Ripperologist February 2008 issue

[Monty]

I also found your article interesting Andy.

Monty

[Howard Brown]

Dear Andy:

Now there can be no doubt that Druitt was known to police as early as 1891, only 18 months after Macnaghten joined the force.

I'm saving my questions for you until this Sunday on Rippercast...and your article on Farquharson's role in the MM. This should be a good program.

By the way....its pronounced, "Far-Koo-Harson", correct? I don't need to look or sound any dumber on the airwaves than I already do.

[Gideon Fell]

The name is pronounced Far-kwar-son.

[Chris George]

The name is pronounced Far-kwar-son.

Farquharson is a Scottish name. Consider this from a genealogical bulletin board:

"In Australia we tend to pronounce both Farquar and Farquharson as Farkwar
(son). It is interesting that in Scotland you pronounce it Farkerson."

On this site you can hear it pronounced both ways:

http://www.howjsay.com/index.php?word=farquharson&submit=Submit

Chris

[aspallek]

Dear Andy:

Now there can be no doubt that Druitt was known to police as early as 1891, only 18 months after Macnaghten joined the force.

I'm saving my questions for you until this Sunday on Rippercast...and your article on Farquharson's role in the MM. This should be a good program.

By the way....its pronounced, "Far-Koo-Harson", correct? I don't need to look or sound any dumber on the airwaves than I already do.

Hello How,

I'm afraid I don't know how the MP pronounced his own name. I have known people named Farquhar and they pronounced it "FAR-kwar," therefore I've been saying "FAR-kwar-son." Trying to imagine how an upper class West of England Brit would say it I would suspect he would have a tendency to drop his "R's" (a habit shared with many US East Coasters) so that it would come out more like "FAH-kwah-son" or maybe "fah-KWAH-son." I'm going to stick to "FAR-kwar-son" because that's how we'd say it in Chicago. It is indeed a Scottish name. As a matter of fact we have to be careful becuase there was another MP at the time named Farquharson, a doctor from Aberdeenshire. I was forever getting them confused. I got excited for a moment until I realized that it was the "other" Farquharson who had at least once spoken at Toynbee Hall. I don't believe they are related.

I'll look forward to fielding your questions on the program, How. When I say "there can be no doubt," obviously I know that someone will still doubt. I discussed the matter quite a bit with Stewart Evans when I found the article naming Farquharson. He has suspected all along that's who it was but there was never proof until now. I hadn't really thought it was Farquharson because I was under the impression "West of England" meant more the area of Somerset and did not realize that it readily includes Dorset. Stewart was even more convinced than I was that the "son of a surgeon" has to be Druitt. When I took a second look, as objective as possible, I have to agree that given the location of Farquharson, he must be talking about Montague Druitt.

Cheers,

[Howard Brown]

Thanks C.G....and Gideon Fell for the help. I'm gonna go with what Gideon Fell says...Far-kwar-son. This way...heh heh...if someone whines, I can always blame Gideon.

Man,wouldn't it be nice if names were as simple to pronounce as Jones, Wood or Wojeichowski ?

[aspallek]

I went to high school with a guy named Olzewski, which in Polish comes out something like "Olshevshy."

[Chris George]

Thanks C.G....and Gideon Fell for the help. I'm gonna go with what Gideon Fell says...Far-kwar-son. This way...heh heh...if someone whines, I can always blame Gideon.

Man,wouldn't it be nice if names were as simple to pronounce as Jones, Wood or Wojeichowski ?

Hi Howard and Andy

Mmmmm. In my post, you will note that the Australian who wrote about the pronunciation said in Australia it would be "Far-kwar-son" but that he noted that in Scotland it is "Farkerson." Since as you say, Andy, it is a Scottish name, I would think that a West of England MP would be inclined to pronounce the name as would his presumed Scottish relatives.

There is also the question about whether the pronunciation today is as it would have been in 1885-1895 when Henry Richard Farquharson served as Member of Parliament for West Dorset. Note also that "Farkerson" itself is a family name, as this Google search, shows.

A blogger turfed up in that search has written on "Queer English Names" and how they are pronounced. The blogger says, "Here's a list of the correct pronunciation of various names, transcribed for public edification from an old New York Times" and among the list is, yes,

Farquharson: farkerson

Chris

[Tom_Wescott]

Ah, I say just farqu it!

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[aspallek]

I suspect "farkerson" would have been prounced "FAH-kah-s'n" in the upper class West of England dialect of the day.

Maybe we should just call him Harry, or to us Americans, Hank.

[Chris George]

Hi Andy

Yes West of England upper class pronunciation was one thing, and presumably Farquharson's speech would have been understandable in the Commons and similar to the plummy English upper class speech of today. On the other hand, the common man's Dorset dialect was another thing and would have been hard to understand elsewhere in England let alone in Parliament. There was a poet named William Barnes (1801-1886), a somewhat older contemporary of Thomas Hardy, who wrote using the Dorset dialect. You can read a sample of his poetry on the Wikipedia page for Barnes.

Chris

[Sam Flynn]

I suspect "farkerson" would have been prounced "FAH-kah-s'n" in the upper class West of England dialect of the day.

If you think "Farquharson = FAH-kuh-s'n" is weird, you should try "Featherstonehaugh = FAN-shaw". I kid you not.

[Supe]

Sam,

If you think "Farquharson = FAH-kuh-s'n" is weird, you should try "Featherstonehaugh = FAN-shaw". I kid you not.

Reminds me of the American tourist who got a bit irked with his hosts always correcting him on the pronunciation of names like Featherstonehaugh, Talliaferro and so on. So, the next time a Brit mentioned Niagara Falls, he quickly said "Oh, you mean Niffles."

And, as you are well aware, we should steer well clear of the way some Gaelic words are pronounced else folks will really get confused.

Don.

[Simon Wood]

Hi All,

Cholmondeley is another good one—pronounced Chumley.

Regards,

Simon

[Robert]

And then we have Mainwaring, pronounced Mannering.

And of course Pike, pronounced Pike.