The 1888 Jack the Ripper scare in Market Harborough

The Macabre Observer quotes the Market Harborough Advertiser of 20 November 1888:

THE WHITECHAPEL MURDER.

A man suspected at Market Harborough. 

Some excitement was caused in a certain part of Market Harborough on Friday on hearing that a man answering the description of the Whitechapel murderer had come from London that afternoon and had taken up his abode with a Mrs Green, near the British school. 

The police were communicated with almost immediately and a watch was set on his movements. During the evening the man went to the station (followed by officers in plain clothes) and returned with his luggage - a portmanteau. 

On his reaching home again the police entered the house and searched the portmanteau, but nothing was found to connect the man with the crime of which he was suspected. He said his name was Dietrich and that he was a doctor at one of the London hospitals and gave his address at 22, Howland Street, Tottenham Court Road. He wore spectacles and his overcoat was trimmed with astrachan. Not being satisfied with this information, Supt. Bott placed a cordon of police around the house and telegraphed to Scotland Yard for instructions as to whether the man should be detained or not. 

This was about 9 o'clock and an answer was expected within an hour or two. At 11.30, however, no reply had been received and it was not until 5.10 on Saturday morning that an answer was handed to the police. This was of a somewhat vague nature, but the police were on it's receipt withdrawn from the house and no further notice was taken of the matter. 

One thing which had excited the suspicions of the neighbours and the police also, was that the same man was in Market Harbough about three weeks ago and stayed at the same house. His movements were then considered peculiar and the neighbours were actually alarmed about him. While here, no murders occurred in London, but after he had gone back, the latest horror was perpetrated."

The British School still stands in Fairfield Road next to Old School Mews.

My own pet theory is that there was no Jack the Ripper. A number of East End murders were grouped together and sensationalised by the press, with the result that we are still talking about them today.

This Skeptoid page and podcast gives some reasons for taking this view.

One figure who turns up regularly in the more imaginative conspiracy theories in this field is the medium Robert Lees. Read about him in my post Jack the Ripper: The Leicester connection.

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Florida candidate for U.S. Senate admits to sacrificing goat, drinking its blood

A goat yesterday

Thanks to a nomination from a reader, the Orlando Sentinel wins our Headline of the Day Award.

Lord Bonkers adds: It is just this willingness to go the extra mile that makes the difference in a closely fought contest.

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How is rewilding different to traditional nature conservation?

Chris Packham explains,

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Lib Dems hold seat on Rutland County Council

Whissendine windmill © Kate Jewell

Good news from Rutland, where the Liberal Democrats comfortably held a seat in a council by-election in Whissendine yesterday.

The result:

Kevin Thomas (Lib Dems)   265
Conservative                      109
Ukip                                    33

The Ukip candidate was Marietta King, who has twice been their general election candidate in Harborough.

Her intervention took a few votes from the Conservatives, but otherwise the result was more or less unchanged from October 2014 when Sam Asplin gained the seat for the Lib Dems in another by-election. He was forced to stand down by poor health.

Rather impressively, there was a 40 per cent turn out, with no spoilt papers.

Martin Brookes has a photo of the victorious Lib Dem candidate.

Incidentally, Lord Bonkers played no part in this triumph. I sent his latest diary off to Liberator last night and it seems he has been in the US state of New Rutland for the Primaries.

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Banning tackling in school rugby

I want to play cricket on the green
Ride my bike across the stream
Cut myself and see my blood
I want to come home all covered in mud

The Who, I'm a Boy


Schoolboy rugby appeals to this blog's prejudices, but the open letter from doctors and other health experts should not be dismissed:

The majority of all injuries occur during contact or collision, such as the tackle and the scrum. 

These injuries which include fractures, ligamentous tears, dislocated shoulders, spinal injuries and head injuries can have short-term, life-long, and life-ending consequences for children."

My impression is that rugby clubs are good at introducing children to the game gradually, whereas one often sees a pack of small boys chasing the ball across a muddy soccer field that is far to big for them.

But an article by Anna Maxted in yesterday's telegraph skilfully brought out the dilemma for rugby parents:

My 13-year-old staggers home pink-cheeked and mud-splattered after rugby practice. I order him up for a bath, and stuff his sodden kit into the wash. 

This ritual gives me a similar feeling to singing 'Lavender’s Blue' to him as a baby. I’m part of a great tradition, upholding the basic tenets of parental duty and care, giving him a textbook happy, healthy childhood. 

But later that night he complains he can’t sleep: he hurt his neck during the game.

At the heart of this debate, I suspect, lies just not a dilemma for parents but one for rugby union itself. What is the game meant to be like?

Robert Kitson wrote a very good article on the subject earlier this year:

What sort of attacking spectacle are we encouraging if up-and-coming young fly-halves and centres keep getting man and ball simultaneously and barely have time to catch the ball, never mind pass or run? When youth teams are kicking penalties as a first resort rather than being encouraged to move the ball?

Boxing used to be taught in state schools, but disappeared in the 1960s after a campaign led by Dr Edith Summerskill.

If rugby union as we know it today does not want to go the same way, it needs to decide what kind of game it aspires to be.

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Six of the Best 578

Mary Reid has been reading a report from the Manifesto Club on Public Space Protection Orders.

It's not Bernie Sanders that Jerermy Corbyn resembles, but Donald Trump. Lance Parkin draws parallels between the woes of the Republicans and the Labour Party.

"Our heritage, our history, our quirky collecting natures are being eroded and erased by the need to make financial savings, to economise, to pare down and re-shape." Tincture of Museum on the threat to our smaller museums.

"All this promises well for Mile End, does it not? Think of all the comfortable and respectable suburbs of London, from Norwood to Golder's Green, and try to find one with a series of concerts like this." The Guardian recently republished a 1921 interview with Adrian Boult about his plans to bring classical music to the East End.

The Gentle Author on two unlikely neighbours: Handel and Jimi Hendrix.

The Nottingham Post has a gallery of 30 photographs of the city's Victoria station.

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Stewart Lee talks to Alexei Sayle

The new series of Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle starts at 10 this evening on BBC2.

While we are waiting, here he is interviewing Alexei Sayle about Thatcher Stole My Trousers, the latter's second volume of memoirs .

Something the two have in common is that, rather than flatter it like lesser left-wing comedians, they attack their audience's view of the world.

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Uckfield to Lewes - it's all kicking off

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One of the causes closest to Norman Baker's heart, both as MP and minister, was the reopening of the railway from Uckfield to Lewes.

The project is now the subject of heated political debate, judging by this report from the Sussex Express:

This week Lib Dems have attacked what they perceive as inaction from the Tories since last year’s general election following the progress secured by the former Lewes MP and ex-rail minister Norman Baker. 

Baroness Randerson, the Lib Dems’ transport spokesperson, is set to question the Government on what action is planned between Lewes and Uckfield in the near future. 

However Maria Caulfield, Lewes MP, said that ‘once again the Lib Dems have got it wrong’, and explained that she had continually lobbied ministers about the ermits of opening a second Brighton mainline to Lewes. 

Rosalyn St. Pierre, a Lib Dem East Sussex county councillor for Ringmer and Lewes Bridge, said: “People in Sussex are forced to live with one of the worst performing railway networks in the country.”

Maria Caulfield would do better to emphasise the project's merits rather than its ermits.

Read more about the campaign on the BML2 (Brighton main line 2) site.

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Mirror alleges Tories exceeded spending limit in 9 Lib Dem seats

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This morning's Mirror takes up the Channel 4 News investigation of alleged Conservative overspending at the last general election.

Its report says:

A Mirror investigation today reveals how 24 Tory MPs failed to declare thousands of pounds spent on their election campaigns in marginal seats. 

None of the MPs we name below declared the party's controversial RoadTrip battlebuses in local budgets, with Tory HQ picking up the tab instead. 

If the estimated £2,000 cost of the bus had been included locally, some of the MPs could have breached strict spending limits. 

Five Tory RoadTrip battlebuses crossed the country to help handpicked candidates in the final stages of last year’s election campaign, with head office picking up the tab. 

The total cost of this campaign has never been published, but the Mirror has found invoices indicating it was more than £2,000 a day, including pay and expenses for volunteers and promotion costs.

It is striking that 9 of the 24 seats the Mirror has identified were held by the Liberal Democrats:

• Wells
• Chippenham
• North Cornwall
• Thornbury and Yate
• Kingston
• Yeovil
• Torbay
• Cheltenham
• Sutton and Cheam

There's more about this story on the Channel 4 News microsite.

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Police to reopen Jeremy Thorpe case

From ITV News:

An investigation into the alleged involvement of the former leader of the Liberal Party in a plot to kill is to be reopened. 

Avon and Somerset Police has passed the files from the original investigation about Jeremy Thorpe, former MP for North Devon, to colleagues in Wales. 

The alleged hit man Dennis Meighan told The Mail on Sunday that he met representatives of Thorpe in 1975. He claims they wanted Norman Scott, said to have been the MP's gay lover, silenced. 

However a few days later Mr Meighan says he backed out of the plot and told the police. But he alleges that all mentions of Jeremy Thorpe in his police statement were removed. He believes that someone in Whitehall covered up his claims. He was never called to give evidence at Mr Thorpe's trial along with three other men accused of attempting to murder Scott. All four men were acquitted at the high profile trial.

First Lord Lucan and now this. Seeing the scandals of my teenage years being recycled makes me feel young again. Can John Stonehouse be far behind?

The odd thing about this is that Meighan's story was known at the time of the Thorpe trial. As I blogged in December 2014:

Here is Auberon Waugh writing in the Spectator on 5 June 1981. Among six questions that remain to be answered about the affair, he lists:

Why Denis Meighan, the man who sold Newton his gun, was not allowed to mention Newton's offer of £1,000 to do the job - of murdering Scott - for him.

So it may be that the police are concerned about something else.

And I think I know what it is.

One of Thorpe's co-accused was a nightclub owner from South Wales by the name of George Deakin.

As I revealed earlier in 2014, he was the uncle of the guitarist in Black Lace.

You know: "Agadoo doo doo, push pineapple, shake the tree."

Lock them up, I say. Lock up the whole bloody family.

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