Dr Charles McLean August 1888

[A.P. Wolf]

Allow me to introduce you to one Dr. Charles McLean, an American charlatan quack quite the equal of our dear old Tumblety, who was practising his quackery in Birmingham in August of 1888, and just like Tumblety ran foul of the law for his inability to control his passion.
The only difference between Tumblety and McLean is that McLean liked girls whilst Tumblety liked boys.
What is interesting with McLean's case is that it gives us a chance to actually and exactly see first hand how the police, the police court and the magistrates dealt with a case of this nature - for McLean's crimes and Tumblety's were exactly the same so the authorities would have dealt with Tumblety in exactly the same manner as they did with McLean.
It is fortutious that both men are Americans, quack doctors who advertised their dubious wares in the local press, made themselves known to the local police by their own actions, and both claimed that they had been arrested in an attempt to extort money and valuables out of them.
Right, enough of the remarkable coincidence and let's get down to business.
McLean was arrested on the 18th August on a warrant issued by a Birmingham magistrate, and taken immediately to the police 'lock-up' where he objected to being in custody and protested his innocence.
McLean appeared in the police court for the very first time on the 20th August where he was asked by the magistrate's clerk:
'Have you anything to say why you should not be put back?'
In other words he had been held in custody since the 18th August with no option of bail until his appearance at the police court on the 20th of August.
Why should we believe that Tumblety would have been released shortly after his arrest when here is clear evidence that this would not have been the case?

From the 'Birmingham Daily Post', August 21st 1888:

http://i908.photobucket.com/albums/ac287/HowieNina/serious1.jpg

[John Savage]

Hi AP,

An intersting item, thanks for posting.

I think we need to remember that 18th. August 188 was a Saturday, so Dr. McLean was at the next sitting of the magistrates court on Monday 20th. I don't suppose any courts were open on a Sunday so it was just the doctor's bad luck to be arrested on a Saturday.

He asked for bail, which was offered on sureties of £100, if he could raise the sum he could have been bailed like Tumblety and on the next boat from Liverpool to America.

Rgds
John

[Tim Riordan]

Hi,

I believe that AP’s point was that police bail was not granted to Dr. McLean. Police bail would be granted before any appearance in a magistrate’s court. In this case, McLean was arrested on Saturday and taken to the police station. He could have been bailed that evening and told to appear before the magistrate’s court at a later date. Instead, he was held in jail over Sunday and brought before the court on Monday.

The problem is, police bail is at the discretion of the Police Inspector. He can grant it but he is not required to do so. The prisoner may be held in jail for up to 48 hours before he is brought before a magistrate’s court. Inspector Noon, knowing there was a court on Monday, was under no obligation to offer McLean police bail. The report that Inspector Noon asked for a remand of a week suggests that his inclination was not to be lenient to McLean.

Tim

[A.P. Wolf]

Thanks John & Tim
Yes, I was making the point that police bail was not offered in the case of McLean. In a later report, from the BDP of the 25th August 1888, it becomes clear that police bail was not offered for three reasons:
1) The seriousness of the offence.
2) The fact that McLean was an American and might abscond if released on bail.
3) That McLean was carrying enough cash and valuables in his pockets when arrested to have easily absconded.
I would suggest that all three of these points also applied to Tumblety at the time of his arrest.
This second report also has McLean telling the court that he 'had been in gaol nearly a week to suit the prosecution'... and I honestly do not know what to make of that statement.
What does seem clear though is that the magistrate does appear to aware of the risk of granting bail to such an individual, hence he asks for personal bail of £200 and two surities from third parties at £100 each. McLean complains that he knows no third parties as he is a foreigner, and even offers the police his valuable gold watch and other jewellery as bonds against his release.
They decline the offer, as they already have them, it seems, as well as a large amount of cash that McLean was carrying at the time of his arrest.
So maybe Tumblety was not lying when he complained that the London police had kept a large sum of cash belonging to him?
It might also indicate that Tumblety was aware of this tactic and had already taken measures to ensure that the two parties were equipped with the cash prior to his actual arrest.

There is a further report on the 31st August which shows the incredible efforts the Birmingham Police Force put into tracking down and tracing McLean's antecedents in America, which does seem to forcible demonstrate that it was not remarkable for a British police force to make routine contact with their American counterparts when they had an American suspect on their hands. Such telegraphic exchange can not be used as an indication that Tumblety was a suspect in a murder case, but rather that he was involved in crimes of a similar nature to McLean.

I would post the further reports but my PC has gone ga-ga on me and won't capture the images, so if anyone else can grab the reports and throw them up here I would be most grateful.

[Mike Covell]

Hi A.P,

I have some news reports covering an "American Arrest" and will dig them out and post them today sometime, they are from the trusty Hull Newspapers, and I had always assumed it was Tumblety!!

(Hope you liked the minstrel scan!!)

[A.P. Wolf]

Thanks Mike
I love the 'minstrel' scan, but only just found it... in my mail junk box!
As I said my PC is seriously ga-ga at the moment, and is feeding me with junk mail and junking my real mail, so my apologies to anyone who has attempted to send me e-mails.
Yes, I thought that this American was Tumblety as well, when I first found him - for there are reports of Tumblety being in Birmingham in 1888 - but after studying the reports I have to say that this guy was a lot worse than Tumblety. Later reports show that McLean had joined an expensive British dating service and had a whole bevy of wealthy young ladies lined up - some of the letters he received are reproduced - to do 'something' with, and I have the feeling that this something may well have led to murder.
So all credit to the Birmingham Police Force for prosecuting him when they did. Unfortunately I have not yet found the end of the story so do not know whether he ended up in a British jail, or eventually fled his bail?
So if anyone does find the end I'd be happy to see it.

[Mike Covell]

Hull Daily Mail, Monday November 19th 1888.
http://i908.photobucket.com/albums/ac287/HowieNina/ripbirm.jpg

[Joe Chetcuti]

That news article took a quick ride over to Canada.

Check out the Nov 19, 1888 Ottawa Free Press at the Casebook.

[A.P. Wolf]

Thanks for that, Mike, one wonders whether Dr McLean was at liberty at that time?
Anyways what immediately strikes me about this 1888 American charlatan doctor called McLean, operating in exactly the same manner and time frame as Tumblety, is the vast abundance of British press reports concerning his sexual offences... they are everywhere. And I've only just begun the search.
Now compare that with the British press reports we have on Tumblety's sexual offences.
None.
Why not?
Both are American quack doctors, who arrived in the same year in England; they both advertised in the same local papers; and they both committed serious offences against young people using the mask of a miracle cure.
So where is Tumblety?
This is good copy for reporters in 1888.
The only real difference I can find between the Tumblety and McLean cases is that in the case of Tumblety the American police contacted the British police, and in the McLean case the English police contacted the American police.
My conclusion?
McLean is a far better suspect than Tumblety, even though it looks like he was in prison at the time of the murders.

[Mike Covell]

McLean is a far better suspect than Tumblety, even though it looks like he was in prison at the time of the murders.


Never stopped the Pro Stephenson clan!!

Funnily enough that article was at the top of the recently printed off newspapers, I have a feeling I have more in my giant folders!!!

:high5:

[A.P. Wolf]

One just sort of wonders how anyone researching this subject to the extent that they did a few years ago could have missed McLean?
What say you RJP?
Was McLean just damn uncomfortable for your image of the Whitechapel Murderer, or did you just miss him?
How can we have we have a perfect template for Tumblety in McLean, and then it needs some old drunk to find him?
Shame on the lot of you.

[Dan Norder]

Hi AP,

The problem here is that, although you can sure pull up newspaper accounts from here and there, you don't really seem to be able to understand what they mean.

Yes, this doctor was held without police bail. But he was only held less than 48 hours. As Tim said above, people could be held for that long without bail before going to magistrate court. If it would have been longer than 48 hours they either would have had to give police bail or charge him in order to continue holding him.

Tumblety's appearance in court was a week after his arrest. He either would have had to have been charged several days earlier (which he wasn't) or he would have been offered police bail (which is the only remaining option).

Whether this Dr. McLean's offenses were similar or not isn't significant, because he was held for less than 48 hours. If he had been held longer than that without an option for bail, then you might have something.

[A.P. Wolf]

Thanks Dan
I appreciate your sentiment here, sort of...
As you'll know I like to push the goal posts apart, and considering that in the last debate we had on this subject, I was reliably informed that it would be 'impossible' to hold a suspect in police custody for longer than 24 hours, so I set myself the task of pushing that 24 hours to a higher limit, which I did, and the same reliable informers reluctantly agreed with me that police custody could extend to 36 hours, but only after I had produced irrefutable evidence that a suspect in the Whitechapel Murders had indeed been detained in police custody - without an option of bail - for 36 hours.
As you can see I have now successfully pushed that limit to 48 hours, and possibly much further than that.
You will remember that McLean complained of being held for 'almost a week' by the police as they gathered evidence for his prosecution. We cannot view 48 hours as almost a week.
Tumblety himself complained that he had been detained for a 'few days'.
That is also not 48 hours.
You'll also note that at no time is McLean offered police bail, but only court bail in conjuction with the assistance of two independent surities. As you'll know the officer in charge at the station of arrest could use his discretion and hold the prisoner in custody without an option of bail if he felt that the prisoner represented a threat to the local community.
This was obviously the case with McLean, and I am suggesting that in the case of Tumblety the same course of action would have been followed.
Their offences were, after all, exactly the same.
Both were guilty of penetration with force of arms.

[R.J.Palmer]

What say you RJP?

What say I?
I say that you ought to read the 'Letters to the Editor' in the latest issue of the Ripperologist.

[Tim Riordan]

Hi all,

The question of Tumblety’s possible police bail revolves around how the court system worked. Having been arrested on November 7th, he would have to have been brought before a police court as soon as possible or released on police bail. Tumblety was not brought to court until November 16th, nine days after his arrest. For him to be kept in confinement for that long, without going before a court, would require two things. First, the Police Inspector would have to have believed that the offense was so great that the public would be in danger. Secondly, there would not have been a court held in the meantime. We can not know how the Inspector felt but we can look at the court schedule.

The Marlborough Street police court does not seem to have met on Saturdays or Sundays. It is reported in the newspapers to have met on most other days. Based on newspaper reports, it is likely that the police court sat every weekday. In the period from November 1 -16, 1888, there are 12 possible days and the newspapers show the court meeting on 7 of these days. It may be that it met every day but that there were days when the cases were not interesting or the column space was limited. Between November 7-16, the papers report the court sitting every day between the 12th and the 16th. Had Tumblety been in custody at that time, the police would have had to haul him up on charges at one of those courts.

Tumblety surrendered the police bail on the 14th and was rearrested on the same charges. From that point, the police had 48 hours to charge him or release him. There was a police court that met on the 15th but he was not brought before it. It was on the 16th, just less than 48 hours, when he was brought before the court.

The McLean case is, however, very different. He was arrested on the 18th brought before a magistate on the 20th. Although the first article suggests he was offered bail at this time, later articles show that he was held for another week. At that point, the question of bail is determined by the court not the police.

Tim

[R.J.Palmer]

I, of course, entirely agree with nearly everything that Mr. Riordan is saying above--which is what Stewart Evans has been also saying-- but I have reservations about the following point:

Tumblety surrendered the police bail on the 14th and was rearrested on the same charges.

‘Same charges’ bothers me. This isn’t really in evidence; it’s an assumption. It might be an excellent assumption, or it might be a bad assumption, but we have to admit that it is an assumption.

As far as I see it, all we know with certainty is that Frank Tumilty was 'received into custody' on Nov. 7th. Since he wasn’t charged immediately, we don’t know for what offense he was detained. It certainly makes good sense that it was for gross indecency, but I don't see where that is proven, and the initial reports said otherwise.

I'm not even convinced the Met wanted to arrest Tumblety on the 7th. For instance, this could have been a cock-up by a police constable who was out-of-the-loop, but because Tumblety afterwards became an identified flight risk (ie., his non-appearance on the 14th), Scotland Yard's hand was forced. At that point they had to charge him for the only crime they had evidence for; ie., the gross indecency indictments. There are several scenerios that could explain what happened; we have to admit that we don't know.

[A.P. Wolf]

RJP, you know already that I don't read such things.

Tim,
I think I disagree with you.
Tumblety was arrested on November 7th, a wednesday, which allows a 48 hour arrest period, taking the arrest period to late on Friday or even the Saturday, 10th November, depending on the hour of his arrest, but whatever I can't see the police releasing him on police bail before a weekend when they probably had a perfectly legitmate right to hold him until the Police Magistrate Court sat on the Monday, 12th November.

Superintendent Noon applied for remand for one week, and he obviously got it, and the reason he got it was that he cited the case of a man who was prepared to give 'a large sum of money to anyone who would hand him (McLean) over, in order that he might horsewhip him (McLean).'
Clearly to have released McLean at this point in time would have led to a breach of the peace which the police had knowledge of, and have formed good legal circumstance for the continued detention of McLean.
I would suggest that Tumblety found himself in exactly this situation, or even perhaps worse, as he had four victims, and four angry parents to contend with.
The problem here is that we do really lack direct information concerning the circumstances of Tumblety's arrest and detention, and that it does none of us any good to adopt a direct position based on such sparse information concerning Tumblety's arrest and detention.
I have not done that.
I have taken my stance from information of which we have a superior and wide knowledge. The McLean case.

[R.J.Palmer]

RJP, you know already that I don't read such things.


That is, of course, unless they are written by Ivor Edwards...

By all means, AP, keep up with your selective reading. It'll keep you safely under your magical mystery walnut-shell.

[A.P. Wolf]

Yeah, RJP, I discover McLean, and suddenly it's a toothpaste.