The Escape Of Jack The Ripper ( Hainsworth & Agius, 2020)

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  • Paul
    replied
    Although Hallie Rubenhold claimed her book was criticised before it was published, that was not the case. It was her pre-publication publicity and statements by herself in tweets and elsewhere that was criticised. This was legitimate criticism. However, I would be very reluctant to criticise a book on the basis of publicity materials alone because one can't be sure that the author has seen and sanctioned it.

    Part of Ripperology has always been about advancing and dissecting theories about the identity of the murderer. In the old days that's what Ripperologist did, was what Ripperology was all about. Richard Whittington-Egan was the doyen of that type of Ripperology. Discussing and debating theories is still something that people like to do (witness them doing it on message boards and social media), and it's what a lot of Ripper books are about, readers well aware that extravagant claims of final solutions can be dismissed, but prepared to give the theory a chance.

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  • Joe Chetcuti
    replied
    I was looking over a brief biography of the co-author Christine Ward-Agius. It said she "worked many years in the Welfare sector gaining particular experience in a program designed to help empower women to escape poverty via education and employment."

    That is very commendable.

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  • Phil Carter
    replied
    Hello Howard,

    Please excuse my usual scepticism, and the cutting this off at the start of the race.. But these things have to be done..

    The 7 points of major peomotional release to the outside world, pronouncing MJD as "Jack the Ripper" are, what is called in good old con merchants language, a massive promotional smokescreen.
    Because, if the claim were to be true.. A few very direct questions would be answered in that promotional list.. Namely...

    1. The proven whereabouts of MJD on each of the nights of murder in question.
    2. The proof that the man was a homicidal maniac.
    3. The proof that he travelled to and from each vicinity, and by what means, on each night in question.
    4. The proof that MJD, the person, was seen and identified, on any of, if not all of, the nights in question.
    5. In order to prop up this rather unproven theory, the writers will have to denounce the supposed words of D. S. Swanson, in the so called marginalia, which back up the story of the Ass. Com Anderson rather definitively stating the killer to have been a Jew. Druitt was not.
    Therefore, if the marginalia becomes questionable, historically speaking, so must the words of another, non participant policeman in 1888, who supposedly wrote the Memoranda in 1894. You can't have it both ways.

    The point is.. It doesn't matter if
    A) the "vicar has been identified".. That's background. It doesn't make him a killer. So is the bit about
    B) MJK being briefly held in a French asylum. It doesn't make him a killer.
    C) Being a barrister defending a killer by blaming a prostitute doesn't make him a killer either. (Whoa.. Shock! Sensation!... NOT)
    D) Now the "blood stained Druitt arrested in Whitechapel" sounds really interesting... IF the authors have come across a bona fide Met Police report on the matter NAMING Druitt... But I fear it's a case of trying to fit Druitt to a known occurrence. And.. It still doesn't make him a killer.
    E) The Druitt family cannot possibly have "anonymously" alerted the authorities that the Ripper was dead if the author has found out PROOF of the Druitt family being the tipsters. Was the tip verbal? Written? I smell a rat...
    Err, I think anonymous means name unknown? in which case, what is the proof family Druitt sent the tip off? Or is it speculation adding 2+2 and getting the desired number? No, it doesn't make MJD a killer either.
    F) Sims "knowing Druitt identity" doesn't prove anything either. It means Sims found out the name. That's all.
    It doesn't make MJD a killer.
    G) So MJD was a medical student who "dropped out".
    That doesn't make him a killer either.

    My apologies. But book after book after theory after theory gets ploughed out ad nauseum, and for some inane reasons best kept in house, some of these so called 'finally revealing" theories get back up, pushed, and faults glossed over.. Sometimes even because the author is a nice person and has always been friendly with certain others in the genre. Hopefully, nothing akin to that will happen this time...
    It's about time someone, somewhere, told it how it is.
    There is no more proof of MJD being Jack the flaming myth/Ripper/Bundy inspiration in this promotional diatribe than Queen Victoria's favourite manservant is.
    A certain female author recently had her work thoroughly put into the bin with her "sleeping" theories. Time to treat this the same, imho. Facts are, without proof, not facts. They are at best supposition.

    It's about time someone, somewhere, said STOP this nonsense. Without proof.. No one is a killer. Period.

    My apologies for the possibility of upsetting the status quo. Enough, I say.


    Phil

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  • The Escape Of Jack The Ripper ( Hainsworth & Agius, 2020)








    The identity of Jack the Ripper is the most infamous mystery of the Victorian era. Montague Druitt was the original police suspect, but we have never had the full story before, and endless speculation in later books and documentaries: But it was him, after all: The toff in a top hat. Jack the Oxonian. The Victorian equivalent of Ted Bundy: young, handsome, professional and homicidal. Today, the average member of the public has actually never heard of the drowned Druitt; this century he has not been the subject of either a best seller, or movie. The fresh material and sources in the new book are not found in any other publication, including the following USPs:

    - Druitt was a medical student who dropped out.
    - As a barrister, Druitt defended a murderer and tried to blame a prostitute for the crime.
    - A blood-stained Druitt was arrested in Whitechapel but bluffed his way to freedom by pretending he was still studying medicine.
    - Druitt was placed by his family, albeit briefly, in a private, French asylum but had to flee as the police's dragnet closed.
    - The Vicar who published parts of the truth in 1899 has been finally identified (Reverend Arthur Du Boulay Hill)
    - The famous writer and police chief Melville Macnaghten's close pal, George Sims, published a profile of the un-named Druitt as early as 1891: a young toff, slightly built but athletic, who was not a qualified doctor and who had killed himself. This newly discovered source proves, once and for all, that the police chief and the famous writer knew exactly who Montie Druitt was and was not.
    - the Druitt family tried, fumblingly, to alert the authorities that The Ripper was deceased whilst remaining anonymous.

    This is the real story of Druitt, the Ripper.
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