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Two more points from Jon Hainsworth.
1) If Farquharson was so hopeless as a source, then Macnaghten would have known this and known him and he would have rejected such a source. By meeting, however, with the Druitt family - as Mac and Sims both imply - then Farquharson's dodginess did not matter. The family were convinced, and they convinced Mac, rightly or wrongly.
2) Christine discovered a Sims/Dagonet column from 1893 in which he, a liberal, traduces the Tory Farquharson for falsely accusing people of being Jack the Ripper. But this is obviously a deflection, and a very rude and unfair one, as Sims and Macnaghten agreed with Farquharson about Montague Druitt's secret life as a serial murderer. For example, in late 1891, Sims had written a column in which he muses that the killer is probablyyoung, a student who has " dabbled in science", an English gentleman, slightly built but very strong, a brunette with a fair moustache, tormented by regret, and a suicide.
1) If Farquharson was so hopeless as a source, then Macnaghten would have known this and known him and he would have rejected such a source. By meeting, however, with the Druitt family - as Mac and Sims both imply - then Farquharson's dodginess did not matter. The family were convinced, and they convinced Mac, rightly or wrongly.
2) Christine discovered a Sims/Dagonet column from 1893 in which he, a liberal, traduces the Tory Farquharson for falsely accusing people of being Jack the Ripper. But this is obviously a deflection, and a very rude and unfair one, as Sims and Macnaghten agreed with Farquharson about Montague Druitt's secret life as a serial murderer. For example, in late 1891, Sims had written a column in which he muses that the killer is probablyyoung, a student who has " dabbled in science", an English gentleman, slightly built but very strong, a brunette with a fair moustache, tormented by regret, and a suicide.
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