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Anthony Dee
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Thursday, February 19, 2004 - 8:56 am: |       |
Hello Everyone
Could anyone tell me if their are plans to do more testing on the watch that Mr. Johnson owns? Mr. Hacker explained very well how this thing could be forged using different tools to polish and age the scratches. Also, in Mr. Feldman's book, he claims that there are Initials "JO" on the back which could be John Over who was a friend on James Maybrick. He also thinks Mr. Johnson could be a relative of J.M.
Regards,
Anthony |
Paul Stephen
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Friday, February 20, 2004 - 10:03 am: | |
Hi Anthony
An interesting question. The watch debate seems to have gone very quiet of late. There is some up to date information in “The Inside Story”, and if I remember correctly, I don’t think there are any plans for further tests.
The initials “JO”, could very well be those of John Over. He was the husband of one of the Maybrick servants.
If I am right, Maybrick did own such a Gold watch, (you can see the chain in the photo of him), as did many other fairly prosperous gents at that time of course.
A gold watch was supposedly listed in the inventory when the contents of Battlecrease were put up for auction by Michael when Florrie was in custody.
This watch never actually made it to the auction, and seems to have gone missing some time between being listed in the inventory, and the sale itself. A very plausible explanation being that it was taken by one of the servants who had just been put out of a job, and eventually passed on to her husband who had the initials engraved on the back.
That watch then came on the market many years later and was purchased by Mr Johnson.
These events, if correct, would provide a very good provenance for the watch in my view. It all fits together quite well.
The diary is often criticised because of its dreadful provenance. I wonder if any of this version of the watch’s life story could be proved over a century later?
I have always felt that the watch and diary are inextricably linked, and if one was proven a fake, then the other would go with it, (and Vice-Versa of course!)
Regards
Paul
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Anthony Dee
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Saturday, February 21, 2004 - 11:15 pm: | |
Hi Paul
Thanks for the update.I was also wondering about Mr. Johnson and others involved in the Watch and Diary mystery. Did Mike Barrett or anybody related to or involved with him ever take a lie detector test. Or did anyone ever ask them to take one ?
Regards,
Anthony
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Caroline Anne Morris
Chief Inspector
Username: Caz
Post Number: 758
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, February 23, 2004 - 10:31 am: | |
Hi Anthony,
For some very sound reasons why lie detector tests probably wouldn’t resolve anything, see the most recent posts on the JonBenet Ramsey thread under the Shades of Whitechapel topic.
Hi Paul,
I think it’s one helluva coincidence that the watch ‘came on the market’ at exactly the same time as Mike was trying to find someone to publish the diary.
I need some pretty damning evidence if anyone asks me to doubt Albert Johnson’s sincerity when he says he believes the scratches must have been in the watch when he purchased it in July 1992 - within just a couple of weeks of the diary publishing agreement.
If the two artefacts came from the same stable, and if their separate emergence onto ‘the market’ at almost exactly the same time was no coincidence, this would appear to make sense only if those involved at that point had no idea the diary and watch would one day be linked again by scratches found inside the latter.
There is absolutely no evidence that Mike knew about the watch when he took the diary to London, or that Albert knew about the diary until after he had shown his watch to his workmates, and between them noticed the scratches, apparently for the first time.
People have largely ignored the watch. This may be because of their beliefs that the diary is a modern fake, therefore the scratches must also be recent, regardless of what the evidence may or may not indicate, and no matter what evidence might emerge in the future.
I still think that anyone who claims the average person could have produced the scratches in the watch, the diary itself, or any similar Jack-related artefact, should actually have a go at it themselves and see how far they get.
Love,
Caz |
John Hacker
Inspector
Username: Jhacker
Post Number: 229
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, February 23, 2004 - 11:12 am: | |
Anthony,
The problem is that there is simply no way to definitively date scratches in gold. The tests that can be done, have been done. Unfortunate, but there it is.
Paul,
I like your proposed "John Over" history for the watch much better than Feldman's tale of multiple watches and hidden Maybricks. It certainly makes much more sense.
I do disagree about the 2 being inextricably linked though. If the watch were to be proved a modern creation, then the diary would survive. However if the diary were to be proved modern, then the watch would go with it. That's just my opinion though.
Caz,
If you'd like to send me a gold pocketwatch and fund the testing, I would be more than happy to demonstrate. I'm a bit short of money for gold antiques right now. And for money for food when it comes down to it.
Regards,
John Hacker |
Andy and Sue Parlour
Detective Sergeant
Username: Tenbells
Post Number: 91
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, February 23, 2004 - 2:53 pm: | |
Hello John,
I have a few friends in the jewellery biz and for years low level frauds have been made in connection with various items. I asked one if I wanted writing in a piece of gold 'aged' is it hard to do.
"Just give me the piece and as long as the hallmark is genuine I'll put Donald Duck in it if you want and it would be hard to know when it went in"!
He went on to say that a Victorian watch would have been cleaned and serviced at least 5 times. Every time it is opened up tiny fragments of the tool used to open it would flake off. Gold being a 'receptive metal i.e. soft, any harder material would oxidise and over time embed into the gold.
This would explain quite a lot with the watch.
Ageing any scratches therefore be relatively easy to do, and roughing them up by abrasion and buffing again, would be easy.
But I am not going to accuse or name anybody of actually doing that with the watch in question, just given an honest explanation of how it could have been done.
A&S
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Anthony Dee
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Monday, February 23, 2004 - 11:30 am: | |
Caz
Thank You for the information on the Polygraph Test. I thought it could be used any time. But I guess the longer you wait, the easier it would be to beat, or at least show an inconclusive result.
Regards,
Anthony
Mr. Hacker
Thanks, Again for the information. I also read somewhere about the Watch being a woman's pocket watch. That would answer any questions about authenticity.
Regards,
Anthony
|
Paul Stephen
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Monday, February 23, 2004 - 11:44 am: | |
Caz
Thanks for that. What you say makes sense to me.
I’ve read what one or two eminent persons have had to say on the subject of the scratches here in the past.
I know it just sounds like I’m being a know-all here, and I’ve bitten my lip for quite a while now, but I have been in the clock, (not watch), trade for 25 years now, and specialise in restoration of antique clocks in particular. This often involves “aging” newly made parts to match a 200 year old movement. It’s very easy, and the effects of certain chemicals are instantaneous and dramatic.
I reckon I could do those scratches, no problem, and make them look old, but would they pass all the forensic tests?….No they wouldn’t. The naked eye, or even a glass would not show up any jiggery pokery, but the chemicals required to age brass particles embedded in the scratches would be detectable without a doubt.
Something else that bothers me a great deal is why on Earth would anyone use a BRASS tool to make the scratches? The scratches are quite fine and crisp looking, even after a lot of years, (or a lot of artificial aging!), and brass is a soft metal that would blunt, or even bend over, in no time if sharpened to a point fine enough to do those scratches, even when used on soft Gold.
What implement did the modern forger use to make the scratches? Anything sharp enough that would be lying around for a modern forger would be very unlikely to be brass, almost impossible I should say. Pick up anything made in the past 50 years that’s sharp and pointed enough to make those scratches and it’s going to be steel. You can bet your life on it.
A Victorian person however, would possibly have several brass implements on his desk. A letter opening knife comes to mind. Maybe an old brass nib.
I know it’s not impossible for our modern forger to get hold of an old letter knife or something similar to make the scratches, but is anyone honestly saying that they would have thought of that?
I sit back now and await the inevitable flack…………..
Love
Paul
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Paul Stephen
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Monday, February 23, 2004 - 6:28 pm: | |
Hi Anthony
I've seen the tale about it being a lady's watch too.
It's a man's watch. A gold hunter with full plate fusee movement by a good Lancaster maker. Exactly the sort of watch you would expect a man like Maybrick to own.
If it's a hoax then the hoaxer picked a spot on example to fake with his scratches. I've seen dozens of them and sold quite a few too.
Lady's Victorian fob watches are something quite different.
regards
Paul |
Anthony Dee
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Monday, February 23, 2004 - 5:26 pm: | |
Hi Paul
Thanks for the post. No flak from me. I was ready to forget about thw watch,but now I have reason to keep investigating and reading other posts.
Regards,
Anthony |
Caroline Anne Morris
Chief Inspector
Username: Caz
Post Number: 766
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, February 24, 2004 - 10:45 am: | |
Hi John,
Well, you see, you made the claim but you don’t have the funds for testing and supporting your claim. I can fully appreciate this as I too am getting desperately short of dosh right now.
But then I am not making any claims about how easy it would be to produce a ripper artefact that couldn’t be proved modern even with the most modern forensic tests available. 
Hi Andy,
A Victorian watch ‘would have been cleaned and serviced at least 5 times’.
Nope, don’t get the reasoning here. Wouldn’t it very much depend on where it has been, who knows where it was, and whether the owner(s) chose to use it, store it away unused, perhaps along with other family keepsakes, or even forgot all about it?
Hi Anthony,
How would the ‘Maybrick’ watch have answered any questions about authenticity, had it been a woman’s? Do you mean a forger would not have used a woman’s watch, knowing very well that Maybrick was a man? Or do you mean the ripper would definitely have used his own watch, and never used a woman’s watch, if he had wanted to record the initials of his female victims?
Hi Paul,
Dr. Turgoose revealed that every initial in the watch had been made with a different implement, while ‘I am Jack’ and ‘J Maybrick’ (which Turgoose believed were the earliest of the engravings – I don’t know why he believed this), were scratched with the same implement. It was a piece of the implement used for the ‘M.K.’ that he believed had broken off and was still in place, and considerably corroded, suggesting it had been embedded in the surface for many years. Dr. Wild told Robert Smith that the scratches could have been made as long ago as 1888/9.
Robert was also told by Wild that he could not have made the scratches himself.
And, since you’re in the trade, I’ll ask you something that has been on my mind lately. Do people in the retail trade make a habit of hanging on to watches they acquire for some considerable length of time before finally getting them serviced/repaired and ready for selling on? Or would this be an unusual occurrence? I would have thought a quick turnover would be the general aim. Under what circumstances would a trading jeweller store a watch they had obtained, instead of putting it in the window as soon as possible?
Love,
Caz
|
John Hacker
Inspector
Username: Jhacker
Post Number: 231
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, February 24, 2004 - 12:03 pm: | |
Andy & Sue,
Thanks for the information. That's about what I figured had been done, although I suspect the brass fragments might have been artificially oxidized.
Paul,
Thanks for your interesting comments. I'm glad that you agree that the scratches would be easily made to appear old. As far as the chemicals go, no exotic ones are necessary. Vinegar would do it.
And of course there was no chemical analysis performed on the watch fragments, so even if something odd was used, it wasn't looked for.
As far as the tool goes, when I was experimenting, I used a brass nail. Nice, sharp, and easy to get ahold of. No worries there at all.
Caz,
I'm not trying to prove anything. I'm merely providing people with an explinition of how it could have been done. As Turgoose did as well. As the person who examined the watch takes the same position, I feel I am on fairly safe ground here. You're free to disagree. In fact, I would probably be disappointed if you didn't.
"But then I am not making any claims about how easy it would be to produce a ripper artefact that couldn’t be proved modern even with the most modern forensic tests available."
Well ya see Caz, the problem is that "the most modern forensic tests available" can't date scratches. Science has it's funny limitations, I know, but there it is. They "look" old, but that doesn't tell us anything about when they were put there.
"Robert was also told by Wild that he could not have made the scratches himself."
Dr. Wild wasn't looking at the problem correctly IMO. His difficulty was the assumption that oxidized brass particles had to be embedded into the scratches. Artificially oxidizing new particles seems not to have occurred to him.
Regards,
John |
Paul Stephen
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Tuesday, February 24, 2004 - 11:48 am: | |
Hi Caz
Thanks for that. Very interesting that a different tool has been used to make the scratches at different times, if in fact that was the case. I can’t imagine how you could date the scratches relative to one another, but you could definitely tell if different tools were used. Very intriguing that…!
I haven’t had a shop for many years so couldn’t honestly comment on your last point other than to say that all jewellers and antique dealers I have ever known are always keen to see a quick return on their money!
Such a Gold watch has been an expensive item to buy for several decades now. In the war years and up to the 60s it was common for good watches like this to be broken up for the gold, as nobody wanted them any more, but this hasn’t been the case in the last 30 years or so. I can only imagine it being kept by a jeweller that long if it had been bought in the 60s or earlier, and then forgotten at the back of a drawer or such like.
Andy and Sue
The “Maybrick” watch does not require a tool to open it. I haven’t seen this exact example of course, but with a gold watch of this type and age you press a spring loaded button in the “bow” at the top and it springs open itself. Alternatively the thumb nail is used to open the case which is hinged. The movement is accessed by a small catch below the numeral VI, and it just hinges out. It’s a key wound watch and the case had to be opened every day in order to wind it and reset the hands. No tools were involved.
In a mucky atmosphere like 19th Century Liverpool, a watch would probably need to be cleaned at least every 10 years. It was made in the 1840s so five cleans by the end of the century would be about right. Pocket watches went rapidly out of fashion by the first war, and it almost certainly sat at the back of a drawer, unwound for many years until it was eventually sold.
To intentionally embed brass particles into scratches in gold is as close to impossible as you could get. How on earth would you know if you had succeeded without the aid of sophisticated equipment? Until you knew you had got microscopic brass particles in there, there would be no point in trying to “age” them.
Regards
Paul
|
John Hacker
Inspector
Username: Jhacker
Post Number: 232
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, February 24, 2004 - 12:46 pm: | |
Paul,
"How on earth would you know if you had succeeded without the aid of sophisticated equipment? Until you knew you had got microscopic brass particles in there, there would be no point in trying to “age” them."
I wouldn't assume that they were necessarily attempting to embed particles in the watch. Anyone who uses tools, has a basic understanding of forensics, or has watched enough PBS specials is likely to be aware of the possibility that traces of the tool might be left behind.
Or they might have simply been observant. When I did my nail experiment, it was pretty clear at one point that the one part of the nail was "shinier" that the rest, indicating that material had been scraped off.
If that *is* was what done, I would think that they were just hedging their bets.
Regards,
John |
Caroline Anne Morris
Chief Inspector
Username: Caz
Post Number: 769
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, February 24, 2004 - 2:04 pm: | |
Hi John,
Dr. Wild reported the following:
The particles embedded in the base of the engraving are brass from the engraving tool… The particle investigated is very heavily contaminated and appears to have been considerably corroded. In this investigation the etching process, which was continued for some 45 minutes, only began to reveal zinc oxide. This suggests that the particle has been embedded in the surface for some considerable time.
Could you explain a bit more about this etching process, and why the fact that it ‘only began to reveal zinc oxide’ led Wild to believe the particle had become embedded so long ago?
I wish I could understand the science better and therefore why you think the experts were mistaken or misled by what their tests indicated.
Thanks.
Love,
Caz
|
John Hacker
Inspector
Username: Jhacker
Post Number: 233
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, February 24, 2004 - 2:40 pm: | |
Caz,
The complete details of Wild's tests have never been made public, so I'm not exactly sure what he was doing, or which particle he was examining. But when doing scanning auger microscopy, an ion beam is often used to remove the outer layer of atoms to get to the layers underneath.
When brass (which is an alloy of zinc and copper) oxidizes, there's an outer layer formed of copper oxide which helps protect the brass. (Unlike iron which will rust all the way down.) I assume that what he was doing was trying to see how thick the outer layer of copper oxide was so that he could see just how corroded the particle was. After getting through the outer layer he'd get to the zinc oxide. It's just a fancy way of determining that it was heavily oxidized.
Regards,
John
|
Andy and Sue Parlour
Detective Sergeant
Username: Tenbells
Post Number: 92
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, February 24, 2004 - 5:40 pm: | |
Hello Paul, Caz & John.
I'me glad you agree that the need to service and clean a watch about every 10 years is right and you would still use fine tools to make fine adjustments. These themselves would lose tiny flakes into the body of the watch.
Obviously Caz you have another string to your bow, a watch and clock mender!
Anyway John, would a scouse, macho, hunky, cotton dealing trans-Atlantic travelling drug taking sadistic butchering woman serial killer wear and prance around with a dainty womans watch on?????
Of course he wouldn't!!
C'mon, he would wear a great big MAN's pocket watch with a whopping big Albert gold chain round his waist like all the other rich merchants did in Victorian times. This would be part of them displaying their wealth and place in current society.
What a great thread this is folks!
A&S |
Paul Stephen
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Tuesday, February 24, 2004 - 5:15 pm: | |
Hi John
Vinegar….? No way I’m afraid. I haven’t been wasting my money on expensive bronzing solutions for years if I could use household vinegar.
You will never get any depth to the artificial aging like that. Turgoose said the brass particles were “heavily corroded”. Not with vinegar they weren’t!
Brass nails haven’t been available for general use for years. Brass PLATED ones have. I have to specially order brass tacks as used in clockmaking, for attaching gilt mounts to clock cases etc. and they are very soft.
I don’t dispute that you know the difference, but have you tried holding a brass nail in your fingers and making legible scratches INSIDE a watch case with the movement still attached? Even if you had the expertise and the tools to get the movement out of the way, you’d need a pretty long brass nail to reach inside and do that. About 2” in my estimation.
Sorry John. This has been my trade for 25 years and I’m on pretty familiar territory here.
Regards
Paul
|
Anthony Dee
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Tuesday, February 24, 2004 - 3:49 pm: | |
Hi Caz
I'm thinking about if a forger put the scratches on the watch. I would expect him to use a man's watch because JM was a businessman and I wouldn't expect to see him using a woman's pocket watch. Like today, you don't see men wearing woman's wristwatches or women wearing men's wristwatches.
Regards,
Anthony |
John Hacker
Inspector
Username: Jhacker
Post Number: 234
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, February 24, 2004 - 8:06 pm: | |
Andy & Sue,
"Anyway John, would a scouse, macho, hunky, cotton dealing trans-Atlantic travelling drug taking sadistic butchering woman serial killer wear and prance around with a dainty womans watch on?????"
I quite agree. There's no way that itty-bitty watch was at the end of that big honking chain Maybrick wore. He might have kept such a watch hidden in a drawer perhaps, but that wasn't one he'd have been wearing in public.
Paul,
Vinegar? Yes. These particle are not large. (Or visible with the naked eye for that matter.) It wouldn't take much at all to corrode those puppies. And there wouldn't need to be much depth at all for them to be "heavily corroded", we're talking about particles visible with an electron microscope, embedded in the base of scratches that are barely visible with the naked eye.
I wouldn't suggest you've been wasting your money, but I've achieved good results with the simple application of vinegar. It takes a bit of time, and a few repeat applications, but it works just fine. Try it yourself, you might be surpised.
I don't know why you've had trouble finding brass nails or tacks, they seem to be generally available in the US in craft stores. (And I did check to see if they were simply plated.) I do live in an "artistically inclined" community though.
While I don't dispute your experience in clock work, I've spent years looking into this particular issue, and I also feel that I am on more than solid ground here.
I'm not sure why you feel that you'd need a 2 inch nail. I've made legible initials on the inside of my pinky ring with a much smaller nail than that. All it takes is a steady hand. And it's pretty clear that the back opens easily enough with the movement still attached to the front so that no special length is required. Look closely at the photographs. The front and cover swing independently. The movement remains attached to the front. There's clearly enough room to make the marks in the position shown in the photo.
Anthony,
Yep. :-)
Regards,
John
|
Caroline Anne Morris
Chief Inspector
Username: Caz
Post Number: 774
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, February 25, 2004 - 6:29 am: | |
Hi John,
Thanks for the explanation, but I’m even more confused now.
What do you mean: After getting through the outer layer?
Wild says that only zinc oxide was revealed, implying that there was no outer layer of copper oxide to be seen.
Would the absence of any copper oxide be why he thought the particle had been embedded for a long time?
Thanks for your patience.
Hi Andy,
Paul says it’s a man’s watch. And he is in the trade after all, so I’ve no good reason to doubt his knowledge and experience, just as I’ve no good reason to doubt the expertise of Wild or Turgoose.
But in any case, what makes you think a watch with murder victims’ initials inside had to be worn by anyone, including the person who put them there? Couldn’t it have been kept it in a drawer or something?
Hi Anthony,
Well, I suppose it doesn’t matter anyway, if Paul is right about it being a man’s watch, although Albert Johnson did say he bought it as an investment for his granddaughter. Whoever made the scratches obviously felt the watch was a suitable one to use for the purpose. People may argue that it wasn’t suitable (either for a forger or a serial killer) but I’m not convinced by any of the arguments I’ve heard so far.
Love,
Caz
|
John Hacker
Inspector
Username: Jhacker
Post Number: 235
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, February 25, 2004 - 6:49 am: | |
Caz,
A corroded particle of brass will have an outer layer of copper oxide. The purpose of etching is to remove the outer layers of material. Wild's exact words were:
"In this investigation the etching process, which was continued for some 45 minutes, only began to reveal zinc oxide."
What he is commenting on is that it took considerable etching time for the presence of zinc oxide to begin to appear. I.E. The outer layer was thick.
I suppose it's also possible that there was additional material to get through before getting to the copper oxide though. A film of polish, grease, or some such. There isn't really sufficient information from that isolated quote to tell.
Regards,
John |
Paul Stephen
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Wednesday, February 25, 2004 - 7:16 am: | |
Dear All
I don’t think I’ve actually seen so much mis-information on one thread in the whole time I’ve been reading the casebook, as has been put forward here in the last couple of days.
Some of the proposals I’ve seen before trying to show that the watch is a modern fake have been bizarre in the extreme, but now it’s just getting silly.
Andy and Sue.
That pocket watch is a man’s watch not a woman’s. A woman’s fob watch is something entirely different. How on earth you can claim to know what Maybrick’s watch looked like is beyond me. Big fat watches do exist. They tended to be made and worn by country yokels, and were looked down upon by city folks. Liverpool and Lancaster were major watch making areas in the 19th century, and the watches they produced were very fine quality, sophisticated, fashionable and NOT of generous proportions.
A man like Maybrick who could afford a decent watch would be very likely to own such a watch as this.
The brass particle found in the scratches was EMBEDDED there. It was put there by the tool used to make the scratches. It did not fall in there. That is a total impossibility. The watch movement is completely removed from the case to clean and adjust it, and no, particles from the tools would not fall in and magically become embedded in the scratches. It just doesn’t work like that.
John
I don’t know how you get the idea that the back of the watch opens easily. It doesn’t open full stop. There are two covers on the back of an English pocket watch. The outer one opens to reveal the key hole. The inner one is an integral part of the case and does NOT open.
The movement is accessed from the front, quite unlike most American watches like Waltham, Elgin etc. that were around in Maybricks time, and hinges out by about 90 degrees. You have to work around that AND reach inside to make scratches which are on the INSIDE of the inner back of the case. A short nail wouldn’t do it I’m afraid.
Please…! If these scratches didn’t say what they do, the darned things would be accepted for just what they are……old!
You have two choices here. Weird and convoluted proposals, full of misinformation as to how some unidentified modern forger put scratches into an expensive pocket watch, potentially reducing it’s value along the way, treating it with vinegar, of all things, on the remote off-chance that he had left a particle in the scratch not visible to the naked eye, and then letting a local jeweller have it to flog at a later date.
Alternatively, some person unknown did it a long time ago. It’s as simple as that.
The forensics strongly support the latter, common sense strongly supports the latter.
Come on chaps. It’s not the end of the world if the scratches are old is it? It doesn’t make Maybrick the Ripper. It doesn’t even make him the owner of the watch! It just gives you the most sensible and plausible starting point for investigating it further.
Regards
Paul
|
RosemaryO'Ryan
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Wednesday, February 25, 2004 - 4:44 am: | |
Dear Mr Stephen,
Brass nail? It could be done with a two inch brass SCREW though. Hmm. The only place you would find a two inch brass screw (not the coated variety) is on an old door-hinge...preferably in a prison, somewhere like B Wing in...lets say, Walton Jail, 1988-89, when a programme of updating prison security required all brass screws to be removed and replaced with Chubb security screws.
The initials "JO" could refer to a shortened "Joanna" or "Josephine"...they could even be "Jean Overton", or gosh! even "Jeannette O'Kelley".We may never know.
Rosey :-) |
John Hacker
Inspector
Username: Jhacker
Post Number: 236
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, February 25, 2004 - 10:10 am: | |
Paul,
I have to take exception to the tone of your post. If those on the "con" side are expected to behave politely, I think that it's only fair to expect the reverse of those with "open minds".
Most of the "misinformation" you're talking about are simple facts. Turgoose himself described the basic technique for artificially aging the scratches, and he explicitly allowed it as a possibility. Indeed, both Wild and Turgoose called for more testing to further support their findings.
As far as how the watch opens, I am only going by the photograph showing the watch in the open position. If it would be possible for Maybrick to have opened the watch to make the scratches, it would certainly be possible for a hoaxer to do so. And from looking at the photograph of the watch in the open position, it is quite clear that a particularly long instrument would not be needed.
"You have two choices here. Weird and convoluted proposals, full of misinformation as to how some unidentified modern forger put scratches into an expensive pocket watch, potentially reducing it’s value along the way, treating it with vinegar, of all things, on the remote off-chance that he had left a particle in the scratch not visible to the naked eye, and then letting a local jeweller have it to flog at a later date."
I won't speculate as to who might have hoaxed the scratches at this time or why. (But let's be serious here, scratches on the inside are NOT going to reduce the value of the watch, and making it "Jack the Ripper's" watch could only increase it's value.) I am merely describing how it could have been done.
I don't understand how you feel that it's "weird or convoluted". It's fairly basic stuff that doesn't require any particular scientific knowledge whatsoever. If someone were to decide to hoax the watch and put in artificially age the scratches it would not be hard to determine how to do so. A bit of research and the application of common sense would do the trick.
1) Scratches don't age. They will appear to age over time because there will be incidental scratches on top of them and polishing out. If they were really old, you'd get some polishing, incidental scratching, polishing, repeated. Thus the most "polished" out scratches will appear older then the less polished ones on top of them.
2) The idea that a tool leaves traces of itself behind it's a difficult one for most people to understand or to figure out.
3) How to artificially age brass also isn't particularly difficult knowledge to come by. Many people who are into antiques would know of this. I get the vinegar technique from my grandmother.
You say that the forensics support the idea that they are old. They certainly support the POSSIBILITY that they are old. Nothing more.
As far as common sense goes, until there is a provenance for the watch, the first time those scratches can be verified to exist is when Albert Johnson and his co-workers put it under a microscope after the diary was public information. That's got to be the starting point, and we need to follow the watch backwards to establish it's history, giving it a verifiable provenance before accepting it as anything but a 1848 Verity watch with undated scratches in it.
Regards,
John |
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