When dealing with the Somerton Man case, many people have a tendency to try to reduce it all to a story wrapped around an emotion (love, passion, jealousy, hurt, anger, loss, betrayal, etc) and/or a crime (plotting, deception, murder, suicide, etc).
But actually, these are mindsets that not only don’t help, but also get in the way: looking at the evidence with a clear head is a hard enough challenge on its own. In fact, I find getting to the point where I’m ready even to ask the right question to be a genuinely tough process, never mind reaching towards an answer.
So here’s today’s question…
Why was the “Tamam Shud” scrap of paper in the Somerton Man’s pocket at all?
After a lot of consideration, my starting points for answering this question are:
* I believe the Somerton Man placed it there himself (i.e. it was not planted there by someone after his death)
* I believe it was not random, accidental or coincidental (i.e. it seems to have been consciously and deliberately put in a hard to find place)
* I believe it was placed there for a rational reason (whatever that reason happens to be)
* I believe it had a specific extrinsic function – that is, it had value or meaning or use only in relation to someone or something else
So… why was it there, then?
Putting all this together, my current working hypothesis is that the “Tamam Shud” fragment was the Somerton Man’s physical proof that the Rubaiyat was linked to him, even though he had (apparently) not previously met the person who was in possession of that Rubaiyat.
So the two items when combined together form a paired identification proof mechanism: the Tamam Shud scrap was a token to prove his identity to someone he had not previously met, while the Rubaiyat was a token to prove the other party’s identification to him.
If this is right, we have a fairly small number of token-based mutual identification scenarios to consider, such as:
(1) Seller – Intermediary – Buyer
* The Seller tears the “Tamam Shud” out of the Rubaiyat.
* The Seller gives the “Tamam Shud” to the Intermediary (the Somerton Man) and the Rubaiyat to the Buyer.
* The Intermediary meets the Buyer to collect money – possession of “Tamam Shud” token proves he was sent by the Seller.
* The Intermediary takes the money back to the Buyer.
(2) Seller – Messenger – Buyer
* The Seller (the Somerton Man in this scenario) tears the “Tamam Shud” out of the Rubaiyat.
* The Seller gives the Rubaiyat to the Messenger to give to the Buyer (but keeps the “Tamam Shud”).
* The Seller meets the Buyer to collect money – possession of the two halves mutually prove each party’s identity.
(3) Buyer – Messenger – Seller
* The Buyer tears the “Tamam Shud” out of the Rubaiyat
* The Buyer passes the “Tamam Shud” to the Seller via a Messenger
* The Buyer meets the Seller to collect money – possession of the two halves mutually prove each party’s identity.
Pete Bowes and Gordon Cramer seem to insist that this kind of behaviour is merely ‘tradecraft’, but I really don’t know if that’s a position that can yet be justified. All the same, there’s certainly a strong whiff of distrust and proof at play here: personally, I don’t yet know what to make of it all. But it is what it is.
Nick, why restrict the hypothesis to commerce?
Pete: they’re just illustrative scenarios, feel free to construct your own ‘mutual recognition token’ scenarios (I’m sure you have plenty in mind).
The point of the post is simply that I strongly suspect the Somerton Man was meeting someone he had not previously met, and the Tamam Shud / Rubaiyat pair was the means by which the two parties could validate each other’s identity. Which is actually a fairly unusual scenario in itself, I think.
Nick, given the number of precedents for using this system of identification and exchange in the world of conspiracy with success, why on earth would you even try to construct such an awkward series of commercial manoeuvres?
Pete: as far as I can see, the number of precedents you’ve listed on your blog (in comments left in the last 24 hours) is two, culled from a single espionage source. So we’re only getting started here.
We’ll need to do a rather more thorough literature search (i.e. not just of espionage books, because that will give only espionage matches) before we start saying what kind of people employed this kind of identification mechanism.
Sure, it could be espionage, as you and Gordon like to propose: while I suspect it could be some kind of black market transaction. Regardless, perhaps this is a signal that – at long last – some kind of overlap between our readings is starting to emerge. Which would be nice. 🙂
hear hear,mate … this bloody thing has to be solved in our lifetime
I read your blog just for fun, but i do know nothing on this item. I you want some sort of system for transaction or identification one would take a random teared piece, such as a corner of a page or half a page. Not such a rectangle as used here: that is really difficult to create. Since there are two capital letters it clearly identifies a name.
david: one notable difference here is that the “Tamam Shud” identification ‘key’ that the Somerton Man had was very well hidden (it was only found some time after his death). Whereas a larger (say) ripped letter would be much easier to find and much harder to explain.
There’s also the question as to whether “Tamam Shud” had any special meaning for the Somerton Man. “TS” might indeed have been his initials, but who can say?
…more observations: a former ballet danser in Australia seems very odd to me, Russia always have had male ballet dansers.
Then, reading wikipedia some more, we see that in 2013, Kate Thomson, (the daughter of Jessica and Prosper Thomson, who once owned the Rubaiyat and first claimed she did not know the Somerton Man) actually said in an interview that Jessica Thomson was interested in communism and could speak Russian. DNA testing on the body was not done, but this could solve the mystery if the Somerton Man is related to any of the Thomson’s.
Looking at the text Taman Shud i took the Cyrillic Numerals and then we get the numbers 300 1 40 1 40 6 50 400 ?
The last symbol i do not recognize. Could this have been a phone number ?
david: unfortunately, it seems to me undeniably true that 65+ years of people shuffling the same cards (ballet, Russia, spies, DNA, etc) around on the table is a process that has failed to produce anything of value. Right now, I’m revisiting every aspect of the evidence to see if anything has been overlooked. 🙂
Does this indicate the Somerton man was a Sufi?
xplor: possibly. Or a poetic drunk. It’s hard to be sure.
I’ve added a few more instances of espionage switching just to keep up the pressure up, Nick, it looks like everybody was in the game. How’s your search going?
Or this was the only book he had…
But why dispose of the “used” book, and in such strange manner?
That the two items might be matched up is not a bad hypothesis. However, the question of it being in the middle of the page, as David says, suggests that it is not a simple strategy. And if it was merely commercial, then why would there be an uncrackable code there as well? You either use the ‘code’ to send the message, or you use the Tamam Shud slip to make the connection. I think the code (if that is what it is) is the intended message, and the Tamam Shud slip something else (romantic, fed up, etc), unless the coded message was written by someone else and intended for SM and he had the matching bit.
Someone also mentioned somewhere that there were drawings of the Somerton Man and a woman and child on the front cover. Does anybody have any information on that? Surely that would make it a romantic connection rather than a commercial one.
Pete: actually, writing a sentence across a line and cutting it in two along the line was what the Knights Templar did with the very first “cheques” in Europe (to get money across to the Holy Land for pilgrims), 600+ years before anything you cite. And in fact they progressed to using invented alphabets for the letters, because ordinary letters were easy to fake (as any stage magicians worth his or her salt will tell you).
So the whole tearing-things-in-two-for-two-parties thing has a history that predates even John le Carre by many centuries. So it’s game on, not just as an espionage thing.
Anton: that’s indeed a mystery. But Pete Bowes gets annoyed every time I raise the issue of the second Rubaiyat (that was allegedly also found in a car in Glenelg), so I’ll keep schtum on that for now. 😉
Interesting Scenario: it was just a drawing of a lady printed into the book (I’m told by a reliabl source), and it was in the Rubaiyat that Jestyn gave to Alf Boxall rather than the Rubaiyat with the code in. But apart from that, you’re not too far off. 😉
Interesting Scenario: whatever is going on here, I think “simple strategy” is not a phrase that will end up describing it accurately. 😉
Anton, another view is that the used book was not ‘disposed of’ but handed in to the South Australian police by another, higher authority after the inquest.
pete: so why exactly would the Vatican hand in the used book to SAPOL? You’re losing me here, sorry. 😉
The pictures were on the front cover of the book that had the Tamam Shud slip torn out. I remember seeing them somewhere. It was not the woman in the pyjama type outfit that appeared in Alf Boxall’s book. It was definitely a man and a woman and a child.
On the 23rd of July, two days after the inquest was adjourned Detective Leane listened with interest to the circumstances leading to how the rubaiyat was located, and he readily agreed to keep the name of the man who gave him the information suppressed.
It always comes back to this, Nick.
It could have been the password needed to collect money from a hawala broker.;
Interesting Scenario: I’ve never seen anything like this, but perhaps somone else has.
pete: so what’s the problem with this? It doesn’t mean there was a conspiracy or intent to mislead, misdirect, or deceive.
Nick, Leane kept it quiet for one perfectly good reason …. other than being threatened to have his gonads removed.
I had a look yesterday on the Net but could not find it. I think it was hand drawn and maybe in pencil, but on the front. The code was on the back. I will keep looking for this.
Interesting Scenario.There was a discussion some 5 years ago on Prof Abbotts FB group where one of the group thought they had seen the outline of the scene you mention. I think they did a pencil over of the outline they believed they saw.
If you except the scrap of paper as proof, then you must see it as proof of intrigue.
xplor: just because I find it intriguing doesn’t mean I find it proof of intrigue. 😉
It’s certainly proof of something, though proof of what remains a far more open question than some people would have you believe.
Jessica left it for the “HIgher Powers” that know!!!!!
I have a copy of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam with the same font as the Somerton Man. I have attached pictures of my book. Dave
IMG]http://i63.tinypic.com/20rw969.jpg[/IMG]
[IMG]http://i66.tinypic.com/30azv40.jpg[/IMG]
http://i66.tinypic.com/30azv40.jpg
http://i63.tinypic.com/20rw969.jpg
Dave: splendid, thanks! What edition is it? (i.e. who was the printer, what was the year,etc) What do you think the cover is made of? And was there an end-page after the “Tamam Shud” page?
Yes there is a page after the Taman Shud page. Unsure of the publisher or the year because there isn’t a reference to one. Do you have Gerry Feltus email. I would love to contact him.
Dave: I do have Gerry’s email, but it’s at home (and he doesn’t tend to answer many emails these days, too many crazies out there with a Send button). Having said that, I’m fairly sure he’d be interested to know more about your Rubaiyat – so if it’s OK with you, I’ll pass him your tinypic links and your email address.
Of course, the first thing he’ll probably ask you is whether you have any idea of your Rubaiyat’s provenance? I’m guessing that you inherited/found/bought it in America, right?
You are very welcome to pass my details on to Gerry. I would love him to see the book. Thanks Nick
Dave: presumably you have already seen this image – http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/hindsight/rubaiyat/5258018
Dave: I’ve passed your details on to Gerry Feltus, I’m quite certain he’ll be very interested to find out more about your Rubaiyat (as am I, of course).
There’s a photograph of the “Tamam Shud” slip next to a ruler in his book (p.169), which seems to give the width of the “Tamam Shud” letters from ‘T’ to ‘d’ as close to 37mm. Is that what it measures in your copy?
I think the problem with this scenario (ignoring for a second the apparent mismatch between the fragment pictures and the torn page pictures – which are inconsistent with the investigator assertion that “it was a perfect match”, so either we are being shown the wrong images (or the page has been further torn for some reason etc) or we are being told the wrong thing) is that the fragment was found concealed. There’s naturally a possibility that SM was going to meet someone and that’s not the same people who killed him, however if you’ve met with this sort of key exchange, wouldn’t the key be the one thing that they’d be absolutely desperate to hide – how then does it end up well concealed in SM’s clothing after his demise.
It had occured to me (and the problem above still exists in this case – probably more so) that what if SM was a spoof. What if he cottoned on to someone else’s secure pre-Diffie-Helmann signature, and had a Tamam Shud fragment that DIDN’T match the ripped book? That would certainly provide a motive (but that pesky key remains in his pocket which simply doesn’t sit well with me). One thing seems certain, and that is that there was an abundance of Rubaiyats in Australia (and even in Adelaide) at the time….
Perhaps some of it fits if the “key” was used as an introduction at some earlier time and by that day there was sufficient trust between the parties – but then why dispose of the book when you’re not certain you’ve recovered the fragment (or did that really happen earlier – before the 3rd party realised that they didn’t have the fragment (perhaps assuming it was in the wallet they pilfered)?). But then you need to question the motive of disposing the book [em]with the page that the fragment was torn from relatively intact[/em]. Sure, we need to distance ourselves from the crime, but someone paranoid enough to think that the Rubaiyat might link to them would surely be paranoid enough to dispose of it more effectively – either ripping out pages, or putting the book somewhere it won’t survive (I’d imagine salt water isn’t good for books, if only there were a large body of saltwater near the beach somewhere….). The discovery of the Rubaiyat is one of the very few things that I’d almost agree with spy conspiracy theorists hints at some sort of attempted cover-up – it’s far too convenient and there would seem to be some inconsistencies around how it was found that support that idea – but in that case it doesn’t need to turn up at all until Tamam Shud fragment is found (and even then it’s not important unless people start questioning how a suicidal person had a fragment with no book – but is easily enough explained with “read a verse from the book, tore the fragment, hurled it into the sea and sat down to die” sort of romanticised suicide) – of course that doesn’t explain why the fragment is so well concealed.
So remind me when did the book turned up? At what point did the police have it? Was it handed in when it was found, and later linked to the case, or was it only handed in once the Tamam Shud fragment was publicised (and in that case could it be a hoax?)?. While that edition would seem rare today, surely there’s a certain clustering of versions to locations that could sufficiently explain 2 identical editions in a similar location (eg a bookshop in Jetty Rd (or somewhere else) happened to stock that edition at some stage or something).
The fragment and the book make very little sense, so matter how we manipulate the facts. Whether you’re fond of conspiracies or more mundane explanations, it’s hard to accept both the fragment and the book without trying to massage some of the facts around them….
milongal: the book was only handed in when prompted by the police publicity / call for information that accompanied the first Coronial Inquest in mid-1949.
From my current perspective, I strongly suspect that even though the fragment and the book are pivotal pieces of evidence, the broadly-accepted narrative assembled around them simply does not work. I’ve got a 10,000-word post on that to finish…
I am now in touch with Gerry. Thank you for passing my details on to him. The Rubaiyat belongs to my Gran. I will give you an update in the future once I have had some discussions with Gerry. Thanks!
Dave: looking forward to your update. Doubtless Gerry has already asked you how your Gran came to get hold of it. 🙂
Once all the historical and practical meat has been picked off the bone (so to speak), you might want to consider doing a press release about your book. It would very likely raise a lot of interest and stands a good chance of helping bring more copies of the same edition into the light etc.
Who knows. 🙂
Dave: it’s amazing the number of people who can remember odd details from 50+ years ago if you just ask them – siblings, cousins, friends, old neighbours, etc. And there are diaries and letters and notes and photograph albums to consider too.
You now have a very easy-to-state historical question – where did this Rubaiyat come from? – so… why not use your best cunning to try to answer it? That, after all, is what history is all about. 😉
Dave: one (possibly) helpful thing might be that your Gran’s Rubaiyat’s blue cloth cover seems typical of a fair few American (I’m thinking New York) books in the 1940-1945 date range, which would seem to be broadly consistent with the date of the Somerton Man’s death. If there are no ownership marks at all at the front, it may well be that your Gran owned it from new, or perhaps was given it as new.
My Gran is a woman of many secrets and stories that I am not fully aware of. She arrived as a refugee to New Zealand at the end of the 1940s. She is now in her late 90s. There are no ownerships marks in the book, so you just might be right about it being a gift or perhaps new. I am sure there are explanations for everything. I am very curious myself as to why she would have this book in the first place. Nobody in my family has ever seen it. It only emerged in the Retirement Facility that she is now living in.
Dave: even if your Gran isn’t able to tell you, I’d say it’s extremely likely that the answers you want will also be in the head of someone, somewhere who is. All you have to do is find that person and ask them. 🙂
Back page after the ‘Taman Shud’
http://i68.tinypic.com/2yv6k42.jpg
Inner Book
http://i67.tinypic.com/sdgzdk.jpg
I have searched the style on google images and its points to the 1940s. I don’t have access to the book until Wednesday next week.
Dave: thanks very much for the extra images. For what it’s worth, I suspect that the marbled-style paper used to bind the back cover to the end leaf was a later addition / reconstruction, but you’d probably need to ask a twentieth century book historian’s opinion on that.
It seems like a huge effort for such a little book. It’s a baffling little book so to speak. I just dont know how to identify it because there is no publishers details on it. I will get access again to it on Wednesday. I will be scanning it with a scanner and taking a video on my iphone.
I will gladly email you a copy of the scans that Gerry Feltus will receive as well. I just really dont know what I am looking for in terms of measurements etc.
Dave: as far as the measurement side of things goes, a single shot of the “Tamam Shud” with a ruler across its length, plus the width and height of the page it appears on would be a really great start, thanks! 🙂
If you have time, I’d also suggest looking through the book for any printing defects (misnumbered pages, awkwardly offset page numbers, or whatever) or unusual features of the content (distinctive drawings or illustrations?) that might help to indirectly identify the printing company that printed it.
Incidentally, I suspect that the original cover may have been joined to the book block by a stubby flyleaf, so there is the possibility that the marbled flyleaf (that connects the book part to the cover part) might possibly be covering up some kind of printer information, so you might also try to hold the front and rear end-leaves up to a bright light to see if you can see anything (however vaguely) beneath the flyleaf. Also, if you photograph these pages in front of a bright light source, we may be able to use image processing to make out details that the human eye can’t easily see. Which is nice.
All basic book detective stuff. 🙂
http://www.abebooks.com/servlet/BookDetailsPL?bi=19397587334&searchurl=kn%3Dwhitcombe%26sts%3Dt%26tn%3Drubaiyat%26sortby%3D17
This looks like a match. 1941?
Thank you for your advice Nick. I can’t do anything until Wednesday next week. In the meantime I have started some detective work myself. My friend who is at University recommended the World Cat site to me. World Cat is a site used by libraries and organizations to index books and their locations around the world. My provisional search is the book print Whitcombe and Tombs of New Zealand. I see from the search that I carried out that their editions of the Rubaiyat came in two series. One series was produced in 1941 and the other during the 1940s called the courage and friendship series. I am thinking that my book could be the 1941 series because I have found examples of the other online and they don’t match. But your suggestions of the book wrapping and cover binding might be the case. I have searched eBay and Trade Me without success but I have managed to locate one edition on AbeBooks which is blue but the writing is Gold as opposed to hand stitching which is the case of my book. I have also sent some images of my books to Whitcoulls Head Office in Auckland, New Zealand. They are the new name for Whitcombe and Tombs and I am hoping that they might have some records and be able to shed some light on the matter. If my book has been altered and covered its a huge expense for someone to cover it in blue cloth and hand stitch the logo and design on the front. I am currently researching the Marble Print and the blue cloth cover. I did find an article on books and New York came up like you suggested in the previous post.
Barbie: it’s very close indeed, close enough to convince me it’s by the same printer at the same time, even if the cover decoration is in gold rather than dark blue ink. Presumably this is the same copy that Dave was referring to in his most recent comment.
Nick: My cover decoration is hand stitched on fabric. Yes this is the book I was referring to.
Dave: it sounds to me as though you already have most of your answer. (Gerry Feltus pointed to Whitcombe and Tombs in his book.)
More specifically, I think it’s perhaps important to note that the book production process is quite different between paperback and hardback, in that the latter involves a little bit more physical craft. Hence my strong suspicion is that Whitcombe and Tombs may well have tried a number of variants for their 1941 hardback edition.
There is a little bit of a paradox here: the ornate bordering suggests something of a luxury edition, while the fairly drab cover suggests something far more mundane. My best guess is that planning for the book occurred before WW2, but that nice quality materials etc proved hard to source in wartime. Perhaps the variants simply came down to their experimenting with different variants to work out which wartime option open to them was the least bad?
Dave: hand-stitched cover decoration sounds quite the luxury item, that only a connoisseur would notice. 🙂
I am hoping Whitcoulls will enlighten me further on the issue. Perhaps the hand stitched books were made for special people etc or came as part of a set. It will be interesting to know why and also why are they so scarce. 🙂
I have also never read the book written by Gerry Feltus. I ordered my copy today from Australia. I am very much looking forward to receiving and reading it.
Dave: I’ve read up a little on Whitcombe & Tomb’s. It seems to me that the company never really managed to find an appealing stylistic edge to its book production, that its output was always a bit staid (if not prim). As such, I would think that the mixed visual messages given out by your book’s cover are probably entirely typical of the company’s output.
I suspect that Whitcoulls may not have a great deal of archive material to interest you, as a good amount of the Whitcombe & Tomb’s archives seems to have been deposited with the National Library of New Zealand (but asking is free, nonetheless). Here are some links to get you going:
* http://natlib.govt.nz/records/22877718
* http://natlib.govt.nz/records/22854918
* http://natlib.govt.nz/records/21814602
* http://natlib.govt.nz/records/32973689
Nick,
I found reference to Omar Khayyam societies and clubs, and thought it might interest you to know that one which was formed in Boston in 1900 included in its charter the condition that membership should be limited to 59 persons.
To quote the author of a paper on the subject:
“This exclusive club welcomed a variety of professionals, including artists and literati in addition to political and military officials”.
It also published its own books – perhaps one of them was a special edition of the Rubaiyat.
I have this information from the abstract for one of several related papers.
Michelle Kaiserlian, “The Imagined Elites of the Omar Khayyám Club”
That abstract and several others are online in a pdf.
http://www.victorians.group.cam.ac.uk/June%202009%20abstracts.pdf
Nick: I am exploring that the Somerton Man could have been a New Zealander or his origin was New Zealand. Whitcombe and Tombs was a New Zealand publisher and the book that the Somerton Man had was very rare and unique. Thank you for the information on Whitcombe and Tombs and the archival location. From my research so far I have found references to The Rubaiyat by Whitcombe and Tombs on google books. One thing was the reference the ‘Unknown Artist’ who designed the books. Given all the tools in the suitcase of the Somerton Man, the Somerton Man could have worked in the book printing industry.
There is a book called The Art of Omar Khayyam: Illustrating FitzGerald’s Rubaiyat that goes into great depths on the different Rubaiyats and their designers.
A man called Gordon Cramer has written a great post.
http://tamamshud.blogspot.co.nz/2016/06/somerton-man-book-collection.html
I travelled especially to see Gran today to ask some questions. I printed a picture of the Jestyn nurse. Thankfully my Gran has never met her or heard of her Nick. She did recognise the picture of the Somerton Man that I showed her. She was very vague and said she would have a think about it. We as a family have found a second copy of the Rubaiyat today which is the same font but a softcover version. It was in a box of Grans things in the garage.
I want to add that she has never never visited Australia but she perhaps stopped in Australia on the boat she was on. She came from Europe after the war and has been to the USA. It was a port of call on the boats. My Gran was captured by the enemy and spent time in Siberia. It’s a long story.
She thinks she remembers the Somerton Man in a refugee camp in Persia.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish_civilian_camps_in_World_War_II
Dave: thanks for leaving so many comments!
(1) According to Appendix 2 of “The Art of Omar Khayyam: Illustrating FitzGerald’s Rubaiyat” by Mason and Martin, the artists who illustrated the two Whitcombe and Tomb’s Rubaiyats were “RGT {nnk}” with nine illustrations and “Unknown Artist” with only one illustration. Would I be right in guessing that your Gran’s two Rubaiyats (hardback and softback) were both from the same version and had only one illustration [and hence were by the “Unknown Artist”?
(2) Was Whitcombe and Tomb’s distinctive triangle on the endpage of the softback Rubaiyat? Did you take a note of the softback Rubaiyat’s dimensions?
(3) Did your Gran think that the man she thought the Somerton Man might have been came to New Zealand on the same ship as her? I’m presuming that she was one of the 105 adults who accompanied the 733 “orphans and half-orphans” who were sent to New Zealand in 1944, is that right? If so, the adults seem (from the photographs I have found on the Internet, not a particularly scientific sampling methodology) to have been mainly women, so it shouldn’t be too hard to find a list in the archives and narrow it down. (I couldn’t find the passenger list, but I expect others will have more luck than me).
(4) And here are some photographs: http://kresy-siberia.org/newzealand/rooms/pahiatua-polish-children%e2%80%99s-camp/church-and-festivals/photos/
(5) As far as Gordon Cramer’s post goes… the three newspaper articles of the time where images of the Rubaiyat front cover and the Tamam Shud appear are as follows:
http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/130271667
http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/130270026
http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/36371154
It’s far from clear to me whether the edges of the Tamam Shud piece were deliberately folded over by the Police (as he asserts), cropped for clarity by the Police, or whether cropping the image tight to the letters was a decision by the picture editors at the News and the ‘Tiser. Just so y’know. 🙂
I am sorry for leaving so many messages. Every time I use my desktop computer the message bounce back. I have been using my phone I’m afraid. It has a very small screen! – I’m just off to work now but ill respond in depth later on tonight when I’m home. Its just annoying when you type a huge message and its bounces back and you lose it. My partner suggested using Microsoft word!
Dave: the most likely thing to cause a comment from a desktop to be rejected would be the use of links to webpages (jpegs seem to be OK). If including a link to a webpage, please remove the first ‘:’ and the last ‘.’, and I’ll reassemble the link when I moderate it up. 🙂
Nick: I really appreciate all your hard work and research etc over this. I have given my book to a printing shop who are going to scan the whole book cover to cover and then I can send copies to people.You, Gerry etc. I will get back to you on Friday night with a huge response. I am just concerned with a few bloggers right now. I’ve been defamed quite badly and my name is attached to it. I have only ever been honest and direct with people in a polite way. Gordon Cramer did a fantastic job on writing up a post on my book he then subsequently let himself down by getting involved with another bloggers attack against me. The other blogger was Pete Bowes. Gordon even went as far as saying that I had scanned my book from another and my copy was a fake. There will be a video of my book coming too along with a stat dec and certified copies of the book from my local police station. I don’t know what Pete’s angle or agenda is but it’s really childish and immature. He keeps changing the posts all the time and amending comments etc to play games and make me look stupid. He is also coming out with some really odd stuff and you keep getting dragged into it. I am seeing my lawyer in the morning because I issued him with a Cease and Desist and he still continued with his behavior. It’s absolutely and ridiculous behavior over a poetry book and a conversation with my gran. Thanks for all your hard work and communicate really soon.
Dave: bear in mind that when you get defamed, libelled or abused on a website, the first legal step is to determine the location of the server where the website is hosted, because that is
the jurisdictionwhere the defamation, libel or abuse is deemed to have taken place, which determines the country / state whose jurisdiction it would fall under. In the case of Pete Bowes’ tomsbytwo.com blog:tomsbytwo.com –> 192.0.78.25 –> Automattic, Inc in San Francisco, CA (i.e. it’s almost certainly a blog hosted on wordpress.com on an American server)
As far as the issue of editing posts, comments, etc, I covered this here: http://ciphermysteries.com/2016/06/04/best-practice-for-bloggers . No prizes for guessing which particular blogger’s behaviour proved so directly inspirational for this. 😐
@Dave – there’s a long history there (and there’s a reason why I tend to stay here than venture onto the other two sites – one gets carried away with fanciful espionage stories that (to me, at least) get crazier the longer time goes on, and the other seems to thrive on trying to engage visitors (especially ones who don’t 100% agree with their deliberately fictionised account of what went on). At some stage they sort of became “best buddies” and you’ll often see one blowing steam up the others clacker in the comments on their respective sites. Certainly they really dislike Nick (I think there’s lots of reasons for that, but it basically boils down to the fact that Nick doesn’t jump onto bandwagons like they seem to and (apologies Nick) sometimes comes across a little brash. Oh, and in their opinion this site is poorly moderated – because they brought trolls along with them and got upset when they turned (or something).
It’s interesting that anytime anything new is suggested, especially if it is suggested here first, then the poster seems to suffer similar bullying to what you describe (more from one site than the other, although I’ve always noticed the “selective comment moderation” on both – not often you see disagreeing comments on either, unless they provide an opportunity to write an attacking post). Anything like what you’ve found will always be treated with suspicion – because people have believed before and been burnt, although I do find a touch of irony that someone would simultaneously try to disprove that your book is the same version AND claim that you’ve pilfered the information to make it all look the same. TBH I was surprised they didn’t find some microcode in your pictures – it seems to be infesting everything else apparently.
Personally, while it would certainly be interesting to have the same version of the Rubaiyat as the one from the SM mystery, I don’t really think it will do much in terms of the actual mystery itself – so I understand the efforts to ascertain whether it’s possible it is the same (or a very similar) edition, but I don’t really understand why all the hoo-haa beyond that (I understand your interest in it – and even others’ to some degree, but not to the point where the two bloggers you mention feel the need to launch an all-out war). Even if it turns out this is exactly the same version there’s very little (other than ludicrous speculations on “all spies had one” or something) that is gained from it.
milongal: apart from the Somerton Man’s body and his suitcase, the only things we have are (a) a code we can’t break, (b) a phone number that leads to a dead nurse who we now know was definitely connected to the Somerton Man (but in some as-yet-unknown way), (c) a now-long-lost Rubaiyat that somehow connects the Somerton Man to a car of unknown make / model / year / colour owned by a local “businessman”.
There has always been a whole bunch of tiny inconsistencies about the Rubaiyat that seem (to me) to be telling us a very particular story about its history. The ornate borders shown in the original photo of the page-with-a-hole-in speak of a luxury edition: yet the original Rubaiyat seems to have had an unassuming soft cover rather than the kind of fancy hand-stitched hard cover Dave’s copy has.
Here, I’m intrigued by the suggestion that some of the Polish arrivals in 1944 may have been given Rubaiyats, presumably donated by Whitcombe & Tomb’s. There must be more to learn about this in the archives: however small a piece of the puzzle it may seem to be, I don’t believe that we will need large pieces to be able to solve the overall mystery – something small may well be all we need.
Nick: I have just taken a video of one of the books using my phone. I have managed to transfer it to my desktop. I am trying to upload it to TinyPic now along with a few more shots I have taken. Sadly I don’t have a lead that connects my scanner to my PC. Once the video comes through could you upload it to your site? Many thanks, Dave
http://speedy.sh/5XnFc/VID-20160616-200018.mp4
http://i65.tinypic.com/9u1ysj.jpg
http://pho.to/ABfzd
Do you have a copy of the video now Nick?
I have just had a bounced email back from you. […]
Does the above link work in last post for you Nick?
Nick: I have just created a YouTube account and uploaded it there.
This is the link.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3YOxbnM88KI&feature=youtu.be
Dave: as the bounced email message said, your 55MB email was too big for my inbox. 🙁 But the online file-sharing link looks like it should work fine. 🙂
Its on YouTube now courtesy of my nephew.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3YOxbnM88KI&feature=youtu.be
Have you seen this Nick?
https://tamamshud.blogspot.co.nz/2016/06/somerton-man-book-hoax.html
My book that I have just filmed and uploaded on YouTube for everyone to see apparently doesn’t exist.
Dave: I’ve seen it now *sigh*, thanks for the link. Oh well. 😐
One (of a few) things I don’t understand. Originally Dave said there was no indication of any publication details, but there they are in the video.
Also – and it may be trick of the light in the video – the page with that information seems to turn stiffly, as if he white area with the printing info were a second piece of paper, glued on.
Sorry to be difficult – I’ve just been difficult in the opposite way on the other site. 🙂
I am at the point now where I am not going to bother anymore Diana. I need to buy a lead that connect my scanner to my PC. Once I have sent that I will do some close up original sized scans. I am also taken a few pages to the police, justice of peace etc and getting them stamped and certified. I’m getting really tired of the conspiracy theories. And I have two books not one.
Don’t worry Dave and Nick, they’ll find some microwriting on it yet…./tic
Funny that Milongal, I was thinking the same 🙂
I am not an expert on books and their production. The last two pages were slightly stuck together but I have been through the book and turned each page.
Nick and everyone else: I have had my nephew over today and he has used a Sony Cybershot Camera and filmed my book in HD. He has even filmed into the spine of the book and those places that people love to talk and debate about. The video has slowly been uploading to You Tube for the last couple of hours.
I do have a second copy of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. The publisher is Whitcombe and Tombs and the inside cover clearly says ‘Courage and friendship booklets’. The book is a softcover. I will get my nephew to film this book too and upload load it to You Tube.
I am putting together a timeline of any memories that my Gran can remember regarding her boat trip to New Zealand and her life before she arrived. I will email this to Nick Pelling when it is completed. 🙂
The You Tube link to the HD video of my book (The blue cover one) is coming shortly, its been slowly uploading for the last couple of hours. My connection is extremely slow.
The HD video of my blue version of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam is here:
https://youtu.be/5gi20byDLP4
Dave: again, thanks very much for sending this through etc. It’s really time for me to write it all this up in a more coherent form. 😐
As an aside, I’m still working my way through the ebook on the Pahiatua Polish Children’s Camp. One tiny detail is that when some of the children left the camp in 1945, they were given brown suitcases. Which might just be coincidental but… I thought I’d mention it anyway. 🙂
Here’s a link to a picture of the Somerton Man’s brown suitcase and some of its contents: http://d6jf304m27oxw.cloudfront.net/mystery-of-somerton-man-the-taman-shud-case/somerton-man-suitcase.jpg
There seems to be lots of coincidences here Nick.
My site for hosting my pictures and videos of my book is here:
https://rubaiyatsite.wordpress.com/
Second book photos:
https://rubaiyatsite.wordpress.com/2016/06/19/rubaiyat-of-omar-khayyam-softcover/
http://www.abebooks.com/servlet/BookDetailsPL?bi=19451262281&searchurl=bi%3D0%26ds%3D20%26sts%3Dt%26bx%3Doff%26sortby%3D17%26vci%3D63672107%26recentlyadded%3Dall
Is this the same edition as your books Dave?
Scott: I’m not a book expert. Sorry 🙂
I have noticed after quick comparison with the book online that that book has 6 books in the series in the inside cover and my book has extra ones making my list 9.
Scott: the bookseller’s reading of the recipient’s name as “Jo” seems a little optimistic – it looks like “To my Dearest La / With Love / From Stu”. And I’m not sure 406.98USD is entirely in line with the market. 😐
Is there a market Nick. I have already had an offer on mine for $1000. Its not mine to sell technically and would be my Grans decision. How often do these things come up?
Dave: was that 1000USD or 1000NZD?
Booksellers sell old Rubaiyats for 100USD and up, with the actual price depending on a whole host of factors including condition, provenance, and (particularly) what they think the level of market demand for that particular edition is. My understanding is that relatively few Whitcombe and Tomb’s Rubaiyats have come up (Gerry Feltus searched for years before finding one), so the price for those will likely be a fair bit higher than for mass market US editions of comparable age, where there is no obvious shortage of supply.
Having said that, Whitcombe and Tomb’s Rubaiyats are now firmly associated with the Somerton Man cold case, and I would be unsurprised if the recent raised level of interest in them following your various posts and comments etc has been enough to add an extra digit on the right-hand end of New Zealand booksellers’ prices. =:-o
But as to whether or not to sell it, who am I to say? I’m far more interested in the story behind it than the object itself.
Im working on the story behind the Rubaiyat as we speak.
I was offered 1000USD and for the trade to be carried out through safe trader. The potential buyer was a representative from an American Hedge fund.
Look at this on eBay http://www.ebay.com/itm/262490932380
Sophie: that’s the copy a New Zealand bookseller is selling (since I commented on the dedication a few days ago, they’ve fixed their description of it) – having unexpectedly received a lot of online interest for a different Rubaiyat, this other copy was retrieved from a far corner of its warehouse.
I’ve got two posts on the Whitcombe and Tomb’s Rubaiyats lined up for the next few days, so perhaps stay your impulse to bid until you’ve read those. 😉
I would go with what Nick is saying Sophie. Just acknowledging that I have received your email Nick. I am seeing gran for a chat tommorow. Were off to the beach for a chat in her favourite enviroment. She is a painter and artist at heart. I will be back to you with the answers to your questions. There is quite of a number of things that Gran remembers that wasnt nice so I’m being careful with my approach. Things were not good at all before she arrived in New Zealand and those camps were horrific.
Dave: if you have an e-reader (such as a Kindle), I’d recommend “New Zealand’s First Refugees – Pahiatua’s Polish Children” as a fascinating read (I’m now very close to the end). It’s structured as a broadly chronological series of memories and reminiscences, with the most horrific near to the front. There are also lots of good photographs in the middle, many of which are also available online.
“The Invited” is good too, but covers only a fraction of the material.
Have a nice time at the beach! (…types Nick, having got soaked through by torrential rain this morning, *sigh*).
One individual has just commented on my blog to tell me that she bought the hardcover Rubaiyat on ABE. She is planning to donate it to the South Australia State Library. Hopefully whoever is interested will be able to get some scans out of her. The policeman I spoke to stay in Adelaide today calls it Taman Shud fever. He can never understand why people get so hyped up over it.
The Tamam Shud page and it’s back page (with the W & T triangle) are the only two pages in the entire book where the text portion (with surrounding white border) is right in near the gutter of the page. All other pages have about 1 centimetre of spacing. Also, as GC has pointed out, the moon on the Tamam Shud page is cut off at the top. The binding points on this double page spread also appear to be different from those on the other pages.
Not judging. Just an observation.
Misca: the point of the post was that Whitcombe and Tomb’s clearly (I think) did not have a single print run for either of its two Rubaiyats, but instead had multiple small print runs and small binding runs – a very fragmentary and experimental affair. And so when people now try to form arguments about the Rubaiyats from a position of consistency (e.g. of layout, of colour, etc), they’re already misinterpreting the kind of thing they’re looking at.
In order to properly understand how all the W&T Rubaiyat versions fit together, a book detective would need a lot more information than we currently have. This post is no more than one particular small starting point on that road. 🙁
On 6/3/15 David said….since there are are two capital letters it (Tamam Shud slip) clearly identifies a name. NP replied….There’s also the question as to whether Tamam Shud had any specific meaning for the SM ‘T S’ might indeed have been his initials but who can say….All this was under the general heading ‘The Tamam Shud fragment was proof of identity’ and later in the segment there was a lot of chatter with another Dave about his gran who had immigrated in 44 with the Polish orphans. Of course we do know a chap with those very intials who also happened to be a Pole and also did the Old Tasman crossing in 44. But it can’t possibly be him as he died suddenly in Dunedin of no apparent cause and without any autopsy being performed, or his legal next of kin being notified. His bigamous spouse who was performing at Melbourne’s Tivoli Theatre did not attend his funeral and nor apparently did his travelling troupe as they were doing a show in Christchurch on the day of his internment. Its of interest to me that his kids and relatives are still inquiring about him and their mother who they thought to have died in 1937. My own inquiries suggest she passed in the early 90s all of which is rather intriguing if I may say so but I’m not prepared to speculate on what all this is about.
To expand a little on my last posting, it seems that T.S. was a ammunition carrier for the Russians as a teenager in WW1 but that does not give us any hint of his political leanings and nor does the disclosure that his three brothers were serving as soldiers with the Polish army in 39. He claims that he tried to inlist at the outbreak of war whilst living in Sydney but was rejected either due to his age which would have been 38, or to some physical incapacity such as bad feet, teeth etc. It seems that he may have had major dental treatment in Melbourne around ‘Cup Day’ of 36 and issues with his feet in 37 which would have put paid to his top level dancing career. From then on he ran dance schools both in Sydney at two addresses down town from 37 to 42, thence from an upmarket address in Collins St. Melbourne where his close friends were mostly well known folk of the sophisticated artistic bent. During the war he is said to have travelled around the country a lot and would have been familiar with large country towns like Broken Hill and Cairns, in addition to the capital cities with which he would have gotten to know well over a 15 year span. So far as I know he fathered three children to his first wife Maria from about 31 to 36 and at least two of them were living in America as of 2013. I’m happy to expand if there is any interest in a person whose demise seems to have pre-dated that of our subject SM by nearly 4 years. By the way I’m heartened to see that someone has been kind enough to post some mementos from the Mikkelsen file amongst those in the T. S. gallery. I wonder if that same kind soul was also responsible for removal of a nice portrait of a chappy sporting what appears to be an American striped Tootal type tie.
I think we may have missed something very important, quite possibly the most significant piece of evidence so far discovered. Strangely enough both Brown and Leane constantly refered to it, along with the Adelaide press, and yet none of us dumbos took any notice. I would like others to ponder for awhile and let’s see who can deduce what appears quite obvious to me now. My insite came about partly from comments made by our two friendly adverseries Nick & Pete, who as we all know are really joined at the hip when it comes to investigative intuition (and intellectual snobbery)……For all of that, it may not prove significant in the long term as I’d like to think that I know who published the book (I’ve hinted at it before), what then became of it after Sapol gave it their best shot regarding the ‘TS’ slip (another clue); and most important of all, where it went afterwards, also where it might yet be located. I’ve got a lot of work in front of me regarding this aspect, however I’m quitely optomistic that this quest can ultimately be achieved….There were in all likelihood two books, identical but for the ‘code text’ missing from one copy; and perhaps one other key element (clue), which l’m still thinking over…The letter ‘J’ could also prove to be of some real significance (there I’ve given the game away)….Whatever transpires with regard to the sought after comments or any expressions of interest, it is not my intention to keep things under wrapp indefinately.
Keep firing Johnno,
J as in Rupert not Jessica.
Congratulations moderator, very impressive indeed, but can you figure out the rest of it without GF‘s infernal prompting.
John – There is a picture online (Narcisse) of your TS dancing with Hilda Manning(s). It’s a great pic because it allows one to zero in on body parts such as feet and hands (should one be so inclined). Hilda (aka Lydia S) was 5′-2″ at age 25. Have a look at the picture. How tall do you guesstimate he was?
Misca: I go back a long way with Lydia but never knew her height so thanks. I think she looks only six inches shorter than Thadee which does not look good although if Narcisse was 1919 as I think it may have been than he may yet have had some growing to do. There is another photo of him alone in the same set alone and gives a good view of his profile albeit made and his features look ok for a younger SM. I had a studio portrait of him which I promised to send you but alas I never could work that stuff out. All my non SM involved people over here were sure it was the chap on the slab (side profile). Alas my efforts to retain it on file in a household full of gamesters was destined to come unstuck. You can check my related posts on Valerie Lawson’s dancelines and Michelle Potter’s ballet blog should you be so inclined. cheers js.
Misca: Perhaps you can find out the height of Thadee’s better known ballet partner Leon Woizicowsky who was Lydia’s husband. Plenty of pics are availabe of them together and the two felows appear to be the same height. Of course we really are only taking the stated 5′ 11″ as given and as with many other so called facts in this case we do not know the reliabilty of the original information. The two Polish lads were known to be inveterate gamblers particularl wellknown around the racetracks in Melbourne (tabletalk mag. Dec. ’37). Now you may recall a trove newspaper article from ’49 (The News) I think andvnot long after SM was found, perhaps a month or two. A couple of unamed baccarat gamblers from Melbourne came forward to nominate their former nitkeeper (cockatoo or lookout) as the dead man they had seen in a newspaper photo; They said that he had worked at their illegal establishment for ten weeks before disappearing from the scene and that had been about four years beforehand. They described him as being a quiet uncomunicative chap and they did not know his name; so all we can take from this is our knowledge that Thadee’s address at the time of his departure from Australia for NZ in Dec. ’44 was 9 Collins Street Melbourne and that a liitle over a month later, just after dawn on the 25th instant he was laid to rest in Andersons Bay Cemetery. His chief mourners were three teens from the Borovanski ballet who may not have known him (my belief), all being now deceased , unfortunately forall of us. In Valerie Lawson’s blog ‘dancelines’ she talks about Thadee (tadeusz) having had a heart attack in his Dunedin hotel on 22nd Jan. ’45 and that he was pronounced dead in hospital. He was most likely an exceptionally fit healthy man of 43 years and I’m sure most people might agree, not a great candidate for such a sudden demise. Of course we know that back in 1940 at the outset if world war two hostilities, he was accused of being a Nazi sympathiser, though later exhonorated of the charge (NAA). It would be a relief if we could get some final clarity on what I consider to be reasonable doubts concerning the matters described herein irrespective of how tall the subject Thadee Slavinsky and our other dead friend were at the time of their respective exits.
I’m sort of intrigued, but in most photos can’t really see the resemblance (although in all I’ve seen he seems in costumes that mask different features (eg in one his eyes look way too big, but I think that might just be face makeup) – and his death seems rather final (pun maybe intended a little bit).
I do notice that some articles have him as M (Michel??) Thadee Slavinsky and notice the TS in the ‘code’ is an ‘MTS’, however to me the elephant in the room is that noone at the time seems to have said “Geez, it looks like that ballet dancer chap” – granted everyone (most people, anyways) thought he was dead, but to me it still seems a touch odd that the resemblance would go totally unmentioned (it was still relatively recent that people would have seen him, and the articles in the papers about his passing seem to have been relatively small – so you’d sort of expect a “looks like him”…”didn’t he die a couple year ago” type exchanges, to the point where due diligence would dictate you try to verify the overseas death.
Of course if everyone’s so keen on an exhumation, why not at Dunedin instead of Adelaide?
I think she looks less than 6 inches shorter than him – he’s standing straight she appears to have bent knees. I’d reckon they were a similar size standing together (she’s shorter, but not by as much as it looks, I think).
He’s a difficult character to trace because his name seems to change from polish (Tadeusz Sławiński) to nickname (Tadeo) to anglicized name (Theodore Slavinsky) to (professional?) Nickname (Thadee/Thade Slavinsky). And the record from the Anderson Bay Cemetry has him as ‘Tadesez’.
A little interesting that his headstone is quite plain (no DoB, no family information, just a note that it was funded by JC Williamson – the theatre company that owned/backed/whatever the ballet company he was in).
Neither are very tall although they give that impression. Is how Thadee and his pal Leon are described in 1936, so what can we gain from that; how long is a piece of string. I’ll go out on a limb and say no more than 5′ 9″ or a tad more so how to make him up to 5′ 11″ which is what they? gave SM but there is no telling how they? arrived there. That figure was given in the very first Adelaide papers announcing the find on day one so we might say it was a guestimate and not an official measurement. I think I’ve mentioned this previously and that is that a body lying on a slab, clothed and most likely with its shoes on can be assessed only roughly. It depends on build so an estimate could be out by a good inch or even two especially if the shoe heals are elevated, so as to make the wearer appear taller (custom bespokes). My man was involved in car wreck back in ’37 whilst on tour in Dunedin and as a consequence he came to the notice of attending police and was hospitalised with nonspecified facial cuts. There have been suggestions made that SM had facial scaring though once again not specifically and that certain proceedures were undertaken perhaps
during embalming to conceal the scar tissue. Whether this was done by design or not, it did not seem to deter those who saw the altered appearance and felt that they could make positive identification which is not particularly unusual.
Whilst Sapol have not released details of those identifications, we could speculate and say that they probably don’t include any of our nominees ie a certain Polish Ballet artiste named Tadeusz (Thadee) Slavinsky. I’ve often wondered if, bearing in mind that he was considered a great international celebrity in his day, this being enhanced his known charismatic demeanor, if perhaps he might not have been able to win over a few of the local coppers or medical staff at Dunedin hospital during his ’37 sojourn. Could that then have put him in a good position to call in help or favours. Such as to take care of necessary bothersome details pertaining to his unfortunate demise eight years on. Might sound ridiculous but let us not forget there’s still a war to be won and the world is upside down and inside out, not as we latter day theorists might imagine. Money is also short with public servants like doctors, coppers and government paper pushers being prepared to do almost anything short of murder? to put bread on the table.
Meet the author David Dufty signing copies of his book “The secret code-breakers of Central Bureau”. Saturday 19 August from 11am at Harry Hartog Bookseller, Westfield, Woden (Canberra).
“A groundbreaking work of Australian military history, The Code-Breakers of Central Bureau tells the story of the country’s significant code-breaking and signals-intelligence achievements during the Second World War. It reveals how Australians built a large and sophisticated intelligence network from scratch, how Australian code-breakers cracked Japanese army and air force codes, and how the code-breakers played a vital role in the battles of Midway, Milne Bay, the Coral Sea, Hollandia, and Leyte.
The book also reveals Australian involvement in the shooting down of Admiral Yamamoto near Bougainville in 1943, and how on 14 August 1945, following Japan’s offer of surrender, an Australian intelligence officer established the Allies’ first direct radio contact with Japan since the war had begun.”
I wouldn’t mind betting that by mid year 1948 the con artists were peddling ‘authentic’ tamam shud slips around all the pubs in Adelaide. We’ve all seen many variations of these reproductions on line and yet I feel confident that we may not yet have been treated with a visual of the real mcoy. That’s the one that Len Brown was given to show the press and to the book sellers and librarians for favour of professional evaluation. Its the one that John Cleland found in the fob pocket of the deceased and handed to Sgt.Leane for scientific analysis, then later comparison with some copy (s) of the rubaiyat. Its the one that according to all of those mentioned, as their respective articals and court depositions will attest, bore the following wording TAMAN SHUD (note the difference). Len Brown always stuck by that spelling and never once mentioned there being a Greco/Latin acute over the letter A. He was also never corrected as to factual misinterpretation by anyone that I’m aware of. For some reason unfathomable to me, the slip was not offered as an exhibit at the June ’49 inquest and it wasn’t until the press smarties with their smug correctness, changed over to TAMAM SHUD with the ‘tony’ accent. I may have missed something that I’ll be corrected upon rather smartly I’m sure, but to my way of thinking this whole book, font, colour,cover, size, edition and year of publication (what else have I missed) has been handled in a rather jumbled manner from the start. Not by us latter day folk, but by the original participants and needless to say, that has me wondering. You’ll recall that the original book or books were said to have gone missing in the early fifties and if that’s correct, I think it/they might yet be found amongst other papers/exhibits in the Aust. National archives pertaining to the Royal Commission on Espionage 1954/55. Not sure of course but it sounds reasonabe that someone like Ray Whitrod would have been well connected enough with Sapol to arrange the transfer of same. Good hunting unless you have already been there done that.
John: the belief was that all the evidence got discarded in a SAPOL Spring clean in the late 1970s, i.e. after the Littlemore documentary.
The so-called spring cleaning seems to have gone down rather handsomly for the fuzz, (perhaps others too), especially in light of the fact that the doco, as it has been described, was seen to be pointing in a certain direction; one that only a good spring cleaning might obviscate the need to come clean on, on number of issues raised. I have deliberately not clicked onto any of those videos, nor have I read the GF Bible, so my views on issues are based intirely on what I glean from the blogs. I certainy don’t feel that I’ve missed out on too much however, but I might well be wrong. I am prepared to plod along merrily my own intuition if that’s how things pab out, so perhaps it’s my foggy old noggin that could do with a good spring cleaning.
John: relying on blogs for your Somerton sustenance is a bit too much like dining on dogshit for my liking, but each to their own path, I suppose. 🙂
Who was it that removed the stuff from SM’s partly stitched fob pocket I wonder; It could not have been the coppers; after all they had fessed up to the tanner in his other duds, whereas they could just as easilly have put it in the tea money box and no one would be the wiser. Admittedly it would have been a good ploy to obviscate any suspicions of underhandedness on their part. No! because our friend Prosper already confessed to having the gold Tudor half hunter (more or less) very early in the piece, though it’s most unlikely, in my opinion that he located the folded and tightly rolled Franklin bluey keeper five pound note hidden beneath it. That was picked up by the other lads who got onto the lurk who then replaced it with Len’s taman shud slip; the original and feeling confident that it would stay safely in place until the need for its timely coincidental discovery by big Jack Cleland just prior to resumption of the inquest. It is all mostly just hypothesising on my part of course but I think its nonetheless worthwhile to put stuff like this out there for comment.
rkzsc needs a better spell check for fancy words like obviate. No matter she seems to have headed west.
NP: I don’t think you’ll see any mention of either the Rubaiyat or TS fragment as having been discarded specifically in the Sapol spring clean (late 70s) as you suggested. My contrary information, derived from dining on dog doings, still points to an early 1950s disappearance of these items which are so imortant; frankly the casual manner in which you seemed to dismiss them to the dust bin of history is unbecoming and quite out of character. If anyone is still active in this case, and has access please proceed with my recommended search of the 54/55 R.C. into Espionage, where I have a hunch that some light on the book’s whereabouts might well be found.
It has been noted that Tom Cleland, the Coroner, in his inquest summing up, described the Rubaiyat as being an 1859 second edition book as opposed to a first edition which all the available evidence would have suggested it to have been ie. the ‘Tamam Shud’ notation on the slip by its very wording. The other five editions, whether the second, of 101 quatrains or the larer three, all being of 110 each, terminated with ‘Taman’ so as to uphold copyright laws which would have still operated at the time. Understandably the first edition book with its 75 quatrains was not available to assist him in his deliberation but the slip was tendered in evidence so he should have known. Or did he base his conclusion on factors not disclosed to the hearing for a particular reason; I’m sure we later day onlookers might think of one or two.
Tamam unless your Len Brown.
I always wondered about the two Melbourne baccarat chaps that knew SM some years prior to his death; spoke of him as having been perhaps an itinerant, who came on their den unknown and unanounced, then pulled up stakes after ten weeks as cockatoo and strangely never to resurface. I think Gerry glossed over them with just a mere passing mention, so we are left hanging as to whether the gents in question ever made the trip over to Adelaide, or if they were just referring to likeness of a newspaper shot of the body. I make mention of this because there was such a person who may have fitted the bill, an Englishman who had been a problem gambler when he arrived in Australia in the mid to late twenties with his wife, who left him because of his addiction. I tried to track Wolf Cohen down with Misca’s expert help in that regard but not a single likely lead emerged as to his whereabouts or anything about the man’s history. A month or so ago I advised that I had found a fellow of the same somewhat unusual name who had ended up dead in West Terrace morgue on precisely the same day as SM. I was naturally deflated when my post relating to this most remarkable discovery seemed, and still seems to have gone completely un-noticed. Not the man I was looking for that’s for sure, but a strange background nonetheless and a man who had been reported as having died five years previously. Nah, not even worth the mention really; sorry I brought it up as intriguing as it might look to someone interested in covert post war government coverups.
Dr. Tom of the Lower Saxony haulocaust site has corrected the earlier 1943 date for Wolff Cohen’s demise, however he’s now posted another inncorrect date which he took from my given Anglicised short version and transformed that into the American/German long version of 12th December 1948. I have reposted to let him know of the misunderstanding.
According to an acknowledged, well regarded, most reliable source, the Tamam Shud slip was found on the body of SM and identified as such long before John Cleland came across it in the fob pocket of a pair of Stamina trousers worn by him at the time of his demise. The evidence is actually repeated in officer Durham’s inquest affidavit and sworn testimony, which is plain for all to see and in no way ambiguous, from my perspective at least ie: “found on the body of the deceased” ie. presumably before 3rd Dec. ’48, the date of his meeting with the dead man at West Terrace Morgue when he attended to take prints and pics. for release to the press. NB: Durham was no amateur and would almost certainly have said “on clothing of the deceased” had that been the case.
John sanders: that individual statement may be unambiguous to you, but you’d surely have to admit that it seems to contradict what SAPOL did for the next few months. :-/
Nick: In your own opinion, was it merely a faux pas; obviously in light of subsequent revelations outlined in newspaper reporting of continuing police operations?. Perhaps Mr. Durham was no longer in the information loop after his session with SM and assumed that the slip was found on the first day. Then six months later he was presumably then brought in to take snaps of the slip and not told that it’s discovery had just come about. Do we have information on any involvement by the three other operators from the fingerprint and scientific analysis officers within the department?….
It seems that nobody these days gives SM’s red white and blue tie much value in terms of the colours being representative of his country of origin and flag loyalties. Bearing in mind that more than a few of our past players have hinted at his general appearance, manner of dress etc. being somewhat Slavic rather than ‘best of British’ as was suggested by one post mortem examiner, I’m interested all of a sudden in the good possibility that our man may have been Czech; formaly Czechoslovakia. Of course in those heady days all those little Slav places in that neck of the woods had been under the rule of nazi Germany, though allegences of course would have varied. If SM had have come to Australia prior to the war, than he could have been a patriotic supporter of a small state near the Polish border for instance; the only alternative being a fifth columnist which of course was not likely. Considering that he chose to stay in the antipodies after hostilities, would suggest that his options did not include living under one of the subsequent new soviet regimes. Who knows, but I still think his old tie is still at least worth a ‘tootal or two’…..
Nick: Actually, what Sapol did for the next few months, and what Sapol has done ever since, could well be the reason some of us are so Keane to clean up their mess. We can put aside for now, Jimmy’s literal meaning behind ‘..found on the body…’, and some folks thinking it was taken out of context. You’ll have noticed that Peteb pounced on it and now even claims it as one of his own investigative coups, I shd say. What Mr. James Durham (for Gordon) also seemed to infer in his connected affidavit, is that ‘…the writing found on the body…’, followed by ‘…the paper found on the body…’ were perhaps not one and the same item, he having late processed the two for exhibit in a similar, though somewhat arse about way…Perhaps a retort is not in order, though whatever, be assured that y’man will take it and run, like a foul hooked jewie, given the chance.
Throwing dust into someone’s eyes.
This idiomatic expression alludes to throwing dust or sand in the eyes to confuse a pursuing enemy. [Mid-1700s]
Source: theidioms.com
I don’t why you came to mind when I read this, Johnno, but I’m sure you understand.
You have to admit though, the striped trousers revelation is a bit of an embarrassment all round. Let’s hope the Voynich mob don’t see too much forest for their trees.
Pete: the striped trousers thing is interesting, but it’s just one data point among many. If anything, what it supports most is Gerry Feltus’s last chapter, with someone (possibly, but not certainly, dead) being carried to Somerton Beach. But only weakly.
Lividity, NickP. That’s two data points. Makes weak look stronger.
Pete: blimey, and there’s me thinking you disagreed with everything I ever wrote on principle. 🙂
I’m a better man for my experiences old son, you being one of them. But this bastard mystery has to be ATTACKED.
Full frontal.
You with us?
If we take a closer look at what Constable Moss said to the effect that people using the stairway, could not help but get a clear view of our evening SM full on, how then could Dereck’s teenagers, who used the stairs twice, not seem able to give any description of their man, implying that they only saw him from the waist down. Both did make clear mention of a suit, mosquitos closeby and that the man was resting against the seawall etc, but neither volunteered further useful information pertaining to height, age or general appearance, yet the guy ‘pulling the strings? above was described in detail, at least by Olive. Neither John Lyons, Const. Moss, nor even the strangley disappearing strappers or their steeds, were called upon to witness their all important evidence of discovery for the coronor. The body on the slab was not even formery confirmed as being the body on the beach, let alone it’s likely being that reported the previous night. . We must not forget that when Moss spoke of the deceased having been transfered to the mortuary for processing, he never claimed that it was he personally who accompanied it there. Police continuity was conceivably compromised from that point onwards, so all those speculations made regarding possibly doctored photos, suspected fake fingerprint cards and non credible descriptions for the beach body might well be valid.
Knight identified the body delivered to the quack as being the same one he saw on the beach, Dusty, common knowledge.
Peteb: Now that one has me stumped! Are we talking about MC Knight, the morgue attendent who pointed out a body to Durham, when that worthy showed up two days late to secure a set of suspect prints and doctored photos? I don’t recall mention of him having been at the beach when SM was found…It had certainly been Moss who accompanied the body and it’s possessions to the hospital in order for Dr. Bennett to give his shaky, rigor mortis based, time of death estimate. No mention of dismounted Const. Knight, Det. Strangway or police ambulance attendents at that crucial period, though we could hazard a guess and assume that the press were all over the case by that juncture. As to if and when the three key witnesses were shown the body in order support their respective vague identity statements, we’re not to know. In effect, from our perspective, all key claims regarding the body, can only be based on assumption, just as it was for Leane, Brown and the Moss/Strangway team, none of whom never laid eyes on the re arranged SM body at West Terrace morgue.
GF page 42, Dusty. next question?
Pete: blimey, and now you’re besties with Gerry F too. Wonders will never cease to amaze, etc. 😉
Love is in the air …
@Nick: Am I verboten, permanently, to cipher mysteries ?
@JS (Maybe this has been your point all along): Olive said she could only see the man ‘from the waist down’. in Littlemore’s doco Brown says:
“…the young lady that was sitting on the esplanade with her boyfriend – she claims that she saw one of the hands er – or one of the deceased’s hands move….if…the hand did move, well then, uhm, he couldn’t have been murdered somewhere else…” (NAA extract, part 2, page 37)
I won’t buy into the assumption at the end of that, but there’s 2 bit there that I find a little bit interesting….
1) ‘Sitting on thee Esplanade’ (and I’ll take the point that Brown doesn’t come across the best with words in the doco)
2) If she can only see him from the waist down , presumably his hands mus be almost straight and by his side if she saw them move . I’m trying to think whether this view fits someone suffering and on the verge of death. To me it sounds rather an uncomfortable place too have your hands when you’re propped up on a rock ….I’d almost think they’d more likely be on your chest. Of course, that all assumes that he’s more lying down than anything else. If he’s propped up in more a sitting position, wouldn’t it be even harder to see his actual hands?
Peteb:: Twenty minutes on the blower with John Ruffles, you surely must have had more to jabber about than his brown striped duds, Jestyn’s mum and how ‘things were great in ’68 on the new UW’. We know that his Adelaide interview list in ‘73, included the beach kids, John Dwyer OBE and most important of all, G. F’s mentor, Det. Sgt. Ron Thomas. It seems your man may have failed to get them to come aboard but the doco went ahead anyway. I’m wondering if you old Bondi boogie boarders got talking about why John’s priority witnesses could not be goaded into giving their up-dated views on the case. Things like why Olive & Gordon denied having seen SM1 from the waist up (we can guess), or might the good doctor like to re evaluate his findings 25 years on, and of course, what might Thomas’s connection with the Thomson’s have been, if any.
Bobbi: you’re not verboten at all, I just delete messages (from anyone) that would likely have the effect of inadvertantly riling other commenters, or which repeat comments that have already been made almost word for word. If you avoid those scenarios, you’ll be fine. 🙂
Here’s a little quinkydink that com-petes favorably with the other Pete’s similarly irrelevant ‘Jestyn’ breakthrough. Of course everyone will remember SM’s young German Jewish slabmate Bill Cohen the Alien butscher (sic) of Loxton. He’s the one that strangly nobody ever found need to comment upon, possibly because he died suddenly without leaving a will or note concerning disposal preference. Of course he went same day as y’man, two weeks before Tibor and lived nextdoor but one from Freeman’s Pharmacy, with his wife Marjorie, daughter of red Sen. Jim Cavenagh’s commie mate Stan Lawson, both of the same rotten inner city burrough. So we have the poor fellow’s merry widow on the hustings, needing a new bread winner for she and the boys Rob and Andy. Now we get into murky waters because we have her quickly getting hitched to one of two siblings, either Max or Carl Schahinger of Hambley Bridge. Nothings certain in this maze, but I’m thinking Max, the ex RAE Staff Sergeant of Alf Boxall’s 15 Water Transport unit NT & NSW, because sibling Carl, the former RAE sapper who also ‘fought’ alongside Alf in the deep north, was perhaps already married to his own Marjorie. I can go into much more detail, but only if anyone can convince me that it could be a better deal than all those new Jestyns..ps: I can come up with my own Jestyn, who even has brothers and uncles named like Alf Boxall‘s No. 1 blacktracker, Mordecai…
You don’t jabber to a bloke like Ruffles, Dusty, you take notes.
milongal: Olive and Ken had come forward on the evening of 1st December, two days before the re-constructed photos became available. My feeling is that when the young people, along with John & Helen Lyons, were asked by police to identify the body as would have been expected, both couples used the standard ‘didn’t see his face’ excuse to avoid a rather uncomely sight. I don’t believe that streetwise old Det. Harry Strangway was particularly pushy by that stage, as his own suspicions of a two body deal, had most likely been summarily rejected, he being thus excused from further input at his own request. So there you have it; No testy identification witnesses to get in the way of a temporary judicial sine die whitewash and another case ready to be filed as ‘PA’ or resubmit in a decade, which it was.
Peteb: I’d expect the great man would be more likely to refresh his memory with a non binding invitation to come on board and share the bountiful fruits of a likely favourable outcome. An old trick that usually worked was to promise your informant anything within reason, and mean it. Don’t bother with notes, the contemporaneous type can sometimes create problems; always best to jot things down from memory. That way you’ve got an excuse if things go kaput.
@JS: out of interest (I’m not doubting you, but I haven’t managed ti find it yet…I got caught up in Littlemore stuff), where does it talk about when the two originally gave their statements?
Found this a touch interesting (re Clifton Gardens Hotel in the mid 1940s):
The Clifton Gardens Hotel was popular with all the adults who would wander up there in the afternoons for some rather happy party times.
An event which comes to my mind that happened at the pub was when a couple of blokes in army balaclavas carrying a Thomson sub-machine gun burst in at closing time and held up the staff who were counting the days takings. They got away but not too far, based on descriptions the police conducted a raid on the nearby army water transport base and found the culprits asleep in their bunks with the money and the gun under one of them.
http://mosmanmemories.net/story/134/squatter-camps-on-clifton-gardens
milongal: Full details of Gordon and Olive’s coming forward with account of their Somerton Beach incident elludes me for the minute, though it seems they heard or read about the body on the afternoon of 1st December and they made contact with police (Strangway?) directly. It is mentioned briefly in the introduction to Gordon Strepps typed Inquest affidavit from memory….Loved the Clifton Gardens Hotel memories. Can’t find any trove references to the armed hold up by Alf’s Water Transport pals. could it possibly have been Prestige and brother Gasper (sic), who lived nearby. Thomson (sic) guns might have been a trifle over the top for such a job, from the standpoint of fire power chosen for small likely gain.
Peteb: ‘In re a gentleman one’ namely J.B. Cleland, who during the inquest, mused somewhat about how the morning SM’s lividity appropose the position he had been found in, was telling, though explicable nonetheless. Of course Moss, who was late on the scene, described our man with his back to the wall more or less. On the other hand John Lyons spoke only of a shoulder being present near the wall; this however, being in marked contrast to what he described to young Ruffles in ’72. At that interview the old ex militia corporal was of the view that, whilst his evening man was almost sitting against said wall, next morning he was flat on his back in the sand which, both agrees, then again is at variance with the young couple’s recollection. I’m inclined to the view that whilst Lyons went to fetch Constable Moss, some thoughtful folks may have propped the old boy up in order that he would look more dignified, which was nice but wrong. The point that I’m getting at is, perhaps Cleland may have intitively considered the possibility of SM being flat out when he expired, so that his head was lower than the rest of his body which solves the lividity question. We will recall the big tide in the morning, we also recall Moss saying that the body was damp. Had some part of the seawall then been subjected to tidal influence, a head on the shifting sand, might well be expected to work down. I know this scenario would to be off line with our respective body swap scenarios per se, but you know dusty ol’me, always calling it as I see it, in the interests of fairness.
Stripes, Dusty, how many times?
Peteb: Apropos ‘stripes’ my man; John Lyons had two of em in the militia. When he went to fetch Judah Moss, he told the lads not to disturb the scene. Did you ever know anyone to take any notice of a bum licking corporal? No..I guess you didn’t!….
With the high tide and the narrow tract of beach (that feels repetitive too) you’d expect the body to have been wet if it had been there all night (as we’ve discussed before – and as JS alludes to above re ‘damp body’), but I’m certain somewhere it explicitly says ‘…but had not been in the water’ (will have to check whether that was something actually said by the investigators, or a bit of artistic license by Littlemore or another story-teller).
Found a different story on Clifton Gardens yesterday too (not likely to be relevant, but an interesting story all the same). Didn’t really think it worth telling then, but seeing as I’m posting anyway….
Betty Van Tonder (a young South African of Dutch extraction) died shortly after leaving the Clifton Gardens hotel in 1940. She’d apparently been strangled by her own stockings – in what was ruled by the police to be a suicide.
Plenty of literature online, but this trove article questions the plausibility of such a suicide:
https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/169112444
It seems to have been an era when many deaths were written off as suicide, even when it seemed unlikely (the chap from North Adelaide with the railway sleeper who managed to drown himself in 8ft water springs to mind).
Actually, changed my mind on that a little (reading the inquest).
The temperatures (recorded at 9AM for the preceding 24 hours) at the West Tce weather station show:
30 Nov min 11.2, Max 24.2
1 Dec min 21.8, Max 35,6
Given everyone whinges about it being a warm night (and that the temp drops again on Dec 2 to 10.2 – 23.6) it seems really strange that Moss describes the body as cold, damp and stiff.
I think you’re right JS – the tide had definitely washed the body if it had been there all night, and even if it had gotten there after 2AM (from memory High tide was at about 4:30?)
For folks that still can’t see the potential for lividity about SM’s neck, try this little experiment when next you’re at the beach with the tide coming in. Just stand at the runin limit and you’ll see that with each wave runout, your feet will sink further into the sand. If you don’t wish to get your tootsies wet, try it with a four pound brick, better still get some 45 year nico freek to play SM for a light pack of Kenestas or equivilent. His head will sink sure enough and his hair will become matted with sand just like, guess who?…
Here’s our likely lad in 1959, on his way out the door; He’s wearing Yakka Keyman blue jeans and feel’in like a kool Kat, on his way by tram to Sydney Stadium for the Col Joy & the Joy boys rock-on with guest star Dig Richards…. “Kerrie, get back to your room this minute and change into those nice brown Brack’s Slacks we got you for your birthday”. That’s mum, she always called him Kerrie, it was his name afterall. “Can’t mum, their at the cleaners down Rose Bay getting pegged, remember? ok see ya”. ” Hold on a tick, what about the brown Fletcher Jones pair; the ones with the light stripes that you once liked ?”. Mother’s no dill when it comes down teen fads. “You sure they have stripes mum I can’t honestly remember them having stripes?”. “Well that’s because you young people never seem to take the least notice, now please do as you’re told and get out of those bodgie pants this second!” Sure sounds like most mums too. “Yes Mother I will”, sez Kerrie her 15 year old troubled young ‘Midge Farrely’ wanabe Bondi, surfie brat, cursing his bad luck for getting sprung…”STRIPES be buggered, you didn’t see no flammin stripes. Struth darls ya should’na let that shifty walloper put words inta ya fool head”, said Olive to her main man Gordon Strapps, all five foot two of im. “I shd say so”, was the only mumbled reply he could muster at such short notice…
Needs work, but we’re liking the research you put into it. Might have to watch it with the hair matted by sand routine, might be questioned by the know-it-alls.
Gordon: We dealt with your Wolfgang and ‘cousin’ Hellmut over here some time ago. He seemed to be an agent for new Jewish arrivals, perhaps nothing more; had his wife Charlotta and a young family if that counts in his favavour. Major Cohen was head of the Army Legal Service, having served at the front in WW1 and was one of Sydney’s top KC’s (later QC) , The fifth son of Australia’s Great Sinagogue head sherang. Being of othordox Jewish background, the old fellow may not have trusted the blow in Euro alien foreigners and unfairly viewed them as being a bunch of commie ship counters, ala CA 32 or originally Q/CA 35 according to our old unreliable records. Fellow loved the nags and richer than all of Adelaide’s royalty put together from memory.
Byron: I can’t find any cemetery records for Robin in Canberra, or anwhere else for that matter. I’ve tried McMahon as well as Thomson and even Thompson which was the spelling he was known by in the A.C.T. according to your recent posts on TBT.
JS: I think Misca found that Robin’s ashes were being held, uncollected for several years, at an Adelaide cemetery. I also think I remember that Misca posted this info and next time Misca checked the ashes had been collected (by DA?). But I might have it wrong. Robin died in Sydney.
Incidentally, Robin was an expert witness (on cars) at the first trial in the Colin Winchester murder case. I find Robin’s involvement in this very strange and I wonder if he was following in Prosper’s footsteps as a police informant in the motor trade.
AFAIK Norwood Park (in Michell) is the only crematorium in Canberra….and you’re right, there doesn’t seem to be any record there. Interestingly some of their entries are listed as “Cremated on” = “OUTSIDE NORWOOD PARK” – which presumably would indicate that they were cremated interstate, but their ashes brought back there (Boxall’s wife Dulcie is an example).
With some of the interstate ones (at least the SA ones) it appears they only list results if there’s a memorial in the park. In SA you also have to take into account there’s a crematorium within a Funeral Home in Royal Park/Port Adelaide (Tony Monte Funerals) – which doesn’t appear to list records publicly at all….
Byron Deveson: I wonder if anyone has put in a Freedom of Information request to SAPOL for information on Prosper or Robin? An obvious question, but sometimes they’re the ones that get overlooked. :-/
Ticket clerk identifies the ticket as being first sold that day because:
It had a line through the number (on a ledger, presumably) indicating it was the next ticket in the box at COB the day before.
Does someone with old time ticketing experience think this is a bit odd? Wouldn’t you cross out n-1 (so the first ticket on a day is the one AFTER the line)?
Where I’m going: What if the Henley Ticket was purchased the day before?
Byron: Ten minutes prior to reading your Robin Thomson?post, I was ‘alarm’ (unusual) woken for my a morning routine. Til then I had been fitfully asleep and dreaming about my perceived worries concerning the Colin Winchester case…Thanks for your information which did jog my recall button.
Gordon: There was discussion at length a fair while back, on Helmmut and cousin Wolfgang, but not the Major’s specific involement. It might have been Dereck’s site that made more detailed mention of their relationship. I some how seem to think Wolfgang could have been a Liverpool Street lawyer and that he aquired Australian citizenship during the war or shortly thereafter which points to his community standing.
Milongal: If the Henley Beach ticket was purchased on 29 Nov-wouldn’t that put into doubt the date of the suitcase being handed in at the station?
The suitcase tag has an actual date on it, so unless evidence was messed with (which i suppose isn’t impossible) there’s no doubt it was handed in on the 30th). From memory it has a time on it too, that indicates it was handed in between 11 and 12.
Even if we are comfortable that the suitcase and the clothes SM was wearing are definitely linked (and I think there’s reasonable evidence to agree they are), there’s nothing to say that the suitcase was handed in the same day the Henley Ticket was purchased – or even by SM for that matter. There’s much confusion over the train ticket – and noone has really managed to explain how they could tell it had been punched but not used (although by the sound of it GF was comfortable swith that after speaking to SAR people). I’ve long held the belief that it was ASSUMED not to have been used, because if both the bus and train ticket were actually SM’s (which there’s only very circumstantial evidence of) he clearly couldn’t have used both – so he must have abandoned the first form of transport, even if the ticket was already punched. That is, I think people assume the HB ticket wasn’t used despite being punched because it doesn’t work in the traditional narrative otherwise.
The ticket simply has a sequence number. It sounds like the ticket sellers had a long list of tickets for an audit trail, and at the close of each day they would mark where they were up to. At Inquest, the ticket clerk states he knew the ticket was sold on the morning of the 30th, because its sequence number had a line through it on their ledger – which he says indicates it was the next ticket on the roll at close of business on the 29th. I won’t claim to understand SAR operating procedures of the 1940s (if I remember I’ll ask the question at busaustralia – because there’s train gunzels aplenty there), because to me it seems more likely that you cross out the last ticket sold not the first ticket left.
If the HB ticket was from the 29th not the 30th, then the fact it was punched probably indicates it was used (not necessarily by SM). The presence of the tickets on the body has always been problematic, especially when tied with the absence of the luggage receipt/ticket/stub, any evidence of visiting the baths (despite the traditional narrative implying it happened), and any wallet. A lot of this is explained away at inquest as being the contents of an overcoat that was never found – but that in itself is a problem. If the stub is in his overcoat, then he had his overcoat on in the station – so why is the train ticket in his pants pocket? And why an overcoat, when according to everyone (except the numbers) “it was a warm day”?
The wallet is easy to explain away – it was pilfered
The bath tickets are easy to explain away – He never went there
The simultaneous presence of the bus and train ticket and absence of the luggage stub is harder – with (IMO) the most obvious explanation being the contents of his pockets were planted (and I’m sure we can think of multiple scenarios from deliberately emptying and refilling pockets, to him being dressed in clothes that weren’t his to half a dozen other things).
Short version: I think it’s easy enough to come up with a narrative where the ticket is from the 29th, but the suitcase is from the 30th.
Peteb: One must point out that our moderator has alloed himself a fair degree of leeway in his thread notes which of course is rather wise in the circumstances. We can’t really knock the man for having a personal opinion no matter how unrealistic, and then having the courage to share such fooshness with the likes of we known shit canners. I don’t intend to do that just yet but would like to set things in motion saying simply that I just don’t buy that the underbelly auto dealers of ’48 would have been much into ‘I’ll show you mine if you show me yours’ as a means of fair exchange. A little too fanciful for mine and considering the type of people that were involved, better means of enabling satisfactory deal compleing arrangements such as inbuilt honour clauses or other less suttle sureties as deemed appropriate. Let’s take old Prosper as a type study, he who made his shonky deals work with falsified paper work, a bloke who knew a con job like the back of his bad cheques. Never any need for no fancy Arab polm books, Shaman Studs or such tom foolery, not for old ‘If it’s from Thomson it sucks’ y’hear’ George McTaggart.
Anway I’m just popping in to remind people that this particular thread has been fraught with many inaccuracies over a long period. unverified mind boggling tales that really don’t seem to hold up when tested. Where they came from one can only wonder but we should certainly be wary of anything stated as fact by that bunch of Inner Sanctum untouchables who have remained so for far too long to be honest injuns. They’ve played us for saps which we are, narry a doubting word have we directed towards their bonifides. They were no doubt behind talk about rolling our Tamam Shud slip into a thin straw like cylinder or into a tiny ball and hiding it in a concealed stitch lining so that it could only be retrieved with help of tweezers ie., fa secret pocket so well constructed that there was difficulty finding it again when J B Cleland tried once more (apparently true). Neither he nor Det. Keane made such a big deal about it at the inquest so as to give it any more evidentiary status than it deserved, certainly nothing compared with the be all end all, bright shining lie that it has metamorphicised into.
‘One Fine Day’ Tbt may seek to get it’s facts straight but, not by quoting the man who wrote the book or by chasing butterflies or ever whilst PB is at the centre of attention. In the latest Feltus quote friend it tries to encourage a new breed of easily led dupes that the published TS ‘code page?’ in Adelaide News’ afternoon edition was a mock-up published the day following Det. R.L. Leane’s having taken personal possession of it. Not so, News published their copy of said page on Saturday 23rd July, on the very same day which of itself was an uncommonly swift response to roundsman’s report from Angas St. HQ indeed. One way in which this might have been achieved, to which the accompanying editorial hints of is, that the unidentified finder contacted the editors first after reading ‘in search of a torn ROK copy’ on 22nd inst., prior to notifying police, not such an unrealistic course of events…..This take is hardly earth shattering news by any stretch, but folks with certain self serving agendi will plug away with their own contrary views; hoping if they repeat them regularly theirs will take hold and become Gospel..Heaven help the gullible in TSM fairy land.