How Brown
08-05-2008, 09:16 PM
The Forums thanks Wolf very much for the effort and responses to these questions.:high5:
____________________________
Hi Howard.
1. Over the past year, have there been any changes in the Tumblety saga that have encouraged you to think differently about this character. I refer specifically to the January 1889 article in the NY World.
Interesting question. If we are dealing specifically with the 29 January, 1889, World article then the short answer would be no. I understand that a case has been made that this interview somehow adds to the suspicions against Tumblety but personally I don’t see it.
The information that Tumblety had been in Whitechapel or that he admitted to being arrested as a suspect in the Whitechapel murders was not, to me at any rate, breaking news. Littlechild tells us that he was a suspect and there are US news reports that he was arrested in connection with the murders. One would assume because of these two points that he was in Whitechapel at some point. The most important bit of information gleaned from this article is supposed to be the fact that Tumblety said that he was dressed in a conservative manner when arrested. However, we already knew that when he stepped off the gangplank of La Bretagne in New York that he was dressed in “normal” and unassuming clothing. I didn’t think it likely that he was strutting around the East End of London in some brightly coloured pseudo-military costume with a chest full of medals and a tall feather in his cap.
There are, however, some things contained in the World article that haven’t seemed to have been commented on or have been brushed aside that I feel are interesting. There is a theory, one which I don’t personally subscribe to, that Tumblety’s arrest in connection with the Whitechapel murders was not really a very big deal and that news about him made it into the American papers simply because Tumblety himself leaked the stories in order to gain publicity. The rejoinder has been that Tumblety’s arrest was a very important one and that Scotland Yard’s investigation of Tumblety was too significant to be missed by the Press. Why the British Press seems to have almost completely missed the story is not explained. I have pointed out, however, that The New York World seems to have had the inside track on most, if not all, of Tumblety’s Ripper related news. They were the first to report that he was arrested; they were the first to report that he slipped away to La Havre and was on his way back to New York; they had a reporter at the scene when Tumblety’s ship docked. Add to this the interview with Tumblety and the World’s string of firsts continued. Where, and from whom, did they obtain all this seemingly inside information? Interestingly the January article tells us that the reporter didn’t track down Tumblety but that Tumblety “voluntarily came forward” to give his side of the story exclusively to the World. So Tumblety did contact the World in order to feed them a story, at least this one time. This doesn’t prove that Tumblety had been continuously doing this in order to stay in the public eye but it does tend to show that those who claim he never did such a thing are wrong.
I also find it interesting that Tumblety tells us that he came into Whitechapel, like thousands of others, as a sightseer and therefore didn’t live in the East End and consequently wasn’t the Batty Street Lodger. Whoever the Ripper was, he knew the East End better than a tourist would. I know that Tumblety states that he had visited London several times over the years and that “every part of it became familiar to me,” but does anyone really think that this is believable? He doesn’t claim he is familiar with every part of the East End but every part of the entire city. London was the largest city in the world at the time and it’s impossible that he could be familiar with the entire city let alone all the back alleys, courts, streets and side-streets of Whitechapel and Spitalfields.
The most interesting and important information to be found in the interview, though, is that Tumblety tells us why he was arrested in the first place. Was it because he was caught carrying around a bloody knife? Was he found standing over a newly killed victim? Was he seen with a victim before one of the murders and was later identified by an eyewitness? No. He was arrested because he was an American wearing a slouch hat. He fit a general description in other words, that’s it. We even have news reports in early October, 1888, of at least one “tall” American, who wore a slouch hat, being arrested, after he drew suspicion upon himself by asking too many questions about the murders, and, after a couple of hours, released (if in fact this wasn’t Tumblety himself). Also, in November, 1888, the Brooklyn Eagle stated “It has been said among other things that the assassin is an American, because he wears a slouch hat,” so we know that things like this did happen. Suspicions probably grew about him after his “large dossier” at Scotland Yard was consulted and from that a picture of an Irish-American (read terrorist), doctor (with either surgical skill or anatomical knowledge) who was Gay (read “deviant” sexual proclivities) was formed. That’s all there really probably ever was against him: suspicion, because he fit the idea of who the Ripper might be, with no real evidence.
2. Are there any plans ahead to do more research into the Carrie Brown story ? Perhaps an article in Ripper Notes?
Well, yes. It’s no secret that I am actually writing a book on the Brown murder case and that I have amassed probably the world’s largest collection of material on the subject. Unfortunately, writing a book of non-fiction on this murder, where all the police files have been destroyed and much of the information has to come from conflicting newspaper accounts, is a slow, painstaking, process. In order to attempt to understand what was going on during the murder investigation, for example, it is necessary to read, compare and contrast as many New York newspaper accounts as possible and try to weed out fact from fiction. And it doesn’t help that the police and newspapers confused Carrie Brown with another woman, Annie Campbell, who was more famously known as “Shakespeare” on the Lower East Side. I also don’t write that quickly at the best of times so I really don’t have a time frame for when it will be finished but it’s about half done right now. Getting back to your original question, I don’t have any plans for a Carrie Brown article, as such, however bits and pieces of my research have already made their way into the pages of Ripper Notes (my articles on Henry Dowd and Carl Feigenbaum for example) and I also intend on writing an article on Arbie La Bruckman in a future issue, if only to set the record straight. Other bits of my research may appear in future issues as well.
3. Are there any specific research tools you would suggest ( on line archives to be exact ) to the fledgling researcher ?
There’s probably no better place to start than Stephen Ryder’s Casebook. I’m not sure if people realize the importance of the Press Section and its large, and free, collection of international newspaper articles which can be viewed… for free. I have a fairly large collection of newspaper articles which I obtained by either sitting in front of microfiche machines in various cities around the world, buying old editions of newspapers or by paying fees to online sources. Many of these same articles can now be found on the Casebook (did I mention they are free?). Ancestry.com, which is not free, is an excellent source of British, American and Canadian information such as census records, births and deaths records, city directories, ships passenger lists etc. Ancestry.com also has a large newspaper section to troll through which is handy if fees are a concern since it is one stop shopping. However, I can also recommend newspaperarchive.com, which is, again, not free, but which has a massive newspaper archive that is continually being added to.
4. Which area ( suspect or aspect) of the Case in general has given you the most enjoyment over the last, say, 5 years ?
Easily the research into the Carrie Brown murder. This story is incredibly fascinating and more than once people have asked me if it was a work of fiction or perhaps a movie treatment. It’s not a Ripper story per se but it is necessary to have an understanding of the Ripper and his place in the wider world in the Late Victorian Period in order to fully comprehend what went on in New York in 1891. Also, since not much was known about the murder everything I discover is new and exciting. It has also given me the opportunity to travel to New York, London and Salem to do research. A couple of people have said to me that they can’t wait to read the book and I always respond by saying “neither can I,” which always gets a laugh, but I really mean it. I think this will be a really great book once it’s finished.
5. Finally...is Hyam Hyams the type of man we should be focusing on if you were in charge of Scotland Yard?
Yes. Let me put it this way. If I was in charge of Scotland Yard and on my first day I was shown into a room with files on all the suspects, lets say all the suspects that we have now, including the recent, non contemporary ones, I would take everyone who didn’t actually live in the East End and toss them in the garbage can. Whoever the Ripper was he was someone who lived in the district, blended in and didn’t seem out of place, seemed non threatening and, most importantly, felt completely comfortable with his surroundings. He wasn’t someone who wondered into the area dressed in top hat and opera cape, killed a woman, and then wondered out again. His mental state must also obviously come into question with a series of ever more brutal mutilation murders and so men who had either been in an asylum or who ended up in one soon after the murders ended would have to have special attention. Hyam Hyams is one of those men. Was he the Ripper? Probably not, but he makes a better candidate than most of the modern suspects put together.
Wolf.
____________________________
Hi Howard.
1. Over the past year, have there been any changes in the Tumblety saga that have encouraged you to think differently about this character. I refer specifically to the January 1889 article in the NY World.
Interesting question. If we are dealing specifically with the 29 January, 1889, World article then the short answer would be no. I understand that a case has been made that this interview somehow adds to the suspicions against Tumblety but personally I don’t see it.
The information that Tumblety had been in Whitechapel or that he admitted to being arrested as a suspect in the Whitechapel murders was not, to me at any rate, breaking news. Littlechild tells us that he was a suspect and there are US news reports that he was arrested in connection with the murders. One would assume because of these two points that he was in Whitechapel at some point. The most important bit of information gleaned from this article is supposed to be the fact that Tumblety said that he was dressed in a conservative manner when arrested. However, we already knew that when he stepped off the gangplank of La Bretagne in New York that he was dressed in “normal” and unassuming clothing. I didn’t think it likely that he was strutting around the East End of London in some brightly coloured pseudo-military costume with a chest full of medals and a tall feather in his cap.
There are, however, some things contained in the World article that haven’t seemed to have been commented on or have been brushed aside that I feel are interesting. There is a theory, one which I don’t personally subscribe to, that Tumblety’s arrest in connection with the Whitechapel murders was not really a very big deal and that news about him made it into the American papers simply because Tumblety himself leaked the stories in order to gain publicity. The rejoinder has been that Tumblety’s arrest was a very important one and that Scotland Yard’s investigation of Tumblety was too significant to be missed by the Press. Why the British Press seems to have almost completely missed the story is not explained. I have pointed out, however, that The New York World seems to have had the inside track on most, if not all, of Tumblety’s Ripper related news. They were the first to report that he was arrested; they were the first to report that he slipped away to La Havre and was on his way back to New York; they had a reporter at the scene when Tumblety’s ship docked. Add to this the interview with Tumblety and the World’s string of firsts continued. Where, and from whom, did they obtain all this seemingly inside information? Interestingly the January article tells us that the reporter didn’t track down Tumblety but that Tumblety “voluntarily came forward” to give his side of the story exclusively to the World. So Tumblety did contact the World in order to feed them a story, at least this one time. This doesn’t prove that Tumblety had been continuously doing this in order to stay in the public eye but it does tend to show that those who claim he never did such a thing are wrong.
I also find it interesting that Tumblety tells us that he came into Whitechapel, like thousands of others, as a sightseer and therefore didn’t live in the East End and consequently wasn’t the Batty Street Lodger. Whoever the Ripper was, he knew the East End better than a tourist would. I know that Tumblety states that he had visited London several times over the years and that “every part of it became familiar to me,” but does anyone really think that this is believable? He doesn’t claim he is familiar with every part of the East End but every part of the entire city. London was the largest city in the world at the time and it’s impossible that he could be familiar with the entire city let alone all the back alleys, courts, streets and side-streets of Whitechapel and Spitalfields.
The most interesting and important information to be found in the interview, though, is that Tumblety tells us why he was arrested in the first place. Was it because he was caught carrying around a bloody knife? Was he found standing over a newly killed victim? Was he seen with a victim before one of the murders and was later identified by an eyewitness? No. He was arrested because he was an American wearing a slouch hat. He fit a general description in other words, that’s it. We even have news reports in early October, 1888, of at least one “tall” American, who wore a slouch hat, being arrested, after he drew suspicion upon himself by asking too many questions about the murders, and, after a couple of hours, released (if in fact this wasn’t Tumblety himself). Also, in November, 1888, the Brooklyn Eagle stated “It has been said among other things that the assassin is an American, because he wears a slouch hat,” so we know that things like this did happen. Suspicions probably grew about him after his “large dossier” at Scotland Yard was consulted and from that a picture of an Irish-American (read terrorist), doctor (with either surgical skill or anatomical knowledge) who was Gay (read “deviant” sexual proclivities) was formed. That’s all there really probably ever was against him: suspicion, because he fit the idea of who the Ripper might be, with no real evidence.
2. Are there any plans ahead to do more research into the Carrie Brown story ? Perhaps an article in Ripper Notes?
Well, yes. It’s no secret that I am actually writing a book on the Brown murder case and that I have amassed probably the world’s largest collection of material on the subject. Unfortunately, writing a book of non-fiction on this murder, where all the police files have been destroyed and much of the information has to come from conflicting newspaper accounts, is a slow, painstaking, process. In order to attempt to understand what was going on during the murder investigation, for example, it is necessary to read, compare and contrast as many New York newspaper accounts as possible and try to weed out fact from fiction. And it doesn’t help that the police and newspapers confused Carrie Brown with another woman, Annie Campbell, who was more famously known as “Shakespeare” on the Lower East Side. I also don’t write that quickly at the best of times so I really don’t have a time frame for when it will be finished but it’s about half done right now. Getting back to your original question, I don’t have any plans for a Carrie Brown article, as such, however bits and pieces of my research have already made their way into the pages of Ripper Notes (my articles on Henry Dowd and Carl Feigenbaum for example) and I also intend on writing an article on Arbie La Bruckman in a future issue, if only to set the record straight. Other bits of my research may appear in future issues as well.
3. Are there any specific research tools you would suggest ( on line archives to be exact ) to the fledgling researcher ?
There’s probably no better place to start than Stephen Ryder’s Casebook. I’m not sure if people realize the importance of the Press Section and its large, and free, collection of international newspaper articles which can be viewed… for free. I have a fairly large collection of newspaper articles which I obtained by either sitting in front of microfiche machines in various cities around the world, buying old editions of newspapers or by paying fees to online sources. Many of these same articles can now be found on the Casebook (did I mention they are free?). Ancestry.com, which is not free, is an excellent source of British, American and Canadian information such as census records, births and deaths records, city directories, ships passenger lists etc. Ancestry.com also has a large newspaper section to troll through which is handy if fees are a concern since it is one stop shopping. However, I can also recommend newspaperarchive.com, which is, again, not free, but which has a massive newspaper archive that is continually being added to.
4. Which area ( suspect or aspect) of the Case in general has given you the most enjoyment over the last, say, 5 years ?
Easily the research into the Carrie Brown murder. This story is incredibly fascinating and more than once people have asked me if it was a work of fiction or perhaps a movie treatment. It’s not a Ripper story per se but it is necessary to have an understanding of the Ripper and his place in the wider world in the Late Victorian Period in order to fully comprehend what went on in New York in 1891. Also, since not much was known about the murder everything I discover is new and exciting. It has also given me the opportunity to travel to New York, London and Salem to do research. A couple of people have said to me that they can’t wait to read the book and I always respond by saying “neither can I,” which always gets a laugh, but I really mean it. I think this will be a really great book once it’s finished.
5. Finally...is Hyam Hyams the type of man we should be focusing on if you were in charge of Scotland Yard?
Yes. Let me put it this way. If I was in charge of Scotland Yard and on my first day I was shown into a room with files on all the suspects, lets say all the suspects that we have now, including the recent, non contemporary ones, I would take everyone who didn’t actually live in the East End and toss them in the garbage can. Whoever the Ripper was he was someone who lived in the district, blended in and didn’t seem out of place, seemed non threatening and, most importantly, felt completely comfortable with his surroundings. He wasn’t someone who wondered into the area dressed in top hat and opera cape, killed a woman, and then wondered out again. His mental state must also obviously come into question with a series of ever more brutal mutilation murders and so men who had either been in an asylum or who ended up in one soon after the murders ended would have to have special attention. Hyam Hyams is one of those men. Was he the Ripper? Probably not, but he makes a better candidate than most of the modern suspects put together.
Wolf.