One on one with Stephen Senise

[cnr]

IPN's depiction of "George Hutchinson" - much like those of Mary Kelly and Mr Astrakhan in the same edition - bears all the hallmarks of having been the product of a draughtsman's imagination, and there is little evidence to suppose that it was drawn from life.

...which just so happens to look like the George Hutchinson who left the port of London in 1889 - and they both happen to have a very particular kind of (broken) nose with a dorsal bump on the same part of the bridge of the nose; and a dip at the tip.

The problem is that the drawing appears in the Illustrated Police News of November 24th 1888. Not only is that a long time after the event, but the account of Hutchinson's statement in the same paper evidently derived from a press agency release, as it was repeated in several newspapers a full 10 days earlier - the Pall Mall Gazette, St James Gazette, the Times, the Daily News and the Evening News of 14th November, to name but five.

The 'Illustrated Police News' was a (Saturday) weekly. I think the fact they didn't publish that montage in the edition of the 17th is testament to the fact that they didn't go with the media accounts of the 14th, but rather took the time to track Hutchinson down to flush out as much detail as possible re the depiction of his gentleman - publishing at the first opportunity immediately thereafter, being the 24th. Hutchinson just incidentally (and fortuitously for us, I propose) got caught in the illustrators net, as it were.

Stephen
https://www.timesofisrael.com/were-t...mitic-frameup/

[Abby Normal]

Thanks Abby,

Yes, I bring up the issue of the eyes in both editions.

Adam Wood's cover to edition 146 of Ripperologist, going off (I suspect / from memory) a high-res image which I provided him from the NSW State Archives really brought the eyes up well. Possibly due to the use of a dark brown wash. I've never really seen the question of the eyes drawn out as well as in that particular reproduction.

For all of that, I think the 1888 illustrator doesn't do a bad job either given the technology s/he was working with and that we're dealing with a relatively, background figure.

See attachment, please.

Stephen
https://www.timesofisrael.com/were-t...mitic-frameup/

Hi Stephen
Thanks! I would also point out that the side view mugshot of Aussie George is also very significant. I think it was reproduced on the other forum.

From that angle you can really see how powerfully built he was.. huge head, neck, shoulders and chest.

Even before I had drawn any conclusions about viability of suspects, I always thought that the ripper must have been a strong man, given the apparent quickness in which he took down his victims and rendered them powerless.

The mugshots of Aussie George is the first time I’ve seen a photo of a suspect and thought, yes, here is a man that could do it.

Edited... I see you just added it. Thanks!!

[Sam Flynn]

Hi sam
I was talking about the mug shot of Aussie George.

But however inaccurate the picture from the IPN that you think, what a coincidence that it matches also the photo.

As I see it, Abby, there's really not that much of a match. For one thing, Aussie George has a somewhat longer face; for another, I really don't see the broken nose in the IPN drawing - the line of the nose in the drawing is more or less perfectly straight to my eyes. I can imagine it, though; I guess that's partly because we're dealing with a blown-up, crude drawing of what might be a generic face. The MO of the IPN points in that direction and, as I say, there's nothing in the text that suggests, still less claims, that George was actually interviewed by an IPN staffer.

[cnr]

I should perhaps add that the raison d'être of the Illustrated Police News was not investigative journalism, but to present its largely working-class customers with exciting picture stories about crime. Its roots lay not with (e.g.) the Times and Telegraph but, according to Wikipedia, in the tradition of the sensationalist Newgate Calendar and Penny Dreadfuls.

Its focus is reflected, perhaps, in the titles of books about the IPN published in recent years, viz. "Cruel Deeds and Dreadful Calamities", "Orrible Murder" and "Victorian Court Cases and Sensational Stories". I must get a copy of one or other of these some day.

On a personal note, I find it interesting that in the editions previous to the 24th the newspaper boasted that it, “faithfully pictures... this sensational story and fully describes all the details connected with these Diabolical Crimes”.

As you say, it was an illustrated newspaper, so it wouldn't be surprising - it was after all, its bread and butter - and as I point out in the interview with Jonathan, newspaper illustrators were an integral part of at least some newspapers, who were even known to travel to keep up with the news (ie Queen Victoria tour of Ireland in the 1860s).

Stephen
https://www.timesofisrael.com/were-t...mitic-frameup/

[Abby Normal]

As I see it, Abby, there's really not that much of a match. For one thing, Aussie George has a somewhat longer face; for another, I really don't see the broken nose in the IPN drawing - the line of the nose in the drawing is more or less perfectly straight to my eyes. I can imagine it, though; I guess that's partly because we're dealing with a blown-up, crude drawing of what might be a generic face. The MO of the IPN points in that direction and, as I say, there's nothing in the text that suggests, still less claims, that George was actually interviewed by an IPN staffer.

To each his own. I see the similarities. Broad face, big ears, stout body/shoulders.

But I agree, it’s somewhat of a generic drawing.

The whole point of my post though was how the photo/mugshot fits most, if not all of the witness descriptions, down to the strange eyes/ weak eyelashes etc.

And it shows how powerfully built he was again, undoubtedly as was the ripper.

[Sam Flynn]

On a personal note, I find it interesting that in the editions previous to the 24th the newspaper boasted that it, “faithfully pictures... this sensational story and fully describes all the details connected with these Diabolical Crimes”.

I shouldn't be surprised if it made such claims, Stephen, but it tended to repackage what were almost certainly press agency reports which had previously appeared in other newspapers. This was certainly the case with respect to Hutchinson's story.

[cnr]

I shouldn't be surprised if it made such claims, Steven, but it tended to repackage what were almost certainly press agency reports which had previously appeared in other newspapers. This was certainly the case with respect to Hutchinson's story.

I think we may have to agree to disagree there Gareth, on the Hutchinson bit at least.

I do go into the issue somewhat in a 'Dear Rip' letter in edition 156 (if I'm not mistaken), for anyone interested.

... we're dealing with a blown-up, crude drawing of what might be a generic face.

It's neither here nor there, I suppose, but I actually had to reduce it down in size significantly so that the Casebook attachment gizmo would accept it. The file I got from the British Library, of the whole front page, blows up quite large and is quite detailed. It lives on my laptop in a zipped file of nearly 30,000KB. I don't know whether that means anything other than I'm somewhat of a Luddite.

Stephen
https://www.timesofisrael.com/were-t...mitic-frameup/

[richardnunweek]

Hi Stephen.
Managed to finish the podcast, and congratulations on at least bringing to Casebooks attention Aussie George.
I refreshed my memory in the link you sent, on the rather long Hutchinson thread some nine years ago, which I appeared in, attempting to defend Topping.
The major difference between George William Topping Hutchinson, and Aussie George is as far as we know, the former actually maintained he was the witness named as George Hutchinson, the latter not.
We have both sons of Topping , and the daughter in law of one [JD Hutchinson] claiming it was family knowledge, and Topping himself relayed many years after the murders several points that only the real witness , would have known .
Any imposter would have had to familiarise themselves with the case, the statement etc, and only the real deal would have been aware of being paid police funds,as that knowledge as far as we know, was only available in The Wheeling Register, a rare publication.
It only came to light in Ripper land in recent years.
Whoever is right, The Topping George , or The Aussie George, I would say we are only dealing with a witness, not a infamous killer. there is no evidence whatsoever to say otherwise.
Thanks again Stephen for the podcast. enjoyable.
Regards Richard.

[Abby Normal]

Hi Stephen.
Managed to finish the podcast, and congratulations on at least bringing to Casebooks attention Aussie George.
I refreshed my memory in the link you sent, on the rather long Hutchinson thread some nine years ago, which I appeared in, attempting to defend Topping.
The major difference between George William Topping Hutchinson, and Aussie George is as far as we know, the former actually maintained he was the witness named as George Hutchinson, the latter not.
We have both sons of Topping , and the daughter in law of one [JD Hutchinson] claiming it was family knowledge, and Topping himself relayed many years after the murders several points that only the real witness , would have known .
Any imposter would have had to familiarise themselves with the case, the statement etc, and only the real deal would have been aware of being paid police funds,as that knowledge as far as we know, was only available in The Wheeling Register, a rare publication.
It only came to light in Ripper land in recent years.
Whoever is right, The Topping George , or The Aussie George, I would say we are only dealing with a witness, not a infamous killer. there is no evidence whatsoever to say otherwise.
Thanks again Stephen for the podcast. enjoyable.
Regards Richard.

Hi Richard

The major difference between George William Topping Hutchinson, and Aussie George is as far as we know, the former actually maintained he was the witness named as George Hutchinson, the latter not.

after he was approached for a story about the royal conspiracy

We have both sons of Topping , and the daughter in law of one [JD Hutchinson] claiming it was family knowledge, and Topping himself relayed many years after the murders several points that only the real witness , would have known .

like the fact that he thought the suspect was jewish?
oh wait, no, it was someone from the royal family or like Randolf Churchill.

Any imposter would have had to familiarise themselves with the case, the statement etc, and only the real deal would have been aware of being paid police funds,as that knowledge as far as we know, was only available in The

its an innocuous statement that anyone could have easily gotten right, and no one would give a crap (or could prove) if they got it wrong.

Whoever is right, The Topping George , or The Aussie George, I would say we are only dealing with a witness, not a infamous killer. there is no evidence whatsoever to say otherwise.

there is plenty of evidence-circumstantial evidence. the main one being he engaged in stalking behavior and then also made a major change in his story when he talked to the press-classic conscienceness of guilt

plus the sigs don't match-not even close.

not sure he even fits the witness descriptions.

Wheres the documented evidence he was in london during the time?

Aussie George has documented evidence he left London shortly after the last murder of Alice McKenzie. He fits the witness descriptions to a T, and was convicted of a sex crime.

[Sam Flynn]

after he was approached for a story about the royal conspiracy

How did Melvyn Fairclough know of Reg's existence? I doubt very much that he speculatively trawled through every Hutchinson in the phone book. Perhaps there was a newspaper article featuring Reg, or did Fairclough hear that same radio interview with Reg to which Nunners refers?

In other words, Reg's family story about Toppy being the Miller's Court witness almost certainly existed before The Ripper and the Royals was a twinkle in Fairclough's imaginative eye, or a flicker in his fertile mind.

oh wait, no, it was someone from the royal family or like Randolf Churchill.

If Fairclough was capable of "producing" the Abberline Diaries in order to bolster his theory - oddly enough, about the Ripper and the Royals - then he was capable of anything. We needn't blame Reg for that bit.

its an innocuous statement that anyone could have easily gotten right, and no one would give a crap (or could prove) if they got it wrong

Sorry, but Reg's claim about the "reward" his father got is spookily close to what was subsequently found in the very obscure Wheeling Register. That detail, at least, is not something "that anyone could easily have gotten right".

plus the sigs don't match-not even close.

Sorry, but the signatures are practically identical, in my honest opinion. I have no skin in this game - indeed, I was very much a "Toppy isn't Hutch" person until I saw the real Toppy signatures, and I was forced to publicly admit that my opposition to Toppy had been entirely misplaced.

Incidentally, when I say "real Toppy signatures", I had initially obtained a copy of his marriage certificate from the National Archive, where the signature clearly didn't match. Being inclined to the anti-Toppy position at the time, I took this as proof positive that he wasn't the MJK witness, and said as much with great glee on these very boards. I ended up with egg on my face a while later when someone pointed out that the signature on that copy was that of a registrar, not of Toppy himself. When the actual marriage certificate was located and scanned, it became immediately apparent to me that there was indeed a close resemblance between the signature on the certificate and the signatures on the 1888 witness statement.

I repeatedly asked (Bob Hinton among others) whether, when Sue Iremonger was asked to comment on the similarity of the signatures, they actually sent her a copy of the original marriage certificate or the National Archive copy. A straightforward enough question, I'd suggest, but one to which I never, ever got an answer.

not sure he even fits the witness descriptions.

Unfortunately, we don't have a witness description for Hutchinson. We have (often vague, "everyman") descriptions for potential Rippers, but to use those as the basis for assessing Hutchinson candidates is to make the a priori assumption that he WAS the Ripper, which is a circular argument.

Wheres the documented evidence he was in london during the time?

Toppy married a woman from Bethnal Green, which is next door to Whitechapel, and he came from a part of Kent that is practically South East London. He was living in a lodging-house in Warren Street, West Central London - just off Tottenham Court Road - in the 1891 (?) census. All that's from memory, I'm afraid, but I don't think I'm too far wrong.

Aussie George has documented evidence he left London shortly after the last murder of Alice McKenzie.

But where is the evidence that he was in London, or had any connections to (South) East London, at the time of the - canonical - Ripper murders?

He fits the witness descriptions to a T

He looks rather weedy to me. Then again, that might be down to prison food. (See also my earlier comment on "Unfortunately, we don't have a witness description for Hutchinson".)

and was convicted of a sex crime.

Against little boys.

[jmenges]

Aussie George has documented evidence he left London shortly after the last murder of Alice McKenzie.

Two months after the murder.

JM

[Herlock Sholmes]

Another excellent podcast guys

I favour Toppy as the witness and neither as the ripper but after listening to the podcast im decided on getting False Flag.

As you know Stephen youre never going to convince everyone but youve made a valuable contribution. I enjoyed Jewbaiter and im sure that ill enjoy False Flag and, who knows, opinions can change

[cnr]

in response to Richard and his post n#25...

A pleasure, Richard. And thanks for your post. I appreciate your kind words.

To clarify, 'Aussie George' (bit of a misnomer: he was actually English) first hit the Ripperologist's radar in late 2015 and shortly thereafter, Casebook. 'Jewbaiter Jack The Ripper: New Evidence & Theory' came out in early 2017.

I think there was quite a bit of conjecture and differing viewpoints on that Toppy thread which I posted earlier – and in terms of resolving anything, what's new ? Now that one is a rhetorical question, as per this one: what's the point of saying the same things with only the usernames being different ? Which is why I might simply refer you to the rather long-ish post in response to Gareth earlier in this thread, as well as that historical thread (which is still open BTW).

A question I'd really like answered (maybe in a perfect world ) and it's not rhetorical, is whether any researchers prior to Fairclough / Sickert ever touched base with Reg ? I'm having trouble understanding how it is that he never hit any researcher's radar before 1992 ?

Allow me to explain these last two questions, and it ties in with an even more fundamental issue for me, because its mechanics are very, very similar. My gut tells me if everything's kosher with the Toppy saga there may have been evidence of him saying something in his lifetime about its one great, distinguishing feature: being the only man who – by his own reckoning – could claim to have had a good at the Jack The Ripper.

Certainly, the Miller's Court witness wasn't shy about talking about it.

For all of what may have been Toppy's other fine personal qualities and achievements, the Ripper incident would have been the most important experience in a seemingly normal but otherwise (more or less) uneventful life. His obituary might have read: “George William Topping Hutchinson, the only person to get a good look at Jack The Ripper and lived to tell the tale, passed away this week”. But there's nothing. Not in his lifetime, and not in the public arena such that can be verified, before 1992, fiftyfour years after meeting his maker. I'll concede, it may just be my way of thinking, but it doesn't sit right.

It particularly doesn't sit right when we compare the Miller's Court witness' screen-play like elaboration of what he claims to have seen that night with this, from Reg:

Dad was a very down-to-earth man, and didn't elaborate on anything. It just wasn't in his nature. He knew more than he told though, but he kept it close to his chest.

Bahhh ! I'm in Jonathan Menges-like fits of laughter having just typed that out. I could barely hit the keys.

There's also the bit where the book says that Toppy “followed” in his father and grandfather's footsteps and became a plumber. That doesn't sit quite right either with the Miller's Court witness. But it's a point that's been made before...

So to get back to your post, I think there's a sufficiently interesting degree of overlap between 'Aussie George', witness George and JTR, to have sparked a bit of interest on my part. If it doesn't speak to you, it doesn't speak to you. Vaya con Dios.

That said, I do wish you luck with your research, and I hope you find what you're looking for. If I might please refer you back, once more, to that concluding paragraph in my original, slightly lengthy response to Gareth for tie-in.

Stephen
https://www.timesofisrael.com/were-t...mitic-frameup/

[cnr]

G'day Gareth...

Hi Gareth,

Just some points of clarification, below, in response to your post #25 of this thread, primarily, but there's overlap with other very recent posts (not to mention that so much of the collective conversation here seems to have drifted off by way of repeating that other thread previously referenced).

Iremonger was a member of the World Association of Document Examiners (WADE). You'd imagine she would have been aware of the pitfalls of not confirming the first and most fundamental chain in the link: that the signature of the person you're examining is actually of the person whose signature you're examining. You're suggesting a scenario whereby the neurosurgeon's in the wrong operating theatre and hasn't bothered to check that the medical file matches the patient.

Also, Iremonger presented her paper, 'Jack The Ripper Revisited' at the WADE's 1993 conference. Hinton's 'From Hell...' was published in 1998.

If anyone is interested in my Ripperologist piece in support of Iremonger, it was published in the current edition, n.160. A spoiler by way of one example, for readers who may not have come across it: have a look at the way the Toppy 't's (13 years apart) both go searching so as to strike the very top-most part of the 'h'. Whereas in the case of the three 1888 witness examples, they are struck right across the middle of the 'h'. And look at the difference between the elliptical backbone of the 'h' in the 1888 examples, versus the simple, linear backbone of the Toppy 'h's.

I cannot stress strongly enough: I am no document examiner.

In terms of a description of Hutchinson, if we believe that Sarah Lewis spied him accurately (a sighting which Hutchinson himself effectively corroborates), he was short/not-tall and stout. If we accept the Illustrated Police News description of the 'witness' (you don't, I do) he was short to medium in height and very wide across the shoulders, quite stocky of frame. I understand that the depth of the image isn't perfect by way giving us the best possible view – he is depicted, after all, as a background figure, relatively speaking. It does, however, IMHO give us at the very least, a good general indication.

Stephen

PS - Weedy ? The guy's built like the proverbial brick outhouse. They must have been slipping steroids into that Victorian-era prison food. I hope you and I never run into someone so weedy on a cold autumn night. There would be twin wakes in Wales and New South Wales.

https://www.echo.net.au/2018/04/ripper-murders-plot-blame-londons-jewish-ghetto-tweed-author/

[cnr]

timing...

Two months after the murder.

JM

Hi Jonathan,

To clarify. I propose that Hutchinson was not in financial/professional circumstances to be able to just hop on a ship and leave. That he was still working as a labourer in 1896 in central-west New South Wales might be an indication of something along those lines.

It may also have taken him a while to get his bearings of the situation post-McKenzie (d. 17 July), especially given the extent to which the blue flag was being flown at that moment.

The immigration committee recommendations dashing the hopes of so many among the nativist element did not come out until 8 August.

The strike may have been the perfect opportunity for an East End casual labourer (the London port system's most basic industrial component) to be recruited onto a ship at a moment when that industry was in crisis. By about 22 August, the port system had been just about shut down, and about 130,000 mariners and dock workers of various stripe were out on strike. And a successful, and very disciplined, industrial action it was by all accounts. Ultimately, the Ormuz had to be staffed by a blackleg crew. They had to get Orient Line head office clerks from Fenchurch Street down to the docks to act as stevedores to get her ready to sail.

A peace agreement was being put together under the auspices of London's lord mayor, Cardinal Manning, at the same moment the Ormuz was making final preparations to cast-off. Normality started to return, from 16 September, under the agreement. The Ormuz had slunk out in the very early morning hours of 13 September, one day later than scheduled.

Many thanks again, Jonathan.