Regarding the Express letter, I spelt out quite clearly and in great detail my stance on it back in post 473 and earlier in post 382, although my comments on it were completely ignored. This was after Adam put it up initially in post 354.
I have stated a few times that it is the best document produced so far that suggests that the Marginalia contained the Kosminski name in 1981. Although I seem to be the first person to realise this, including Adam, who didn’t include it in his Ripperologist article!
This thread is the first time it has been seen by a wider audience, and it is only just now, 300 posts later has the penny dropped – so I need no late in the day lectures on its potential importance.
However I repeat my stance that on its own, and in the face of other unanswered questions, the Express letter is not enough to authenticate the Marginalia.
It is no good caricaturing what I have said.
I do not seriously dispute the authenticity of any of the signed letters on company headed notepaper.
I recognise that forging these documents is of a different magnitude from, for example, Jim Swanson simply re writing one of his own letters.
I feel I have to explain everything now in case someone deliberately misconstrues. So…
I did not just accuse Jim Swanson of forging his letters. I mentioned it as an example to compare the relative difficulties of two types of forgery.
But if we are examining the possibility that someone may have faked some or part of the Marginalia, and if we wish to eliminate Jim Swanson from that accusation, then using his own letters, which he could potentially have written at any time, is utterly useless.
This is so obvious that I should not even have to say it. It is like asking someone to alibi themselves.
In short, if he faked the Marginalia, where he would have had to mimic his grandfather’s handwriting, then then how much easier would it have been to re-write a few of his own letters in order to create a paper trail?
But let’s return to those signed letters on headed notepaper.
None of them refer to the suspect – apart from the Express letter and they did not see the Marginalia.
The signed letter on Sandell’s personal headed notepaper doesn’t refer to the suspect either.
The unheaded and unsigned memo, that turned up at Scotland Yard Crime Museum in unexplained circumstances does refer to the suspect though.
So the very worst document in terms of provenance is the one that mentions the suspect (excluding the Express item).
Adam
In your ‘Ripperologist’ article you mentioned a letter that Jim Swanson sent to Charles Nevin dated 9th October 1987.
Any chance of putting that up? I’ll tell you why.
I quote from your article:
On 9 October 1987 Jim wrote again to Charles Nevin, revealing he had found more papers belonging to his grandfather.
These referred to Donald Swanson being placed in overall charge of the Ripper case. The papers also recorded a list of victims and alleged victims, as well as the attack on Annie Farmer.
and
Interestingly, it’s clear from Charles Sandell’s internal memo that Jim had shown the same documents to the News of the World reporter, so this was far from a new discovery six years later in 1987.
So in 1987 Jim Swanson claimed to have found various other documents (these are currently lost I understand). But the information in these documents was included in the 1981 article that turned up at the Scotland Yard Crime Museum.
Was Jim Swanson gilding the lily in telling Charles Nevin he had just found these documents? Or was the 1981 unused article actually written after 1987?
Either way it would be helpful to see Jim Swanson’s letter to Charles Nevin so readers could make up their own minds on that one.
I referred to the two emails from Charles Nevin and Martin Fido as it is suggested that they were wrong in remembering that the Anderson letter was not glued in place in 1987.
Is there anything else to back up Fido and Nevin? Well yes!
In his unpublished letter to the Telegraph that must have been written after 27th October 1987 Jim Swanson wrote:
‘My Grandfather’s notes were made in 1910 when he was 62.’
Why did he say 1910? Clearly because this was the year the book was published. So he must have known in 1987 that the book was published in 1910 and not 1905, the date on the letter that was later stuck over the Fred dedication.
I have also stated – but will repeat it as a lot seems to get washed over – that I doubt any additions were made to the Marginalia prior to 1981.
Jenni
In case you haven’t noticed I haven’t made any accusations against anyone – much to some people’s annoyance.
I have stated a few times that it is the best document produced so far that suggests that the Marginalia contained the Kosminski name in 1981. Although I seem to be the first person to realise this, including Adam, who didn’t include it in his Ripperologist article!
This thread is the first time it has been seen by a wider audience, and it is only just now, 300 posts later has the penny dropped – so I need no late in the day lectures on its potential importance.
However I repeat my stance that on its own, and in the face of other unanswered questions, the Express letter is not enough to authenticate the Marginalia.
It is no good caricaturing what I have said.
I do not seriously dispute the authenticity of any of the signed letters on company headed notepaper.
I recognise that forging these documents is of a different magnitude from, for example, Jim Swanson simply re writing one of his own letters.
I feel I have to explain everything now in case someone deliberately misconstrues. So…
I did not just accuse Jim Swanson of forging his letters. I mentioned it as an example to compare the relative difficulties of two types of forgery.
But if we are examining the possibility that someone may have faked some or part of the Marginalia, and if we wish to eliminate Jim Swanson from that accusation, then using his own letters, which he could potentially have written at any time, is utterly useless.
This is so obvious that I should not even have to say it. It is like asking someone to alibi themselves.
In short, if he faked the Marginalia, where he would have had to mimic his grandfather’s handwriting, then then how much easier would it have been to re-write a few of his own letters in order to create a paper trail?
But let’s return to those signed letters on headed notepaper.
None of them refer to the suspect – apart from the Express letter and they did not see the Marginalia.
The signed letter on Sandell’s personal headed notepaper doesn’t refer to the suspect either.
The unheaded and unsigned memo, that turned up at Scotland Yard Crime Museum in unexplained circumstances does refer to the suspect though.
So the very worst document in terms of provenance is the one that mentions the suspect (excluding the Express item).
Adam
In your ‘Ripperologist’ article you mentioned a letter that Jim Swanson sent to Charles Nevin dated 9th October 1987.
Any chance of putting that up? I’ll tell you why.
I quote from your article:
On 9 October 1987 Jim wrote again to Charles Nevin, revealing he had found more papers belonging to his grandfather.
These referred to Donald Swanson being placed in overall charge of the Ripper case. The papers also recorded a list of victims and alleged victims, as well as the attack on Annie Farmer.
and
Interestingly, it’s clear from Charles Sandell’s internal memo that Jim had shown the same documents to the News of the World reporter, so this was far from a new discovery six years later in 1987.
So in 1987 Jim Swanson claimed to have found various other documents (these are currently lost I understand). But the information in these documents was included in the 1981 article that turned up at the Scotland Yard Crime Museum.
Was Jim Swanson gilding the lily in telling Charles Nevin he had just found these documents? Or was the 1981 unused article actually written after 1987?
Either way it would be helpful to see Jim Swanson’s letter to Charles Nevin so readers could make up their own minds on that one.
I referred to the two emails from Charles Nevin and Martin Fido as it is suggested that they were wrong in remembering that the Anderson letter was not glued in place in 1987.
Is there anything else to back up Fido and Nevin? Well yes!
In his unpublished letter to the Telegraph that must have been written after 27th October 1987 Jim Swanson wrote:
‘My Grandfather’s notes were made in 1910 when he was 62.’
Why did he say 1910? Clearly because this was the year the book was published. So he must have known in 1987 that the book was published in 1910 and not 1905, the date on the letter that was later stuck over the Fred dedication.
I have also stated – but will repeat it as a lot seems to get washed over – that I doubt any additions were made to the Marginalia prior to 1981.
Jenni
In case you haven’t noticed I haven’t made any accusations against anyone – much to some people’s annoyance.
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