James Maybrick - Jack The Ripper Diary

Jack The Ripper Diary

In 1992, a document presented as James Maybrick's diary surfaced, which claimed that he was Jack the Ripper. The diary's author does not mention his own name, but offers enough hints and references consistent with Maybrick's established life and habits that it is obvious readers are expected to believe it is him. The author of the document details alleged actions and crimes over a period of several months, taking credit for slaying the five victims most commonly credited to Jack the Ripper as well as two other murders which have to date not been historically identified.

The diary was first introduced to the world by Michael Barrett, an unemployed former Liverpool scrap metal dealer, who claimed at the time that it had been given to him by a friend, Tony Devereux, in a pub. When this was queried, the story changed. Barrett's wife Ann, formerly Graham, said that the diary had been in her family for as long as she could remember. She had asked Devereux to give it to her husband because he had literary aspirations and she thought he might write a book about it. She had not wanted to tell him her family owned it because she thought he would ask her father about it and relations between the two men were strained. It was published as The Diary of Jack the Ripper in 1993 to great controversy. Few experts gave it any credence from the outset, and most immediately dismissed it as a hoax, though some were open to the possibility it might be genuine. Debate was often heated, and one writer notes that the "saga of the Maybrick diary is confusing, complicated and inescapably tortuous."

Tests carried out on the ink used in the diary produced contradictory findings. The first test, using thin layer chromatography (TLC) revealed the ink contained no iron, and was based on a synthetic dye called nigrosine, patented and commercially available in 1867, and in general use in writing inks by the 1870s. The second TLC test found nothing in the ink inconsistent with the date of 1888, and that the ink contained iron and sodium, but no nigrosine. The third TLC test found nothing inconsistent with the Victorian period. A fourth TLC test was attempted, but could not be carried out.

Several tests were carried out to find out whether the ink contained chloroacetamide, a preservative, in an effort to definitively date the ink. According to one source, chloroacetamide was introduced into the Merck Index in 1857, but not used commercially in ink until 1972. In 1995, Dr Earl Morris of the Dow Chemical Company stated that chloroacetamide has been found in preparations as early as 1857. A fourth test, this time using gas chromatography, found chloroacetamide present, at 6.5 parts per million. A fifth TLC test found traces of chloroacetamide, but this was attributed to contamination from the control. The test was carried out again, and no chloroacetamide was found.

Among the investigators were sceptic Joe Nickell and document expert Kenneth W. Rendell. In Rendell's analysis, he was struck that the handwriting style seemed more 20th century than Victorian. He also noted factual contradictions and handwriting inconsistencies. Written in a genuine Victorian scrapbook, but with 20 pages at the front end torn out, he also found this suspect as there was no logical explanation for the purported author to use such a book.

In January 1995, Michael Barrett swore in two separate affidavits that he was "the author of the Manuscript written by my wife Anne Barrett at my dictation which is known as The Jack the Ripper Diary." Adding to the confusion, however, was Barrett's solicitor's subsequent repudiation of his affidavit, then Barrett's withdrawal of the repudiation.

Some people, including Robert Smith, the present owner of the diary and original publisher of the associated book by Shirley Harrison, insist it may be genuine. They argue that scientific dating methods have established that the book and ink used to write in it are from the nineteenth century; that the symptoms of arsenic addiction, claimed to be described accurately in the book, are known to very few persons; that some details of the murders provided in it were known only to police and the Ripper himself before the book's publication; and that one of the original crime scene photographs shows the initials "F. M." written on a wall behind the victim's body in what appears to be blood. These, they claim, refer to Florence Maybrick, James's wife, whose possible infidelities were the purported motivation for the murders. These claims are dismissed by the majority of experts.