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I see that Mike has decided to continue his argument with me about whether a Scotland Yard detective really was in New York in December 1888 to meet Tumblety on his arrival. Although my central argument is that the "English detective" referred to in a couple of New York newspapers as hanging around Tumblety's dwelling probably didn't exist, Mike prefers to focus on my suggestion that, if he did exist, he was more likely to have been a private detective than a Scotland Yard detective, a suggestion he coyly attributes to "a number of modern researchers". Perhaps Mike can name those researchers for us because I'd be interested to know how their arguments are expressed and if they accord with mine.
Mike seems to think that if he can find a few examples of Scotland Yard detectives being referred to as "English detectives" he has somehow proved that anyone referred to in the American press as an "English detective" must have been from Scotland Yard! I don't know how that works.
Hawley himself writes that "contemporary American readers believed English detectives were synonymous with Scotland Yard detectives, not private detectives from England". That is EXACTLY the point I have made, namely that anyone who saw an Englishman who looked like a detective simply assumed he was from Scotland Yard, regardless of whether that was the case or not.
Mike's key exhibit is a newspaper report in the Chicago Daily Tribune of 30 June 1889 relying on what their reporter was told by someone Mike describes as "Special Branch Detective H. Dutton". But there was no officer called Dutton in the Special Branch at any time prior to 30 June 1889, so it all starts off terribly badly. Even worse, Mike says that "Claiming that the funding of a Scotland Yard man being sent to New York must be in Home Records conflicts with the facts." What facts? He doesn't present any! Just a newspaper report sourced to a non-existent Special Branch detective who himself does not refer to a single Scotland Yard man being sent to New York! In fact, of the two paragraphs cited by Hawley, which he attributes to Dutton, neither of them is actually attributed to Dutton within the story!! The first supposedly comes from a visit by the reporter to Scotland Yard’s crime museum while the second is unsourced and follows a discussion by the reporter with Robert Pinkerton (but he does not appear to be the source of the information).
Mike then conflates a report referring to “agents of the British government” with Scotland Yard detectives. They are not necessarily the same thing.
Above all, Mike does not tell us WHY an English Scotland Yard detective would have bothered to make an expensive trip to New York at cost to the public purse. He couldn't arrest Tumblety because there was no enforceable warrant. If Tumblety needed to be followed in New York this could have been done by Pinkerton's men on behalf of Scotland Yard. So what was he doing there? Mike seems to swallow a bartender's story that this English detective told him he was there "to get the Whitechapel Murderer". But how? Any such arrest in America by an English police officer without a warrant would have been illegal. And if there was sufficient evidence to arrest Tumblety for any of the murders in Whitechapel why hadn't he been arrested while in London when he was in custody? It doesn't make sense and if it doesn't make sense then it probably didn't happen.
Mike seems to think that if he can find a few examples of Scotland Yard detectives being referred to as "English detectives" he has somehow proved that anyone referred to in the American press as an "English detective" must have been from Scotland Yard! I don't know how that works.
Hawley himself writes that "contemporary American readers believed English detectives were synonymous with Scotland Yard detectives, not private detectives from England". That is EXACTLY the point I have made, namely that anyone who saw an Englishman who looked like a detective simply assumed he was from Scotland Yard, regardless of whether that was the case or not.
Mike's key exhibit is a newspaper report in the Chicago Daily Tribune of 30 June 1889 relying on what their reporter was told by someone Mike describes as "Special Branch Detective H. Dutton". But there was no officer called Dutton in the Special Branch at any time prior to 30 June 1889, so it all starts off terribly badly. Even worse, Mike says that "Claiming that the funding of a Scotland Yard man being sent to New York must be in Home Records conflicts with the facts." What facts? He doesn't present any! Just a newspaper report sourced to a non-existent Special Branch detective who himself does not refer to a single Scotland Yard man being sent to New York! In fact, of the two paragraphs cited by Hawley, which he attributes to Dutton, neither of them is actually attributed to Dutton within the story!! The first supposedly comes from a visit by the reporter to Scotland Yard’s crime museum while the second is unsourced and follows a discussion by the reporter with Robert Pinkerton (but he does not appear to be the source of the information).
Mike then conflates a report referring to “agents of the British government” with Scotland Yard detectives. They are not necessarily the same thing.
Above all, Mike does not tell us WHY an English Scotland Yard detective would have bothered to make an expensive trip to New York at cost to the public purse. He couldn't arrest Tumblety because there was no enforceable warrant. If Tumblety needed to be followed in New York this could have been done by Pinkerton's men on behalf of Scotland Yard. So what was he doing there? Mike seems to swallow a bartender's story that this English detective told him he was there "to get the Whitechapel Murderer". But how? Any such arrest in America by an English police officer without a warrant would have been illegal. And if there was sufficient evidence to arrest Tumblety for any of the murders in Whitechapel why hadn't he been arrested while in London when he was in custody? It doesn't make sense and if it doesn't make sense then it probably didn't happen.
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