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** 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 **
Archive through April 27, 2001
Casebook Message Boards: The Diary of Jack the Ripper: General Discussion:
The Maybrick Diary-Archives 2001:
Archive through April 27, 2001
Author: Martin Fido
Wednesday, 25 April 2001 - 06:46 pm |        | Peter - Many thanks for posting Melvin's piece. I'll put a brief response on the proper board.
Martin F |
Author: Christopher T George
Wednesday, 25 April 2001 - 11:58 pm | | Hi, Martin:
I entirely agree with you that Mike and the line from Crashaw is a very puzzling piece to this whole puzzle. I said earlier that Mike going to the Liverpool Central Library to look for the quote when he already had it struck me like something out of a Roddy Doyle novel. His appearance at the Cloak and Dagger Club in April 1999, from descriptions of the appearance and a recording of the interview of Mike conducted by Keith Skinner, kindly provided to me by Stewart Evans, likewise strikes me as straight out of Roddy Doyle, whereby Mike would say that he had the proof of the forgery scheme, would produce the correct receipts to prove the whole sordid affair a sham, etc., but never did: A man who was trying extremely hard to be believable but not quite succeeding. A man enjoying the spotlight but never able to satisfy the audience's curiosity for the goods on the Diary. Since you were there on that night, I would think that you share a similar view of him.
Best regards
Chris George |
Author: Martin Fido
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 07:58 am | | Dear Mark,
Unless I've missed it, you've again posted straightforward 'beginner's' questions which nobody's bothering to answer, we're all so busy with our ongoings.
I think all four of the positions you postulate have been considered at one time or another, and more or less rejected for one reason or other, except for the preponderant current opinion that some one other than Maybrick wrote it and somewhere along the line it was passed off as a genuine confession by Maybrick, and to that extent it is a fake.
Keith, in the early days when we were led to believe that the ink of the diary definitely came from the Maybrick household, and before we had external evidence that it was not in Maybrick's hand, gave long and serious consideration to the possibility that Maybrick had actually written it under some form of delusion or compulsion, though he wasn't the Ripper. This, I think, he ultimately dismissed when his Feldy-financed discovery of further letters by Maybrick finally (in most people's opinion) put to rest the suggestion that Maybrick might have written the diary with drugs or mental stress or disguise making his handwriting seem different.
Other people gave thought to the possibility that somebody wanting to help Florence Maybrick composed it to denigrate James's memory. Had this been the case, it would still have been a fake unless they had evidence to substanmtiate their charge. And no such evidence seems to most of us to appear from internal evidence in the diary.
Once there seemed no further hope of any arguments persuading most people that the diary could be in Maybrick's distorted hand, I suggested to Shirley that her position now should really be that somebody else had copied into the album/scrapbook a genuine Maybrick document. I don't know why this last position has never been taken up.
And, of course, Shirley and Feldy still propose that there is a strong probability that the diary genuinely represents the words of James Maybrick, the truth about the Ripper case, and in that sense is definitely not a fake.
Hope this helps you,
Wuth all good wishes,
Martin F |
Author: John Omlor
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 08:51 am | | Hi Mark,
Here are a couple of other fun thoughts about what's real and what's a fake that I had after reading your questions. Let's say we learn for sure, we become absolutely certain, that the diary was composed in the last fifteen years. And we even learn when and where and by whom it was composed and that, of course, it can have no link whatsoever to the real Maybrick or the real Ripper. Once we know that, is the diary still a fake?
It still exists, but now as a text that can no longer simply announce itself as an authentic diary by James Maybrick confessing he is Jack the Ripper and perhaps it becomes an oddly interesting and even fun little fictional "what-if" artefact or performance. Suddenly, it can be read as a somewhat imaginative though not I think, very good or subtle or complex or even finally aesthetically successful sort of created literary performance.
Curiously enough though, once it relinquishes its claim to being "real," it no longer becomes a fake.
Then what is it? Would people still buy it, just for the read? Perhaps they could reproduce the volume itself, making new "old Victorian albums" and carefully photo-reproducing the handwriting on their pages and the wear and tear and the black stuff in the spine and everything, as a sort of souvenir or art book (sort of like Nick Bantock's cool Griffin and Sabine series). I bet some people would want a copy. It would be an interesting conversation piece if it was produced with care. If we learn for sure when and where and how this thing was composed, will they still make the movie? What will the movie be? Another fantasy based "What-if" sort of thing like Time After Time, where the Ripper is a friend of H.G. Wells and they both head for 20th Century San Francisco in Wells's time machine? (Best line of the movie: Jack sits Wells down on the bed in his hotel and turns on the TV. Uses the remote to flip channels and passes war films, football games, news footage of horrible accidents and murders, wrestling matches, and other modern day dramatic violence. He turns to Wells, who has been trying to convince him that they should return to the 19th Century, and says with confidence, "You don't belong here, Herbert. I'm home.") Anyway, once we know for sure where this diary came from, what does Battlecrease become? Does Hopkin's Maybrick-Ripper then have the same sort of fictional status as his Hannibal or his Titus? And is that OK?
These questions popped into my head when I read your post asking about what constitutes a fake. For a fascinating little discussion of this topic, check out Orson Welles' odd little psuedo-documentary called F is for Fake. See also the speculations on this troublesome question about the relationship between authenticity, value, history, and art, offered by Keith Carradine (as an accomplished forger in 1920's Paris) in Alan Rudolph's delightful film The Moderns.
These remain, for me at least, interesting questions for a morning's wandering.
--John |
Author: Peter R.A. Birchwood
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 08:52 am | | John:
1/ The only person discussing Devereux and his diary knowledge is Feldy and he quotes (p139) from Nancy Steele, Tony's daughter as saying that she knew nothing about the diary. However Tony had, as you will see if you check his will, other children and it's not clear if Feldy spoke to them. It is of course clear that Tony had the Whittington-Egan book and that it had been borrowed from MB. It's not necesarily true to say of Tony that "he didn't read". Your comments do not actually make sense: if Tony's "family" didn't know about the diary does that presume therefore that TONY didn't know about it and was keeping it secret for some reason? And Tony definitely knew Gerard Kane.
2/ MB made several confessions and also retracted them. I agree: his confessions are not reliable but may have been made for a similar reason to the theory positted for AG's acceptance of her family provenance of the diary: simply to make his ownership of the thing more definite by keeping production within his family unit. It's therefore entirely possible to theorise a connection with MB and someone else as "Jim the Penman."
3/ If we understand that people unlike fictional characters do not always act in reasonable or logical ways then I would not be surprised that MB could act in this fashion. I am still awaiting confirmation of the details from this particular booksearch company but it is still more likely that the red diary was bought to be the recipient of the Maybrick material and found unsuitable thus instituting a search for something better.
4/ It would be interesting to know what the result of the interview with MB's sister was? I presume of course that somebody did bother to interview her once MB gave the story that she had been the recipient of the material used in the forgery plus the disks concerned and that she had destroyed everything. Perhaps the transcripts held by Messrs. Begg and Skinner might help and I'm sure that they will be more accessible than the Feldman/Skinner/Graham tapes. If more questions had been asked between 1992 and 1994 we might have been able to clear the whole thing up by now.
And John, do you really have any evidence yourself other than what you have picked up from the books and the boards that a number of increasing unlikely speculations are more likely than the more simple explanation that the diary was forged between 1990 and 1992 by a small group of individuals in the Liverpool area?
By the way, I do apologise if I have failed to understand any of your messages on these boards. In my own business I have to make sense of several different items of evidence that might lead a particular person or persons to an inheritance and my expertice in this field has often led me to defend my conclusions in Probate Courts. Since College I have had little to do with the sort of word-by-word criticism that I see here. |
Author: Martin Fido
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 10:38 am | | Mark and John,
Even if a reliably documented fake, the diary would come to have quite a market value if two of the disputants over its origins - let's pick a good-natured pair who haven't abused anybody over the boards - say Shirley Harrison and Stewart Evans - suddenly disagreed so violently that they ordered pistols at dawn, and one of them became the last victim to die in a duel in England. At that point the forged diary, as the source of the incident, would become a real collector's item.
But I fear that like Oliver Edwards, our attempts to be philosophers are being undermined because humour will keep coming in.
All the best,
Martin |
Author: John Omlor
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 10:39 am | | Hi Peter,
Thanks for the response.
You write, addressing my questions elsewhere:
"1/ The only person discussing Devereux and his diary knowledge is Feldy and he quotes (p139) from Nancy Steele, Tony's daughter as saying that she knew nothing about the diary. However Tony had, as you will see if you check his will, other children and it's not clear if Feldy spoke to them. It is of course clear that Tony had the Whittington-Egan book and that it had been borrowed from MB. It's not necessarily true to say of Tony that "he didn't read". Your comments do not actually make sense: if Tony's "family" didn't know about the diary does that presume therefore that TONY didn't know about it and was keeping it secret for some reason? And Tony definitely knew Gerard Kane."
I think you misunderstood my question here. And it is not just Feldy discussing Tony and his diary knowledge. In a post that appeared on Saturday, April 21, 2001 - 10:43 pm and which remains in the archive, Karoline sent to Paul a list of what she called "available facts" that were followed by what she claimed were convenient "alternate explanations" which she clearly felt were not the most "likely" ones and which were being used to avoid the likely scenario of complicity.
Here, from her own original post, is one of Karoline's available facts and the too-convenient alternate explanation she seeks to dismiss in her post:
"Devereaux's family say they never saw the diary or heard him talk about it?
Well, maybe they aren't telling the truth. or maybe he kept it quiet from them.
This is all couched in terms that seem reasonable. But are they really? How rational is this method of reasoning and where does it actually get us?"
That is the quote from Karoline's list. Now, if she is claiming that Tony was the link between Kane and Mike (and she has done this explicitly and repeatedly -- I can offer the citations) then either this underscored line is no longer an established fact in support of her claim and she herself needs this "alternate explanation" or she would have to be claiming that Mike met Kane through Tony but that Tony thereafter knew nothing about the diary. Given her own writing, these are the only logical possibilities.
So the comment of mine which you say "does not actually make sense": "if Tony's 'family' didn't know about the diary does that presume therefore that TONY didn't know about it and was keeping it secret for some reason?" is actually, specifically, and carefully based on Karoline's use of her "established fact" (her phrase) that "Devereaux's family say they never saw the diary or heard him talk about it? She suggests that this makes Mike's story that he got the diary from Tony less likely than that he composed itself. But as you yourself have just very nicely demonstrated, it does not and cannot make one of these scenarios any less likely than the other since, as you point out, not all of Tony's children were interviewed and since in any case we can finally infer nothing at all from this about whether Tony knew or didn't know or whether his knowledge indicates anything about Mike’s knowledge concerning the forgery. Tony could indeed have known about the forgery and Mike not have known. Mike could have known and Tony not have known. Karoline's original citation of this established fact, that "Devereaux's family say they never saw the diary or heard him talk about it?" suggests nothing really or specifically about the likelihood of Mike's complicity. You have just demonstrated this yourself. It is precisely what I have been claiming all along. Thank you.
Now onto number 2.
You write:
"2/ MB made several confessions and also retracted them. I agree: his confessions are not reliable but may have been made for a similar reason to the theory posited for AG's acceptance of her family provenance of the diary: simply to make his ownership of the thing more definite by keeping production within his family unit. It's therefore entirely possible to theorize a connection with MB and someone else as "Jim the Penman."
I would have said "Shem" myself, but fair enough.  Thanks for the agreement that Mike's confessions are "not reliable" and therefore, logically, rather thoroughly discredited as sworn statements. Unfortunately Karoline also included, in two separate lists, the "fact" that Mike confessed to the crimes as being evidence in support of his complicity. In fact, the very first item on her list of "established facts" and "discovered alternate explanations" which she sees as too convenient, the item that begins this list is, yes, Mike's confessions! Here, word for word, is her opening sentence to Paul and her first "established fact."
Karoline wrote:
"Paul, of course, anyone can take a circumstantial case like this one and 'discover' alternate explanation for each of the available facts.
MB confessed?
Well, he was probably lying."
Now remember, Karoline's conclusion to all of this was:
"This is all couched in terms that seem reasonable. But are they really? How rational is this method of reasoning and where does it actually get us?"
Now you, Peter, are telling me that Karoline's "established fact" cannot be considered evidence of Mike's complicity, since the confession itself is "unreliable" and even a false statement under oath. In other words, Peter, you are now telling me that Mike was "probably lying." So you are advancing precisely the possibility that Karoline can be seen here suggesting remains only a convenient "alternate explanation" which would not be a "rational" part of any "method of reasoning!" Obviously, Karoline's "alternate explanations" are not that irrational or even "alternate" at all. Obviously, they are now the "likely" and "probable" explanation.
Obviously the "established fact" that Mike confessed, does not, because of the thorough unreliability of those confessions, support in any way the likelihood or probability of Mike's complicity. This is also exactly what I have been suggesting all along. Thank you again.
Once again, if his confessions are themselves discredited, unlikely and even inconsistent, then surely they cannot be allowed to stand as evidence which could be legitimately claimed to in any way make his complicity in the crime more likely. As I say, this is what I have been explicitly arguing all along. Thank you, seriously, for your supporting paragraph here.
Now, why did Mike offer such bizarre and apparently misleading confessions? I have no idea. Can their failures and inconsistencies be read to suggest that Mike couldn't tell the truth about how the thing was composed and therefore perhaps did not compose it or did not know how it was composed? Sure. Can they be read as a deliberate attempt to mislead, by giving a false account that would allow the diary’s status and origins to remain uncertain and still keep Mike's claim to ownership intact. Sure. This might be an elaborate con which seeks to lead us all down false paths. It would have been a very clever move, this deliberately fragmentary and false confession designed only to distract. It would have been a politically wily move. Or he could just not have known what the hell he was talking about, because he did not really know how the thing was created in the first place and was therefore simply not capable of demonstrating how it was done in any reliable or believable way. Now I ask you, knowing Mike, which of these possibilities is now the "most likely" or "most probable." I think I have made my point. And even if your answer is well, we don’t know, we can't tell which is more likely really, then you are saying exactly what I have been saying all along and the case against Mike or Anne as complicit is no longer even supported by the evidence to be the most "likely" or "probable" scenario. You see?
Now to number 3.)
"3/ If we understand that people unlike fictional characters do not always act in reasonable or logical ways then I would not be surprised that MB could act in this fashion. I am still awaiting confirmation of the details from this particular booksearch company but it is still more likely that the red diary was bought to be the recipient of the Maybrick material and found unsuitable thus instituting a search for something better."
This is a very odd paragraph. It begins by suggesting that it is at least possible, perhaps more than possible, that Mike was not acting "in reasonable or logical ways." Then it concludes that therefore his purchase of the maroon diary was "most likely" for the purpose of committing the crime. So you are basing your "most likely" scenario on the possibility of Mike’s behaving in an "unreasonable and illogical" way. What sort of reasoning is this? Even allowing that Mike has behaved elsewhere and repeatedly in an illogical and unreasonable manner, just what sort of way is this to read evidence and establish conclusions, even about what is likely. You are saying that the only thing that allows you to claim it is more likely that Mike bought the diary to use specifically and shortly thereafter in a criminal act is that he might very well behave in illogical and unreasonable ways? Wow. Using this sort of argument I could claim that anything at all was "most likely" since Mike may very well have been acting in an illogical and unreasonable manner. This is not a reading of evidence at all. This is pure hypothetical speculation based on the assumption that someone was behaving illogically. How can you use this to claim anything!?
Here are the "facts," as we know them (or at least the current version of them). A short time before Mike took the diary to Doreen's, he ordered a maroon Victorian diary, using his own name and giving his home address and paying with a check easily traceable to his own family and getting receipt which the merchant would have had a copy of. And you are seriously telling me that this indicates that Mike intended to use this diary in a criminal forgery in a short time knowing that the purchase of the diary could be traced easily and quickly back to his own real name and his own home address? And your evidence in support of this claim, in support of this reading of criminal intent, is "people often do unreasonable and illogical things!?" That Mike has done "illogical and unreasonable" things at other times? This is your "evidence?" This is what you think allows you to logically and seriously claim that the most likely scenario was a criminal one, that as you say, "it is still more likely that the red diary was bought to be the recipient of the Maybrick material."
I'm sorry, Peter, but examining specific facts such as the ones we have that tell us that Mike ordered a book using his own name and address and paying with a traceable check and getting a receipt and then saying, as if it were a conclusion that this "most likely" indicates that Mike was planning to use this very book in a felonious criminal act in only a short time, since after all, people often do illogical and unreasonable things, seems to me to be to be quite clearly illogical and unreasonable. It is certainly no way to base a case of forgery and certainly not a step by step careful interpretation of any "most likely" scenario supported by what actually took place. (Of course, it becomes very easy to simply ignore big parts of what actually took place [such as Mike giving his name, etc], if we are just willing, whenever necessary, to say, "hey, people often do illogical and unreasonable things.")
Talk about convenient "alternate explanations."
Finally, number 4.
"4/ It would be interesting to know what the result of the interview with MB's sister was? I presume of course that somebody did bother to interview her once MB gave the story that she had been the recipient of the material used in the forgery plus the disks concerned and that she had destroyed everything. Perhaps the transcripts held by Messrs. Begg and Skinner might help and I'm sure that they will be more accessible than the Feldman/Skinner/Graham tapes. If more questions had been asked between 1992 and 1994 we might have been able to clear the whole thing up by now."
Hey! I agree with this one. It would indeed be interesting. But until we do, we can say nothing about the fate of the disk with any confidence whatsoever and therefore cannot logically claim that the transcript on the disk was destroyed by Mike or kept by Mike. Consequently we cannot claim that the transcript was written before or after the diary was finished and therefore, as it stands now, it cannot yet be offered as support for the likelihood or probability for or against Mike and or Anne's complicity. Agreed? This is exactly what I have been saying all along. I too wish more questions had been asked earlier. I would also like to know what Mike and Anne were doing between say 1985 and 1991. But since the questions were not asked, we can say almost nothing about the origins and the fate of this transcription and the disk it was on, and consequently we cannot claim it makes Mike's complicity any more or less likely. Once again, this has always been precisely my point. Thank you again for helping me establish its validity and soundness.
Finally, you ask me a question:
"And John, do you really have any evidence yourself other than what you have picked up from the books and the boards that a number of increasing unlikely speculations are more likely than the more simple explanation that the diary was forged between 1990 and 1992 by a small group of individuals in the Liverpool area?
Absolutely not! The difference is, I have never claimed that such evidence even exists and I am certainly not claiming that such a scenario exists anywhere but in my own fanciful imagination. I have precisely said this more than several times and can offer you explicit citations, dates, and time if you'd like. And I have certainly never claimed that any specific scenario is in any way "more likely" "than the more simple explanation that the diary was forged between 1990 and 1992 by a small group of individuals in the Liverpool area?"
In fact I have written at no doubt ponderous and tedious lengths about why I would never make such a claim and why I think using the phrase "more likely" in this case, with the state of evidence and narratives (and contradictions and inconsistencies) as it now exists, is not only illogical and invalid, but even irresponsible. [Incidentally, as an irrelevant aside: I too am inclined to lean towards a small group of individuals in Liverpool, although my own date of preference (like yours without any substantial evidence whatsoever in support of it) would perhaps be closer to the centennial.]
In any case, this remains speculation on both our parts so far, and, most importantly, nothing you have said anywhere in your post has in any way offered any evidence that the contradictions I originally cited did not exist in Karoline's lists of evidence or that any case can be made specifically for the likelihood or probability of knowledge and complicity on the part of two specific people: Mike and Anne. In the name of justice and a fair interpretation of very scant evidence and the reliability of our own reading and with consideration for the reputations of all involved I still do not believe we have done the work or made the case necessary to confidently claim that it is more likely or probable that Mike and Anne knew the details or actively participated in the research creation and execution of this document. Material evidence is missing everywhere. Links are being "established" with unfortunately vague phrases like "known associate" but without any material evidence whatsoever to support them. Items being claimed as evidence in support of the case for complicity are demonstrably self-contradictory, illogical, unreasonable, and incomplete or irrelevant. This is no way to accuse anyone of anything, or even to claim that anyone "probably" did anything. This is simply not responsible reading or careful interpretation or logical or valid argument and it does not yet allow us to fairly reach any conclusions about what might or might not "most likely" be the truth.
This has been my concern throughout this investigation and this seems to me still the only responsible conclusion so far available.
Thanks, Peter and everyone for reading,
--John |
Author: Paul Begg
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 11:01 am | | Dear Peter
I have every sympathy with your problems with word-by-word criticism, but such close analysis probably wouldn't be necessary if people were more precise and better understood the implications of what they are saying. For example - and I mean no criticism of you - but you wrote: And John, do you really have any evidence yourself other than what you have picked up from the books and the boards that a number of increasing unlikely speculations are more likely than the more simple explanation that the diary was forged between 1990 and 1992 by a small group of individuals in the Liverpool area?
This statement seems fair enough, except hat it actually contains some assumptions John might not agree with, such as (i) the speculations being 'unlikely' and being 'increasing(ly) unlikely', (ii) that he is suggesting that these speculations are more or less likely than any other speculations and (iii) that he has disputed that the diary was forged "by a small group of individuals in the Liverpool area" (he hasn't disputed this; he has in particular requested the evidence or the logical argument for what was initially a definite statement that the forgers were Mike and Anne and which has now grown - without any noticeable acknowledgment - to a "small group").
You see what you have done? You have asked the same sort of question as 'have you stopped beating your wife?' And your question is as unanswerable. John cannot reply simply. He is forced into answering at length, pointing out the errors in your reasoning or argument and either asking for clarification or suggesting what you mean and why it is wrong. |
Author: Paul Begg
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 11:03 am | | Ah!
|
Author: Caroline Anne Morris
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 11:26 am | | Hi Karoline,
I posted a few dates and facts about the Crashaw quote on October 30 2000 on the ‘Jack’s Watch board. Then on November 2 2000 I posted Keith’s record of 12th October 1994. But briefly, Shirley gives the date for Mike ‘discovering’ the quote in the library as September 30 1994.
Mike told Shirley, 12 days later, on October 12 1994, that he was taking his own copy of the Sphere Guide, which he said had come into his home after the Hillsborough disaster in April 1989, to his solicitor that very day – ie October 12 1994.
Shirley has asked the solicitor if he can confirm the date given her by Mike, but appears to have had no luck so far.
Melvin’s source for the date of lodgement is also Mike, but this time via Alan Gray. Gray has given Melvin an unconfirmed date of around early September 1994.
So there is an obvious discrepancy here. But we are ultimately left with Mike’s word in both cases, unless someone can get the correct date from Mike’s solicitor’s records, or Alan Gray can come up with a firm date he can substantiate somehow.
Love,
Caz |
Author: Martin Fido
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 11:29 am | | Omigod! Mike's word! Brothers and sisters, if THAT'S the source in all cases, then believe me - Nobody Knows!
Martin F |
Author: Caroline Anne Morris
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 11:29 am | | Hi Martin,
Thanks as always for your comments.
You wrote:
I cannot dispute Caz's point that it is possible that Mike spotted it, riffling through Ricks in the public library, where he was now searching the literature section in the hopes that it would - do what?
reveal the 'Oh costly...' quote to him – that’s what! Shirley had been asking him to do just that - something constructive, like finding a source for the ‘Oh costly intercourse of death’ lines in the diary.
As I said, it’s a puzzle why Mike would be so pleased to announce that he’d found the quote by himself in the library’s Sphere Guide, then go and spoil it all within days, by announcing that he had owned the same book since 1989, and had given it to his current girlfriend’s son during the summer, but would try to retrieve it to lodge with his solicitor. And a puzzle why he didn’t produce it to back up his June 1994 confession, when he didn’t, or couldn’t, give any other details of his involvement.
Love,
Caz |
Author: Caroline Anne Morris
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 11:33 am | | Hi RJ,
A bit more about the maroon diary for you. I’ve just been speaking with Keith again. He confirms that the cheque stub for £25 matched the cheque, which was paid to the book firm and passed through Anne’s account. Anne herself obtained a photocopy of this cheque for Keith. Since publication of Shirley’s 1998 Blake edition, further information was obtained from the book firm, giving the details and timing of Mike’s order. In July 1999, Shirley and Keith posted about all this, and I have reposted it all at least twice on the diary boards. But there still doesn’t appear to be any evidence that Anne knew about this diary before May 18 1992, when she actually paid for it.
Talking about the April 1999 C&D meeting, as Chris was last night, Keith says he took all this evidence of the maroon diary purchase along with him, plus samples of Anne’s handwriting, together with some photocopies for anyone interested in having a look or taking copies away. I must admit that I was so carried away with my first time at the club that I didn’t take advantage of this at the time. I bet Peter and Karoline are kicking themselves now if they didn’t either. I don’t think they put any questions to Mike either. I passed a long list of my own to Keith beforehand.
Anne’s attitude to producing the maroon diary documentation when asked appears to be in marked contrast to Mike’s over the auction ticket, doesn’t it?
In June 1999, Peter was saying how important it was to find out if Anne was telling the truth or not in 1995, when asked about the maroon diary. I wonder if Peter would have found it more important if she had lied.
Love,
Caz |
Author: Caroline Anne Morris
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 11:39 am | | Hi John,
Since no one has made more than a half-hearted stab at addressing your famous 4 questions over on the College Course board, I think I'll post there now and do my best to help out. This is a serious attempt on my part to iron out and deal with the contradictions you noted, taking into account the facts we have right now, and Melvin's claims, which must surely count for something.
See what you think of the resulting new scenario.
Love,
Caz |
Author: John Omlor
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 11:42 am | | Hi All,
I've made a couple small additions and corrections to my earlier reply to Peter, now eight posts above (counting Paul's smile).
If anyone wishes to refer or to respond to any of it, please be so kind as to re-read it carefully beforehand to take account of the revised and added words.
Sorry about that, but I wanted to get it right. It now appears in what I think is its final version. I am now mostly satisfied with its readings, arguments, and conclusions. So please have another look.
Thanks,
--John
PS: Caz, I think Peter's post to me this morning, to which I have attempted to respond carefully and in some detail and which I have just now finished slightly revising, was an explicit attempt to respond to these particular questions. But I look forward to reading your thoughts, as well. |
Author: Caroline Anne Morris
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 11:53 am | | Hi Peter,
Just before I leap over to make a small deposit on the College Course board -
You wrote:
Perhaps the transcripts held by Messrs. Begg and Skinner might help and I'm sure that they will be more accessible than the Feldman/Skinner/Graham tapes. If more questions had been asked between 1992 and 1994 we might have been able to clear the whole thing up by now.
Well, if enough questions weren't asked then, it's a bit late to cry over spilled milk. But you could help clear the whole thing up now by asking Melvin when and where he would like to meet up with you, Keith and Shirley. Keith and Shirley will bring their transcripts along (so you can compare them with each other and with the diary) and you can bring Kane's larger handwriting sample, together with any evidence you have found by then that he is, or was, a known associate of the Barretts. If Melvin can also provide evidence that either Mike or Anne were handling and placing a known modern forgery, I really think the whole thing should be able to be cleared up to everyone's satisfaction, including your own.
Love,
Caz |
Author: Paul Begg
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 12:09 pm | | Hi Martin
In September 1994 Shirley Harrison asked Mike to do something useful like find the quote. He ‘discovered’ it on September 30th and claimed he’d found it after diligent searching at Liverpool Library, only to thus realise that he had his own copy of the Sphere book in his attic.
According to Melvin Harris (apparently via Alan Grey), Mike had in fact realised the significance of the Sphere book a long time earlier – maybe even before his confession to Brough in Liverpool (we’re told he didn’t produce it for Brough because Brough wanted everything for nothing, but this seems doubtful since Mike wasn’t selling) – and at some point ‘long before’ his break with Anne (maybe Caz can remind me what Melvin’s argument about the date was; I recall that the definition of ‘break’ got a bit confusing) he lodged the ‘diary’ with his solicitor. We are told by Melvin that Alan Grey ‘phoned the solicitor at the beginning of September and confirmed that a book was lodged there. We do not know that this is true, but on October 12 1994 Mike told Shirley that he was taking his copy of the book to his solicitor.
What we do know is that during the summer of 1994 Mike took the Sphere book with others to the home of his girlfriend in the hope that they might be of use to her son in his school studies. The books had until then been in his loft. The books weren’t of any use and Mike presumably brought them back home.
The problem for us is that Mike’s story about finding the quote at Liverpool Library could be true – it does have a sort of ring of truth about it. Alternatively, he could have found the quote when he took the books to his girlfriend’s son, realised its significance when Shirley asked him to do some research and grasped the opportunity it gave him to show off and gain some kudos for finding the quote nobody else could find. Or Mike’s story to Melvin is true and he realised the significance of the quote ages earlier, lodged it with his solicitor and steadfastly didn’t do anything with it until he needed to prove he’d forged the ‘diary’, but in the end threw this valuable piece of evidence away by claiming he’d found it in the library.
Against the first is what is deemed its improbability along with the enormity of the needed coincidence that Mike should possess a copy of the very book and that it should fall open on the page containing the quote. I’m not sure what’s against the second alternative. And the third seems unlikely because (a) Mike would almost certainly have produced it and (b) if he’d kept it for as long as he did, it’s not really very reasonable to suppose that he’d have suddenly chucked the whole thing away (though Mike is kind of impetuous).
So you pays yer money and takes yer choice. It is and important choice though. |
Author: Mark List
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 12:34 pm | | John and Martin,
Thanks for all your input.
I'm still new at the board, so I'm not sure where to post my questions.
So I apologize to all if my questions show up in the wrong place.
Cheers,
Mark |
Author: Caroline Anne Morris
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 12:59 pm | | Hi Paul,
As I said to Karoline, if you go to the posts on the 'Jack's Watch' board towards the end of October and the start of November 2000, there is a lot of 'Costly' stuff hanging around. Here you will find the saga of how Melvin's LONG BEFORE (his own emphasis, and referring to Mike's Sphere book of faulty binding notoriety) Mike's break with Anne (in January 1994) and his first confession (in June 1994), gradually mutates, after gentle prodding on the part of yours truly, and finally becomes early September 1994 - the earliest date that Gray maintains there was a book lodged with Mike's solicitor.
Er, hope all is now clear, guv.
Love,
Caz |
Author: John Omlor
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 01:24 pm | | Hello again, everyone,
I would like to return for a moment to the question of the maroon diary.
Peter has suggested that Mike ordered and purchased it using his own name, his home address, paying with an easily traceable check and getting a receipt, all with the intent to very shortly thereafter use it in a criminal conspiracy to commit fraud.
Now of course, on the surface this looks "unlikley," since Mike's purchase would have been easily traceable and since Mike did nothing at all apparently to disguise this purchase or to acquire the diary in some way that would not instantly link this forgery directly to him once it hit the streets. Unless he didn't care about being linked to this book, didn't care about being quickly tracked down and caught as a forger pawning off a recently purchased diary as an authentic Victorian document, didn't care about being quickly prosecuted using incontrovertable material evidence of his own participation in the crime, Mike would, at first glance, not seem to have been intending to use this book in a forgery.
However, we are told by Peter that the "more likely" scenario is indeed that Mike intended to use this book in just such a criminal act, despite all appearances to the contrary. And his evidence for this is...
"that people unlike fictional characters do not always act in reasonable or logical ways ."
OK, for a moment let's put aside our reservations about this observation actually being evidence of anything at all. And let's also admit that Mike indeed does not always (or even regularly) act in reasonable or logical ways.
What can we logically, validly conclude from this? What is now the "most likely" scenario?
As I see it, there are two possibilities under consideration.
1.) That Mike bought this diary in this way, taking no precautions whatsoever to disguise his purchase or the book's origins, specifically in order to commit a felonious criminal act with it.
or 2.) That Mike bought this diary because he was holding a document that was alleged to be an authentic Victorian diary and he had his doubts about it's authenticity and he was trying to research the possibilities before taking the diary to an agent's. Consequently, he decided that he needed to get his hands on a genuine Victorian diary that he knew to be authentic for the purposes of comparison.
Now which is more likely? I don't know.
But here's the problem:
Let's say that I suggest that #2 is more likely. "But," proponents of #1 will cry, as they in fact have, "This cannot be the more likely scenario! Why would Mike need to buy a diary? Why couldn't he just go look at one in a book shop or museum? Why would he go to all the trouble of ordering one? It makes no sense. It can't be the most likely scenario."
To which I could then triumphantly announce:
Ah, but you see, "people unlike fictional characters do not always act in reasonable or logical ways!"
You see the problem? The very same claim offered as a possible explanation for scenario #1 works exactly as well and in precisely the same way for scenario #2. The fact that "people unlike fictional characters do not always act in reasonable or logical ways" therefore cannot be considered as a useful explanation or as evidence for anything at all, since it applies just as well to one possible explanation as it does to a directly contradictory one. It is rendered irrelevant in helping us distinguish which scenario is in fact "more likely and more probable." Therefore Peter's claimed conclusion,
"it is still more likely that the red diary was bought to be the recipient of the Maybrick material and found unsuitable thus instituting a search for something better."
is completely invalid since it is not even distinctly supported by his own explicitly stated premise and therefore it is a conclusion which remains completely without any supporting evidence of any sort. This proves also to be the case concerning the other evidence he discussed above, as I hope I have carefully and conclusively demonstrated in my previous response thirteen posts above, sent at 10:39 am. Please see that post for further details concerning the soundness and quality of people's interpretations and conclusions and concerning what has been actually and reliably established. For instance, the assumption that Mike Barrett was "a known associate" of Gerard Kane's remains a claim I still have not seen anyone offer a single piece of reliable material, physical or testimonial evidence to support. I haven't seen anyone even offer any evidence that the two men knew each other or even knew of each other. Consequently this link or "known association" can only remain as a purely speculative accusation through innuendo.
As I said before: "This is no way to accuse anyone of anything, or even to claim that anyone 'probably' did anything."
In any case, the only fair and responsible conclusion I can see here is that it is impossible to determine, as I have just clearly demonstrated, which of these scenarios concerning the purchase of the maroon diary is now "more likely" and this will remain impossible to determine until further evidence arrives and is considered.
I hope that clarifies the state of what we can logically claim has been established even as only the "most likely" or "most probable" scenario.
--John |
Author: Karoline L
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 02:00 pm | | Thank you for the info Caz, your kindness is much appreciated.
I don't have a copy of Kane's handwriting - but I'd love to see a transcript of the diary. Would that be possible?
Paul, have you managed to find yours yet?
Karoline |
Author: Martin Fido
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 02:06 pm | | There's nothing to apologize for, Mark. no reasonable person would ever criticize a newcomer for getting misdirected among the manifold branches of Spryder's tree of webs.
Although it is a well-known fact that nobody unreasonable or facetious ever became entangled in Ripper Studies, or would ever enter onto these boards without having something of such vital importance that they could assume that nobody would lead them to spend any time unprofitably, as you will see by a quick glance at the postings of Good Queen Wenceslaus, Bilbo Beggins, Francis Bacon the Fried Friar, Major-General Grate Greene Greezy Limpopo and others who are gradually woking out what the contents of the next Ripperologist - (an unreadably learned journal) - shall be.
M.Dido |
Author: Paul Begg
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 02:20 pm | | Hello Karoline
No, I haven't managed to lay hands on it yet but I live in hope. However, I believe a message was posted by Keith offering to show you his copy (and I think Shirley has even offered to try and get hold of the "master" copy) for you to see if you'd care to accompany Melvin and, I think Peter, to a meeting where Melvin will be sharing his information. |
Author: Christopher T George
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 03:42 pm | | Hi, John:
Mike, illogical?
[Paraphrasing---]
"No, officer, I own no word processor!" as the word processor sits in the corner of the room.
"When Tony died, Shirley, I ran out and bought a word processor. We used it to transcribe the Diary from the photo book. I dictated while Anne typed the transcript."
"Actually, Shirley, I owned the word processor for five years before Tony died."
"I swear under oath that I, Mike Barrett, wrote the Diary on my word processor, then I dictated it to my wife Anne to write down in the book."
"I had no idea where the Crashaw quote came from until I found it in the Liverpool Central Library."
"I had the Crashaw quote all along in my attic."
"I ordered the little maroon diary but when it arrived I found it wasn't the right size."
"I will not mention that it was not the right year either."
"I have the receipt for the photograph book from the auction room where I bought the book. I will produce it and prove the Diary was a forgery."
"Whoops, sorry I forgot to bring the auction receipt with me, but I have it all right and will show it to you anytime."
"Who are all these people who have come to hear me speak at the Cloak and Dagger Club about what a fine fellow I am? A great writer and human being? What was the topic again?" |
Author: Christopher T George
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 04:19 pm | | Hi, John:
I regret that the foregoing will be taken the wrong way, that I am trying to poke fun at an alcoholic man. However, I have posted it in good faith to point out that much of what Mike has said and done is not logical, that he has said things that fly in the face of the facts. Perhaps he is not the forger but so many untruths have been told that it's hard to discern the truth any longer.
In one of the documentaries on the Whitechapel murderers, Roy Hazelwood observed in an almost throwaway line that the Ripper was not a "rocket scientist." I would propose, John, that the forger was not a rocket scientist either and the cool logic that you and I might employ may not have been employed by the person responsible for the Diary.
I will say that of the two of them, Anne seems the cooler customer, hard to pin down, enigmatic. I will also say that her "in the family" story seems all too convenient. I would like to observe that she proposed it at the time when Feldman was floating all sorts of theories to the extent that she may have figured "anything goes" -- that Feldy would believe anything -- and then came up with the story we know from her today. Does that make her the forger or she and Mike the forgers? I don't know but as Karoline, R.J., and I have been saying, indications still are that the Barretts had some sort of involvement in producing the Diary.
Best regards
Chris George |
Author: John Omlor
Thursday, 26 April 2001 - 05:41 pm | | But Chris,
You have made my point for me. Of course Mike behaves in illogical and unreasonable ways, as Peter suggests.
Consequently, how are we ever going to be able to logically or confidently decide which of the following two scenarios is "more likely?"
1.) That Mike bought this diary in this blatantly traceable and obvious way, taking no precautions whatsoever to disguise his purchase or the book's origins, specifically in order to commit a felonious criminal act with it. Therefore, Mike was complicit.
or 2.) That Mike bought this diary because he was holding a document that was alleged to be an authentic Victorian diary and he had his doubts about it's authenticity and he was trying to research the possibilities before taking the diary to an agent's. Consequently, he decided that he needed to get his hands on a genuine Victorian diary that he knew to be authentic for the purposes of comparison. Therefore, Mike was not complicit.
Don't you see? Since we both agree that Mike behaves in unreasonable and illogical ways, both scenarios above necessarily end up being equally likely or unlikely, since Mike would be equally and indeterminately "likely" to behave in either of these two different "illogical and unreasonable ways." Consequently the only logically valid conclusion anyone can make based on the premise that Mike behaves in illogical and unreasonable ways is that we therefore cannot in any way fairly or reliably decide which of these two sets of illogical and unreasonable behaviors is more likely. That is, there is therefore no way to determine, since the same premise supports both conclusions in precisely the same way, which conclusion is more likely to be true. It is simple logic. If you can use precisely the same premise (that Mike behaves in illogical and unreasonable ways) to support either conclusion equally then the premise becomes useless for distinguishing which conclusion is more likely to be true. And that is the case here. So I'm sorry, but proving the claim that Mike behaves in illogical and unreasonable ways, only serves to prove my point that this premise then becomes useless since it supports both contradictory conclusions in exactly the same way and therefore you cannot validly determine from this premise the truth or even the "likely" truth of either conclusion.
In fact, if you read my previous post on the subject carefully, you'll see that I pointed this out and began myself with the very same assumption, that Mike behaves in illogical and unreasonable ways. In fact, I wrote there:
"And let's also admit that Mike indeed does not always (or even regularly) act in reasonable or logical ways."
You see, I had already insisted upon this. Consequently what you have written above about Mike's behavior in no way challenges or contradicts the logic of my necessary conclusion concerning the utterly invalid assertion Peter makes.
Here again is my argument and conclusion. Do you see anywhere where your evidence concerning Mike's behavior poses any challenges or in any way refutes this argument or this necessary conclusion? Here it is in detail:
**********************
But here's the problem:
Let's say that I suggest that scenario #2 is more likely. "But," proponents of #1 will cry, as they in fact have, "This cannot be the more likely scenario! Why would Mike need to buy a diary? Why couldn't he just go look at one in a book shop or museum? Why would he go to all the trouble of ordering one? It makes no sense. It can't be the most likely scenario."
To which I could then triumphantly announce:
Ah, but you see, "people unlike fictional characters do not always act in reasonable or logical ways!"
You see the problem?
The very same claim offered as a possible explanation by Peter for scenario #1 works exactly as well and in precisely the same way for scenario #2. The fact that "people unlike fictional characters do not always act in reasonable or logical ways," and especially that Mike undoubtedly does, therefore cannot be considered as a useful explanation or as evidence for anything at all, since it applies just as well to one possible explanation as it does to a directly contradictory one. It is rendered irrelevant in helping us distinguish which scenario is in fact "more likely and more probable." Therefore Peter's claimed conclusion,
"it is still more likely that the red diary was bought to be the recipient of the Maybrick material and found unsuitable thus instituting a search for something better."
is completely invalid since it is not even distinctly supported by his own explicitly stated premise and therefore it is a conclusion which remains completely without any supporting evidence of any sort. This proves also to be the case concerning the other evidence he discussed above, as I hope I have carefully and conclusively demonstrated in my previous response thirteen posts above, sent at 10:39 am. Please see that post for further details concerning the soundness and quality of people's interpretations and conclusions and concerning what has been actually and reliably established. For instance, the assumption that Mike Barrett was "a known associate" of Gerard Kane's remains a claim I still have not seen anyone offer a single piece of reliable material, physical or testimonial evidence to support. I haven't seen anyone even offer any evidence that the two men knew each other or even knew of each other. Consequently this link or "known association" can only remain as a purely speculative accusation through innuendo.
As I said before: "This is no way to accuse anyone of anything, or even to claim that anyone 'probably' did anything."
*****************
Chris, If you see nothing here, where I assume that Mike behaves illogically and unreasonably and then clearly demonstrate how that very fact makes deciding between the likelihoods of two alternatives no longer logically possible, and you see nothing specific in my earlier post to Peter, available above and sent at 10:39 am, that is any way incorrect or in any way arguable, that you can specifically cite, then I do not see what evidence you might possibly have that would legitimately allow you to write:
"indications still are that the Barretts had some sort of involvement in producing the Diary."
Every "indication" I have seen offered here so far, with the possible exception of the presence of the Crahsaw quote in the Sphere volume, has either been a simple and utter speculation, a self-contradictory assertion, a created narrative without supporting material evidence, a detail equally open to equally likely contradictory interpretations based on problematic or missing evidence, been eventually admitted not to be evidence at all, or simply and perhaps most disturbingly implied through innuendo. I have not seen one single serious and unchallengable "indication," supported by any specific, real, reliable physical or material evidence whatsoever, "that the Barretts had some sort of involvement in producing the Diary." Honestly, Chris. Not one. Anywhere. Nothing that would logically, soundly or validly allow us to conclude that the Barrett's were even "most likely" involved in producing this diary.
Again, for this reason I really do not think it is fair to suggest or imply yet that they were. It is not just. It is not supported by any reliable or significant evidence, it is merely suggested through speculation and self-contradictory pieces of evidence and completely unproven and even unevidenced innuendos such as the "known associate" remark, and it is simply not yet a reachable or responsible conclusion. I know you to be a careful reader and to have a sense of fairness about your conclusions. It seems extraordinarily unfair to go around claiming that there are "indications" that two people participated in a criminal act and not to actually have either any evidence or even any unchallengable or seriously reliable and non-contradictory "indications" that this is in fact so, or even likely.
Why would you do this? Why would anyone do this? Why not wait, and be careful, and actually establish conclusions using reliable evidence and valid logic and consistent premises? Why not be responsible when real people's reputations and futures continue to be at stake. Why not simply be content to admit the demonstrably obvious conclusion that we have no clearly established or reliable or non-contradictory "indications" that the Barrett's did or did not participate in the creation of this forgery. Or show me even one.
I have not seen one yet, and therefore I really must insist that it is irresponsible to continue to claim, without offering any solid and reliable and logically established and necessary and valid evidence, that "indications still are that the Barretts had some sort of involvement in producing the Diary."
This conclusion at this time seems utterly unsupported and needlessly to risk a serious injustice.
Why do such a thing when with patience and with responsible reading we can proceed more carefully, if we just begin by admitting that we have no clear reliable, supportable, consistent "indications" yet either way. Please show me why this would not be the more logical and responsible way to proceed and what evidence anywhere contradicts this conclusion.
Thanks, Chris,
--John |
Author: Caroline Anne Morris
Friday, 27 April 2001 - 06:06 am | | Hi John, All,
Is there perhaps a feeling in literary and historical circles that it is a worse crime to accuse a 99.9% certainly innocent James Maybrick of being Jack the Ripper, than it is to accuse a possibly innocent man, woman, or small, but expanding group of modern-day scousers, of varying degrees of honesty, of forging this diary?
The latter 'crime' serves to keep our history, and with it our sense of security, firmly rooted - not dancing about all over the place in ways that would make many of us dizzy.
The bottom line is that it matters to us, that others will always try to make our history dance for us, in ways that make us uncomfortable. I understand that, or at least, I think I do. But it also matters to me that we don't risk making today's people, and today's truths, scapegoats for our desires to nail down yesterday's perceived truths.
If we get the evidence we need, we can use it to nail down this bit of our history and make everyone feel safe again. I almost get the feeling sometimes, that people's unconscious disquiet, that the evidence might not be forthcoming because it might not be there, is what causes them to grab too quickly at their 'truth'. It allays their disquiet, or postpones the moment when they may have to acknowledge it.
I know I will get my arse kicked for writing the foregoing (with the inevitable risk of being accused of reading other people's minds ), but it would go some way to explain, for me at least, the incredible amount of hostility that the diary has generated, when even those of us asking simple questions have been subjected to everything ranging from being called 'pro-diarist', to having the vilest anonymous abuse thrown our way.
On with the dance, I say, and let's worry about this particular part of history doing the highland fling, if and when it happens.
Love,
Caz |
Author: Peter R.A. Birchwood
Friday, 27 April 2001 - 06:37 am | | Dear Paul:
Although we may have clashed in the past, I do appreciate your comments, and I am sure that John Omlor will reply in his characteristic way. Having re-read my original message I can see that the flavour would have been greatly improved if, in the phrase: "more simple explanation " I had omitted the word "more."
As to the rest, I have to point out that it expresses my own opinion but you have certainly made a point which scares me immensly: that I have been responsible for John having been "forced into answering at length." |
Author: Caroline Anne Morris
Friday, 27 April 2001 - 07:01 am | | Hi Karoline,
You are more than welcome.
I'm afraid you are asking the wrong person about the possibilities of seeing a transcript of the diary. It is beginning to look like it may be in Melvin's hands, but certainly not in mine, if and when that meeting takes place. Somehow, I can't see myself getting an invite, can you?
Have you seen the latest sample of Kane's handwriting, even though you don't have a copy?
Hi Peter,
The only thing that scares me about you being responsible for John being forced into answering at length is the fact that I have to print it all out for Keith if he wants to keep up to date with the diary posts! (All that and no commas. )
I'm immensely scared I will never get away from the computer, but equally terrified that, if I ever do get dressed and downstairs, my income tax forms will still be there to greet me. What a choice....
Have a good weekend all.
Love,
Caz |
Author: John Omlor
Friday, 27 April 2001 - 07:06 am | | Dear Chris and Peter,
I am afraid I have not been completely clear about why Peter's conclusion concerning the maroon diary purchase is simply not valid. (That is, it does not logically or necessarily follow from his premises.)
Here, again, is Peter's conclusion:
"it is still more likely that the red diary was bought to be the recipient of the Maybrick material and found unsuitable thus instituting a search for something better."
I am claiming that this is simply and demonstrably not a valid conclusion given Peter's own stated premises.
Now I think I have come up with a clearer way of demonstrating this so that there can be no doubt.
How's this?
Here, once again are two possible behaviors:
1.) That Mike bought this diary in this blatantly traceable and obvious way, taking no precautions whatsoever to disguise his purchase or the book's origins, specifically in order to commit a felonious criminal act with it. Therefore, Mike was complicit.
or 2.) That Mike bought this diary because he was holding a document that was alleged to be an authentic Victorian diary and he had his doubts about it's authenticity and he was trying to research the possibilities before taking the diary to an agent's. Consequently, he decided that he needed to get his hands on a genuine Victorian diary that he knew to be authentic for the purposes of comparison. Therefore, Mike was not complicit.
I think we can agree that both of these behaviors appear unreasonable and illogical.
Now, Peter's argument had two premises. Remember, I agree with the truth of both of them.
Here are the premises Peter offered:
A.) "people unlike fictional characters do not always act in reasonable or logical ways."
B.) Mike behaves in unreasonable and illogical ways.
But Peter's conclusion was:
Therefore, behavior #1 is more likely than behavior #2.
"it is still more likely that the red diary was bought to be the recipient of the Maybrick material and found unsuitable thus instituting a search for something better."
But you see, since both behavior #1 and behavior #2 are unreasonable and illogical, Peter's premises simply do not allow him to determine, do not allow him to logically, validly claim whether #1 or #2 is more likely.
His premises told us only that Mike would often and likely behave in illogical and unreasonable ways. Both behavior #1 and behavior #2 are illogical and unreasonable. Consequently, nothing in Peter's argument allows him, logically, to choose one or the other as "more likely." His choice simply isn't made possible by his premises in this argument.
In fact, since both behaviors are illogical and unresponsible and since the only evidence that Peter has put forward for choosing one over the other is that Mike behaves in illogical and unreasonable ways, Peter's conclusion that behavior #1 is more likely than behavior #2 remains simply a personal preference or a random speculation but can in no way be said to be valid or to even follow from his own premises. Therefore the truth of his personal choice, that #1 is more likely than #2 remains clearly and demonstrably and with any doubt whatsoever completely unestablished. His conclusion is logically invalid. He is, therefore, in fact merely stating an unsupported personal preference that is in no way determinable given his premises (which we agree would by themselves allow for the choice of either behavior, since both fit the description in the premises).
Consequently, unless he offers more relevant evidence or specific and clearly supported arguments that would allow us to choose one of these behaviors over the other, the only logical and valid and responsible and indeed true conclusion possible is that neither behavior #1 nor behavior #2 can be said to be more likely at this time.
It is all we can say given Peter's own premises.
It is all we can say given Chris's perfectly true and accurate observations concerning Mike's behavior.
Reason clearly demonstrates that it remains all we can say.
I hope this is now clear.
-- John
PS: This is just one example of someone offering unsupported personal preference or random speculation as established and/or "more likely" truths or scenarios. This is very dangerous behavior in any investigation or analysis. As Caz has suggested, it perhaps stems from our desire for conclusions and answers where not are yet available. However, in the name of justice and of accuracy, such unreasonable arguments must be avoided at all costs and be clearly examined when they do appear. Sorry, Peter and Caz, I seem to have done it again.  But I hope I have made my point. (Peter, I hope you'll still at least take the time to read my original response to your first post on these questions. My response appears above, dated and timed: Thursday, April 26, 2001 - 10:39 am.) Thanks. |
Author: Paul Begg
Friday, 27 April 2001 - 07:22 am | | Dear Peter
When everyone is working towards a common goal, in this case the identification of the author of the 'diary', I think it is a pity that imprecise language should lead to lengthy (in terms of time, not wordage) debate and animosity. I have unfailingly enjoyed and learned a great deal from John Omlor's posts and sincerely hope others will have done so too, especially as he has argued for nothing more alarming than a proper and careful analysis of the information.
The omission of 'more' might have improved the question, as you say, but unfortunately it would still have left us with "increasing unlikely speculations". Sadly, many and perhaps even the majority of the alternative speculations are not more or less likely or unlikely, but of equal value and deserving of consideration and investigation.
All the best
Paul |
Author: Caroline Anne Morris
Friday, 27 April 2001 - 07:44 am | | Oh poo,
I was just about to go down and face the taxman...
Dear John,
I suspect you are going to see a post very soon along the lines of, "Have it your own way, but I'm still going to believe Anne and Mike were involved."
I shall be sad if it does come to this after all your hard and patient work, but hopefully others, who may never have posted a word here, will benefit from their own careful reading of yours.
Love,
Caz |
Author: Christopher T George
Friday, 27 April 2001 - 07:46 am | | Hi, John:
Yes, you have made your point. Yes, you are quite correct that it does not make sense that if the little maroon diary was intended to take the text of the Diary as we know it that, as you put in your post of Thursday, April 26, 2001 - 01:24 pm, giving Peter's scenario, "Mike ordered and purchased it using his own name, his home address, paying with an easily traceable check and getting a receipt, all with the intent to very shortly thereafter use it in a criminal conspiracy to commit fraud." Yes, indeed, it does not seem logical or reasonable does it? However, is it logical or reasonable to create a diary allegedly written by James Maybrick without trying to match Maybrick's writing? Is it logical to try to place a document without having a proper provenance for it?
It would not surprise me that if Barrett actually, as he says, bought the photograph album from the auctioneers Outhwaite and Litherland, he did have a receipt for the purchase, just as he had the receipt for the maroon diary. This is the receipt from the auctioneers that he said he would produce at the April 1999 Cloak and Dagger Club meeting but ultimately did not.
Whatever you say, Mike Barrett and Anne Barrett (now Graham) have to be considered suspects for the very reason that they had the Diary and no good explanation has been given of where the Diary came from before they had it. The Diary is a suspicious and in my opinion undoubtedly phoney document and both Anne and Mike have told lies about it.
Both you and I agree that the proof is lacking that says that the Barretts did the forgery but there are there are strong although circumstantial indications that they could have been involved in such a scheme.
Best regards
Chris George |
Author: Peter R.A. Birchwood
Friday, 27 April 2001 - 07:48 am | | Paul:
Some minor points:I'm a little confused about the date when MB admitted having in his possession the Sphere book. I realise that on these boards it has been said that it was shortly after the Sept. 30th 1994 date of the "discovery" at Liverpool Library. However in her Blake edn. (p 283) Shirley does imply that it was after her correspondence with RJ Goulden of the British Library on 25th March 1998. Is this just faulty proofing?
Is it conceivable that MB could find the Sphere book on the library shelves without knowing what title he was looking for? The Dewey number for this book would place it many shelves away from books like Bartletts and other dictionaries of quotations which would be the obvious place to look. And we've already addressed the possibility of a Librarian telling MB that the quote was in the Sphere book rather than in a collection of Crashaw's poetry.
It's certainly true that newspapers, in common with the Discovery Channel and other programme contractors want everything free. It therefore seems possible that this is why MB didn't tell Brough about the Sphere book. Isn't it though just as possible that MB didn't realise the importance of the Crashaw quote until Shirley asked him to look for it?
I have to disagree with you about the story of MB finding the quote in Liverpool Library: it might, in a very low degree, be true but it does not have "a sort of ring of truth about it." Equally, I haven't seen any indication that MB did lodge the book with his solicitor at the time Alan Gray suggested. It seems more likely that MB had no idea of the importance of this quote until Shirley sent him to find it and the rest followed on from there. Please note that if this is considered to mean that I am disagreeing with Melvin Harris, it is my opinion and is based only on what I have seen
If we have matched the cheque stub and cheque together (and from memory, the stub only said "Book" rather than giving the name of the payee,) can we also match this cheque with correspondence from the booksearch company HP Bookfinders, not now of Bledlow Ridge? In short, can the cheque be matched with no doubt whatsoever to the purchase of the red diary? The red diary is not in fact completely blank. As I looked through it I saw a couple of notes on various dates. |
Author: Karoline L
Friday, 27 April 2001 - 08:02 am | | I must say I think this "you show me yours and I'll show you mine" approach to data seems a very odd one to employ in any historical enquiry.
One reason it's so hard to maintain any kind of rational debate here is the continuing absence or non-availability of some of the crucial hard data. The last thing we need are more silly proposals like this "exchange" that will in all likelihood result in keeping this situation going.
I can see a possible problem over the Kane handwriting since it involves a direct implication of criminal involvement and therefore could be construed as possibly libellous, but even so I don't think there could be any objection to merely posting it on the web somewhere, without comment.
(yes, I have seen it, and I concede a strong apparent similarity, but I hardly think more than that can be said until it's in the public domain).
If I had the Kane writing I would probably post it publicly, but it isn't my place to do so. Likewise the transcript and the taped interview with Billy Graham ought to be available to anyone who wants to see them, rather than shrouded from public view in this wholly questionable way.
I'd appeal to everyone who has relevant data to just get it into the public arena and let it speak for itself.
Karoline |
Author: Karoline L
Friday, 27 April 2001 - 08:30 am | | I'm interested in getting a clear chronology here.
So far as as I understand it, Melvin Harris was told by Alan Gray in the late summer of 1994 that MB had a book and some other evidence of his involvement with the forgery lodged with his solicitors.
Harris then suggested Gray get this book off MB if at all possible, since it might (obviously) prove valuable.
Gray then asked MB to produce the book and eventually, 6 December 1994, he and Gray went to MB's solicitor together, MB obtained the book and handed it over to Gray.
The book is inscribed with the date of handover from MB to Gray, and dated with the above date.
This much seems clear.
What I'd like to ask is this -
when did Harrison first state her claim that MB had been sent by her to do research in the library?
Is her claim confirmed by any other source (by MB or himself, or by a third party?)
Secondly I have to echo the opinions of Peter, RJ and Chris George. It is almost impossible that MB could have found the quotation in the library. The only possible way he could even hope to discover it would be by manually searching, page by page, through every even remotely relevant book in the library, a task that would take years of dedicated effort.
That MB could employ this technique and discover the quotation in days or even weeks, is such an absurd and remote contingency that I think it should be ruled out of any rational assessment of the possibilities.
The claim is bogus. The question is, how exactly did it arise, and when
Does anyone have that information?
best wishes
Karoline |
Author: Alegria
Friday, 27 April 2001 - 08:41 am | | LOL. Wanna test the Crashaw quote? Why doesn't John Omlor, our resident literature guru, post an obscure quote from some hard to find poet and see how long it takes to find it.
Ally |
Author: Paul Carpenter
Friday, 27 April 2001 - 09:53 am | | Hi all,
Although it seems a little late in the day to be joining this thread - especially as I have only managed to read the first 3000 entries, I thought you may be interested to note that Crashaw wrote a small piece of religious doggerel called "Two Went to the Temple to Pray," which I think has an interesting echo of some of the Diary rhyme
"1 Two went to pray? O rather say
2 One went to brag, th' other to pray:
3 One stands up close and treads on high,
4 Where th' other dares not send his eye.
5 One nearer to God's altar trod,
6 The other to the altar's God."
The passage I am thinking of is the "One dirty whore was looking for some gain" verse in the diary...
You may feel that the similar metre and construction shows that the diary verse is grounded in a poetic commonplace.
Fans of serendipity might like to note that Crashaw also wrote a poem called "The Flaming Heart," which those of a certain bent might choose to read as a clue to whereabouts of MJK's heart...
Anyway, nothing serious, just a random log on the fire we call 'Ripperology,'
Cheers,
Carps |
Author: John Omlor
Friday, 27 April 2001 - 10:19 am | | Dear Chris, Karoline, and all,
Chris:
You write:
"Yes, you have made your point. Yes, you are quite correct that it does not make sense that if the little maroon diary was intended to take the text of the Diary as we know it that, as you put in your post of Thursday, April 26, 2001 - 01:24 pm, giving Peter's scenario, "Mike ordered and purchased it using his own name, his home address, paying with an easily traceable check and getting a receipt, all with the intent to very shortly thereafter use it in a criminal conspiracy to commit fraud." Yes, indeed, it does not seem logical or reasonable does it? However, is it logical or reasonable to create a diary allegedly written by James Maybrick without trying to match Maybrick's writing? Is it logical to try to place a document without having a proper provenance for it? "
But I guess I haven't made my point, since this wasn't it.
My point was that since both possibilities, his buying the book for criminal purposes and his buying the book for comparison purposes, seem illogical and unreasonable, it is not fair, responsible, nor even possible to decide which illogical and unreasonable behavior is "more likely."
If you read my last post carefully, you'll see that I was not simply arguing that since behavior #1 seemed not to make sense, we could not conclude that it happened.
I was arguing that since
A.) neither behavior seemed to make sense and
B) since our only premise is that the more likely conclusion would be one that did not make sense,
C.) we cannot therefore decide which one is more likely.
This is a completely different point than the one to which you have responded. This point, and my previous post, demonstrate clearly and without question that it is now impossible to say whether illogical behavior #1 or illogical behavior #2 is more likely. Therefore, it becomes impossible to claim whether this makes Mike's complicity in any way more likely.
Please check out my last post above to you and Peter to see that you have misread my claim there. I agree that we should not expect Mike to be logical or reasonable. In fact, it is because of this, and because our two possibilities (#1 and #2) are both not logical or reasonable, that we simply cannot claim that either is in any way more likely.
Allow me one more time, Chris:
If you have two items -- 1. and 2.
Both items are illogical or unreasonable.
Someone comes along and fairly and accurately says, the true item is the one that is illogical and unreasonable.
What can you then say about which item is more likely true?
Answer: Nothing, since both items fit this description. The information is useless in helping us determine which is more likely to be true. Consequently, any claim the either 1. or 2. is more likely to be true would necessarily be invalid and remain pure speculation and completely unestablished. You see?
This is my point. It is different from the point addressed in your response. It is a point about what it is fair to claim as being even more likely. I have not yet seen anyone refute this logic or my conclusion that neither scenario therefore can be claimed to be more likely with any validity whatsoever.
Here to refresh our memories, are the two possible scenarios:
1.) That Mike bought this diary in this blatantly traceable and obvious way, taking no precautions whatsoever to disguise his purchase or the book's origins, specifically in order to commit a felonious criminal act with it. Therefore, Mike was complicit.
or 2.) That Mike bought this diary because he was holding a document that was alleged to be an authentic Victorian diary and he had his doubts about it's authenticity and he was trying to research the possibilities before taking the diary to an agent's. Consequently, he decided that he needed to get his hands on a genuine Victorian diary that he knew to be authentic for the purposes of comparison. Therefore, Mike was not complicit.
Premise: Because of Mike's behavior, we know the true one is likely to be illogical and unreasonable.
Both of these are illogical and unreasonable.
What can we say about which one, therefore, is more likely to be true?
Only possible logically valid answer: Nothing at all.
Also Chris, you wite that the Barrett's must be considered as suspects. I agree, they are of course suspects. You also write:
"they had the Diary and no good explanation has been given of where the Diary came from before they had it. The Diary is a suspicious and in my opinion undoubtedly phoney document and both Anne and Mike have told lies about it."
I agree also with both of these sentences. Although neither of them are even circumstantial evidence that the Barrett's actually participated in the forgery. In fact, if they had not participated, they could not be expected to know where the thing came from. And we have already discussed what we can properly infer from their lies after the diary is being received publicly.
But then you write:
"there are strong although circumstantial indications that they could have been involved in such a scheme."
Where? What are they? How, specifically, logically, reasonably,do they indicate that the Barrett's could have been involved? I have not seen anyone offer any evidence directly, logically, validly and reliably supporting any clear indication that the Barrett's were involved in the creation of this forgery. Show me even one instance, where such evidence even clearly establishes one of these "indications." Otherwise, your sentence remains simply an unestablished opinion.
Karoline,
You write:
"Secondly I have to echo the opinions of Peter, RJ and Chris George. It is almost impossible that MB could have found the quotation in the library."
Geez, Karoline, you could at least give me credit when I actually agree with you.
I have said precisely this several times in responses to Chris and RJ and can cite my remarks specifically if you'd like. This of course tells us nothing at all about when MIke first saw the quote in the Sphere volume or if he used it to compose any diary or discovered it there and lied about the library research to impress the experts (since, after all, we now all agree that Mike regularly does illogical and unreasonable things, and tells unnecessary lies). Unfortunately we have no real evidence whatsoever that would allow us even to speculate fairly whether Mike saw this quote in the Sphere volume beforehand and used it in the diary or saw it there afterwards when he supposedly doing research. And if you are claiming that it is more likely that he saw it there beforehand, you must answer one nagging question: why, then, since he knew he had it and he knew he had put it in the diary, did he not simply produce it to prove he had written the thing, when this is what he wanted us all to believe? Why? Where is your real, substantial supporting evidence for the claim that he found it there before rather than after the diary's composition? Or is this too just speculation and opinion and therefore no more entitled to be claimed as "more likely" than Peter's claim about the "most likely" reason behind the diary purchase, a claim which remains completely unsupported and demonstrably and utterly invalid?
Is anyone actually using real, reliable, and substantial evidence around here to validly claim aything at all about the identity of the forgers?
If not, then I think we ought to refrain from suggesting that it is likely or probable that any specific person or people participated in the creation of this document and therefore in the criminal creation of a forgery.
Does anyone still disagree with this particular statement concerning what it is responsible to claim given the available evidence and independent of personal preferences or random speculations or unsupported interpretations?
Anyone?
--John
PS: Does anyone know if Mike claims he at least knew or was told that the quote was from Crashaw when he allegedly began his research? I don't think he does. Without at least an author, the library search would have been all but impossible, it seems to me, since all you would have to go on would be the "O" figure, which commonly appears in the poetry of the time and which was a paricular favorite of Crashaw's, and the phrase "intercourse of death" which suggests a metaphysical conceit but is not strictly one; but MIke could not have known either of these things in advance and even if he did, there is too much poetry and too many poets from the period to make finding the quote this way very believable. I knew the quote was from Crashaw but I did not know which poem it was in when I went on my search, and I found it in an hour or two in three of four volumes in my univeristy library. If I had not known the author beforehand, I don't think that would have been possible, unless I got very, very lucky. I would have started looking at poets of the period, but I could easily have been there all day unless I just happened to start with Crashaw. Unless Mike found a very, very smart librarian, this all seems to me to speak against the library discovery and in favor of his finding it in the Sphere volume. Though we still cannot, of course, say when this might have happened. (No real evidence of this "when," you know...) |
Author: John Omlor
Friday, 27 April 2001 - 10:57 am | | Alegria,
Here you go. And like all good diary readers, you can assume this was written before 1888.
"To Clothe the fiery thought
In simple words succeeds"
Yes I know it appears to be part of a larger conceit. So is "O costly intercourse of death"
Have fun,
--John |
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