|
 |
 |
|
|
|
** This is an archived, static copy of the Casebook messages boards dating from 1998 to 2003. These threads cannot be replied to here. If you want to participate in our current forums please go to https://forum.casebook.org **
Anti-semitic prejudice in the Seaside Home "identification"?
Casebook Message Boards: Ripper Suspects: General Discussion :
Anti-semitic prejudice in the Seaside Home "identification"?
Author: Ivor Edwards
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 01:32 am |        | Ha Ha.Boy did that make me laugh.You wrote, if you read a lot of novels you get the sense etc.To accuse me of being other posters shows you have no sense whatsoever. If your self-appointed deductions in the search for the ripper are to be compared to your deductions in this matter I advise everyone to ignore any statement you make in reference to the case.I cant stop laughing, you really are something else. What pleases me so much is the fact that I NOW KNOW what nonsense you really talk, more so than anyone on this site.
Even Martin knows my character and he does not agree with you on this matter. Boy when you make a mistake you really make them. Radka I really feel sorry for you, how sad you are to make such ill founded statements.You call that evidence.All you have produced is a motley collection of incoherent babblings which make no sense to man or beast.Go away and play with your own kind and stop boring me.Furthermore no one is interested
in your mad and incorrect rantings least of all me. |
Author: Paul Carpenter
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 03:33 am | | DAVID AND IVOR
A repeat request that you take your argument somewhere else please. You do, of course, have the perfect right to air your personal grievances in public if you wish - however tiny-minded it makes you both appear to the disinterested. Whether you have the right to do it in a thread that until your appearance had avoided all of this kind of strop and nonsense is, I would contend, a different matter altogether. The title of the thread gives notice as to its content, and nowhere in the title does "childish name-slinging and feeble attempts to out-insult each other" appear.
I doubt now whether this previously amiable and informative thread would be of any use to future students of the case now that 50% of its contents consists of your arcane dispute over who said what to whom and where. Those who have contributed to this thread in the spirit in which is was intended have essentially wasted their time because you feel that your argument is so very important that it should be allowed to clog up any thread you fancy.
I have enjoyed both of your postings in the past, you are clearly two erudite and intelligent people with, between you, a great fund of knowledge from which we can all profit. Quite why you choose to act in this unbecoming playground manner is beyond me entirely - and I am not going to read through the accusations and counter-accusations in order to discover why.
Before either of you attempts to goad me into involvement in this sort of tosh, let me inform you that I am old enough to know better and will simply ignore it - as you should be wise enough to know to do so yourselves. I bitterly regret having to post this message in any case, but I am absolutely livid at the contempt that you have shown for people trying to use this board for its intended purpose.
Thank you,
Carps |
Author: Paul Carpenter
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 04:54 am | | In fact, Stephen has enunciated this all with a great deal more good humour than I did in the heat of the moment here I would heartily implore those thinking of carrying on personal vendettas on the boards to read it and digest.
Cheers,
Carps |
Author: Caroline Anne Morris
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 05:38 am | | Hi David,
But Caroline Morris is daft! And Ivor Edwards is not our daft collection of anons and pseuds put together!
So, in the words of 'The Scousers': "Calm down everyone, calm down."
Just write to people how you would like others to write to you. Then 'giving as good as getting' would for evermore be an utterably pleasurable affair. (And what could be nicer than that?  )
Love,
Caz |
Author: Martin Fido
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 05:54 am | | Carps - Who's Stephen?
David and Ivor - My nearest and dearest has always urged me not to get into the sort of brawling I've been doing with Melvin on the grounds that one should never enter a p*ssing contest with a skunk.
Now couldn't you two concentrate on the beautiful black and white striped furry charm that is to be seen in each other rather than - er - put at risk - (I nearly said p*ss away, except that neither of you could ever quite do that) - the genuine respect and good will people like Carps and me feel for both of you?
I've asked people elsewhere to accept that my falling silent in the face of abuse will not mean that any charges that I can't answer are valid. Can we all assure both of you that if either of you doesn't reply to the next posted insult, NOBODY will imagine that this means it's true?
(Personally I don't believe that either of you has been posting anonymously. You've both shown very clearly that you have the courage of your own convictions, and I very much fear you are being stirred into hostility by the malevolence of Mr Question and his like: actually letting them win their evil game of trying to bring certain posters on the boards into undeserved disrepute).
With all good wishes,
Martin |
Author: Paul Carpenter
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 05:59 am | | Hello all you good-natured, charming creatures of the forest...
Martin - Stephen as in Stephen P. Ryder... it wasn't very clear, but the word 'here' was a link to his recent appearance on the board to restress his admirable 'laissez-faire' attitude to the whole vexatious issue, and to plead for general sanity. I can't wait till Melvyn hears about the skunk comparison though!
Cheers,
Carps |
Author: Guy Hatton
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 06:41 am | | If I may bring the discussion back to something other than people's subjective impressions of who is who on the boards PLEASE:
Ivor quite correctly states that "returning to the scene of the crime" is a very real phenomenon, and not just folklore. Indeed, criminals may inject themselves into events subsequent to a crime in many ways: for instance, they may contact the police, sometimes making accusations against somebody else. (We know that Cream did this, some people believe that D'Onston did). It is also common practice for police to watch the funerals of victims of unsolved murders for "strangers" present.
Ivor quotes the example of Peter Sutcliffe, the Yorkshire Ripper. Sutcliffe is known to have gone back to Manchester to the allotment where he had abandoned the body of Jean Jordan. He had indeed been surprised when it had not been found soon after death. And he most certainly did carry out further mutilation. However, his primary motive for going back seems to have been a practical one - he had left a five-pound note, newly distributed to him in his pay packet and offered to Jordan as payment for sex. He realised the possibility of this note being traced to him, and that he had an opportunity to rectify the matter by retrieving it. The additional mutilation apparently only came about as a result of his frustration at being unable to locate Jordan's handbag, and hence the banknote.
On the other hand, it is sometimes claimed that Sutcliffe also returned to the undiscovered body of Yvonne Pearson in early 1978. Pearson was found, more than a month after her death, under a discarded sofa on waste ground in Bradford. It is claimed that a newspaper, dated after the murder, was found trapped under the body in such a way that it could not have got there without human intervention, or without the presence of the body being obvious at the time it (the newspaper) was "placed". However, I don't know for sure whether this story is completely accurate, and the Jordan incident is the only such to have been admitted by Sutcliffe himself.
All the Best
Guy |
Author: Martin Fido
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 07:40 am | | Apologies, Guy, for a very brief reversion to the unseemly....
I've just spotted that in my posting above I said, 'I can't answer' when of course I meant 'I don't answer'.
And, Carps, I'm sure Mrs melvin thinks equally badly of me, though her language might be less colourful and (I hope) entertaining.
Finally (at last) - Guy, for what it's worth, confirmation of your and Ivor's point about murderers returning to the scenes of their crimes. Cream's injection of himself into the investigation was rather a special case, however, as it had always been a part of his batty make-up to do this. And he did it anonymously or pseudonymously, not apparently recognizing that pointing the finger at a fellow-lodger in his own digs would bring the investigation to his doorstep. Donston's intervention was different in that he was doing it openly under his own name. Offhand I can't think of a parallel, which is not to say that one can't be found.
Allthe best,
Martin F |
Author: John Omlor
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 08:07 am | | Quick question for Paul Carpenter:
Hi Paul,
How did you do that "turning a single word into a link to another page on the Boards" thing? That was very nice. I want to do that! It would come in very handy for discussion purposes. Where might I find the instructions for this one?
Thanks in advance,
--John
PS: You can e-mail me privately if you'd like -- omlor@tampabay.rr.com |
Author: Guy Hatton
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 08:32 am | | Martin -
Thanks for pointing out the Cream/D'Onston distinction.
...and not too troubling a reversion to the unseemly, as it happened!
All the Best
Guy |
Author: Paul Carpenter
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 09:19 am | | Hi Jon,
I'll actually post this publicly as it might be a useful tool wherever people feel compelled to refer to or quote a different message.
There might be a less convoluted route than this, but:
1) Right click on the little 'folder' image in the titlebar of the message you want to refer to.
2) From the pop-up menu that appears, choose the 'open link in new window' option. The message opens in a new window with the complete url of the specific post in the address bar.
3) Copy the url to your clipboard.
4) When writing your message, enter the following text:
(a href="" target="_new")Whatever you type here will act as a link(/a)
Important: You must actually use ">"-style brackets and not "("-style brackets.
5) Paste the url of the posting you want to refer to inbetween the quotation marks.
6) Hey presto!
Hope this helps. If it isn't transparent enough to follow, then drop me a line and I'll send you an email and take more time over the instructions!
Cheers
Carps |
Author: Martin Fido
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 10:29 am | | Wowee, Carps! That is a fantastic skill! I've printed it out and posted it up, though it's a virtual certainty that technically incompetent MF will make a b*lls-up if he ever tries to use it.
Martin |
Author: John Omlor
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 10:45 am | | Thanks indeed Carps.
I may still rely on scrolling back and cutting and pasting relevant citations. But I'll no doubt try this one as well.
Excellent!
Thanks again,
--John |
Author: Ivor Edwards
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 04:18 pm | | | Carps,Martin,Caroline and all.As far as I am concerned I will take your advice.Anymore postings to me if not of a mature nature will be ignored.I cant say fairer than that.I will not retaliate anymore.I would also like to thank those of you that came to my defence when my character was attacked without good cause.Martin any comments to make on those distances and those cardinal bearings.You may have missed the questions. Criminals do of course go back to the scene of the crimes for a variety of reasons. In relation to Neil Cream he kept writing to various people, members of Parliament, doctors treating the Royal Family, divorced peereses.However he did use pseudonyms.D'Onston wrote in his own name.But he was also known to use pseudonyms. |
Author: Martin Fido
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 05:21 pm | | Hi Ivor,
Sorry I forgot to make any comment on the topographical data you supplied. I'm not really sure what to say about it. I'm sure you're accurate, and these are probably the most precise descriptions of the sites and their relation we've ever had. But until your full theory is published, I don't really know what they mean. Sorry to be so dim. You'll have noticed I have never joined in any of the discussions of the occult in any great depth, being an out-of-place character who would probably be very happy in some monkish age of faith, but living instead in an age of enlightenment and scientific reason has to tailor my sense of awe at the universe to strictly rational limits. So I strive for a religion without superstition and a morality without taboo: this probably leaves me only non-pastoral Quakerism, Unitarianism, Buddhism or 'Sea of Faith' Universalism to turn to at present. And it certainly rules out the occult, which I've never studied deeply.
(I think somebody mentioned Anton LaVey when all this was under discussion, and I have to admit that I see him as an example of freethinking adapted carnival barkerism with a nifty eye to the main chance, rather than a guru of any kind).
And finally, all strength to you in keeping up silence under provocation.
All the best,
Martin |
Author: Ivor Edwards
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 06:23 pm | | | Martin,I do understand your position and thanks for the comments. |
Author: Jeff Bloomfield
Sunday, 06 May 2001 - 02:24 am | | Dear folks,
I have been rather out of the discussion of the
"Jake" the Ripper theory, and the possibility
of an anti - Semitic background to it, mostly
because I am not well acquainted with the actual
events at the Seaside House. However, for what
it is worth, while at the 42nd Street Library
today, I came across the following matter. You
may very well know of it before, but I thought
it had not been mentioned.
On Tuesday, Oct. 2, 1888, the Times had an article
on page 5, column b. It mentioned that a trial
in Crackow Poland (then part of Austria-Hungary)
in 1884, resembled the recent Whitechapel murders.
The defendant, one Ritter (who was Jewish) was
tried for the murder of a woman (no name was given)three times by the locals, and three times
found guilty. But each time the Austrian courts
overturned the verdict due to various defects in
the trials, mostly due to prejudice. After the
third reprieve, the Austrians released Ritter from
further judicial travail. The following is in
the first paragraph of the item:
"The mutilation was like that perpetrated on the
body of the woman Chapman, and at the trial numbers of witnesses deposed tjat a,pmg certain
fanatical Jews there existed a superstition to the
effect that if a Jew became intimate with a Christian woman he would atone for his offence by
slaying and mutilating the object of his passion.
Sundry passages of the Talmud were quoted which,
according to the witnesses, expressly sanctioned this form of atonement."
Later this sentence ends the article:
"There is no doubt that the man was innocent, but the evidence touching the superstitions prevailing
among some of the ignorant and degraded of his
co-religionists remains on record and was never
wholly disproved."
On Wednesday, October 3, 1888, on page 13, col.c,
the Times published two letters. First, Herman
Adler, Chief Rabbi of England, roundly condemned
the idea. ""Woe unto the ears that hear this;
woe unto the eyes that see this!" I may exclaim
with an ancient Hebrew sage. I can assert, without hesitation, that in no Jewish book is such
a barbarity ever hinted at. Nor is there any
record in the criminal annals of any country of
a Jew having been convicted of such a terrible
atrocity. These facts were conclusively proved by
Professor Delitzach, of Leipsic, and Dr. Bloch, a
member of the Austrian Imperial Diet, on the occasion of the trial of Ritter, who, living in an atmosphere surcharged with anti-Semitism, had
been accused of this crime, but who was ultimately
acquitted, there being, as your Correspondent
admits, no doubt as to his innocence." Adler
hoped that the English would not resurrect the
"blood libel" (he calls it "this medieval spectre")due to murders. The other letter,
by M. Gaster, the Chief Rabbi of the Spanish and
Portuguese Synagogue pointed out the amount of
fabrication in the documentary evidence in the
Ritter trial, and then went on to list the
fact that the blood libel had been denounced by
Christian theologians in the Times forty years
earlier.
A final article was in the Times of Thursday,
October 16, 1888, page 3, col.a. It was rather
even handed. Most of the letter (a long first
paragraph) supported Adler's and Gaster's contentions of Ritter's innocence, and that the
rule that a Jew could murder and mutilate a
gentile wife was a hideous lie. This paragraph
was from a letter from the Times' Vienna correspondent. But a short final paragraph,
from an unnamed Viennese lawyer insisted that
the trial had proved that whether or not in the
Talmud, a certain class of low-class Jews in
Galicia, Poland did believe in the rule. As for
Ritter's acquittal, it was due to the death of
the main witness against him.
The "blood libel", in all it's variations (the
worst being that Jews killed Christian children
and used their blood to make matzas) had been
behind many anti-Semitic incidents down to the
the last century. In 1911, the trial of Mendel
Beiliss in Russia led to protests by Christians
and Jews throughout the world. Beiliss was
accused of killing two children for blood libel
purposes. Eventually he was freed. During the
1930s and 1940s, Julius Streicher's Der Sturmer,
reprinted the same stories for Nazi Germany.
In 1840, a blood libel incident occurred in
Damascus, Syria, leading to anti-Jewish riots
in Arab countries. Although it was condemned
in most Western European circles, some anti-Semites in England and France believed it. One
was the noted English traveller and explorer,
Sir Richard Burton, who would write a "learned"
treatise on the ritual murders of the Jews over
the centuries. [Footnote for science fiction
fans: If you read the "Riverworld" series of
novels of Philip Jose Farmer, Burton appears as
one of the adventurer heroes. But Farmer has
Burton getting squeamish when Herman Goering
thanks him for documenting the crimes of the Jews
for the Nazis to use.]
Given that the murders were occurring in an area
with a large Jewish population, anti-Semitic
thoughts were doomed to start popping up at any
time. But I wonder if the referrences to the
Ritter Trial were the first attempt to give those
thoughts some form.
Jeff |
Author: Martin Fido
Sunday, 06 May 2001 - 05:50 am | | Dear Jeff,
The Times's repeated stories pushing the possibility of a Jewish Ripper were something I observed in 1986, and they led me to write, (among other things), ' The Times was not habitually anti-semitic, unlike the East London Advertiser which made the most of any stories casting Jews in a bad light, even though much of its readership was Jewish. Yet the Advertiser made no great play with the notion of a Jewish murderer. Where was The Times receiving the covert information which it discreetly echoed? Obviously from its familiar contact Dr Anderson, who had leaked secret material for the anti-Parnell series while still at the Home Office.'The Crimes, Detection and Death of Jack the Ripper, p.208.
This is an excellent example of my contention that the word ' obviously' when used in Ripper writing usually only means, 'this conjecture or deduction is my decided opinion'. In 1986 I was excited by the discoveries that Anderson combined a cranky set of opinions about Judaism with little or no apparent traditional Judaeophobia, but was insistent that the Ripper was Jewish, and that his opinion could not be lightly brushed aside as had been the habit of less informed writers. I was astonished to take in the full import of his confession in his memoirs to contributing to the infamous series on 'Parnellism and Crime', since I hadn't, when first reading the memoirs, grasped that this was the vehicle for Piggott's notorious forgery trying to pin approval of the Phoenix Park murders on Parnell. I was fascinated to see The Times playing repeated and unnecessary variations of the 'Jews do this sort of murder' story (all too reminiscent of the traditional blood libel). And I put two and two and two together... and today I shouldn't be at all sure that they really add up to a valid conclusion. Under the more rigorous standards demanded today, I should replace 'obviously' with 'possibly', if I didn't water down the conjecture still further or even omit it.
With all good wishes,
Martin F |
Author: Jeff Bloomfield
Sunday, 06 May 2001 - 01:03 pm | | Dear Martin,
With Sir Robert anything is possible, vis-a-vis
the revelations about the origins of the "Parnellism and Crime" series in the Times.
When one deals with a revelation of activities,
which otherwise would not raise eyebrows or
might raise eyebrows, one has to place them
in context of when the revelations were made.
I'll site an example.
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote his autobiography,
MEMORIES AND ADVENTURES in the late 1920s. When
I read it, I was surprised to learn from it that
he was (briefly) on friendly terms with Oscar
Wilde. In 1889, the English representative for
Lippincott's invited both men to a dinner party,
and (as a result) Lippincott published THE PICTURE
OF DORIAN GRAY and THE SIGN OF FOUR. During the
dinner, Wilde told Doyle he enjoyed his historical
novel about Monmouth's Rebellion, MICAH CLARKE.
It seems that Doyle's portrait of Sir George
Jeffreys, as a "good man" gone corrupt - a fallen
angel - appealed to Doyle. Doyle seems to suggest
that this started a friendship between the men,
but after such a promising beginning, he breaks
off all further discussion of their relationship.
Of course, in 1929, Wilde's trials and conviction
for sodomy made any suggestions of intimate
friendship seem odd, and Doyle (in the middle of
his crusade for spiritualism) did not need any
additional questionable baggage to explain away.
So he seems to have censored his own memoirs.
Same thing with Sir Robert, in his memoirs. I
had to use THE LIGHTER SIDE... a few years ago
in an essay on the Waterloo Bridge Mystery. Although he was not involved in that 1857 case,
he claimed to learn the actual solution from a
French secret policeman. Possibly he did (his
solution was that the victim was an agent of
one of the various parties involved in the Italian
re-unification problem) but he held back from
naming who were the killers. Yet, reading between
the lines he seemed to suggest it could have been
Orsini's co-conspirators (like Dr. Bernard). Why
he held back in 1909 - 1911 from admitting his
guess I can't fathom. Possibly libel liability
(Dr. Bernard was acquitted in an English trial
about a year after Orsini's attempt). Who really
knows?
With Parnell, however, Anderson was on firmer
ground. Yes, the Pigott forgery was a discreditable business...but so was the O'Shea
Divorce Case. Even in Ireland Parnell's name was
not what it was in 1884 or 1889. To boast that
he had sent discredited documents to undermine
a political leader is normally to blacken one's
own reputation, but when the zeitgeist of one's
time has thrown that leader into a garbage heap
for other reasons, one can claim, "Yes, I sent
bad documentation in, but in the long run I was
right to do it!" That is how, I suspect, Sir
Robert actually saw it.
Best wishes,
Jeff |
Author: Martin Fido
Sunday, 06 May 2001 - 04:13 pm | | Hi Jeff,
But bear in mind, too, that Anderson was a really bigoted anti-Catholic and a completely unyielding Unionist. So Parnell at his best would still have seemed to him a traitor to his class and religion.
Of course, with his Dublin Castle connections and spymaster's experience, my guess is that Anderson knew what a dodgy figure Piggott was all along, and wouldhave been appalled to learn that The Times had accepted anything from him. Anderson's own contributions were essentially accounts of American Fenian leaders Parnell had met and mingled with, and their part in supporting and financing the bombing campaigns. (And, of course, their loopy, shift-one-letter secret code).
All the best,
Martin |
Author: Rosemary O'Ryan
Sunday, 06 May 2001 - 05:26 pm | | Dear Martin,
Really! I suggest you stop this late night reading of the Penny Dreadfuls. Melodrama is one thing...the truth, however, as Horton might trumpet, is sommat else.
Major Le Carron (aka.O'Ryan):-) |
Author: Martin Fido
Sunday, 06 May 2001 - 06:25 pm | | Does that alias in the superscribed name indicate a native of JSFMBOE?
Nbsujo G |
Author: Rosemary O'Ryan
Sunday, 06 May 2001 - 08:08 pm | | NFN-fizz geezer.
SPTFZ :-) |
Author: Jeff Bloomfield
Sunday, 06 May 2001 - 10:19 pm | | Dear nitraM and yramesoR,
I regret that I have lost the code - must contact
assoR'O to get it again. I think I dropped it
when we did the Scotland Yard job.
Yours,
ffeJ (a.k.a. "Dr. Cronin") |
Author: Martin Fido
Monday, 07 May 2001 - 06:34 am | | Hi jjeJ,
You're probably aware of this, but other readers might be interested, especially anyone who is seriously thinking of following up the Ripper's Fenian connection as alleged in Douglas G.Browne's 'The Rise of Scotland Yard'.
JSFMBOE was the actual code word for IRELAND in American Fenian secret messages. They simply used the next alphabetical letter for each character in their code. JSFMBOE was often quoted in press reports on Fenianism as a standard example of how the code worked. Nbsujo G is another (completely mystifying) application of the code, which I might, if I felt like it, intensify as,
Octvkp H
(who sounds like something from the OGPU) |
Author: Jeff Bloomfield
Monday, 07 May 2001 - 11:02 pm | | Dear Martin,
Although I have Browne's THE RISE OF SCOTLAND
YARD but can't recall the bit about the Irish
code. I'll have to go over it again. My
pitiable attempt at a backwards "mystery" code
is based on an episode in the sinking of the
Titanic. J. Bruce Ismay (unfortunately for his
reputation) survived. When he was on the Carpathia, he sent telegrams using the "disguised"
name of YAMSI. Nobody was fooled.
Jeff |
Author: Martin Fido
Tuesday, 08 May 2001 - 06:14 am | | Hi, Jeff,
I don't think the Fenian shift-one-letter code is mentioned in Browne. It's prominent in the 'Parnellism and Crime' series in The Times, however.
With all good wishes,
Martin |
Author: Eduardo Zinna
Tuesday, 08 May 2001 - 10:18 am | | Hello Martin and Jeff,
In America in the 60s I was told that the name of the computer in '2001' had been determined through a shift-one-letter code: from 'IBM' backwards to 'HAL'.
Best,
Eduardo |
Author: Martin Fido
Tuesday, 08 May 2001 - 03:35 pm | | Amq!
Lzqshm |
Author: Martin Fido
Tuesday, 08 May 2001 - 03:36 pm | | Sorry, that should be
Bmq!
Lzqshm |
Author: Rosemary O'Ryan
Tuesday, 08 May 2001 - 04:49 pm | | All such coding methods derive from Cabbalistic-
Wheels, a favourite toy of Druids, apparently.
X=/* :-) |
Author: Jim Leen
Wednesday, 09 May 2001 - 12:35 pm | | Hello Everybody,
Not having a crossword puzzle mind I'll refrain from any codes!
Jeff, I've previously mentioned your blood libel case on other boards, latterly on Jacob the Ripper? wherever that is. Your comments and insights would be appreciated.
I once had information that the story was attributed to the Okhrana but I can't place my hands on who blamed whom at the moment!
Incidentally, two days after the discovery that KE's uterus was missing, another story, originating on the continent, purported the frankly ridiculous claim that uterii were used by Jews to make candles. How bizarre!
Thanking you
Jim Leen |
Author: David Savitsky
Thursday, 10 May 2001 - 05:47 pm | | Hello Mr. Leen,
Could you elaborate on the story of the uterii/candle theory please. Where can you find this story? What does the story imply? Anything at all would be most helpful.
Thank you.
David |
Author: Rosemary O'Ryan
Thursday, 10 May 2001 - 08:27 pm | | Dear David,
Apparently, this theory is a rather lurid element in Ivor Edwards forthcoming book, (Jack the Black Magician), which I understand will document a case in S. Africa.
There does not appear to be a similar case in the annals of European 'black magic'.
Mr Leen was seeking information on the Ochrana's
Black Propaganda Office and its whacky racist rumour-mongerings...I think?
Rosey :-) |
Author: The Viper
Friday, 11 May 2001 - 02:47 am | | Details of the uteri candle story are available at the Casebook Press Reports section.
Press Reports
Check out the following:-
Jewish Chronicle for 5/Oct/88; 12/Oct/88; 26/Oct/88.
East London Advertiser for 13/Oct/88.
Illustrated Police News for 20/Oct/88.
(For some reason we don't seem to have the original story published in The Times. Will rectify this some time).
Regards, V. |
Author: Christopher T George
Friday, 11 May 2001 - 09:29 am | | Hi, David:
Viper has given you several good leads in contemporary press reports that discuss the story that European Jews made candles out of women's uteri. This story is also discussed in a number of books. I think, but am not certain, that Fido and Odell may touch on this theory in their books since both of those authors have explored the Jewish aspect of the murders. The idea that Jews made candles from uteri is one of the "myths" of the Whitechapel murders and, quite rightly, was bitterly denied by British Jews at the time.
Best regards
Chris George |
Author: Martin Fido
Saturday, 12 May 2001 - 05:59 am | | Hi Chris,
Yes. My treatment of the question is on pp.63-64 of 'The Crimes, Detection and Death,' and meets Viper's point with remarks to the effect that The Times's original story was a nasty new variation of the 'legend of blood', (2, 16 and 25 October editions), and it was 'every other newspaper' that copied from The Times which added the story of Gentile thieves in Galicia making 'corpse candles' from uteri which supposedly ensured that sleepers stayed asleep if the candles' light fell on them.
With all good wishes,
Martin |
Author: Jeff Bloomfield
Saturday, 12 May 2001 - 06:51 pm | | Dear Jim,
Keeping in mind that I am not an expert on the
history of the "blood libel" accusation, I'll
do the best to explain what it entails and
what it has caused.
In the middle ages, due to the growth of Christianity and relative collapse of learning,
ignorance combined with hatred of Jews and other
non-Christians (pagans, Mohammadans after 632 A.D., and different splinter groups of Christianity from the Eastern Orthodox after 1076
or so, to such groups as the Albigensians a century later). In the case of the Jews the
basic reasons for the hatred were their so-called
killing of Jesus and their refusal to acknowledge
Jesus as the Son of God and to worship him.
As time passed, Jews were prevented from working
in certain professions, and were forced into
areas which eventually became ghettos. They were
also suspected of other crimes, for if they were
capable of killing God they could kill anyone.
Blood Libel was specifically about the murder of
Christians (usually children) to use their blood
for rituals (a typical lie on this - the use of
children's blood for baking matzoh at Passover).
It was universally believed in Christian Europe.
In England the Jews suffered pogroms and physical
destruction for the killing of children like
little Hugh of Lincoln, whose story is retold in
Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. Hugh was made into a
saint, until the 1960s when the Roman Catholic
Church removed him from the list of saints. But
that was centuries later. Other variants on the
Blood Libel included the lie that Jews stole the
eucharist wafers and at secret conclaves tortured
them until the savior's blood ran anew.
In 1089, during the early part of Richard the
Lion Hearted, the Jews of York were massacred -
a subject that is somewhat discussed by Walter
Scott when dealing with Rebecca and Isaac of
York in Ivanhoe. Two centuries later,in 1290,
Edward I became the first European monarch to
order the Jews to leave his realm. There were
no native born Jews in England from 1290 to 1655.
That year, convinced by Rabbi Manasseh ben Israel
of Amsterdam of the moral rights and religious
necessity of the case*, Oliver Cromwell allowed
the Jews to return to England. Despite the
end of the Commonwealth Government three years
later, King Charles II decided to allow this
to continue. [*Cromwell was a believer in
millenialism, and the second coming of Christ -
but Manasseh pointed out that this was impossible
unless the Jews were scattered all over the world,
and they couldn't if they could not be in England!]
When Shakespeare creates Shylock in The Merchant
of Venice, about 1595/96, there are some Jews in
England, connected with foreign governments or
personally invited by monarchs and powerful nobles. In 1594, Dr. Roderigo Lopez, a Portuguese
Marrano (a Jew converted to Christian) was executed for trying to kill Queen Elizabeth I
(as the accuser was the corrupt favorite, the
Earl of Essex, the reality of Lopez's guilt is
questionable). It is doubtful that Shakespeare
ever really met any Jews.
To add to the issue of "blood libel" the Black
Death made many continental Europeans think they
were being poisoned by Jews who poisoned water
supplies and wells. During the Crusades, in
the Rhineland, there were massacres of Jewish
communities on the route. I should point out,
however, that on the Crusades, the Albigensian
Christians were also destroyed, and the Greek
Orthodox capital of Byzantium, Constantinople,
was sacked in 1214 or so.
As we pass into more recent times, "blood libel"
seems to pass out of the issues of Jews - but it
does resurface frequently. In the backward areas
of Europe, Poland, Russia, the Balkans, Spain,
it resurfaces. It also spread to the United States (yes, really), and to Islam. In 1928, in
Messina, New York, the disappearance of several
children was blamed (briefly) on Jews. I mentioned that Julius Streicher mentioned it fully in Der Sturmer during the Nazi period in
Germany. After the war, in Orleans, France, there were suspicions of Jews in several disappearances. A massacre of Polish Jews occurred in 1946 when a young Polish boy lied
to his elders and said his disappearance was due
to being kidnapped by Jews. When confronted by
the bodies, the boy just shrugged his shoulders
and smiled (he was never punished, from what I
understand). The Arabs embraced the libel after
the creation of the state of Israel, but in 1840
the Jews in Damascus were being attacked for
possible responsibility in the murder or disappearance of children. Rothschild and
Sir Moses Montefiore tried to assist the Damascus
Jewish community. Their attempts to get assistance from Tsar Nicholas I, who had influence in the Christian communities in Damascus, met with icy contempt.
The Beiliss Affair in 1911 - 1913 occupied the
attentions of the great-grandson of Nicholas I,
Nicholas II. The Romanov Government was slowly
collapsing, having lost the Russo - Japanese
War, and suffered the Revolution of 1905. Despite reformers like Serge Witte and Pyotr
Stolypin (assassinated in 1911) Nicholas II was
opposed to the feeble democratic institutions
forced from him. He saw the Beiliss Affair as
a way of restoring Romanoff strength by anti-
Semitism.
The affair was based on the murder of two children (by cut throats). Their mother blamed
Beiliss, and the authorities (including the
Okhrana) chose to believe her. Pity, because
the woman was a criminal fence and smuggler, who may have murdered her children to silence them. Beiliss was eventually the recipient of a jury
that could not make up it's mind, and the coming of World War I prevented any retrial.
The best account of the murder was Maurice Samuel's 1964 book, BLOOD LIBEL. A novel
(by Bernard Malamud, I believe) called THE
FIXER, was made in the 1960s, and made into a film with Alan Bates (as Beiliss, Jakob Bok in the story).
I hope this is of some use to you.
Jeff |
|
|
|
|
