Proof of Innocence?

[Michael Banks]

Hi Michael,

I'm not angry, just mildly intrigued that so many people buy into Macnaghten's memorandum and the lengths to which they are willing to go to defend his honour.

Cricket matches either side of a murder date—even a cricket match on a murder date—yet still the believers insist indignantly, "Oh there's absolutely no reason why Druitt couldn't have got up at four in the morning, caught the four-twenty seven from Blackheath to Charing Cross, taken the Underground to Aldgate East, wandered around Whitechapel and down Hanbury Street, murdered Annie Chapman, stuffed her uterus in his coat pocket and made it back to Blackheath in time to clean himself up, take breakfast, and play a match against the Christopherson brothers.

It transcends BS.

Regards,

Simon

Then your looking for a serial killer who thinks and behaves in a perfectly normal way Simon. If, according to some, Lechmere can kill Polly Nichols and then clock in for a days work around 15 minutes later then Druitt playing cricket not far away around 6, 7 or 8 hours later shouldn’t be a massive issue. You might think it unlikely and that’s fair enough but it still doesn’t approach eliminating him.

[Simon Wood]

Hi Michael.

I can't believe you wrote these last two posts with a straight face.

If you did, then it's time you got a grip.

Take care.

Simon

[Michael Banks]

Hi Michael.

I can't believe you wrote these last two posts with a straight face.

If you did, then it's time you got a grip.

Take care.

Simon

And I’m sorry Simon but I’d say it’s long past time that you stopped believing in fairy story conspiracies about moustache twiddling Victorian police villains and considered reality.

Im past tired of this nonsense.

[Tammy Green]

I know I'm late to this party and, firstly, I'd like to say that I think Joanna's find is significant. The same cannot be said for some of the comments...



And what evidence is there for that? None. Could rain have interrupted play? There are reports of a lot of rain at that particular time of year (it's quoted here somewhere). Or, perhaps, many of the batsmen were fairly inept and low scorers. (By the way there's a double negative in the original post which I'm assuming was unintentional).

Like so many discussions about any suspect theories are advanced to 'prove' points when they do no such thing. This is one such. All we have is the proof that Druitt was there on one day and there two days later. The balance of probability is that, as both matches were close to the family home, he stayed there in the interim. The probability (not possibility) that he returned to London specifically to commit a random murder is round about zero.

The only actual fact there is to suspect Druitt is that MacNaghten mentions him amongst his 3 suspects. (That someone commits suicide doesn't, on its own, implicate them in anything other than the fact they committed suicide). There appears to be no police record which mentions him. Hainsworth's ludicrous suggestions that other writers disguised him in their works deliberately is the stuff of fairy tales.

I find it difficult to understand why anyone can seriously consider Druitt as a suspect at all. From Howells and Skinner's book through others to Hainsworth's two volumes there is nothing but a trail of disinformation and conjecture without a shred of evidence that Druitt had ever been in the East End, never mind being a murderer.

Agree completely.

I always favoured Druitt as a suspect, but now I feel ashamed and guilty for this.

I wasted days and hours just studynig this person, this time was lost for nothing.

Greet research here, it helped me see the truth.

We won't be hearing his name too much in the furure I believe, people are smart enough to know it is a burned card.


Tammy

[Gary Barnett]

Agree completely.

I always favoured Druitt as a suspect, but now I feel ashamed and guilty for this.

I wasted days and hours just studynig this person, this time was lost for nothing.

Greet research here, it helped me see the truth.

We won't be hearing his name too much in the furure I believe, people are smart enough to know it is a burned card.


Tammy

If you agree with this, perhaps you can explain
what it means:

‘Like so many discussions about any suspect theories are advanced to 'prove' points when they do no such thing. This is one such.’

[Michael Banks]

. We won't be hearing his name too much in the furure I believe, people are smart enough to know it is a burned card

Wrong I’m afraid. The only way that Druitt will cease to be mentioned is if he gets eliminated by facts which might happen at any point. And, as we can all read, it should be simplicity itself to see that isn’t the case as it stands. There’s no point in discussing this with some. Thankfully most don’t take leave of their senses on the subject of Druitt.

Man takes part in a cricket match on day x.
Man kills a woman on day y.
Man takes part in a cricket match on day z.
After x, man has approximately 12 hours to get to the murder site with a perfectly good train service available.
After the murder the man has 12 or more hours to get a train back.

And this eliminates Druitt for some! It’s an insult to reason and the subject.

[Michael Banks]

If it’s suggested that it’s unlikely for example for Druitt to have killed Chapman and then played cricket on the same day then we should re-consider all suspects in the light of this. If the killer was an average working class man engaged in a manual Labour job (which is entirely possible of course) then it’s reasonable to suggest a start time of 6am (although we know that Lechmere started 2 hours earlier which wasn’t unusual) So after the Chapman murder (Phillips time 3.30ish, witness time 5.30ish) our Mr X still has to get to his place of work and work as normal in around 2 hours or even much less, for probably 10 hours of work. Possibly working next to people that knew him well after working with him for a considerable time and who would spot any strange behaviour or missed spots of blood. Does this make all of our Mr X’s unlikely suspects? Or…..is it perhaps the case that men who murder and mutilate women in the street aren’t exactly ‘wired up’ like the rest of us. No investigation would advance far if we just say “well I wouldn’t have behaved that way because it’s just not normal,” then we won’t get far. Mr X had a commitment to go to work. Druitt had a commitment to play cricket. Of course the work commitment was far more important to life in general but isn’t it possible that Druitt (if guilty) might have been wary that an unplanned no-show on the morning of the murder might have appeared suspicious (especially if, for whatever possibly misguided reason) he felt that he was suspected?

We should apply the same criteria to all suspects fairly. Any unnamed working man would have had to have behaved in an ‘unlikely’ way. Why is it only a huge obstacle in Druitt’s case?

[Chris Phillips]

It's funny, actually. I realise that many people are interested in the Ripper case as a whodunit, and I don't think there's anything wrong with that at all. And I think this new information is very interesting. But I think the reason I find it interesting is not so much to do with any light it sheds on the identity of the Ripper - because I think it's unlikely that any of the named suspects was the Ripper. It's more that it bears on the plausibility of Druitt as a suspect as it would have been seen in the 1800s, and that Druitt is one of the suspects the police (or at least Macnaghten) took seriously - and also in a sense the first suspect evaluated in the "modern" era of record-based Ripperology. - and it's interesting to think about what they knew and what they thought. Not that I think that the judgments of any of the senior police officers were affected by anything more exotic than the usual human shortcomings of fallible memory, ego, vanity, pugnaciousness and so on. The same ones that still afflict us today. It was just the same with the other case I've devoted most time to researching - the murder of Lily Volpert. In one aspect that is a fascinating whodunit. But the aspect that always interested me there most was how and why the police made of it what they did.

[Edward Stow]

I'm sorry if you though I was being condescending Kattrup, but you still seem a little confused.

The start time for the match is of great significance. Those who favour Druitt want an early time and we see spurious claims that because modern games start in the morning, then surely this match must have had a morning start - whereas all the contemporary evidence seems to point to an afternoon start - but we shall see.

The time Druitt arrived in Blandford for the match is of much less significance as the murder happened afterwards not before. I hope this is clear.
For all I know Druitt stayed in Blandford overnight on 29th to the 30th in a hotel. There were hotels in Blandford. I checked this even though his time of arrival of of little to no importance whatsoever.
So, gee, I guess I have to confirm - 't was irrelevant when Druitt arrived at Blandford.

[Edward Stow]

I can agree with Chris that one interesting aspect of this discovery is that it sheds light on the Macnaghten Memorandum and investigations in 1888. It it goes a long way towards exonerating Druitt (I think more information is pending) not just in the 1880s but now.
If this information related to, say, Lechmere, and it as shown that he was in Blandford in those circumstances, I know that there would be a huge cheerful chorus saying that it was game over for Lechmere... with some of those who are cautious on this Druitt issue throwng all such caution to the wind! And isn't it telling that Lechmere keeps being introduced here as a point of comparison.

Anyway.
Here is the 1887 map showing the Recreation Ground and the station and the high street where the hotels were.
Followed by a report from the Blandford Weekly News 5th May 1888 about the first match of the cricket season. The match ended at 7pm.
Incidentally the reports of the weather affecting cricket matches I have seen were when the match was called short due to the weather - rather than the completion of the match being delayed the the weather.
I will add the images after!

[Edward Stow]

Blandford 1887

[Edward Stow]

Blandford Weekly News 5th May 1888

[Gary Barnett]

Blandford Weekly News 5th May 1888

Where does it say the match finished at 7.00?

[Edward Stow]

That's when the band assembled at the Market Place (see map) - about 7 o'clock. According to some when discussing Crossmere (whoever he might be), 'about' could mean 7.10. And then clocks were very irregular so maybe 7.15 or 6.45 in the other direction. Is it even worth speculating as to time? Given that time keeping was so haphazard in that period...
Or as times were kept quite accurately due to the age of rail and timetables (and there was a station in Blandford), there was a well established process to communicate times across the nation based from Greenwich.
But this is to digress - do you think the band turned up at the Recreation Ground several hours after the close of play - after the crowd had dispersed?

[Steve Blomer]

Agree completely.

I always favoured Druitt as a suspect, but now I feel ashamed and guilty for this.

I wasted days and hours just studynig this person, this time was lost for nothing.

Greet research here, it helped me see the truth.

We won't be hearing his name too much in the furure I believe, people are smart enough to know it is a burned card.


Tammy

Tammy,
seriously, if before this latest research you believed Druitt was a credible suspect , there is nothing in this which should change your mind. It may make you question that belief but thats it.
Its not, as some here have said, a knock out blow, its not even a blow to knock him.off his feet.
I say this from my well known position of being An Anderson suspect person.

There are several things that need to be established or considered, in my view to take this further.

if we cannot establish a start or finish time for the days play, comments about how long he had to travel are somewhat meaningless.

if we cannot establish if he had a legitimate reason to travel to london, then postulating as to how realistic such a trip was, is also a futile experience.

linked to this is the attempt by some to suggest that its unlikely he travels up on 30th, commits a murder( possibly), and then travels later on 31st or early on 1st.
For me, the issue is, we simply dont know if such behaviour, indeed odd to many of us, would be odd to a serial killer.

And here is maybe one point which really needs to be checked. is the Druitt in the match Monty?
my view on the balance of probability is that it is, but it also seems its not conclusive.

While the discovery by Joanna is wonderful, some, not many, are making this into a knockout blow.
Not only is that not so, its unfair to tell others it is.