Casebook Examiner No. 3 (August 2010)

[protohistorian]

I really enjoyed Adam Went's piece. Nice to know more about events like that. Dave

[Zodiac]

Bloody...cough, cough, hairballs...cough, cough, again...cough!!!

Chris,
The tone of the article, no matter how much I tried to temper it, is indeed a bit too negative; I mentioned earlier today to a good friend that I equate it to coughing up a hairball...unpleasant in itself, but a relief to have out of my system.

Indeed!!! But please John, I implore you, if these symptoms persist for more than 72 hours then you must contact your local medical practicioner for further assistance. Failing that, perhaps a barber or hairdresser could help with hairballs....
Then again NO!!! Best stay away from them barbers/hairdressers, they are a very dodgy looking crowd indeed, an' no mistake!!!

Best wishes,

Zodiac.

[Phil Carter]

Hello John, all,

Have thought a lot about this. The front page asks for our objectivity.

I thought it was a nicely written piece, but in my opinion, spoilt by the headline grabbing cover piece title "Arise Sir Robert Anderson" which made it sound like his resurrection. "Holier than thou" he was not, although he doubtless would have approved of this formulation.
This headline grabber on the front page, gave me the wrong impression from the word go. Rather like "Le Grand, New Prime Suspect" when a question mark after "suspect" would have made all the difference to that impression in Casebook Examiner No.2, for me, it is an over-the-top proclamation by the cover designers of Casebook Examiner. Whether you had anything to do with this title, I know not, but I DO note, that in your piece early on, you write that this is " not meant to be seen as an endorsement of the Sir Robert Anderson theory"... which, conjoined with the front page seems to be a mis-match. That is my personal opinion at least.

Looking objectively at this, even as a self confessed "Anti-Andersonite", the be all and end all of this is what does this article actually achieve? Does it recuperate lost ground after a steady run of found documentation showing Anderson in a poor light? Does it exonerate his views and opinions? Does it change the way we look at Anderson on the whole? The outcome of it however, rests on weight of evidence. As we stand, I humbly opine the weight of evidence against Sir Robert Anderson actually knowing the true identity of the killer (if there was only one), is greater than the opposite.
These are questions for the individual to consider however. Like you say, we must keep talking and opinion will sway one way or the other, depending on views and theories of who was Jack the Ripper or nay.

Phil Sugdens book has been and still is, an important book in Ripperology.
I am prepared to see it's weaknesses as you have attempted to point out,
I am prepared to digest them, with long thought. I am prepared to consider your views, but in my opinion, if one is first going to re-review and re-entertain Phil Sugden's excellent book, then by only pointing out the exact parts that you have, re Kosminski and Klosowski, one wonders if not a new look at the whole book had been more appropriate? Because then the "Pro-Andersonite" interpretation would not be so alarmingly obvious. We are talking about objectivity here after all. Are we to assume that the rest of the book is still fault free? To be objective, I get the impression that this interpretation on Sugden's work is a retaliation of sorts for the recent opposite interpretations.. (as the self confessed Andersonite you are, then I can see why, whether it was meant in exactly that way or not).

You asked for objectivity. That means for us to consider fairly. It will be done by this writer. But the front cover is NOT objective, it leads us a stated direction... for the 2nd issue in a row, in my opinion.

No doubt there are those who disagree with this viewpoint. Some will agree. However I feel that it would be far better to make less proculamatorial statements on the front page.

I enjoyed most of the issue, but have one other small bug-bear. In the mortuary time-line piece, the over-sizing of the red ink seemed to me to be pointless. A lot of space could have been saved and the effect would not have lessened with smaller type. Just an opinion.

The Princess Alice piece was indeed excellent, and the Whitechapel High-Street photos intruiging and nicely presented.

Overall, a fine edition, CE3. Thank you to all concerned for it's publication.

best wishes

Phil

[The Good Michael]

I have high praise for Malcolm's article. Is it negative? Yes. It needed to be in these times. I wish I had written it. In fact, there has been a conspiratorial movement regarding Anderson and perceived cronies and toadies going on on this very site (and others) for a few years now. The digging up of new (and old) information is absolutely only about character assassination with the ultimate purpose (one supposes) to discredit the Kosminski theory of which (Malcolm suggests) Anderson isn't really a part of. Baby and bath water again? Appears to be the case.

I have no praise for Anderson, but I do detest witch hunts. Good work John!

Mike

[Stewart P Evans]

Witch Hunt

I have high praise for Malcolm's article. Is it negative? Yes. It needed to be in these times. I wish I had written it. In fact, there has been a conspiratorial movement regarding Anderson and perceived cronies and toadies going on on this very site (and others) for a few years now. The digging up of new (and old) information is absolutely only about character assassination with the ultimate purpose (one supposes) to discredit the Kosminski theory of which (Malcolm suggests) Anderson isn't really a part of. Baby and bath water again? Appears to be the case.
I have no praise for Anderson, but I do detest witch hunts. Good work John!
Mike

I shall be addressing John's article in a further post.

However, I must object to the comment in the above post that "there has been a conspiratorial movement regarding Anderson and perceived cronies and toadies going on on this very site (and others) for a few years now. The digging up of new (and old) information is absolutely only about character assassination with the ultimate purpose (one supposes) to discredit the Kosminski theory of which (Malcolm suggests) Anderson really isn't part of. Baby and bath water again? Appears to be the case."...and, last but not least, "...but I do detest witch hunts."

Such comments reaise questions all of their own such as 'What is this conspiratorial movement and who belongs to it?' 'What evidence is there to suggest that the 'digging up' of information is 'only about character assassination'? I find the insinuations particularly offensive as I may be perceived as the chief 'witch hunter' here and that my research on Anderson is only about 'charater assassination.'

[Adam Went]

Just wanted to say thank you to those who have given feedback on my Princess Alice article so far, it's been very encouraging and i'm glad it was enjoyed.

Overall, looking like a very good issue so far.....

Cheers,
Adam.

[mariab]

With many apologies for expressing my opinion so openly as a newbie, I completely agree with Phil Carter about the header “ARISE, Sir Robert Anderson“, which makes it sound as an attempt at a complete rehabilitation (whatever that would mean exactly), or even, at a resurrection! In fact, it bothered me as much as the headline “Le Grand, new prime suspect“ whithout a question mark in Examiner 2 (for an otherwise very well-researched article by Tom Wescott, but on which case, clearly, the research is still ongoing). It reminded me too much of tabloid headers (or even of Cornwell's “case closed“), and I really think that Examiner doesn't need such and, as a scholarly publication, should be above such. Many apologies for saying this as a newbie!
I haven't read the Anderson piece yet, but Stewart Evans' quotes from it (both here and on the other thread he just started) already make it clear that there are some (problematic) points worth debating over. I hope to be able to read it much later tonight, after finishing up with a bunch of urgent work. I'm also looking forward to the piece on the Princess Alice disaster, and to the piece correcting details in Sudgen.

[bolo]

Hi Examiner team, all,

thank you for another issue packed full of interesting articles. Currently, I'm on pg. 100, already tried my luck with the puzzle but it seems that I still have lots of catching up to do!

Of course I've also read John Malcolm's contribution The Complete Mystery of Jack the Ripper. What seems to be an article on Anderson at first turns into a full-blown critique of Philip Sugden's take on the matter. Of course it's perfectly okay to try to point out flaws in a Ripper book, I just wish people would be less snappish in this regard, it's rather counter-productive and certainly not a good base for fruitful discussion. Seems that iconoclasm still is a popular activity among Ripperologists...

My compliments also go to Adam Went for his most interesting article on the Princess Alice desaster, as well as J.G. Simons' for the hugely useful mortuary timelines, I love handy reference material like that.

Great stuff for mere pennies, what else could one ask for. Keep up the great work!

Regards,

Boris

[tnb]

I have noticed 3 errors in my Ultimate Tour piece, which I felt I should acknowledge before others find them, and which are entirely my responsibility. They hopefully should not detract from the piece - although for the record the tour ends at Southwark station, not (as was initially planned) at Tower Bridge, as suggested in the intro. The others are minor. I apologise nonetheless.

I hope people enjoy it anyway, and feel free to get in touch with me with any comments. I am massively enjoying the issue myself, but still only halfway through!

[protohistorian]

How dare you Trevor! Accepting responsibility and apologising! I will not have this responsible, adult behavior! Dave

[Hunter]

Fine piece Trevor. For those of us that can't get across the pond very often and miss a lot when we do, this is priceless.

Adam, fine article too; with a narrow subject such as ours it is difficult to write about anything fresh. Your Princes Alice story showed some good thinking out of the box.

[Adam Went]

Thanks, Bolo and Hunter.

Have to say that I enjoyed John Malcolm's piece, it wouldn't be easy to write a piece like that about a book which many people consider to be akin to the bible for Ripperology. So I thought it was handled quite well (though it was bound to attract some criticism) - and a particularly interesting point raised about Phil Sugden's mysterious silence since the release of his book. Obviously it's his choice, but for a man who clearly has such talent and knowledge on the case, it almost seems like a waste that to this point he's been something of a one-hit wonder.

Anyway, good stuff....

Cheers,
Adam.

[Tom_Wescott]

This headline grabber on the front page, gave me the wrong impression from the word go. Rather like "Le Grand, New Prime Suspect" when a question mark after "suspect" would have made all the difference to that impression in Casebook Examiner No.2, for me, it is an over-the-top proclamation by the cover designers of Casebook Examiner.

I can't speak for John Malcom, but the reason there wasn't a question mark in 'Le Grand: The Prime Suspect' is because I was making a statement, not asking Phil Carter a question. I also disagree that David Pegg and Don Souden were 'over-the-top' in their presentation. If anything, I feel my name and title should have been much larger...so large there would have been no room for anything else.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

P.S. I haven't yet had time to read #3, but I'm looking forward to it, particularly Malcolm's and Went's.

[caz]

So Tom, remind us - what was Le Grand's reasoning behind getting Packer to tell his suspicious customer story? This is rather crucial to your statement that he is the new prime suspect, if he is meant to have killed Stride and no grapes were found on her or in her. If you are right about this, he'd have known that Packer's story would be as useful to the police as a chocolate teapot, based as it was on a rumour they knew to be false.

Love,

Caz
X

[mariab]

Caz,
but you know that Le Grand planted a grapestalk/pretended he'd found a grapestalk close to the scene in his "capacity" as a member of the VC.
As for no grapes having been found among Stride's stomach contents, clearly Le Grand was not the brightest bloke.