Talk:British royalty and urban legends

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[edit] Problems

Just saw this page... I have a few concerns that I will take care of at some point but I thought I'd give a heads up first.

First one is it seems like the entire Jack the Ripper section is basically a fork file of the Jack the Ripper royal conspiracy theories article. I can't see duplicating discussion of the same information in such depth in two different places, especially as the information doesn't seem to match. It seems to me that the section here should be brought down to a summary and with a link to the appropriate section on the other article.

Also, as a general rule, "urban myths" is not an accurate term. They are urban legends. Myths, when used in a folkloric sense (as the term "urban legends" is intended to, means supernatural tales of gods and creation and so forth, which is lacking in this article. The name should be fixed to read legends, with all references in it being changed to either legend or a more accurate word (rumour, tale, whatever).

Also, Jack the Ripper should not be italicized, not sure where the idea to do otherwise came from. There are other words that also seem to be italicized for no apparent reason.

Also... there are a number of claims in the section that are not sourced and appear to be inaccurate:

• "elegantly attired gentleman, completely out of place in the East End of London, was seen chatting to a prostitute on the night of two of the most notorious murders, those of Elizabeth Stride and Catherine Eddowes,"

What elegantly attired gentleman? Are you thinking of George Hutnchinson's witness testimony? If so that was another night completely, more than a month later.

• "Nor did he have the medical skills evidenced in the work of Jack the Ripper."

Sorry, but whether medical skills were actually evidenced in the murders is a matter of much debate, with many sources, then and now, claiming exactly the opposite.

• "by the supposed royal psychopathic killer?"

Psychopathic has a precise meaning. We don't know that the killer was psychopathic. In fact, if the story about the Prince were true (as that's the context we are discussing it in), psychopath would be an inaccurate term.

• "Alice Margaret's father, who was not named on the birth certificate, was later revealed by her in adulthood to have been her own grandfather, so the silence on her parentage was due to a desire on behalf of her family to conceal incest rather than because the Duke of Clarence was her father. "

Uhhhh... no, the incest part was never proven. In fact, as far as I know, the only person who claimed this was a fiction author trying to tell a more interesting story (see From Hell). That's quite a claim. If you have a reputable non-fiction book that makes that claim we should source it, but I really think that's got to go.

• "Jullien did make clear that had been widespread during the lifetime of King Edward VII. "

"did make clear" presumes that it is true. This is currently a claim with no known supporting evidence.

• "The claims that Alice Margaret Crook was the daughter of the Duke of Clarence, and that her mother Anne Crook, was his secret wife, is sometimes thought to owe its origins to a rumour possibly put around by her family at the time that the father of her illegitimate child was a royal personage, so distracting local community attention from the more sordid truth; the existence of an incestuous relationship between Anne Crook and her father and the fact that it, and not some mysterious 'must be kept secret' marriage, led to the birth of Alice Margaret."

As above, who thought this? What? And, heck, as long as you are bringing up the story about Crook supposedly being Catholic and a threat to the throne, you ought to mention that records show she was actually Church of England and not Catholic at all.

Now, I can obviously go in and fix a lot of this myself, and some other things that I didn't mention, but considering the name of the article is wrong and there's a question about where all this Ripper info should be located, I thouht I'd post before jumping in to make changes. I also think that this whole article may be better split off into separate articles discussing each major legend/rumour (not myth) instead of trying to cram them all into one. DreamGuy 01:02, August 8, 2005 (UTC)

Since nobody has responded in a timely manner I have fixed the errors as best I could on a once through. DreamGuy 13:45, August 21, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] merge

Is there still a merge question here? It seems that the article are sufficiently different to removed the merge tag? Kerowyn 09:30, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

The merge tag is regularly removed for that reason. Unfortunately the merge tag is DreamGuy's "pet" and whenever it is removed he goes ballistic, accuses users of censorship, and reinserts it with a stream of abuse. If anyone else sees that damn tag in again, please remove it. DreamGuy has had his game-playing for long enough. FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 18:19, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Albert, the Prince Consort, was illegitimate

According to this page his parents divorced because of his mother's adultery, but according to the articles on his mom and dad it was his father who was cheating. Does anyone know which is true? Tocharianne 03:26, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

The allegation that Albert was illegitimate, is by necessity based on an allegation that his mother was unfaithful. That however is urban legend, rumour, as indicated by the article. I have not seen any convincing citations that she actually had extramarital relations before her divorce. In most places, the reason of divorce is said to been Ernest's continuous cheatings and the consequent incompatibility (whatever were its symptoms). Maed 12:13, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

I should have phrased that better. Regardless of any rumors about his mother, it is a fact that his parents were divorced. The article currently states as a fact that the divorce was because of his mother, but the rumor is that the man she was cheating with was a Jewish manservant. It currently isn't written to imply that part of the rumor was the claim that the divorce was because of his mother's adultery. (Confused yet?)

Ultimately I guess my question is "What exactly was the rumor?"

1. Was it: Albert's mother had an affair with a manservant at the time of Albert's conception.
2. Or was it: Albert's parents divorced because of his mother's infidelity.
3. Or was it both?

If only the 1st point is the rumor the section needs to be rewritten to make that clear. (Note also that the article on Albert himself also claims that divorce was because of his mother's adultery--I'm going to change that there.) Tocharianne 14:34, 28 December 2006 (UTC)