercial Road to Christian St. But for time purposes his beat started at the corner of Commercial and Berner. I think this is a strong pointer to the Harris clock being his time benchmark.

Cheers, George

Hi George,

Reasonable line of thinking regarding the Harris clock. It's probably worth keeping in mind that the reason any of this was being mentioned was because of an incident on Berner St, and Smith's relation to it, so he's using Berner St as the focal point, more specifically his sighting of Stride at 12:35 being the 'start point' for the purposes of the inquest. Just my opinion.

[JeffHamm]

Hi Jeff,

My impression is that Smith was stating how long it usually took him to complete his round, which would vary according to any disturbances he may have had to address, or anything unusual that he may have had to investigate. When Frank and I, and I seem to remember you were involved, were trying to work out how Smith patrolled the internal streets of his beat, the conclusion was that he walked down Berner St, turned around at Fairclough, and return back up Berner St, so to complete this he probably was in Berner St for about five minutes. When he said 12:30-12:35, he wasn't talking about a point time but a total time in the street.

I am in no doubt that when he spotted all the commotion, Smith didn't check the Harris clock as it was on the opposite side of Berner St, and I'm sure he would have run straight to the yard. But it makes sense to me that Lamb and Smith would have been using the same clock as their time benchmark. So I believe Lamb would have checked the clock at least on his way east towards the fixed point if not on the way back as well after the alarm was raised.

Frank's timeline is in an almost permanent tab on my computer. His point "19, P.C. Lamb arrives, followed by PC 426 H", indicates to me that Lamb had told PC 426 H (Ayliffe) that he had a minute or two before his release time of one o'clock. Herlock disagrees with me here insisting that the fixed point PC had to be released by the supervising Sergeant, but I would think that if that Sergeant were there to release him the Sergeant would have come to the yard as well when th alarm was raised. The fact that the fixed point PC was following Lamb indicates to me that he was called by Eagle and Koze before or at one o'clock. This would support Johnson's testimony that Ayliffe arrived a few minutes after one o'clock. Smith testified: When I came to the spot two constables had already arrived. The gates at the side of the club were not then closed. I do not remember that I passed any person on my way down. I saw that the woman was dead, and I went to the police-station for the ambulance, leaving the other constables in charge of the body. Dr. Blackwell's assistant arrived just as I was going away. This seems to confirm that there was a disparity between police time and Blackwell's pocket watch time, IMO about 7 minutes.

If we allow two minutes from pony shy to search parties departure, and four minutes for a sequential search and apply that to a Lamb call time of 12:59, we have Diemshitz turning into Berner at about 12:53. That would, I should think, qualify as about one o'clock as he originally said. It also would not unduly disturb times by Mortimer (adjusted), Letchford and Schwartz. I used Google maps to determine that when Diemshitz said he saw the clock he would have been in the middle of Commercial Road nearly 15 metres from the clock. Apart from my doubt that he could have seen the clock from there past the palister facade, I also wonder why he would have, while trying to cross a major thoroughfare in the dark, felt the need to know the time when he was less than a minute from home. Your speculation on his mental processing seems more likely.

I still believe that all the time differences, including those of Koze and Hosch, can be resolved with clock sync adjustments. With so many witnesses sourcing their estimates from so many different clocks, there would be many sync corrections to make.

Cheers, George

Hi George,

There's many ways to interpret things. But, on the whole, I think most of the minor discrepancies can be, as you say, mopped up in clock sync error and errors of time and duration estimations. There will always be a few oddities, sometimes reflecting nothing more than the idiosyncratic way someone spoke - and their intension just isn't clear to us and we misinterpret what they meant. Or, personally accepting less of the responsibility, maybe they misspoke, or misremembered or were otherwise simply mistaken, etc. Generally, though, I think it will be possible to come up with a recreation of the events that satisfies the majority of the statements we have, and there will be one or two bits that are just way off. Given how many people we have, many estimating times, etc, sooner or later one of them is bound to be way off the mark, that's kind of expected - ask enough people, sooner or later one of them will make a larger than usual error.

I don't know whose clock you're referring to with regards to Deimshutz though. I've been basing things on Dr. Blackwells 1:16 reading upon his arrival, and using that as the benchmark, I would place Deimshutz more around 12:58 type thing, but there's no need to quibble over 5 minutes. I do think Smith's times are out of sync with Dr. Blackwell's watch, but that's not surprising, but with regards to the "Blackwell Standard Time", I would place Smith's arrival around 1:05 or 1:06 type thing. To the extent our times differ would probably reflect different clocks.

- Jeff

[NotBlamedForNothing]

My impression is that Smith was stating how long it usually took him to complete his round, which would vary according to any disturbances he may have had to address, or anything unusual that he may have had to investigate. When Frank and I, and I seem to remember you were involved, were trying to work out how Smith patrolled the internal streets of his beat, the conclusion was that he walked down Berner St, turned around at Fairclough, and return back up Berner St, so to complete this he probably was in Berner St for about five minutes. When he said 12:30-12:35, he wasn't talking about a point time but a total time in the street.

I think it was concluded that a beat constable would never do that - go down a street (or up), and then immediately turn around and traverse it in the opposite direction. It would be better to do the return leg at a later stage, to spread out the surveillance of that street.

The upshot of this is that Stride and companion did not suddenly appear, but may have already been on the street for a few minutes or more. That could mean she were on the street at 12:30, which is rather interesting.

I am in no doubt that when he spotted all the commotion, Smith didn't check the Harris clock as it was on the opposite side of Berner St, and I'm sure he would have run straight to the yard. But it makes sense to me that Lamb and Smith would have been using the same clock as their time benchmark. So I believe Lamb would have checked the clock at least on his way east towards the fixed point if not on the way back as well after the alarm was raised.

Smith: I saw a crowd of people outside the gates of No. 40. I did not hear any cries of "Police." When I got there I saw constables 12 H R and 252 H.

What makes you think he ran? Lamb knew of the murder before he arrived, but why would Smith know likewise? Another reason to suppose there was a substantial delay between Lamb and Smith's arrival, is that Smith does not seem to have passed Ayliffe, as the later proceeded to the surgery.

I used Google maps to determine that when Diemshitz said he saw the clock he would have been in the middle of Commercial Road nearly 15 metres from the clock. Apart from my doubt that he could have seen the clock from there past the palister facade, I also wonder why he would have, while trying to cross a major thoroughfare in the dark, felt the need to know the time when he was less than a minute from home.

Good point. The time at that point would be the least of his concerns, especially if he were a bit early getting home, due to wet weather.

[NotBlamedForNothing]

Well, it's a good thing your opening if is false. See, if I were trying prove Diemshitz's arrival time was more or less correct, I would have included Diemshitz in the analysis. I would also have great difficulty because, unless Diemshutz stopped by Dr. Blackwell's to get the time, Diemshitz's stated time is based upon a different clock.

So what are you comparing Blackwell's time to? If Diemschitz has nothing to do with it, why did you chose 1am as the starting point for the search, and not say, 12:55 or 1:05?

Ok, Dr. Blackwell arrives at 1:16.
We'll go with 9 minutes for the Lamb-Johnson interval as you suggest above.
Johnson arrives, and he estimates he arrived 3-4 minutes before Blackwell, which would translate to 2m 2s - 2m 49s (we'll call that 2-3 minutes though).
So Johnson arrives around 1:13-1:14.
Lamb estimates Johnson's arrival 9 minutes prior, making Lamb's arrival at 1:04-1:05.

The round trip from the yard to Lamb and back we worked out to roughly 2m 24s,
Meaning that trip started between 1:01:36-1:02:36.
And if you go with a sequential search, the first trip started 1m 47 seconds earlier, so between 12:59:51 and 1:00:51.

The round trip from the yard to Lamb and back, assumes that Eagle did just that, but this ignores Spooner's ~6 minutes of subjective time, prior to Lamb's arrival. So that would have the search starting at between about 12:58 and 12:59:30.

Add a couple minutes for Diemshutz's activities, and Diemshutz arrives between 12:58 and 12:59.

So I would say as early as 12:56, and even that is assuming Blackwell's watch is not ahead of time.

In the sense that Smith's time doesn't match with Dr. Blackwell's watch, yes. Why do you think Smith would know what time Dr. Blackwell's watch read?

I'm only interested in what we suppose Blackwell's watch read. I assume that the police would have used clocks that were known to be kept to an accurate time. The discrepancy between Smith's testimony and the calculated time(s) of Lamb's arrival, suggest that Blackwell's watch was not reading the correct time.

[GBinOz]

Trying to delete double post.