Patricia Cornwell - Walter Sickert - BOOK 2

[FISHY1118]

To the best of my knowledge, Mrs Sickert was not doing any of the swimming or painting, and there wasn't a pool, but a sea.

I thought you might share with us your copy of the letter.

Has it occurred to you that the letter may have survived in an envelope with the date stamped on it?

There must be some reason that the experts have dated it to 1888.

Exactly, so why is it so elusive if all the experts have seen it and dated it ''1888'' it should be fairly easy to find .

[FISHY1118]

I traced the original collection and bought them for Patricia Cornwell


You're not saying that Patricia Cornwell owns the original letter?


What I would like to know is why FISHYW118 wrote that he has a copy of the same letter and there is no year on it, whereas you say you have a copy of that letter and it does have a year on it.

I didnt say i had '' a copy'' only that i saw the letter with only Sept 6th that i saw that was on it , not the year ''1888''

[FISHY1118]

Keith Skinner asks:

Perhaps you could clarify this. I think there are two letters being queried?

There is a four page letter with envelope from Ellen Sickert from to her friend in Croydon (Surrey) dated September 6th 1888 with two references to Walter being with his family in St Valery-en-Caux, from where the letter is written.

There is also the Jacques Emile Blanche letter to his father,Dr Blanche, (the original of which is in the Biblioththeque De L'Institut De France) which refers to having had lunch with Sickert in Veules (near St Valery-en-Caux). From memory the letter is undated but somebody has pencilled on it 18th September 1888. I had the letter colour photographed but I don't think I have a copy as it went to Patricia, along with all my notes of my visit to the archive in October 2007.

KS

JM

Sept 6th is all I have have seen on that letter, if 1888 is on it then ive not seen it, but would be happy to if someone can post it here. Or send a link to it.

[PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR 1]

Keith responds-

Yes - Patricia Cornwell now owns the original letter. I have handled the original and had it and the envelope professionally photographed in colour and have a copy which I cannot reproduce without Patricia's permission.

I can't answer why FISHYW118 wrote what he did.

KS

JM

I have a copy which I cannot reproduce without Patricia's permission.


I imagine Sickert can't turn in his grave without Cornwell's permission, either.



I can't answer why FISHYW118 wrote what he did.


Neither can he - evidently.

[jmenges]

Keith responds-

Yes - Patricia Cornwell now owns the original letter. I have handled the original and had it and the envelope professionally photographed in colour and have a copy which I cannot reproduce without Patricia's permission.

I can't answer why FISHYW118 wrote what he did.

KS

JM

[PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR 1]

Keith responds:

Eleanor Sickert's handwritten letter is from Maison Throude, Rue des Bains, St Valery-en-Caux, Seine-Inferieure and the date of Sept 6th 1888 is written by her at the beginning of the letter. On the reverse of the envelope is stamped Croydon - Sp9 88 - E. If it's of any use I can post my amateurish transcript of the letter from the microfilmed copy at the Tate Archive? It was the reason I traced the original collection and bought them for Patricia Cornwell because the microfilm was such a nightmare to decipher and I could not work out what related to what! I can't post the original letter and envelope without permission from Patricia.

KS

JM

I traced the original collection and bought them for Patricia Cornwell


You're not saying that Patricia Cornwell owns the original letter?


What I would like to know is why FISHYW118 wrote that he has a copy of the same letter and there is no year on it, whereas you say you have a copy of that letter and it does have a year on it.

[jmenges]

Ahah!

I didn't see the above post when I sent my reply to Fishy1118 at 6.11 p.m.

Are you saying the envelope has the date 1888 stamped on it?

Keith responds:

Eleanor Sickert's handwritten letter is from Maison Throude, Rue des Bains, St Valery-en-Caux, Seine-Inferieure and the date of Sept 6th 1888 is written by her at the beginning of the letter. On the reverse of the envelope is stamped Croydon - Sp9 88 - E. If it's of any use I can post my amateurish transcript of the letter from the microfilmed copy at the Tate Archive? It was the reason I traced the original collection and bought them for Patricia Cornwell because the microfilm was such a nightmare to decipher and I could not work out what related to what! I can't post the original letter and envelope without permission from Patricia.

KS

JM

[Aethelwulf]

Why does Cornwell attach so much importance to the paper Sickert used? Short of him manufacturing his own paper, he must have bought the stuff. If he bought it, other people could have.

[PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR 1]

Keith Skinner asks:

Perhaps you could clarify this. I think there are two letters being queried?

There is a four page letter with envelope from Ellen Sickert from to her friend in Croydon (Surrey) dated September 6th 1888 with two references to Walter being with his family in St Valery-en-Caux, from where the letter is written.

There is also the Jacques Emile Blanche letter to his father,Dr Blanche, (the original of which is in the Biblioththeque De L'Institut De France) which refers to having had lunch with Sickert in Veules (near St Valery-en-Caux). From memory the letter is undated but somebody has pencilled on it 18th September 1888. I had the letter colour photographed but I don't think I have a copy as it went to Patricia, along with all my notes of my visit to the archive in October 2007.

KS

JM

Ahah!

I didn't see the above post when I sent my reply to Fishy1118 at 6.11 p.m.

Are you saying the envelope has the date 1888 stamped on it?

[PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR 1]

Stories and made up senarios dont interest me , only proof that Walter Sickert was in France while the murders were committed . What Cornwell did or didnt do is also irrelevant .

''1. A date specifically that shows ''6th Sept 1888'' on the letter his mother wrote claiming Walter, herself and Bernard were in France together by the pool painting.[/I]''

Wont sombody show me the full date on this letter.

To the best of my knowledge, Mrs Sickert was not doing any of the swimming or painting, and there wasn't a pool, but a sea.

I thought you might share with us your copy of the letter.

Has it occurred to you that the letter may have survived in an envelope with the date stamped on it?

There must be some reason that the experts have dated it to 1888.

[jmenges]

Keith Skinner asks:

Perhaps you could clarify this. I think there are two letters being queried?

There is a four page letter with envelope from Ellen Sickert from to her friend in Croydon (Surrey) dated September 6th 1888 with two references to Walter being with his family in St Valery-en-Caux, from where the letter is written.

There is also the Jacques Emile Blanche letter to his father,Dr Blanche, (the original of which is in the Biblioththeque De L'Institut De France) which refers to having had lunch with Sickert in Veules (near St Valery-en-Caux). From memory the letter is undated but somebody has pencilled on it 18th September 1888. I had the letter colour photographed but I don't think I have a copy as it went to Patricia, along with all my notes of my visit to the archive in October 2007.

KS

JM

[FISHY1118]

Stories and made up senarios dont interest me , only proof that Walter Sickert was in France while the murders were committed . What Cornwell did or didnt do is also irrelevant .

''1. A date specifically that shows ''6th Sept 1888'' on the letter his mother wrote claiming Walter, herself and Bernard were in France together by the pool painting.[/I]''

Wont sombody show me the full date on this letter.

[PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR 1]

IN REPLY TO FISHYV1118:


Two days before the murder of Annie Chapman, Sickert's mother wrote to a friend that she and her family (including Walter) were all having a happy time in France. Whilst Cornwell does refer to Sickert's mother's letter, and to a letter written by Sickert's wife, Ellen, about him being in France with 'his people', which Cornwell incorrectly assumes are his arty friends in Dieppe rather than his family, she dismisses the importance of such evidence of his absence from London. After all, even if he had been in France, he could have hopped on a steamer to scoot across the English Channel, then caught an express train to London in order to do away with an East End tart (presumably because a French tart wouldn't do) before dashing back to France in time for dinner without anyone noticing he'd gone. I imagine he managed to fit in posting several Ripper letters from Liverpool, London and Lille (in northern France) while he was at it.

Having gone to great trouble to demonstrate that Sickert was a crazed killer who couldn't even holiday in France without rushing back to the East End to assassinate a prostitute, how does she explain the fact that the Ripper murders came to an abrupt end following the slaying of Mary Jane Kelly on 9th November 1888, even though Sickert lived for another fifty-four years? What did he do, take up fishing or stamp collecting to fill his time? Well, apparently he didn't stop murdering people... he went on going. Sickert wasn't just Jack the Ripper, he was responsible for the Thames Torso Murders of 1887-89 too, and he committed the Camden Town Murder in 1907. He may even have murdered a widow named Madame Francois at Pont-à-Mousson, in north-eastern France, in 1889, and another French woman in the same area. He was a busy fellow.

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/415155835

As you can see from the article above, even Patricia Cornwell didn't deny that the letter dated 6 September was sent in 1888.

I'm not sure why you do.

[FISHY1118]

I already had the impression that checking one's inbox here sometimes involves having an experience similar to what it would be like to visit a lunatic asylum.

Your post to me above has to be one of the craziest messages I have ever received.

As you are evidently not satisfied with my very detailed history of Sickert's holidaying in France, none of which required any original research by me - as it is all available online - I suggest you take the matter up with:

(1) his biographer, Wendy Baron

(2) Bonhams

(3) Richard Shone

(4) jmenges, a moderator, who posted a similar account relating to Sickert's whereabouts during the period in which the murders took place, posted five minutes before mine.

(5) Michael Palin, who purchased Sickert's 'October Sun' and has stated that it was painted in October 1888, an opinion shared by many art experts.


Let me help you out with what you cant find .

1. A date specifically that shows ''6th Sept 1888'' on the letter his mother wrote claiming Walter, herself and Bernard were in France together by the pool painting.


I'm not a researcher in the sense that one does original research; I'm what you might call a reviewer. I review the evidence.

I presume that Richard Shone saw the original letter.

I suggest that if the letter, or the report of the date on the letter, has been invented or falsified, then Patricia Cornwell - who has spent $7 million on trying to prove that Sickert committed the murders - would by now be gleefully proclaiming that.
But nothing has so far been heard from her.
I don't know whether you're suggesting that someone has made up the fact that that letter was written on the 6th of September.



Let me help you out with what you cant find .


I do not need your help and, as I said, I don't do original research.
I would be interested in seeing the original, but I haven't yet.
I have found enough to exonerate Sickert.
I do not need to see the original letter in order to do that.
So far as I am aware, you are the only person who has actually questioned whether that letter exists or whether the date on it it has been correctly reported.



I noticed that when I mentioned the art world, you dismissed it is as irrelevant.

It obviously is not, since Sickert was an artist.

Art experts and his biographers are obviously the people who know most about this subject.

So far as I am aware, you are the first person to insinuate that art experts would falsify the date on an historic letter.

I suggest you write to Shone and ask for a copy of the original letter.


Again you havent provided was was first asked , and that is proof that sickert was on French soil when the WM murders were committed



I quote Richard Shone:




there is a drawing [by Sickert] dated 4 August made at a Hammersmith music- hall. No further London drawings occur until 4 October. It has long been known that Sickert was abroad that summer, following his annual custom of being in or near Dieppe, a town that the Sickert family knew well and where they had many friends. The second murder (31 August, Mary Ann Nichols) and the third (8 September, Annie Chapman) took place when Sickert, his mother and his brother Bernhard were at St ValZry-en-Caux along the coast west of Dieppe. On 6 September Mrs Sickert wrote to a friend in England from St ValZry saying that her sons Walter and Bernhard were there swimming and painting (a letter unknown to Cornwell). At some point (probably August) Sickert wrote from St ValZry to the French painter Jacques-Emile Blanche telling him he had come to 'this nice little place' for a rest.
According to Cornwell this is the only evidence she could find that Sickert was abroad during these two months. But on 17 September Blanche wrote to his father that he had visited Walter and his family at St ValZry on the day before (16 September).
On 21 September Sickert's wife Ellen, in London, wrote to her brother-in-law that Sickert was in France for some weeks with 'his people'.
On 30 September the Ripper caused a terrible sensation when the bodies of Elizabeth Stride and Catherine Eddowes were found, murdered within hours of each other. A day or two later Sickert painted (or finished) 'The October Sun' showing a shop-front in St ValZry. By the 4 October he was back in London.



Following the reaction to my comment that one can reasonably deduce from the evidence that Druitt was in Dorset when the first murder took place, I realise that what I'm about to write involves an element of risk.

It is more than reasonable to deduce from the evidence we have that Sickert was in France when the first two murders took place - and very probably in France when the double murder took place.

It is not reasonable to say based on the evidence that he could have been the murderer.

Now some people might say that doesn't prove that he didn't commute between London and Dieppe and commit the murders.
That would have involved three return trips between France and England, and returning from England on 30 September to paint the October Sun and then leaving a couple of days later to return to England.

That is not credible.

I suggest that no one here would consider that to be a reasonable hypothesis in the event that he himself were the person who had been on holiday.

Does anyone here seriously imagine that the police, while conducting an investigation and having been tipped off that Sickert might have committed the murders, on learning what we have learned about his whereabouts, would not eliminate him as a suspect?

In order for Sickert to have been the murderer, we would also have to believe that, although he was enjoying himself swimming and painting on 6 September, he then - presumably on the following day - travelled to England, committed the Hanbury St murder, returned later that same day to France, and the following day was back with his mother and brother painting and swimming again, without their having noticed his absence, and of course without anyone having noticed him in the East End.

(Alternatively, we have to accuse his mother of being part of a conspiracy to allow her son to commit the murders and be acquitted in the eyes of posterity.)

The question is: why would he have done that?

The only answer I can think of is that he would have done it in order to satisfy the suspicions of investigators more than a century later.

''1. A date specifically that shows ''6th Sept 1888'' on the letter his mother wrote claiming Walter, herself and Bernard were in France together by the pool painting.[/I]''




Now were getting somewhere, all the rest of your post are just words and speculation on your behalf ,i dont need your opinion as to whether of why he was or wasnt jtr, just proof he was in france at the time which you havent done . ive seen that letter, it says the the 6th sept only not the year . So all you have to do to prove me wrong is show the letter that you claim shows the day month and year , simply .

[FISHY1118]

youve got to be kidding. And you have issues with Druitt and Lech??? LOL

Whats lol abby is this i asked for someone to prove that sickert was in france with some hard facts and they havent , wheres the problem ??? .

Just as posters do with lech and druitt when discussing them as suspects