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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 18 October 2001
Casebook Message Boards: The Diary of Jack the Ripper: General Discussion:
TIME FOR A RE- EVALUATION!:
Archive through 18 October 2001
Author: Peter Wood
Tuesday, 16 October 2001 - 03:00 pm |        | John, how are you doing? Sit back, it's going to be a bumpy ride...............(a la Feldman).
Quote "It became more and more apparent to me that the claims to authenticity.........were made almost exclusively by inference".
Well, knock me sideways John! Of course they are made by inference! Every book that has ever been written about Jack the !@?"!$ Ripper relies on 'inference'! Be honest with yourself John, although we might ALL find it a little hard to stomach, there really is no NEW evidence is there? Not after 113 years. Fair enough Stewart Evans uncovered the Littlechild letter and there is always the McNaghten memorandum to fall back on, but as for 'concrete evidence' - what exactly is there?
I would love to think that someone has got an artefact with some of JTR's DNA on it, but it's not likely is it? I suggested myself seeing if we could find a photograph of Maybrick where you can see sufficient of his fingers to compare the prints to that supposedly smudged in blood on the postcard, but I knew I was clutching at straws.
My point is John that Feldman is the first person to throw serious money at researching the subject, and you have to be honest he researched it from all angles, not just from the viewpoint of the diary. Paul saw the diary as 'evidence', to him it is! He supposedly spent £100 000 investigating it! I wouldn't be surprised if it were much much more.
So, what are we left with? Inference, of course! We all, every single one of us, infers something from what we see. We just infer it in different ways, hence the discussion. Nobody who's on here can say 'actually, I've got Jack the Ripper's underpants and they might have some DNA on them', or 'I've got Mary Kelly's headboard'. I know certain people CLAIM to have JTR artefacts, but that is no more likely than someone possessing a piece of Noah's ark!
So, infer away John, because I will be, and so will PHF and a myriad of Ripper investigators.
Once again John, your arguments appear valid, but I would claim equal status for mine alongside yours. We have our viewpoints - and yours often seems to be along the lines of '..it isn't necessarily like that, this could be an option...'.
Well, yes, there are other options, but we have to plump for the most likely in our eyes, and to put a cap, for now, on certain parts of the debate - so we can concentrate on other parts, I will say that if the diary is ever proven to be a forgery then I FULLY EXPECT that the diarist will have used certain sources for his 'evidence' and those sources will include the Christie archives and certain Ripper letters. You contend it ain't necessarily so - and strictly speaking you can be deemed to be right - but it is all very 'clinical'. It could be this, it could be that, it could be the other. Yes, it could be a lot of things, but just because it could be doesn't mean that it is.
And John, I still don't see how you think you can argue that I have argued the discrepancies between the diary and the letters as proving them genuine. ALL I have done, John, is pose questions. Something with one of these - ? - at the end is a question, not a statement. Yes it can be asked forcefully and it can be asked in a number of ways, but it's still a question, and you haven't really come up with a viable answer. Of course I don't claim the discrepancies prove anything to be genuine, that would be absurd, but the REASONS behind the discrepancies do open certain avenues for discussion. Not only is your logic flawed on my thinking, but your basic facts are wrong, and you are trying to put words into my mouth that simply don't belong there.
The question is still valid John? Why DO YOU think a forger would not attempt to copy a known signature of Jack the Ripper?
And whilst you're at it, do not Paul Feldman's discovered letter of Maybrick's show a similarity not only in the signatures to those of JTR, but also to James' writing in the bible he gave to Sarah Anne. I suppose now you will argue the bible to be a fake! Lousy provenance!
You have written a very long post John, most of which, to use your words, 'is pure speculation'. Yep, that's right, no cast iron conclusions, nothing concrete, just your opinions - and I don't hold anything against you for that. What you must understand is that Feldman can't perhaps PROVE any one particular point, but when they are lined up alongside each other, then it becomes too much of a coincidence, too much like good luck, too good to be true.
And now, when I challenge you to prove that Maybrick could not have been in London at the relevant times, what do you do? At the end of a very long post you simply say ".....no one can do either". Actually John, yes you can. I firmly believe that if the diary is genuine then our forger has slipped up somewhere. No matter how much he researched he couldn't have dug up every piece of paper showing Maybrick's whereabouts in 1888...........there are of course the 20 or so doctor's appointments that Maybrick is known to have kept. Do any of them dates conflict? No. But come on John, don't be so defeatist, you wrote a wonderful piece of literature there, that post was not bad at all, but then to cop out at the last minute is not worthy of you. I have come to expect more.
The challenge is still there John. And believe me, it would be SO MUCH EASIER for you to find one single document to place Maybrick somewhere other than London when the women were killed, than it would be for me or a forger to uncover EVERY SINGLE DOCUMENT RELATING TO MAYBRICK'S WHEREABOUTS and trawl through them to prove otherwise. Imagine getting to the last but one document and finding out that on the 9th November Maybrick was attending a meeting of Cotton Brokers in Conneticut or wheverever! You would quite rightly be heartbroken! If you were the forger, that is. If the diary is a forgery John, then that document is out there somewhere - go find it.
".....if Michael can succeed in rhyming verse then I can do better, a great deal better...."
Now John, call me Mr Thicko if you want, but where exactly is the inference (that word) in that line which tells you Michael Maybrick actually wrote the words to his song. Using your own method of aruing John, I would have been impressed with you if the diarist had written "....Hey, that was a snappy tune Michael wrote there, and what a fabulous lyric he wrote to go with it, maybe I'll have a go......".
But it just isn't there, is it John? The diarist doesn't SAY that Michael WROTE the words, just that he RHYMED them. The singer in a band isn't always the song writer - but he's the guy who has to fit the words into a meter. So his songwriter might write. "Spent last night in Mississipi, my dear God I'm feeling chilly" and it is thus up to the singer to imbue those words with the meter that makes us think "aaahhhhh, good rhyme!"
One other way of looking at it John, and I'm getting a little pre-emptive here, just like yourself, but what is there to suggest that Maybrick KNEW Michael DID NOT write the words? Maybe James knew his brother was a famous musician, maybe he BELIEVED, ignorantly, that Michael wrote the words. What's so hard to believe about that? After all our "Maybrick" is a cotton merchant, what would he know about music? I work in Local Government, my sister is a mortgage consultant, it doesn't necessarily follow that I could do her job.
And finally John! Maybe Michael did write some of the words. A lot of musicians do 'cover versions' or employ songwriters, but it doesn't mean that they don't fancy having a dabble every now and then.
Oh dear me John, crashed and burned! Still, it was a good question whilst it lasted. Next one, please.
Take care and always look on the bright side
Peter. |
Author: Peter Wood
Tuesday, 16 October 2001 - 03:26 pm | | RJ
Thanks for the concerns over my health, I don't feel ganged up on, not really. You all have a jobe to do in relation to the diary and I can respect that. I actually thrive on being the 'odd man out', so thanks for the concern, but don't hold back.
I have to admit to nearly wetting myself when I read that you knew the exact mileage from London to Liverpool! To qualify your statement - is that from border to border? or centre to centre?
As for your other points, you're right - they have been dealt with, at great length. Shirley and Paul have uncovered a vast amount of detail that connects Maybrick to Whitechapel that a forger could simply have no right to expect......unless, of course, he had done his research.
RJ, why do you think our 'forger' chose Maybrick as his suspect? Why not Kosminski, or Druitt, or Ostrog? As for your suggestion of Kosminski, he remains only a viable suspect if the diary is ever proven to be a forgery.
I was SO looking forward to defeating your argument about Maybrick not knowing Whitechapel, but I believe Paul Begg has done that for me. Save to say, or to ask, do you know every nook and cranny near where you live? Maybrick DID live in Whitechapel, that has been documented - but to use as an argument that he would have known every backstreet and alley is ludicrous.
And indeed RJ, if our diarist had played Whitechapel 'to the hilt', wouldn't you just have screamed "FORGERY" all that much more the louder?
Oh dear R.J! So our diarist really thought he was 'but a few feet' away from the Prince of Wales? Get real! Is only a forger allowed to exaggerate? Like that time I was at a Michael Jackson concert and went home and told my mum "I was this close to him!", hands held two feet apart, when in reality we all know he was but a distant speck on the horizon. Come on, get a grip. Maybrick was real, he was prone to exaggerating, big deal! Have you got nothing better against the diary than that? What about one of those documents that I constantly challenge John to uncover.............
Paul Begg: To assume that any visitor to Mike's home could have read the Crashaw poem in Mike's book would be to assume that your average scouser took an interest in obscure poetry. Not likely really, is it?
One more thing, has anyone investigated Mike's claim as to how he came by the Sphere Twelve volumes of English Literature? One phone call to Sphere, for instance? Well, you are after all the sceptics, far be it from me to do your job for you................
Peter. |
Author: Christopher T George
Tuesday, 16 October 2001 - 03:39 pm | | Hi, Peter:
Excuse me, I am a songwriter. I write the lyrics and I also do the rhyming for the songs that my partner, composer Erik Sitbon, and I have written for "Jack--The Musical." Erik Sitbon's job is to put the music to the lyrics but he doesn't do the rhyming which is all done by me. Erik simply varies his music in terms of rhythm and sound to fit my lyrics. When you say a composer "rhymes" are you getting confused between working with rhythm and with rhyme?
On another topic, I was under the impression that Maybrick's common-law wife Sarah Maybrick lived in London's East End in the 1860s but not later. It is a while since I read that passage in Shirley Harrison's book. If you say I am wrong, I will have to recheck her narrative.
Best regards
Chris George |
Author: Madeleine Murphy
Tuesday, 16 October 2001 - 04:44 pm | | Peter:
You're raising an interesting point about the nature of research here, something I've raised before in Shirley Harrison's defense.
The fact is, finding out *what* material exists on any subject and consulting it is a momentous, never-finished task. We don't know what other material on JM may or may not be lying around. Shirley and Paul have done heroic work uncovering records, but at any moment someone in the British Library may come across some letter reading "Had dinner with the Maybricks last night, that Florie, what a bimbo" and giving the same date as Mary Kelly's murder. There *is* no "last but one" document on Maybrick; we only know what we know so far, and anyone who thinks research is straightforward just hasn't tried it!
Where we differ, though, is in whether this lack of alibi is significant. It doesn't strike me as much of a coincidence. If the diary entries were dated, I too would be impressed: there would be so much more room for error. But since they're not, the only dates that would conflict with the diary's claims are the dates of the five murders. It's not perhaps all that amazing that five nights in the life of a then-obscure businessman are--100+ years later, when no contemporaries are available for interview--unaccounted for.
mm |
Author: Peter Wood
Tuesday, 16 October 2001 - 06:39 pm | | So that's how Chris and Erik work, is it? Well good for you!
I expect Elton and Bernie, do it slightly differently, of course. Gary Barlow was the songwriter for Take That, but Robbie and the other three got the occasional chance to bung a couple of lines in there - and look what a fabulous songwriter Robbie has turned out to be in his solo career.
My point,Chris, is that some songwriters write the words BEFORE the music, thus the composer of the music has to fit those words into a meter. Not hard to understand really, is it?
I notice you don't answer my other hypothesis that James Maybrick, being a cotton broker, could have been perfectly ignorant of how his brother went about his job. So Maybrick talks to George at the Palatine club and the conversation goes a little something like this:
"James, what is your Michael doing these days?"
"What? Our kid? He's a songwriter and a musician, writes some wicked tunes, man - you should hear the lyric he did to 'We all love Jack'".
George, being slightly more in the know, doesn't want to point out to the thick cotton merchant that Michael Maybrick only does the music and so leaves his friend to labour under his misapprehensions.
Just a possibility, nay - more of a probability actually.
As for Sarah's whereabouts in the post ripper era, it's on page 37 of Shirley's book.
".........census records for 1891....established the names of the inhabitants of 265 Queen's Road...". Last on the list is Sarah.
Interesting to note that immediately prior to this she was supposed to be living 'out of the way' (whatever that means) in Sunderland at No 8 DUNDAS street. Now there's a coincidence for you. And whilst on the subject I'm sure that whilst in America he once lived on a 'Freemason' Street.
Having thought about our earlier discussion I now think it most likely that James Maybrick laboured under the delusion that his brother wrote the lyrics as well as the music and was perfectly ignorant of Michael's partnership with Frederick Weatherly.
Madeleine, you had me going there for a moment! I thought you were changing sides. But in making my comments regarding research I am only stating the obvious and my challenge to anyone out there is to make a name for themselves as the man/woman who proved the diary to be fake, not by conjecture, hypothesis or inferrence - but by, as you so rightly said, putting Maybrick at dinner in Outer Mongolia on November 9th 1888.
There I begin to get a bit disappointed though. You mention that the diary entries aren't dated, which they aren't, but there are certain references in there which enable us to place them in a certain 'time frame'. And don't forget, my challenge to John and the others doesn't just revolve around Maybrick and the nights of the murders, but Maybrick's whereabouts at any time when something important happened in the ripper investigation to which Paul Feldman has linked him. So you can now add to your four nights of the murders, the numerous occasions that he must have been in London when the letters were posted. The diarist claims the 25 September letter and it's associated postcard as his own, along with a number of other communications and is variously linked by Paul with a number of other letters. So now your net has widened. It's the 89th minute of the World Cup Final, one all with Germany, you have a penalty kick 6 yards out and the goal is a gaping 50 feet wide - what do you do?
All of you - go find that document! Just one, that's all it will take.
John Omlor: My turn to question. I wonder if you might have a response to how the forger could have discovered that Maybrick's parents were buried together, a not altogether common fact? "Soon, I trust I shall be laid beside my dear mother and father". If our forger couldn't be bothered doing any research, as you sometimes infer, then he had a fifty fifty choic and he got it right. If however, our forger actually DID do some research - where do you think he got that particular fact from?
Sleep tight
Peter. |
Author: Peter Wood
Tuesday, 16 October 2001 - 06:45 pm | | That would be 'choice' by the way.
Peter. |
Author: John Omlor
Tuesday, 16 October 2001 - 06:49 pm | | Hi Peter,
Slowly again...
You tell me that all the books and theories on Jack are based on inference. True. But I was not speaking about Jack or books on Jack. I was speaking about the case for the authenticity of the diary. That is another matter entirely. That case should not simply be made through vague inferences like the one Paul constructs about the Philly/New York letter. The diary is a material artifact. The case for its authenticity must be made with reliable provenance, material evidence, documentary support, and historical record. It has not been. It has not even nearly been. This is not a case about the identity of Jack the Ripper at this point -- it is a case for the authenticity of a specific document. That is an entirely different sort of case and one that quite simply has not been made in any thorough, reliable or scholarly way.
Once again you ask me:
"The question is still valid John? Why DO YOU think a forger would not attempt to copy a known signature of Jack the Ripper?"
Possible reasons:
1.) They did not know of the existing samples (and thorough research in other areas is not evidence that they should have -- knowing A while not knowing B is certainly quite possible in this case).
2.) They did not have the necessary skill to forge the writing.
3.) They figured that attempting to forge the writing would be in one way riskier than not attempting to, since if the writing did not look at all like the known samples, it could not finally be compared to them in order to spot a forgery.
My guess is that it was probably number one or two. That is speculation. Of course it is possible for our forger to have researched and written this text and still not have known that samples of Maybrick's handwriting existed. But, in any case, what follows is not speculation: it is very clear that the fact that the handwriting does not look like Maybrick's does not, in any way, suggest that Maybrick wrote the diary. Quite the opposite.
By the way, you write to me, without being specific:
"You have written a very long post John, most of which, to use your words, 'is pure speculation'."
Actually, most of my last post to you was only close reading of your own prose and some careful analysis of the logic built into it and the logic built into Paul Feldman's little sleight of hand trick concerning the New York/Philly letter. It was not speculation at all. It was a simple reading of the arguments being made in order to demonstrate their logical assumptions and the questionable validity of their unestablished conclusions.
There were moments in which, as you note, other possibilities were offered, but this was only done in order to demonstrate that the conclusions which Paul makes so triumphantly with his ellipses or his rhetorical questions or his exclamations are, in fact, not conclusions at all, despite their appearance. Often, they are not even proper evidence that would lead one to any conclusion.
You write about the preponderance of Paul's alleged "points"...
"when they are lined up alongside each other, then it becomes too much of a coincidence, too much like good luck, too good to be true."
Only if you believe that any one of them has been fairly established. And a close reading of the text shows that few if any have actually been fairly or thoroughly or logically established whatsoever. Consequently, when they are lined up alongside each other, then it becomes a long string of things that have not been proven and a long string of associations that do not hold up under closer scrutiny (like the Philly/New York or any one a number of similar vague associations masquerading as evidence). Since almost none of them are likely to be true (including the authenticity of the Ripper letters he mentions), there are in fact very few coincidences, very little good luck, and not only are they not "too good to be true," but they are not likely to be true at all.
Inductive logic is a tricky business, Peter. It only works if the evidence clearly suggests the conclusion and if the evidence is also reliably established and examined.
You then ask:
"do not Paul Feldman's discovered letter of Maybrick's show a similarity not only in the signatures to those of JTR, but also to James' writing in the bible he gave to Sarah Anne."
Well, I've never seen a signature of JTR's, so I can't say about that one. I don't think that Maybrick's known signature matches the handwriting of any the alleged Ripper letters particularly, no. Would James' known handwriting match the handwriting in a bible he might have given to someone? Sure. I don't know if it matches the bible Sarah Anne had, to be honest.
But I do know this. It does not match the writing and the signature in the diary. And that problem remains and remains and remains.
Peter, you then write this:
"I firmly believe that if the diary is genuine then our forger has slipped up somewhere."
I assume this a typo. You must mean that if the diary is not genuine... right?
And once again you argue that a single document showing that Maybrick was somewhere else on the four weekends in question would prove the thing a fake.
You're absolutely right.
And no one has found such a document.
Right again.
And this proves...
Nothing.
Because no one can place Maybrick in the East End on those four weekends and no one can place Maybrick out of the East End on those four weekends. Therefore we can assume nothing about where he was and where he wasn't. That is a simple and logical fact.
Consequently, to argue that the fact that no one can find a document placing him outside of the East End on those weekends is somehow evidence for the diary's authenticity is simply invalid.
There is an important difference between saying A.) "No one can find proof James wasn't in town" and B.) "James was in town."
A does not establish B. A is not even evidence of B. Especially when we are talking about 1888.
Of course, the reverse also holds true. No one can claim James wasn't in town either.
As I've said, the only logical conclusion we can draw from this is that we do not know where James was on those weekends.
But still there is not a single piece of reliable evidence to suggest he was killing whores in the East End.
And you make one logical howler, Peter.
You say this:
"If the diary is a forgery John, then that document is out there somewhere - go find it.
This "if-then" conditional statement is simply not a valid conclusion. There is no way to know, Peter, whether that document is indeed out there or not, even if the diary is a forgery.
Let's be very clear about this.
The diary could easily be a forgery and there could still not be a reliable historical record of Maybrick's whereabouts on those four weekends.
Watch:
A. The diary is a forgery.
B. There is no record of Maybrick's whereabouts on those four weekends.
Nothing prevents both of these statements from being true at the same time.
Consequently, one cannot, under any circumstances whatsoever, argue that because B is true, A is false (or A is likely to be false or A is probably false).
And that's what you are trying to do.
You cannot claim that because there is no record of Maybrick's whereabouts on those weekends, the diary is probably not a forgery.
You cannot even argue that the fact that there is no record of Maybrick's whereabouts on the weekends in question is somehow evidence of the diary's authenticity.
It is not.
It's not evidence of anything, since there is no record either way.
So your challenge demonstrates nothing at all, Peter, except that no one knows where James Maybrick was on those weekends. And since no one knows, we can conclude nothing from this fact, either responsibly or logically. We can't even infer anything from it, since it is in fact only an absence of knowledge.
I hope that is clear.
Finally Peter, you demonstrate a desire to make the history fit the text. The text says Michael rhymed verse and that James was competing with him (in other places James remarks how easy it is for Michael, etc...)
History tells us that Michael composed music, but there is no record of his ever writing verse nor any record that he did not.
But you need him to be a writer to make the diary true -- so here comes the desire-filled speculation...
"The diarist doesn't SAY that Michael WROTE the words, just that he RHYMED them."
What?
Michael didn't write verse, he just "rhymed" verse? Interesting distinction. So someone wrote all the words first and Michael just changed the last word in each line to make them rhyme? OK, this is a little bizarre. And this is what James is trying to beat with his "funny little rhymes," his attempts at writing poetry? There is serious stretching going on here.
Then you try this one:
"Maybe James knew his brother was a famous musician, maybe he BELIEVED, ignorantly, that Michael wrote the words. What's so hard to believe about that?"
Well, for one thing, "James" refers directly to Michael writing rhymes and having an easy time of it, so it's more than just a belief. And for another, you are again making history fit the text. The text is supposed to fit history, remember. The real Maybrick was fairly close to his brother. He visited him frequently. And Michael was a well-known part of a well-known song-writing team. And all the songs by the team said, right on the music, who wrote what. More stretching, I'm afraid.
There there's this last one, my favorite:
"Maybe Michael did write some of the words."
I knew this was coming. Again, "the text says Michael wrote verse, so it might be true, even though all the records we have say he wrote music." But wait, I thought we were trying to verify the text. We can't use the text as evidence that the text is right. Unless you can find some evidence that Michael wrote verse, the text doesn't fit the history. You can't rewrite the history to fit the text as a way of arguing for the accuracy of the text. That way lies madness. (And a host of invalid conclusions.)
Anyway, Peter, still there is not a single reliable or thoroughly established link between the diary and the historical James Maybrick that stands up in any way to critical scrutiny or scholarly analysis. This does not speak well for the likely authenticity of the diary.
All the best,
--John
PS: Two points in response your latest post.
1.) Paul Feldman has not linked the real James Maybrick to any of the Ripper letters -- so his whereabouts when those letters were posted, even if they were discovered and proved that James couldn't have written the letters, wouldn't change much. If the case of the diary's authenticity is based on the assumption that James wrote some of the Ripper letters, then the case must fall of its own weight since it has never been established that James had anything at all to do with any of the letters or that any of the letters were even written by the murderer.
The diary does link "James" to some of the letters (though it remains typically vague). The fact that Maybrick's whereabouts is not known on the postmark dates of those letters in no way alters the logic of my analysis above (concerning the weekends of the murders). The same conclusions remains. You cannot fairly infer anything from an absence of information either way.
2.) I have never said the forgers did no research. I believe that they did. I will leave it to RJ, who is more familiar with the available info on Maybrick than I am, to discuss the parents' burial site issue. |
Author: Peter Wood
Tuesday, 16 October 2001 - 07:29 pm | | John
You can take it as 'slowly' as you like or as fast as you like, it's immaterial and adds nothing to your argument.
Thanks for pointing out the 'typos' by the way, I'm glad you too the correct meaning of it, there are probably others.
Now, John, why do you have such a problem accepting the diary as evidence? It is a physical document that is allegedly written by James Maybrick and without which it is highly unlikely Maybrick would have been brought into the Ripper debate. So, yes, it is evidence.
Aaahh! The handwriting argument again! Do you not have anything more? The handwriting doesn't bother me. It obviously bothers you.
As well as the 'typo' you spotted and graciously pointed out, I did, of course, make a mistake in my structuring of the sentence in which I referred to Sarah Anne's bible. And John, you never know, you MAY have seen Jack The Ripper's signature, perhaps you're just not aware of it yet. Anyway I should have written: "Do not the letters ALLEGEDLY signed by Jack The Ripper have signatures which resemble those on letters of Maybrick's which PHF has discovered and furthermore, the writing in the bible which Maybrick gave to Sarah Anne". I did not mean to argue that Maybrick's handwriting looked like Maybrick's handwriting! If you see what I mean. Actually John, I rather suspect you understood perfectly what I was trying to say the first time.
Your argument against the forger copying the known signature is weak, very weak. To have done the research he did, he would have had to read books which referred to the September 25 letter many times over, maybe even books which reproduced the facsimile. You change horses very often John. When it suits you, our forger has done no research. On other occasions, yes, he's done some research. Which is it?
Is there any one else out there who agrees with John that there is even the remotest possibility that a forger who could forge a document that would keep Ripperologists, songwriters, police officers and publishers et al in discussion for nigh on ten years, would not be aware of the September 25 letter? No, I thought not. Best strike that one off your list, John.
John, my challenge to you is to find a document that proves Maybrick was where he shouldn't be on any of the occasions when Feldman has him in London or Scotland or America. Believe me, it is out there somewhere. Because if it isn't then that means our forger would have had to read every single piece of evidence, every document, every letter, every shipping record - OR - he just guessed - and, incidentally almost, guessed right. The 20 doctors appointments are in the public domain. Do you think our forger read about them before or after writing his 63 page masterpiece?
It's not a logical howler John, it's a simple inevitability. If the diary is a forgery, then that document is out there somewhere.
Your arguments regarding the did Michael/didn't Michael write any lyrics are becoming desperate. The simple fact is that you don't know! So in essence you are giving me nothing to argue against. PROVE to me that Michael never ever wrote one word of his songs. You can't, can you? Because Michael very well could have written some of the words, either that or my pet theory - Maybrick was just ignorant of what his brother did, or rather the way in which he did it. It's perfectly reasonable to suppose that James Maybrick did not have a clue about the nature of Michael's partnership with Fred Weatherly. He was a cotton merchant, for God's sake! Not a music critic!
And once more John you resort to that old chestnut of trying to accuse me of quoting the diary to prove the diary. This is sheer nonsense, and something which you have done so many times that you really ought to be bored of it by now. I have never once relied on 'the text says Michael wrote verse, so he must have written verse'. They were your words John, not mine. The idea that Michael May have written some of the lyrics is only a possibility and not even my favourite theory. Still I'm glad it's your favourite. Remember John, if you want to criticize me next time, this is the main plank of my argument against your idea that the diarist has made a mistake in the Michael/rhyming verse saga - JAMES MAYBRICK DID NOT KNOW! End of story.
You like to be analytical and 'logical', don't you John? In fact I would go further than that I think your whole world is based heavily around 'logic'. So how can we explain 'logically' the acts of a madman ( this holds true whoever JTR was)?
Feldman's job was hard at the beginning. It must have appeared harder when guys like yourself came out to attack his work. Paul has done some sterling research, and what have you got, John? You've got your 'logic' for company. Well, I hope it keeps you feeling warm at night.
Good night
Peter
p.s. How about a reply to the poser on Maybrick's parents? |
Author: John Hacker
Tuesday, 16 October 2001 - 07:43 pm | | Peter Wood,
This conversation isn't confusing enough with only two Peters, we need two John's as well. Just for reference, I'm the Good John, and he's the Evil John. :-)
I'd like to horn in on your discussion with Evil John and address a statement you made in your recent post. "What you must understand is that Feldman can't perhaps PROVE any one particular point, but when they are lined up alongside each other, then it becomes too much of a coincidence, too much like good luck, too good to be true." Too good to be true indeed. This is the essence of virtually all Ripper suspects. A few coincidences and a LOT of inferrence.
That that author of the DT got many points right is hardly suprising considering the fact the Maybrick was not an unknown, research had already been done. Lucky coincidence that. The problem with Maybrick in my opinion is that not only do you have to believe in the "pro" points, you also have to disbelieve a number of arguments against the disputed texts (Referred to hereafter as the DT.) authenticity.
We need to believe that slight facial similarities in old, low quality photos serves to provide an acceptable provenence for a document that frankly has the worst provenence imaginable. (For the record, my wife's grandmother is the splitting image of Florrie and one of my co-workers would look just like "Sir Jim" himself if only he would shave the beard off. Coincidence? Yes.)
We need to believe that Maybrick had consistent handwriting only when writing to the DT. Other than that it was potluck on the will and the letters.
We need to believe that he couldn't remember when he placed MJK's breasts?!?!? And that he didn't know what his brother did for a living?
We need to believe that for some reason he chose to write his "diary" in the most narrative fashion imaginable for what would surely be an incredibly personal document. (I agree heartily with Evil John on this point.) Why set the stage when you're writing to yourself?
We need to believe that an SK choose to venture 200 miles from home to consistently kill within a single small area. (It's possible I suppose, but I've never heard of it happening. Have you?)
We need to believe that a man can be driven into becomming a SK based on drug use and marital infidelity. (Can you cite any actual examples of this kind of behavior? Heck, we got drugs that make arsenic look like sugar today.)
I could come up with more, but time grows short and I must get the boy off to bed. It's chat night. :-)
You can argue around these points and more I have no doubt, but it's pretty hard for me to swallow because you gotta to believe 'em all. Frankly I'd need to start drinking again to believe all these things at once. None of these points conclusively prove the DT to be a forgery of course, but "but when they are lined up alongside each other, then it becomes too much of a coincidence, too much like good luck, too good to be true." :-)
You keep asking for proof that Maybrick was elsewhere on a significant date. Given that you're willing/able to reason away the points above and more, I can only believe that should a dated document place Maybrick elsewhere on a significant date, you'd make the very reasonable suggestion that the author could have transposed digits or whatever. It's just another thing to swallow.
Cheers,
John Hacker |
Author: John Omlor
Tuesday, 16 October 2001 - 08:25 pm | | OK Peter,
Quickly, then.
The words in quotes are always yours:
"Now, John, why do you have such a problem accepting the diary as evidence?"
Because we don't know who wrote it. And since you are trying to prove who wrote it, things in it cannot be used as evidence or claimed as facts, since we have no idea whether they are true or not because we don't know who wrote it. You cannot claim that James Maybrick said something or knew something or didn't say something or didn't know something or did something or didn't do something based on what is in the diary -- because we don't know who wrote the diary. We do not even know if James Maybrick is in the diary, remember?
"Do not the letters ALLEGEDLY signed by Jack The Ripper have signatures which resemble those on letters of Maybrick's which PHF has discovered..."
No.
"When it suits you, our forger has done no research. On other occasions, yes, he's done some research. Which is it?"
Again, I have never written that the forgers did no research. I believe they did.
Again, they may have done research and still not attempted to copy the handwriting, either because they did not know the sample was still existent or because they did not have the necessary skills. It's one thing to research and write a bunch of stuff about James Maybrick and Jack the Ripper in an old Victorian book -- it's another to be able to accurately copy someone's handwriting well enough to fool the experts. I, for instance, could probably do the former and not the latter.
"Is there any one else out there who agrees with John that there is even the remotest possibility that a forger who could forge a document that would keep Ripperologists, songwriters, police officers and publishers et al in discussion for nigh on ten years, would not be aware of the September 25 letter?"
Perhaps there are people out there who think this. I don't know if anyone is out there or not. That is immaterial. It is still a situation that is certainly possible.
Remember, Peter, the argument you are making still ends up being that the forgers would have known about the samples and therefore would have tried to copy the handwriting. If they didn't... what?
You are not seriously suggesting that because they did not copy the handwriting we can conclude that there were no forgers? You are not seriously suggesting that because Maybrick's handwriting was not copied, this is not a forgery? Because if you are, remember, you are then telling me that because the handwriting does not look like Maybrick's it must be Maybrick's. And this simply makes no sense.
Only two things are possible:
A.) Someone forged the document and did not copy Maybrick's handwriting.
B.) No one forged the document and it is authentic.
If A. -- then yes, someone forged the document and did not copy the handwriting and that is why the handwriting does not match Maybrick's.
If B. -- Why does the handwriting not match Maybrick's?
B. is only possible if Maybrick wrote the diary in a handwriting that did not come close to matching any known historical samples of his handwriting. Still, no one has logically explained this. And MPD is not a real answer.
Then, again:
"If the diary is a forgery, then that document is out there somewhere."
Sigh.
Once again, simply.
A. The diary is a forgery.
B. That document (which proves Maybrick's whereabouts on those weekends) does not exist.
It is perfectly possible for both A and B to be true. The diary could have been forged and there could also be no documentary evidence of Maybrick's whereabouts.
Consequently, your conditional -- "If the diary is a forgery, then that document is out there somewhere." is simply invalid.
That is, the "If - then" part of that sentence is not a necessity.
Consequently this is indeed a simple logical error and not a valid argument.
Regarding Michael not being a verse writer:
"JAMES MAYBRICK DID NOT KNOW!"
Do you have any evidence whatsoever for this claim? Remember, it can't come from the diary.
If you do not, then it is just wishful thinking.
"So how can we explain 'logically' the acts of a madman ( this holds true whoever JTR was)?"
I am not trying to explain the acts of a madman. I am trying to read a diary critically and respond responsibly to your arguments. These are things I can do logically. My world no more revolves around logic than it does around passion --it revolves around logic, and passion, and reason, and love, and joy, and delight, and patience, and self-discipline, and abandon, and control. But in this discussion, in which we are trying to analyze arguments and read Paul Feldman's claims for logical consistency and validity and read your conclusions for the same qualities, my reading does indeed revolve around reason and logic.
"How about a reply to the poser on Maybrick's parents?"
See my previous post's PS for my deferring to RJ, someone who knows much more about available source material on Maybrick, regarding Maybrick's parents. Remember, I have always believed and always written that the forgers did do research. And this is not, in any way, contradicted by the fact that they did not try to copy Maybrick's handwriting.
"Paul has done some sterling research, and what have you got, John?"
My ability to read.
--John |
Author: R.J.P.
Tuesday, 16 October 2001 - 09:52 pm | | Peter Wood--You ask about the diary's statement "Soon, I trust I shall be laid beside my dear mother and father", and how the forger of the diary would have known this. Simple enough really, Bernard Ryan's The Poisoned Life of Mrs. Maybrick pg. 94. The passage describes the exhumation of Maybrick's body by the coroner:
"The workman pulled up the heavy flagstones and revealed a whitewashed brick vault which contained the remains of Maybrick and his mother and father."
There are a lot of claims about the sophistication of the Maybrick material in the diary. By my count, there are only about 55 or so confirmable 'facts' about Maybrick in the entire diary. All of them can be found in Ryan's book; reprinted by Penguin in 1984, with a copy available at the University of Liverpool. |
Author: R.J.P.
Tuesday, 16 October 2001 - 11:19 pm | | Peter--a few more examples.
The Diary: "Business is flourishing so I have no inclination as regards the matter..."
B. Ryan: "Maybrick's cotton brokerage flourished" (p. 26)
The Diary: "True my head & arms pain me at times, but I am not duly worried..."
B. Ryan: "Maybrick complained of ceaseless headaches over a period of three months, of a numbness of the left leg and hand..." (p 29)
The Diary: "Frequented my club" (p 449)
B. Ryan: "James continued to spend frequent evenings 'at the club' and to travel to London for a day or two 'on business'." (p 28-29)
The Diary: "The bitch has no inclination"
B. Ryan: "He annoyed her by seeming not to be distressed that for nearly two years now she had not permitted him to sleep with her." (p32)
The Diary: "The Whore informed Hopper"
B. Ryan: "One day in 1888, Dr Arthur Hopper, who had delivered Mrs. Maybrick's daughter a year or so earlier, received a visit from her. She said she wanted to consult him about her husband..." (p29)
The Diary: "The whore is in debt"
B. Ryan: "Mrs. Maybrick told the doctor about her repugnance for her husband and revealed that she had accumulated considerable debts." (p 38)
The Diary: "The bitch has written all"
B. Ryan: "In London, about 12th March, Michael Maybrick received a letter from his sister-in-law. Florence was concerned because her husband seemed to be in the habit of taking some pernicious drug.." (p 33)
The Diary: "Fuller believes there is very little the matter with me."
B. Ryan: "At last he [Fuller] told his patient that he could find very little the matter with him.." (p 42)
The Diary: "I place this now in a place where it shall be found. * * * Dated this third day of May 1889"
B. Ryan: "On the 3rd of May he stayed in bed, and Cadwallader again hurried to fetch Dr. Humphreys.." [The passage then describes Maybrick returning to his office very briefly one last time and then returning home where he died a few days later.] |
Author: Madeleine Murphy
Wednesday, 17 October 2001 - 12:48 am | | That was a very eye-opening list, RJP.
I am especially struck by the frequency of echoed words: "flourish," "frequent the club," "find nothing the matter with me." !!!
madeleine |
Author: Paul Begg
Wednesday, 17 October 2001 - 03:25 am | | Hi Madeleine
I think text analysis is fine in the context being argued by RJP and Caroline, namely whether or not the text suggests that the author of the 'diary' (for which read faker) knew Maybrick had a knowledge of the East End. But I don't think we can infere that he didn't simply from the passage ‘I have walked the streets and have become familiar with them’. Otherwise you are perfectly correct that I am interested in establishing the ways and methods and language that should be used when trying to determin the authenticity of a document.
To touch briefly on the definition of an open mind, the discussion has moved on apace but I agree with what you say, though to pick up on your (rather emotive)white supremacist analogy, wouldn't you only know that what he says is based on a false premise if you’d heard and critically assessed his words? To do that you have to have an open mind. Ditto about graphology. And isn't the open-minded person also the person who continues to listen and hear and assess what is being said, and who continues to question and test one’s own perceptions? Having a closed mind is not hearing, not critically analysing, and not continuing to test what is said and what one believes - is being the white supremacist! |
Author: Christopher T George
Wednesday, 17 October 2001 - 04:04 am | | Hi, Peter:
You note:
"As for Sarah's whereabouts in the post ripper era, it's on page 37 of Shirley's book.
"'.........census records for 1891....established the names of the inhabitants of 265 Queen's Road...'. Last on the list is Sarah.
"Interesting to note that immediately prior to this she was supposed to be living 'out of the way' (whatever that means) in Sunderland at No 8 DUNDAS street."
Now, Peter, you were, if you recall, castigating me for saying that Sarah Robertson lived in the East End twenty years before the 1888-1889 period, the alleged period of the Diary. The truth though is the way I pictured it, i.e., she was in the East End earlier, being at age 13 on Tower Hill in 1851 and in 1868 at 55 Bromley Street, Commercial Road (Harrison, Blake edition, p. 38), both locations being close to Whitechapel. She apparently met Maybrick while working as an assistant in a jeweller's shop at age 20 in 1858 and lived with him on and off for twenty years (ibid., p. 39).
At the time of Florence Maybrick's trial, Sarah was as you say in Sunderland in the northeast of England... although her usual residence was 265 Queen's Road which while it is in London is not the East End either, but has a S.E. postal code in New Cross, south of the River Thames. She was to die in New Cross as well, as a "spinster of independent means of 24 Cottesbrook Street, New Cross." (Harrison, p. 39)
The point I was trying to make was that during the time Maybrick was supposedly writing the Diary and doing the murders, he was not popping into Whitechapel to visit his commonlaw wife. She was elsewhere. Yes I know he has the bolthole (supposedly) in Middlesex Street, "which is a joke in itself."
Finally, something else to think about. Who is the mysterious mistress who is hinted at in the words, "Tonight I shall see mine"??? Evidently it is not Sarah Robertson. Why is this love interest of Maybrick's so shadowy and not better characterized?
Best regards
Chris George |
Author: Caroline Anne Morris
Wednesday, 17 October 2001 - 06:42 am | | Hi All,
Hi John (Omlor),
You suggested the following as a possible reason for the diary handwriting not matching Maybrick’s (or ‘Dear Boss’ for that matter):
‘They figured that attempting to forge the writing would be in one way riskier than not attempting to, since if the writing did not look at all like the known samples, it could not finally be compared to them in order to spot a forgery.’
Then you wrote:
‘…it is very clear that the fact that the handwriting does not look like Maybrick's does not, in any way, suggest that Maybrick wrote the diary. Quite the opposite.’
And then you wrote:
‘It's one thing to research and write a bunch of stuff about James Maybrick and Jack the Ripper in an old Victorian book -- it's another to be able to accurately copy someone's handwriting well enough to fool the experts. I, for instance, could probably do the former and not the latter.’
But would you bother to conceive, research, compose and write 63 pages of a diary, then attempt to pass it off as someone else’s work, if you knew you didn’t have the basic skill to try and copy that person’s handwriting? I don’t understand how not even attempting to copy it could in any way be thought a less risky option by a determined forger – however stupid he was, or is. If a thief wants to get away with using someone else’s credit card, for instance, he would never consider it less risky not to try copying the signature, would he?
I get the feeling that whoever wrote the diary must have had something else in mind, other than committing a simple fraud to make some cash. All that work could have got our faker nothing but a prison sentence. But somehow, whoever it was, I think he knew it wouldn't end like that.
Hi RJ,
Very interesting snippets from Ryan – thanks. Of course, if our faker did use this source, he obviously overlooked the bit about the will being written in James’s hand, or, as John suggests, thought it would be less risky not to track it down and copy the writing, because he knew he would make a lousy job of it – much better, and more convincing, to write it in a completely different hand and let everyone argue about graphology and MPD for the next decade. 
By the way, do we know where Ryan got all his information? Could he have been quoting some of the expressions from much earlier sources, for instance?
Love,
Caz |
Author: John Omlor
Wednesday, 17 October 2001 - 07:29 am | | Hi Caz,
I'm late for work again...
But sure, it is certainly possible that the "forger" didn't try to copy the handwriting because he had something else planned for the document or was going to make some other sort of argument or use it for some other purpose, I suppose. But I have hard time thinking of what that other purpose might have been, to be honest.
You ask me:
"But would you bother to conceive, research, compose and write 63 pages of a diary, then attempt to pass it off as someone else’s work, if you knew you didn’t have the basic skill to try and copy that person’s handwriting?"
Well, I wouldn't. But that means nothing. I'm not at all sure that there aren't plenty of others that would, especially if they lacked a certain sort of common sense or if they either mistakenly believed that no samples of the writing in question still existed (or at least could be accessed) or that it was possible that people would, themselves, come up with some convenient "explanation" for the lack of a match purely out of their desire to believe a good story.
If it was the latter, by the way, they were right.
In any case, as I think you know, we certainly cannot conclude that because there was no attempt to match the handwriting, there were no forgers. Because that would leave us arguing that because the writing does not match Maybrick's, it must be Maybrick's. And that would be nonsense.
As I mentioned to Peter -- either forgers wrote this diary and did not try and match the handwriting, or Maybrick wrote it. These are the only two posibilities. If the first one is true, then regardless of why, forgers did write the diary and did not match the handwriting. If the second one is true... then why does the writing not match?
Without a reasonable answer to that last question, we have to assume the first possibility (for whatever reason) is far more likely.
Off to work,
--John |
Author: John Hacker
Wednesday, 17 October 2001 - 08:11 am | | I have to run to work in short order, but I wanted to make a couple of quick points on the issue of the handwriting.
First, to forge someones signiture is one thing, you can simply copy the thing. But to keep it up for 60+ pages is going to be difficult at best, and there are likely to be tell tale mistakes that would tip off folks off that it's a forgery. We're writing in ink here, there's no erasing.
Secondly, in my opinion there was no compelling reason for the author to try and imitate JM's writing because there's no point. The author clearly wanted to attribute the JtR letters to the "diarist" and they don't match JM's writing. What's a 3rd writing style at that point?
The letters are a key part of JtR lore to the public, he taunted police, it's like the gladstone bag. It lets the public know it's "really him". I can see why the author choose to include them, JtR's story WOULD be more interesting if he had writtent he letters.
RJ,
Excellent list!
Cheers,
John Hacker |
Author: Christopher T George
Wednesday, 17 October 2001 - 10:06 am | | Hi, all:
I like the way all you guys are doing your best Ed Carter impressions and running off to work ha ha 
Chris |
Author: Christopher T George
Wednesday, 17 October 2001 - 03:21 pm | | Psssst.... Time for Peter Wood to get home and start firing salvoes at John Omlor and myself. 
Oh, hi, Peter!  |
Author: John Omlor
Wednesday, 17 October 2001 - 05:50 pm | | Hi Chris,
Well, I'm afraid I won't be around. I'm off for an evening with family and friends and Greek food.
Thought for the day: It is coming up on seven and half years since Mike Barrett had "only days to live," according the story he told Harold Brough at the Post.
--John
"Yes, I am a forger. The greatest in history." MB |
Author: Peter Wood
Wednesday, 17 October 2001 - 06:48 pm | | Christopher
I shall take that as a compliment I think. I am not in the best of moods tonight, having played in a game of football - and lost, then to arrive home and watch Manchester United play Deportivo - and guess what? They lost too! I also have sciatica and I am tired, I feel a need to get to my bed, indeed I am sitting on it right now, but I shan't be able to sleep until I have had my nightly round of 'to-ing' and 'fro-ing' with John et al.
It says a lot about the status of the diary that after ten years you are still trying to argue against it's authenticity by continually having a go at the handwriting. I think PHF has more than put a lid on that question by putting forward the circumstances under which we can all exhibit different styles.
R.J.
Thanks for the reference to James' parents being laid to rest together. So we now have to accept that our forger read Ryan's book? But, no! John Omlor would argue that ain't necessarily so! Indeed it probably would be a perfectly logical thing to do when faking a diary of a Victorian cotton merchant to surmise that his parents were buried together, after all don't we all bury our parents together? R.J. If the diary is a forgery then clearly our forger read Ryan's book, but to quote a handful of lines and compare them with similarly sounding lines in the diary is being selective to say the least. Those are words and phrases in common useage and it is not evidence of a forgery to suggest that our gifted forger simply lifted them out of Ryan's book. Still we can now add to the list of texts he must have read Ryan's book. But according to John we can't add the Christie archives. And we can't add the letter which refers to 'treble event' either. My view here must be crystal clear to you, if the diary is a forgery then our forger got his information from somewhere, right? But you choose to 'lift' a few quotes from Ryan's text which is 'obvious' for a forger to use as it is in the public domain, whilst deftly swatting away Paul's evidence by saying 'the forger needn't have necessarily read that text'. Yes, he must. And he must have read many others.
John relies heavily on logic and reason, but takes it to its extremes. It therefore ceases to be a valid argument and becomes nothing more than a succession of could, could, could. And John is also reliant on trying to force words upon me which I simply haven't written.
John Omlor - the writing argument isn't the most important argument to prove or disprove the authenticity of the diary. To use your logic, there may not be a document out there which would place Maybrick in the wrong place at the relevant times, indeed there does not have to be. But it's not likely, is it John? In fact it is much more likely that the particular document does exist - and more than one. I can't prove that that document exists, but if I were in your shoes I would have a damn good go at looking for it, something which you obviously seem content not to do, relying on your argument to augument your laziness by saying 'but it may not be there, so why should we waste our time looking'.
R.J.
In your list of quotes lifted from Ryan you mention two which contain the word 'inclination' but you seem, for your purposes, to ascribe a different meaning to the word on each occasion. Would it not make sense to substitute 'knowledge' for 'inclination' in both texts? Therefore your argument against at least one of the lines becomes invalid and your list is exposed as nothing more than a desperate attempt to 'prove' that the diary is a forgery by quoting lines from an old book - and, on occasion, misinterpreting them.
John Hacker
Slight facial similarities? Hmm, any of you guys got enough money for some DNA tests? For all our forger knew, the people to whom PHF is attempting to create a lineage with JM could have looked like ..........Jerry Springer! So once again our forger didn't research anything, he just got lucky.
As for the issue of Mary Kelly's breasts John, I have covered this before, but for your convenience I will repeat that I do not believe the diarist made a mistake here. It is one of the areas where I differ in my opinion from that of Shirley Harrison. Shirley and other's would seem to put too much store in Dr Bond's statement that the breasts were under the head and by the foot. I think it much more likely that John McCarthy, the first man into the room don't forget, got it right when he ascribed the breasts as being on the table. Bond is in dispute with other doctors on other points regarding the case.
So, our forger probably read a good few texts, perhaps R.J. would like to give me an instance of one where it mentions both Bond and McCarthy's statements regarding Mary's breasts - and then explain why the 'forger' chose to plump for McCarthy's option? If I were in your position and I were looking for a forger, or at the very least to seek evidence that the diary was a forgery then I would question why the diarist saw fit to refer to Mary's breasts at all.............but once again I am doing your job for you.............
Chris
I honestly don't know where Sarah was during 1888, but she appeared to have at least a base in London. I am surprised that the diarist doesn't make some reference to her by name, especially in view of the amount of evidence available to suggest a link to her. It is perfectly possible that his mistress in London was an entirely different woman and that James hadn't seen Sarah in many years. I do however think it very likely that he went through a marriage ceremony with her. I am sure that a forger would have been tempted to make mention of Sarah Anne's existence. After all he refers to just about everyone else with one name or another - George, Lowry, Bobo, Gladys, Bunny, Hopper, Fuller etc etc. Perhaps John Omlor would argue that the diarist could have seen it as too much of a risk. James certainly had a mistress in Liverpool, whether or not it was Sarah is doubtful.
Let's play the forgery scenario John (Omlor). Our forgers don't attempt to copy the handwriting of James. Why not? Maybe there isn't enough of it to give an accurate impression of his writing? Maybe the examples they find are different to each other, so they can't decide which one to copy? Then they turn their attention to the JTR letters........why not copy that? - As the other John points out it would be difficult to do for 63 pages, so then we have to ask - why write 63 pages? Why not just write a single letter to James' best mate George in which he confesses to being JTR? Now that would have been easy to maintain a 'copy' of known handwriting, for one page, wouldn't it? But no, our diarist chooses to write 63 pages, and with every page increases his risk of being exposed. I do not believe that whoever wrote the diary intended to make money from it (Maybrick if it was genuine, any other if it's a forgery), because they would be taking too great a risk in view of possible prosecution. It would have been much easier to write a book about Maybrick, our diarist is obviously talented, after all. Mike Barrett is the only candidate who could have forged the diary with the intention of making money from it - but the diary writing doesn't match his natural hand either, does it?
Then to the question of 'Why Maybrick?' Indeed why! It's an inspired choice for a forgery, a cotton merchant from Liverpool who was attributed as having spent several months a year in America, and chose to kill whores 200 (206) miles from his home. Whoever asked the question, by the way, it's not altogether unknown for serial killers to travel to their crimes. Peter Sutcliffe did. What about Bundy, didn't he travel all over? I'm not quoting from knowledge here, just asking a question. And of course other candidates for the Ripper would have had to travel good distances - Tumblety, for instance, from America. Druitt from Dorset, yes I know he lived in London, but on the days of two of the murders he is known to have been playing cricket in Dorset. George Chapman was on the scene of course, he would have made a far better subject for the diary than James Maybrick.
To prove the diary a forgery you do not have to answer all these questions, but nevertheless they are interesting questions. Why would a forger deliberately make it difficult for himself by choosing a suspect who lived, supposedly, 200 miles away? Even if, as PHF has proven, the candidate did have links with Whitechapel. Why not go for Kosminski, resident in Whitechapel? Chapman, resident in Whitechapel? Leather Apron, Joe Barnett, Michael Kidney, George Lusk - all nominated as candidates and all resident or working in Whitechapel.
No, as I stated before, you do not have to answer those questions to prove the diary a forgery. But read them anyway, and chew them over. To prove the diary a forgery you don't have to do much......You can stop arguing the handwriting because it is too contentious an issue; you can forget about the analysis of ink and paper - because basically that falls down on the side of authenticity; you can forget about tin match boxes and lost keys which could be argued about until the cows come home; you can forget about the psychoanalytical babble because, again, that falls down on the side of the diary (feel free to lift this piece of text John O, and place it in one of your future posts). What you should do is concentrate on where Maybrick was in 1888. Our diarist, on a whim, has him in Whitechapel. Go on John, go and look for THAT document!
R.J.
As I said before, thanks for the info on Maybrick's parents. Perhaps you and John O would like to team up again? Answer me this:
Your starter for ten: "In view of the fact that the majority of you think the diary is a 'modern' forgery, how do you account for Alec Voller's examination and statement of the ink? Alec has the ink looking 'tens' of years old and says it is at least 90 years old. If you accept Alec's evidence then you must accept that the diary is an old forgery or is genuine. Which then leads you to problems with the tin match box, unknown about until late 1980's - so I rather suspect that you won't concur with Alec's evidence. However it would be interesting to see how you argue against it. Perhaps you should all have some input on this, even Paul Begg and Caz.
Regaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaardzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
A very sleepy Peter.
Curse you all for keeping me awake at night! I do believe my wife has no inclination of my nocturnal activities.............. |
Author: Peter Wood
Wednesday, 17 October 2001 - 06:50 pm | | John Omlor
All you have achieved with your last post is to blatantly expose Mike Barrett as a liar.
Ergo, he could not have been telling the truth when he said he forged the diary.
Peter. |
Author: Peter Wood
Wednesday, 17 October 2001 - 06:52 pm | | Peter
Note to self: Aah but yes he could Peter.
Slowly:
Mike Barret is a liar.
Mike Barret lies all of the time.
That's not logical.
Just thought I would save you the bother, John.
Hope you enjoyed your Greek food John, I just love Houmous and pitta bread. Olives are my favourite. |
Author: John Omlor
Thursday, 18 October 2001 - 12:58 am | | Hi Peter,
The food was lovely.
Yes, reminding everyone of Mike's lie was one of the things I had in mind.
I certainly didn't "expose" him as a liar, though. That was done long ago and no doubt for all time.
And I completely agree with you, Peter.
Mike is a liar.
Mike lies all the time.
Therefore it becomes nearly impossible to know when and if he is ever telling the truth.
He is completely unreliable and nothing he says can be taken as evidence for anything whatsoever.
I have argued just this point time and time again on the boards.
His so-called confessions are certainly not reliable evidence of his guilt. Not in any way.
None of his stories are to be trusted. Not the ones he told to Keith and Shirley, not the contradicting ones he told to the detective, not the ones he told to Paul Feldman, none of them.
That is why I have never suggested that Mike Barrett forged the diary. Because there is still no reliable, material, independent evidence, except perhaps the Crashaw quote in the Sphere Guide, that links him to the diary's scene of writing or to its composition and execution.
None.
Now then,
To save time and archive space, Peter, before we get into an ink discussion, I should mention that there is an entire board dedicated to a recent discussion of the science including and especially the ink; and the Maybrick Diary board also has an extensive discussion of the science and Dr. Voller's analysis as well.
And they all prove one thing.
The science remains completely conflicted. Therefore, it too has proven unable to prove that the diary was written in 1888 or in 1982. Consequently, as of yet, until the results are more definitive either way, the science simply remains inconsistent and it retains its status as evidence which conflicts even with itself (like so much of the evidence concerning the history of this little project).
Peter,
You write:
"Mike Barrett is the only candidate who could have forged the diary with the intention of making money from it..."
Why?
What makes Mike so special? Why couldn't lots of other people have done this? Because Mike is one of only two people to have actually seen money from it? No. Since it is certainly possible that once the diary met with public and critical reception the plan (whatever it was and whose-ever it was) went horribly wrong.
And certainly someone could have forged the diary at any point between 1888 and 1982 with the intention to make money off of it and then decided not to pursue their plan for a million possible reasons ranging from fear to wisdom to death.
So I'm not sure why Mike is the only candidate who could have done such a thing.
Also,
The honest answer, the only honest answer, to the question of motive, at this point, is that no one has any reliable idea.
But still, either someone did forge a diary of James Maybrick and did not copy his handwriting (for whatever reason) or James Maybrick wrote it. And it's not Maybrick's handwriting. And Paul Feldman has not "put a lid on that question by putting forward the circumstances under which we can all exhibit different styles." Not at all. Not in any thorough or reliable or verifiable or scholarly way whatsoever. And until someone does, the simplest and most likely scenario remains that the writing in the diary is not Maybrick's, since it matches nothing that he is known to have written.
One aside... You write:
"John relies heavily on logic and reason, but takes it to its extremes. It therefore ceases to be a valid argument..."
This is fascinating. I have seen such a response before. Too much reason, too much logic, there must be something wrong. This signals to me only that there is no satisfactory response to the specific arguments, the specific logic or reason.
It is also, by the way, nonsensical. How can something be so logical, so reasonable, that it's not valid?
Speaking about the documentary proof of Maybrick's whereabouts on the murder nights, you say:
"In fact it is much more likely that the particular document does exist - and more than one."
Why? How is this more likely than the possibility that there is no such record? Please explain, since it seems to me, that given the nature of the record and the time that has passed, it is just as likely that there is not a record of Maybrick's particular whereabouts on the four weekends in question as it is that there is such a record.
And for the sake of accuracy, I believe you know that I have never written nor said anything like:
"'but it may not be there, so why should we waste our time looking'".
as you have me saying. Anyone who wants to look for it should do so. All I have said is that it does not necessarily exist and therefore to claim that there is no record of Maybrick's whereabouts is not to offer any evidence at all either way for the diary's authenticity or the likelihood of Maybrick being Jack.
It's just not.
You cannot say that because no one has found any document that fixes Maybrick's whereabouts on those days, it is more likely that he was in the East End. It's not, since we have found no documentation either way.
Consequently, the lack of information on this subject is not evidence of anything at all.
Still, we have not a single piece of reliable, material, independently confirmed evidence that links the historical James Maybrick to this document or to the Jack the Ripper murders or that establishes this book as having even existed at all prior to 1992.
Consequently, there is not a single piece of reliable, material, independently confirmed evidence which exclusively supports this diary as being authentic. Not one. Not in any book and not in any of the arguments that have been advanced here.
You tell me Peter, that I am "relying on [my] argument to augument [my] laziness." But as far as I can see, I am doing exactly the same thing you are -- sitting here, reading carefully, responding carefully, analyzing the document, its history, the evidence and the surrounding texts, and debating it all with you. So if you believe that my arguments here only serve to augment some laziness, then that must be true for both of us. That's fine with me.
By the way, Peter, you ask why the forgers chose Maybrick. No one knows this, of course. But it is certainly possible that they did not decide to forge a Ripper diary and then go looking for a subject. It's possible that they came upon Maybrick' story (especially if they lived in Liverpool) and made the link with the Ripper dates (especially around the centennial anniversary of the crimes and all the consequent publicity) and hit upon the idea that way. In which case, Maybrick wasn't chosen as a suspect at all. He was there, so to speak, at the birth of the idea.
Once again, Peter, you speak to me of proving the diary a forgery. I'm not in that business, despite our recent discussions. I'm in the business of reading the text, considering the evidence, looking for logical soundness and completeness in the arguments and reading the related studies. From that I form a set of problems and, of course, my own readings.
But the diary was brought to the public. It needs not to be proven false, but to be authenticated. It's provenance needs, also, to be authenticated.
No one has been able to do either of those things.
No one has even come close.
Consequently, the diary remains a work of fascinating fiction until someone can link it and its provenance in some reliable and material way to actual history.
Now I too must sleep.
Enjoy the day,
--John
PS: Peter, do you have any explanation at all for why or how a C of E businessman like James Maybrick would be likely to suddenly burst into a line from the middle of an obscure reworking of a Sacred Latin hymn by the 17th Century Catholic poet Richard Crashaw? And then not do anything even remotely like that anywhere else in his so-called "private journal?" |
Author: R.J.P.
Thursday, 18 October 2001 - 02:50 am | | Caz--the writer of the diary could have used a diverse amount of documents, old news articles, etc. to create the diary. In other words, they could have used the same sources that Bernard Ryan [or Nigel Morland] used. And I can't really prove that they didn't. But in studying the matter rather carefully, I came to the opinion that this wasn't very likely. There were some elements in the diary that would have been difficult to know from, say, news articles--such as the pet names of Maybrick's children. And many of the books that treated the Maybrick case (such as Christie's, RWE's, or Victorian Murderesses by Mary Hartmen) were excellent, but didn't have all the detail that the diary writer would have needed. The only source that I could find that both had all the needed material plus seemed to use much of the same phrasing as the diary was Bernard Ryan's. Except for dating purposes [the book was originally printed in 1971] this is unimportant in itself, but I was mainly interested in seeing if Mike Barrett's claims held up to scrutiny. Sure, as John pointed out, Mike tells many contradicting statements, but I wasn't interested in that aspect. I was only interested in whether the details of Mike's statements held up to any scrutiny or suggested that he had 'inside information'.
At one point Alan Gray asked Mike to explain how he knew that Maybrick was away at Christmas in 1888. Mike answered:
That other book, The 'Poisoned Life' one, says he was in thick with Thomas....He only live 20 miles away in Manchester...see the connection? It's all about plotting...It's just a big circle...The first was in Manchester so the last has to be in Manchester. It's put down like that in the diary. F$&# it, he was only 20 miles away..You don't need a f&%*ing excuse to hop over and see your brother...Everyone visits everyone else at Christmas time..."
Now I admit this is hardly proof of anything. But it does seem likely to me that Ryan's book was used--for some of the examples I've alreadly listed, and others such as, for instance, that it's the only source I could find [outside of newspaper reports] that mentioned his 'Royal Highness' being at the Grand National. And here we have Mike mentioning Ryan's book as a source by name. It seems to jive. And to me, Mike's statement seems pretty likely to be the way the creators of the diary composed. They had some bare skeletal facts, used a little logic, and created some vague and almost verifiable facts about Maybrick's life that seem to be nearly impossible to have researched. [We don't know, of course, if Maybrick really was away at Christmas].
I realize that you are not particularly keen on the idea of Mike having inside knowledge, but I find it interesting that some elements of Mike's statements seem to hold up to a certain amount of scrutiny.
As for the will, yes Ryan mentions it. But I'm not sure the average person would realize that it would actually still exist in a record's office. Cheers, RP |
Author: Caroline Anne Morris
Thursday, 18 October 2001 - 05:47 am | | Hi All,
Hi John O,
I hope you are not confusing me with Peter Wood here. I have never suggested, and don’t intend to now, that Maybrick must have written the diary because a forger would have at least tried to copy his handwriting! It’s just another aspect which I find puzzling, that’s all. Mike Barrett takes the diary to London, knowing that the writing looks nothing like Maybrick’s? I don’t think so. Has he ever been asked, I wonder, how it was decided and agreed that his co-forger, our elusive penman, should risk writing the thing in his own undisguised hand? It doesn’t make sense to me that anyone would anticipate, in the wake of the Hitler Diaries, that the handwriting aspect would not put a permanent spanner in the works, and condemn their little hoax along with those responsible. The fact that the diary is still believed genuine by those first presented with it does not mean that a forger not bothering to copy Maybrick’s writing had any right to hope this would be the case.
Where I agree with Peter W is when he writes:
‘I do not believe that whoever wrote the diary intended to make money from it….because they would be taking too great a risk in view of possible prosecution.’
And, like Peter, I think the obvious thing, from a modern forger-for-money’s point of view, would have been to write a much shorter confession note, where the risk of getting stuff wrong would have been far smaller. Whoever wrote the diary was a big show-off, who had no worries that some document might emerge at any time to say Maybrick had spent Xmas 1888 at home with his family. Our diarist always seems to get away with whatever he chooses – either it’s confirmed by the historical record, or the record fails to tell us either way, or details are left too vague to trip him up.
If our hoaxer did very little research, I think he was extremely lucky that so many of his choices were endorsed by other people’s later findings.
Hi RJ,
So I assume you believe that Mike knows who the penman is, but for some reason isn’t telling. Well, as you know, he first confessed to forging the thing single-handedly, but the writing is no more like Mike’s than it is like Maybrick’s. Then he said Anne wrote it – ditto. He also wrote to Anne privately, saying: “I know you wrote the diary”, which, however you read it, appears to make nonsense of the idea that either of the Barretts could have worked on it with the other’s knowledge, or that they both knew very well who did write it.
The handwriting is a problem for modern hoax theorists every bit as much as for believers. Why would Mike have protected the penman all this time, if he knew his identity? And what if he doesn’t know?
Incidentally, no one seems to want to come up with a scenario by which Robbie could have put the scratches in Albert’s watch and engineered the discovery - all without Albert’s knowledge. And I’m afraid this is what has to be addressed, unless all you modern hoax theorists are happy that your beliefs mean that Albert must be a liar and a cheat.
The watch won’t go away – sorry. It’s not just here because naughty Caz keeps bringing it up.
Love,
Caz |
Author: John Omlor
Thursday, 18 October 2001 - 07:41 am | | Hi Caz,
I have only a moment. I knew you didn't think that there were no forgers because no one tried to copy Maybrick's handwriting. I was just re-emphasizing where that argument inevitably leads those supporting authenticity.
You write:
"Our diarist always seems to get away with whatever he chooses – either it’s confirmed by the historical record, or the record fails to tell us either way, or details are left too vague to trip him up."
I suggest the possibility that the third thing on your list helps account for the first two things on your list.
But I do still think it's possible that someone somewhere got the idea of writing a diary and foisting it as a hoax onto the general public (either for money or just to prove they could or out of perverse delight)-- wrote it without copying Maybrick's writing (and RJ is right, they might not have realized that samples were still available to them) -- and then sent it on its way.
Of course, the idea of Mike carrying a book to Doreen's which he knows is forged and in which he knows the handwriting doesn't look like Maybrick's and still thinking he can avoid trouble is a bit strained. But then it is Mike after all, and besides he too might not have known Maybrick's writing would be so simply reviewable.
Still, it is also very possible of course that this thing was written somewhere else, by someone else, and that Mike really did only acquire it and therefore did not know exactly what he had when he delivered it to Doreen. And then, upon the critical reception and the real Maybrick writing turning up and all of the other problems with the book, the writer chose anonymity as the better part of valor and was never heard from again.
Perhaps they are long deceased.
Perhaps they are still with us.
Perhaps they are reading this sentence.
Hi. If you are reading this sentence, my clever and creative friend, thanks for all the fun.
--John |
Author: R.J.P.
Thursday, 18 October 2001 - 10:03 am | | John--I guess we'll have to disagree. I think the chances of someone coming to town with a recently forged document and not knowing where it really came from is minuscule rather than as you suggest "very possible". And it's infinitely less possible when one considers Mike's pre-ownership of the Sphere and his odd purchase of that maroon diary. And when Mike pointed out the Blue Coats Art Shop he sure got another lucky hit that their manuscript ink just happened to contain chloroacetimide. Mike Barrett is the only person to whom we can trace the diary. Obviously, any investigation has to start with him. It means nothing to me that he hasn't given a convincing confession; I think he's playing his own game.
And I'm no expert in British law but I think one could argue that there is a big difference between selling a forged document and merely selling the publishing rights of a forged document. If Barrett had tried to auction off the Maybrick document on the block at Christies and then it was shown to be a forgery he would have been in big trouble. But if he sells it for a pound (he did) and then it is published as a controvesial document that is being investigated then I think he might have neatly side-stepped the legal issues of peddling a forgery. Every day of the week books are published full of nonsense and false information but no one is every put on trial for fraud. |
Author: John Omlor
Thursday, 18 October 2001 - 10:39 am | | Hi RJ,
Yes, I think we will disagree about the quality of the evidence so far against Mike. The chances of someone coming to town with a recently (or not so recently) forged document and not knowing where it really came from increase, of course, if they happen to have recently acquired such a document and don't know what else to do with it. And we don't know whether this happened in this case or not.
And, as has been clearly demonstrated, the maroon diary purchase suggests conflicting things, since Mike did indeed give his own name and address for the record while purchasing it and his buying such a thing in order to compare it to the volume he might have already been holding is certainly no more or less bizarre or illogical than his buying a diary with which to commit a crime and identifying himself casually in the process.
The recently disseminated tapes have an interesting first-hand account of how and why Mike named the Blue Coat Arms shop, by the way. It too (as with all things Mike has ever said) could be a lie, needless to say. But it does dramatically demonstrate that there is another perfectly likely path to the naming of the shop. And this need have had nothing at all to do with knowing anything about any specific chemicals.
Then you say:
"Mike Barrett is the only person to whom we can trace the diary."
What happened to Anne? Or is she disqualified because she did not carry the book to Doreen's with Mike?
"Obviously, any investigation has to start with him."
I agree.
"It means nothing to me that he hasn't given a convincing confession; I think he's playing his own game."
That last phrase is pretty vague, RJ. Care to be specific about how you think that game works and why?
Finally, concerning your legal point -- could be. But are you suggesting that Mike Barrett cooked up a scheme whereby he would take the faux diary into Doreen's office, somehow get a publisher to buy it for a pound, make an agreement then to get paid via its sales and thereby avoid possible prosecution and still legally make a profit off of a hoax he had singularly composed and had someone write out? Mike arranged all this in advance? And then added a fake confession or two because... Well, I'm lost at this point. But if you're right, then Mike may very well be the "greatest forger of all time."
And if the thing is proven to be a deliberate hoax, and Mike is still making money off of its sales, would that return him to the ranks of the legally culpable?
I don't know. I'm just asking.
Still having fun,
--John |
Author: Caroline Anne Morris
Thursday, 18 October 2001 - 10:50 am | | But somebody has been playing that game with him, RJ. Or do you seriously think Mike did it all by himself, despite the fact that the diary handwriting doesn't match his own? MPD perhaps? 
Surely Mike must be protecting someone in your view - even from Anne, since he accused her privately of writing the diary without his knowledge.
Who is this person, letting Mike play his own game with the diary, whatever it happens to be at any one time? And how did the penman engineer things so that Mike would take his creation to London, and not grass on him - even when that very creation has caused Mike so much grief?
Love,
Caz |
Author: R.J.P.
Thursday, 18 October 2001 - 11:29 am | | Caz--Yes, I think Mike is protecting someone. And I also think he has had second-thoughts and is protecting his own interests, thus the lack of a fully convincing confession.
John-- Hi. You still haven't convinced me with your analysis of the red diary and I don't believe that you ever will. You make the point that Mike used his own address when buying the red diary but this is neither here nor there. That doesn't make it an innocent purchase. Bank robbers have written notes to tellers on the back of their own deposit slips, for instance. Does that suggest that they weren't really holding up the bank? That's hardly a strong argument that someone trying to peddle a recently forged document is entirely innocent. Besides, in the real world of the Maybrick diary investigation there was no traceable record found that Mike bought such sort of item until he admitted to buying it 3 years after the diary was brought to London and published. It was only traceable after Mike let the purchase be known, and with the cooperation of Anne Graham. So you certainly haven't demonstrated to me that this was some highly dangerous action on Mike's part. And, as I said before, Mike didn't pay for the red diary until long after the Maybrick diary was published, so there is no evidence that Mike would have ever paid for the red diary and left a paper trail had he decided to use the thing. Cheers, RP |
Author: R.J.P.
Thursday, 18 October 2001 - 11:57 am | | John--As to some of your other points. Yes, I think Mike is a cagey fellow, and not in the least bit stupid. Forgers--even excellent ones such as Mark Hoffman--sell their documents. This was never the aim of Barrett. He first approached Pan books, a seller of paperbacks and mystery novels. It seems likely to me that he really believed he had a 'best seller' on his hands, as he would later call the diary. When Pan showed no interest, he then sought a literary agent. So it seems to me that Barrett was clever enough to seek a book deal rather than to sell the diary itself as a legitimate document. His favorite saying in those days, by the way, was "if you tell the truth you can't get into trouble." Perhaps an odd thing for a dupe to say. And I don't know why you find this particularly difficult to believe, it strikes me as rather obvious. I think the average person who would have discovered such a stupendous find as the diary of Jack the Ripper would have taken the find to the newspapers, rather than to hold on to it for a year and a half studying it [and really having very little to show for this alleged 1 1/2 years of study]. So the claim that Mike got this diary from Anne, poured over it for a year and a half, and then was totally convinced that it was genuine is, to me, ridiculous. Nor does this speak to the observation made by Chris and Simon that the diary looked 'artificial'. Nor does it speak to the fact that Anne Graham offers no proof for her claims that the diary is old. So I'm still stuck with Mike Barrett trying to sell a forgery to book publishers.
As for Mike's various tales, this is the norm with hoaxers, not some strange abberation. Obviously, one aspect of Mike's confession might have been to drag his estranged wife into the fray. I don't know why you think this entitles him to be the greatest forger of all time. |
Author: Caroline Anne Morris
Thursday, 18 October 2001 - 12:16 pm | | Hang on RJ. If the red diary had proved useable, and Mike had taken that, instead of the scrapbook, to London, and just not paid for it, they would have chased him for the money, wouldn't they? Then he would have been in deep trouble as soon as a picture of said red diary appeared in the papers, now chock-full of supposedly Victorian entries, along with some invented tale of how Mr. Michael Barrett acquired it. They'd be far more likely to remember the red diary, and the name of the bloke who ordered it, if he was down on their books as a non-payer.
No paper trail, but his little game would have been up without a doubt.
Love,
Caz
PS Haven't you ever wondered why no one has ever come forward to say that they remember selling materials that could have been used in the creation of the diary, to any one of the suspects? |
Author: R.J.P.
Thursday, 18 October 2001 - 12:28 pm | | Caz--Hi. Still here at my desk. True, and a fair objection, but Barrett of course could have paid for the red diary with a money order, cash, or by some other non-traceable means. It's impossible to know what he would have done after the fact. So all I am saying is that it isn't proveable that this was either a dangerously traceable purchase or wasn't merely an act of criminal stupidity. So I disagree with John's implications. The fact that Mike used his home address doesn't suggest to me any sort of innoncence on the part of Mike. The purchase is still suspicious.
Let me put it this way: for me to believe that Mike's purchase of the red diary was innocent, it seems to me that I have to either believe that he thought the diary was genuine [possible; but I doubt it] or that he somehow got hold of the Maybrick diary by deceitful means and wanted to transfer it into another book. The second point is somewhat moot. It still would suggest that he knows something about the origins and is just refusing to say. Cheers, RP |
Author: Caroline Anne Morris
Thursday, 18 October 2001 - 01:24 pm | | Hi RJ,
However Mike had decided to pay for the red diary, the order would still have been recorded somewhere, and the sellers could easily have remembered it as being a somewhat unusual request - I very much doubt Mike would have got away with it in the long run.
Do you not, in all honesty, think that Mike's private accusation to Anne, of "I know you wrote the diary" is extremely odd, if he knew - and she knew he knew - that this simply was not the case?
This is nothing like just telling another lie - this is telling Anne that she had better watch out, because he was - or thought he was - on to her little game.
Love,
Caz |
Author: R.J.P.
Thursday, 18 October 2001 - 02:08 pm | | | Caz--O.k. Granted it's odd. Gotta run-off for a few days. By the way, I'm not suggesting that I have 'quality' evidence against Mike Barrett [to use John O's word]. All I am really trying to suggest is a working theory that doesn't have internal contradictions. Cheers, RP |
Author: Peter Wood
Thursday, 18 October 2001 - 04:18 pm | | John O
I wrote that Mike Barrett is the only candidate who could have forged the diary with the intention of making money from it because logic tells us it is so - and although not exclusive of other options, it is certainly more than a possibility.
The other option is, of course, that someone else forged the diary and a great many people in Liverpool have conspired to keep the mystery going, thus enabling Mike, Shirley and Paul to make some money, although they would say no fortunes have been made - and the conspirators in Liverpool, what do they get? A big fat nothing. Zero. Zilch.
Now wouldn't that just irk you a bit? After all, put yourself in the forger's shoes - you create a masterpiece that has fooled many experts and you created it just for fun. Then it falls into MB's hands and - voila! Mike makes a lot of money from it, a lot of money to an unemployed person in Liverpool, anyway. The other option of course is that the forger faked the diary for money - so how come Mike is the one making the cash? You wouldn't just sit back and allow it, would you? Right now, after ten years, there is probably as much money to be made from a book which could prove the diary a forgery as one which could prove it genuine. And yet no-one comes forward to write that book. Why not? The last option is that Mike has control of the diary because he forged it or was in on the forgery - but it doesn't match his handwriting nor any of his known associates. So by now the forgery for cash argument is beginning to look a bit thin and the forgery for fun argument is looking positively anorexic.
I wrote "In fact it is much more likely that the particular document does exist".
You replied "Why? How is this more likely than there is no such record?"
Why John? Let me tell you:
It's a simple 'logical' deduction to be made. In essence it is called the law of averages. Take every piece of correspondence, every record, every newspaper report in gossip columns relating to the Maybricks in 1888, known and currently unknown and put them all into a huge drum. Then gather round with your mates and pull them out one by one. What are the odds, John, that not one of those documents, letters etc, could not put James Maybrick anywhere but London for that period of six weeks in 1888. Just one document John, that's all I ask. And John, I believe that if you had any belief in the diary as a forgery then you would search high and low for that document, you must convince yourself that it exists, that is why I feel justified in questioning your commitment to the forgery side of the argument. Once again I do your job for you, and until you can come up with that document I am perfectly entitled to argue the diary as genuine. And I intend to.
You write "You cannot say that because nobody has found any document that fixes Maybrick's whereabouts on these days, it is more likely he was in the East End".
Read my post again John. In words of one syllable - I did not say that. I think it likely that if the diary is a forger and Maybrick wasn't the Ripper then there will be something somewhere that will place Maybrick where he shouldn't have been for PHF's argument to hold water. It could be a photograph at a race meeting. It could be a letter. It could be an entry in a hotel register. It could be a record of a business transaction. Even a record of a doctor's transaction. Which of the alleged forger's "text books" which he "copied" from would tell him that there were no documents which conflicted with the idea of Maybrick being in Whitechapel in 1888. I didn't say Maybrick was there John. The diarist did. And if you can't place him elsewhere then the score is one - nil to the diarist. You are an intelligent man John, if that document exists you will be able to find it. Even a reference in an old book that says "On 1st November Maybrick went on holiday to Scarborough and didn't come back for two weeks" will suffice. That'll be enough for me, I'll hold my hands up and join the group of "forger-ites". But not just yet, because you can't present me with that document. And the chances of it not existing if the diary is a forgery are infinitessimally small, microscopic almost. The only other option therefore is that the document doesn't exist because the diary is genuine.
And John, as for you arguing in response to my accusation of laziness "I am doing exactly the same as you are....." - oh but John, no you are not. As a believer in the diary I'm not going to go trawling through records hoping that Maybrick wasn't in London in 1888 now am I? But you should. If I were in your shoes I would be hunting high and low for the one piece of evidence that will condemn the diary beyond doubt. Make a name for yourself, make some money or just take the opportunity to laugh in Paul Feldman's face, it would be so easy. But you won't do it. What is it John? Fear of failure?
And as for why a C of E businessman would quote a line from an obscure 17th century poem, well that is one of the most disappointing questions you have ever posed John. I am a total non-believer in any deities, in fact I hate being labelled as 'non' anything because that just gives credence to the thing I don't believe in. I loathe religion with a passion, it causes far too many wars and divides families. But wait a minute, you might catch me walking down the road humming a nineteenth century hymn, Jerusalem is one of my favourites. And you will certainly catch me listening to Gary Numan whose last three albums have been almost exclusively concerned with the nature of heaven and hell. So what exactly is the point of your question John? My answer? Witness this: Maybrick enjoyed quoting lines from poems. Isn't that enough for you? Visit my profile, you'll see I like quoting other people's work too. Dear me.
And John, your question is no more valid if you ask why a forger would be likely to quote Crashaw.
Caroline
I think somebody would need particularly bad eyesight to confuse you with me. But thanks for the compliment.
R.J.
The argument that Paul and Shirley seem to make regarding the entry about "Christmas" is one of the problems that I do have with their interpretation. Is there any document anywhere that actually says James wasn't there on Christmas day at Battlecrease with his wife and children. Are we supposed to believe that he preferred to stay in Manchester with his brother? Which book was it that told of Florie going out dancing at Christmas time and said it was the first time she was able to do so as she was left unattended by James. Now here's a funny thing, but in England we start to celebrate Christmas way way way before 25th December and for a long time afterwards too, 12 nights to be precise. So the celebration, whether religious or not, isn't just confined to one day. My point being that even if James went to see his brother in Manchester it could have been at almost any time in December 1888 or early January 1889. It needn't have been on Christmas day at all and I don't see this argument as a valid plank for supporting or not supporting the diary, I don't see it as anything other than one of the few banana skins upon which PHF has inadvertently trodden. It's a red herring. It doesn't matter.
And R.J. I'm not sure I follow your scenario re: Mike trying to pass the diary off as genuine then making money from it legally. But anyway, as far as I remember we have a law in England which relates to "attempting to obtain pecuniary advantage by deception". That 'advantage' isn't necessarily cash but must have a cash value. It needn't even be tangible, so if the diary were forged and Mike hoped to make a few quid out of it by doing interviews then he would be still as guilty of that offence as he would if he'd sold the diary on the open market. The deception would be knowingly passing a forged document off as possibly genuine. And the police have investigated this matter and cleared all concerned. So, there is your answer. Mike is only culpable of course if he can be proven to be knowingly passing off a fake. Or even suspecting a fake but passing it off as 100% genuine. Although I don't think anyone has actually passed the diary off as genuine. PHF has claimed to have proven it beyond all reasonable doubt though.........
Why can't you just answer my question about Alec Voller here instead of sending me on an errand through the archives? You can precis it if you so wish, but Alec is a professional person with a professional opinion, so what is wrong with his reading of the ink?
Take Care
Peter. |
Author: Madeleine Murphy
Thursday, 18 October 2001 - 05:05 pm | | Hi Peter!
You wrote: "As a believer in the diary I'm not going to go trawling through records hoping that Maybrick wasn't in London in 1888 now am I?"
Actually, that is exactly the way to go about strengthening an hypothesis: you put it to the test. Suppose, for instance, you had a suspect in custody, accused of a crime. What's the first thing you do? You examine his alibi. You take his fingerprints. You go through anything that might rule him out, and if you think of a new thing that might rule him out, you do that too. Only when many measures haven't ruled the suspect out do you start building up the case against him. |
Author: John Omlor
Thursday, 18 October 2001 - 10:01 pm | | Hey there Peter,
You write:
"I wrote that Mike Barrett is the only candidate who could have forged the diary with the intention of making money from it because logic tells us it is so - and although not exclusive of other options, it is certainly more than a possibility." (my emph.)
Peter, "only" means "exclusive of other options." Your sentence above has an internal contradiction, but it seems that now you are saying Mike isn't the "only" candidate who could have forged the diary with the intention of making money from it. There might be "others."
Good. We agree.
And yes, I suspect there might very well be people who had some hand in creating this document who have seen nothing from it. Zero. A big fat zilch. And they're probably thankful for all the headaches they've avoided. (Listen to Mike on the tapes talk about his wife and child and Paul Feldman and his own life these days-- he wishes he had never seen (or possibly written) the thing now, I'd wager.)
By the way, Peter, how much money do you reckon Mike has finally made off of the diary? Just a guess. I think you'd be surprised when all is said and done.
One more logical point Peter.
You write:
"The last option is that Mike has control of the diary because he forged it or was in on the forgery - but it doesn't match his handwriting nor any of his known associates."
The second part of this sentence in no way prevents the idea of Mike being in on things from being true, since we do not know all of the possible penmen, of course.
However, I have never said that Mike was in on it, and I do not think there is substantial, reliable or material evidence to make the case that he was. At least not yet. See my argument with RJ above. I, as I have said repeatedly, have no idea who wrote this book or precisely when or where or why. And I don't believe we have anything like the necessary evidence either way to form such an idea with any confidence.
*******************************
You then ask:
"What are the odds, John, that not one of those documents, letters etc, could not put James Maybrick anywhere but London for that period of six weeks in 1888."
Actually, I'd say the odds are pretty good. How many years did Maybrick live? How many weeks is that? How many contemporary and reliable stories, documents, letters actually exist concerning his life. Divide that by the number of weeks he's alive. You get a pretty good chance that any six weeks of one year (say, 1888) will remain unaccounted for. That's the law of averages, as you say.
You write:
"Once again I do your job for you, and until you can come up with that document I am perfectly entitled to argue the diary as genuine."
Nope. Not based on the non-existence of that document, you're not. Not logically. Since all that non-existence tells you is that Maybrick's whereabouts remain unaccounted for. That non-existence does not, in any way, tell you that Maybrick was in the East End and therefore the diary is genuine. So you are most definitely not "entitled to argue the diary as genuine" based on the lack of any knowledge concerning Maybrick's whereabouts on those weekends. You cannot argue for the authenticity of anything based on a lack of knowledge.
You say:
"I didn't say Maybrick was there John. The diarist did. And if you can't place him elsewhere then the score is one - nil to the diarist."
No, it's not. The diarist has no more placed Maybrick historically in Whitechapel on those weekends than I have placed him somewhere else. The diarist has simply written words. He, and you, have offered not a single piece of reliable, material, or historical evidence whatsoever, of any kind, to show that Maybrick was anywhere near the East End on those weekends. Consequently the score remains nil - nil. And you can infer nothing about whether or not the diary is authentic from this.
You then say:
"And the chances of it not existing if the diary is a forgery are infinitessimally small, microscopic almost."
Nonsense. The chances are actually quite significant. James Maybrick lived in 1888 and it is thoroughly possible that his whereabouts on four weekends in his life remain unrecorded or unavailable to us today. There is no reason to assume that this is unlikely, let alone all those impressive, minimalizing adjectives you've just used.
But you go further:
"The only other option therefore is that the document doesn't exist because the diary is genuine."
No, it is just as possible that the document doesn't exist and the diary is a forgery as it is that the document doesn't exist and the diary is genuine. If the document doesn't exist, it doesn't exist, regardless of whether the diary is genuine or a forgery. So the document's not existing proves nothing at all. It just doesn't.
You can't use a lack of knowledge to prove anything.
You then write:
"If I were in your shoes I would be hunting high and low for the one piece of evidence that will condemn the diary beyond doubt. Make a name for yourself, make some money or just take the opportunity to laugh in Paul Feldman's face, it would be so easy. But you won't do it. What is it John? Fear of failure?"
Thanks for the assignment Peter. I have my own professional responsibilities. And, like you, I'm not trolling through any records. Like you, I am reading and discussing things here on the boards. Like you, I am happy doing so. Like you. See?
Oh no, wait, IT IS! It's fear of failure that's stopping me from heading out into full-time research looking for this alleged and mysterious document. Yes that's what it is. Of course, That must be it. Why couldn't I see it all along? Oh, Peter, I am so ashamed of myself. You have uncovered the real me. I'm afraid! Of course! I'm very afraid. I see it now. I'm not sure how I can ever repay you for this moment of enlightenment. 
As for my question about the Crashaw quote Peter, you have missed the point.
I'm not suggesting that James was a believer or that only a believer would have quoted Crashaw. I'm talking about a particular poem by a particular poet. Not "Jerusalem," with words by Blake (a well-known Romantic poet) and sung as a hymn in churches and on television. Not even Gary Numan (Played on the radio). No, this was Richard Crashaw. A poet who had fallen out of favor in the nineteenth century and would not be widely read again until after T.S. Eliot rehabilitated the Metaphysicals in the 1920's. A poet who was exclusively a Catholic writer and between the 17th and 20th centuries read in almost exclusively those circles. But there's more. It is not even one of Crashaw's well-known poems (there are about half a dozen). It's not the "Hymn to St. Theresa," not the "Flaming Heart" or "The Countess of Denbigh." No, it's an obscure re-working of a Sacred Latin hymn from medieval days. Not anything sung at church anywhere or even studied anywhere in Maybrick's day. And it's a single line from the middle of a middle stanza. This is something I know something about Peter. The chances that James Maybrick is going to suddenly blurt out this line from the middle of this obscure poem by this rarely read poet (at that time) are, to use your own words, "infinitessimally small, microscopic almost."
And you insist:
"Maybrick enjoyed quoting lines from poems."
Peter, earlier you said that James "DID NOT KNOW" about his brother's real job as a composer. I asked you if you had any evidence for this whatsoever. It cannot come from the diary, since we don't know who wrote that.
Of course, you did not have any independent evidence for such a claim, since it was just wishful thinking.
Now you tell me:
"Maybrick enjoyed quoting lines from poems."
And do you have any reliable evidence of this at all? Or is this more wishful thinking. You can't use the diary as evidence of this, of course. But even if you could, it wouldn't be, since in "his" whole, alleged private journal, the character of "James" only quotes this one line from this one poem verbatim. It's not even a habit in the diary, let alone a habit that the real Maybrick might have had. And even if you could find some evidence somewhere, somehow that he did sometimes quote poetry, you'd still be stuck explaining this quote from this poem, which is anything but likely.
No, again, like the Michael-as-versifier problem, you are just hoping that the diary reveals the real Maybrick and that that accounts somehow for the peculiarity of the text. But you have no outside or independent evidence to support you or the diary on these items, and consequently, the diary retains its thoroughly questionable status as allegedly historic artifact.
And still, we have not a single piece of reliable, material, independently confirmed evidence that links the historical James Maybrick to this document or to the Jack the Ripper murders or that establishes this book as having even existed at all prior to 1992.
Consequently, there is not a single piece of reliable, material, independently confirmed evidence which exclusively supports this diary as being authentic. Not one. Not in any book and not in any of the arguments that have been advanced here. Still.
All the best,
--John |
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