Jack the Ripper
By Richard Jones
At around 3.40am on August 31st 1888, a
carter named Charles Cross was making his way along Bucks Row
Whitechapel, when he noticed a bundle lying in a gateway. Presuming it
to be a tarpaulin, and thinking that it might prove useful, he went to
examine it and discovered, instead, that it was the body of a woman.
Within moments another carter, Robert Paul, had arrived on the scene and
the two decided that the wisest course of action would be to find a
policeman. Following a brief search of the neighbourhood, they managed
to find three officers and brought them to the site, where one officer,
Constable Neil, shone his lantern onto the body and the five men saw, to
their horror and disgust, that the woman’s throat had been cut back to
her spine.
The woman was Mary Ann Nicholls, a forty
- three - year - old prostitute, who had been ejected from her lodging
house just two hours earlier, because she didn’t have the money to pay
her rent. “I’ll soon get my doss money” , she had confidently
predicted, “See what a jolly bonnet I’ve got..” That bonnet now
lay trampled and bloodstained in a Whitechapel gateway. It was observed
also that her skirt had been pulled up around her waist. But what no-
one noticed, until later that day, was that beneath her blood soaked
clothing, a deep gash ran along her stomach- she had been disembowelled.
Jack the Ripper’s reign of terror had begun.
In the week that followed the murder, the
press began to publish lurid and sensational stories. They had wrongly
blamed two earlier killings, that of Emma Smith on 3rd April 1888 and of
Martha Tabram (or Turner as she was also known) on the 6th August 1888
on the murderer of Mary Nicholls. They had even come up with a possible
suspect in the form of a man whom the local prostitutes had nicknamed
“Leather Apron” and whom, they were claiming, had been making
violent threats toward them, including that he was going to “rip them
up”. Unfortunately they didn’t know his name, couldn’t provide an
address and the only description they could give was that he habitually
wore a leather apron and that he sometimes wore a deerstalker cap.
Just such a man was seen at 5.30am on 8th
September 1888, talking to prostitute Annie Chapman, in Hanbury Street.
At around 6am market porter, John Davis, went into his backyard at 29
Hanbury Street and discovered “dark Annie’s” mutilated body. Her
dress had been pulled up around her knees, exposing her striped
stockings. A deep cut had slashed across her throat; her intestines had
been tugged out and laid across her shoulder. Missing from the body were
the uterus and part of the bladder. The contents of her pocket were
found lying in a neat pile near to the body. The brass rings that she
had been wearing at the time of her murder, had evidently been torn from
her fingers and were never discovered. And, just a few feet away from
the body, there lay a folded and wet leather apron.
Since the leather apron was the standard
garment worn by a wide range of Jewish workers from butchers to tailors,
the finding of just such a garment in the backyard of 29 Hanbury Street,
coupled with the frenzy that was being created by the press, caused the
neighbourhood to erupt into anti - Semitism. Innocent Jews were attacked
by angry mobs claiming that no Englishman was capable of committing such
murders. The media frenzy would come to an end on the 10th September,
when Sergeant William Thick went round to 22 Mulberry Street, and
arrested thirty - six - year old John Pizer maintaining that he was
“Leather Apron”. Pizer, however had cast iron alibi’s for the
nights of both murders and was quickly eliminated from the enquiry.
In the streets of Whitechapel and
Spitalfields, the intensification of police activity had seen a dramatic
downturn in the crime rate. There were newspaper reports that “ a
dreadful quiet has descended onto the East End of London”, and by the
end of September people began to wonder if the murders had come to an
end. With the last day of September just two hours old the “beast of
Whitechapel” had proved them horrifyingly wrong by murdering twice in
less than an hour.
At around 1am on 30th September 1888,
hawker Louis Diemshutz, returned to Berners Street, having spent the day
hawking cheap jewellery at Crystal Palace. As he turned his pony and
cart into the yard of the Jewish Socialist Club at number 30 Berners
Street, the pony suddenly reared in alarm and pulled to the left.
Looking around to find what had distressed the animal, he saw what
appeared to be a pile of clothes lying on the ground. He poked at them
with his whip and then lit a match. The flame flickered for a brief
moment before being extinguished by the breeze. But in that brief
seconds light Diemshutz saw it was the body of a woman, and he ran for
the police.
The woman’s name was Elizabeth Stride
(sometimes known as “Long Liz Stride”) and her throat had been
slashed. But the fact there were no mutilations to the body led the
police to conclude that the murderer had been interrupted as he went
about his bloody business. Is it possible that, as he stooped over his
victim , the cart entering the yard had disturbed him, causing him to
move back quickly into the shadows? Perhaps it was this sudden movement
that had startled the pony? And, with Diemschutz distracted by his
grisly find, the killer had slipped quickly and quietly away, as the
news of another murder and the ensuing frenzied excitement, helped cover
his escape.
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At around 8.30pm the previous evening PC
Louis Robinson of the City Police had arrested forty - six - year - old,
Catharine Eddowes on Aldgate High Street and charged her with being
drunk and disorderly. She was taken to Bishopsgate police station,
placed in a cell and left to sober up. As Elizabeth Stride was meeting
her murderer, Catharine was heard singing and was deemed sober enough
for immediate release. Leaving the station at around 1am, she turned to
the desk sergeant and spoke her last recorded words “Cheerio me old
cock” she called, and stepped out into the early morning. At
approximately 1.35pm three Jewish men were leaving the Imperial Club at
16 - 17 Duke Street. They noticed a man and a woman talking with one
another at the corner of Church Passage. One of the three, Joseph
Lawende, would later give the police a detailed description of this
mystery man and maintain that the woman whom he saw was definitely
Catharine Eddowes.
At 1.45am PC Watkins walked his usual
beat into Mitre square and, by the light of his bull’s - eye lamp,
discovered her mutilated body. He would later state “I have been in
the force for a long while but I never saw such a sight. The body had
been ripped open, like a pig in the market.” If the killer had been
denied his satisfaction of mutilating the body of Elizabeth Stride, his
appetite had been more than sated on the unfortunate Catharine Eddowes.
Her body lay on its back, head turned
toward the left shoulder. The throat had been cut back to the spine; the
lobe of the right ear was cut through; a V had been cut into her cheeks
and eyelids; the tip of the nose was detached; her abdomen had been laid
open; the intestines tugged out and laid over her shoulder, while
missing from the body were the uterus and left kidney. The murderer had
then left the scene and headed off into the Streets of Spitalfields. We
know this because, on this one night, the beast of Whitechapel would
leave behind him a tantalising clue.
Let us put his escape that morning into
context. There had been an earlier murder in Berners Street. Word was
spreading throughout the neighbourhood that the beast had struck again.
All the police activity now centred on flushing him out and hunting him
down. Yet, having murdered Catharine Eddowes, he did not escape to the
relative safety that he might find West of the district, but instead,
went straight into the area where the activity was directed toward his
apprehension. He could have only escaped if, as he went through the
neighbourhood, he fitted in. In other words he was not thought
suspicious, or out of place, by those who may have seen him.
In Goulston Street there still stands a
sturdy building that in 1888 provided accommodation for Jewish traders
who dealt in second - hand clothes on Petticoat lane or traded shoes at
the footwear market on Wentworth Street. Known as The “Wentworth Model
Dwellings”, it was here in a doorway, at 2.45am , that PC Alfred Long
discovered a section of Catherine Eddowes apron. There were bloody
finger marks on it and it was evident that the blade of a bloodied knife
had been wiped clean upon it. This clue, tells us exactly where the
murderer was heading, and confirms the theory that he was an East -
Ender living in the area. But the doorway also contained a much more
famous and, subsequently promoted, none clue. For, scrawled in chalk on
the wall above the apron, was the message “The Juwes are the men That
Will be blamed for nothing” (although several observers remembered
slightly different wording to the Graffito). Sir Charles Warren, the
metropolitan police commissioner, fearful of a resurgence of the anti -
Semitism that had swept the neighbourhood in the wake of the “Leather
Apron” scare, ordered that the message be rubbed out, and it was duly
erased at 5.30am before a photograph could be taken of it.
On the 1st October 1888 the Daily News
published a letter which had been received by the head of the Central
News Agency on 27th September. It read:
Dear Boss
I keep on hearing the police have caught me but they wont fix me just
yet. I have laughed when they look so clever and talk about being on the
right track. That joke about Leather Apron gave me real fits. I am down
on whores and I shant quit ripping them till I do get buckled. Grand
work the last job was. I gave the lady no time to squeal. How can they
catch me now. I love my work and want to start again. You will soon hear
of me with my funny little games. I saved some of the proper red stuff
in a ginger beer bottle over the last job to write with but it went
thick like glue and I cant use it. Red ink is fit enough I hope ha ha.
The next job I do I shall clip the ladies ears off and send to the
police officers just for jolly wouldn't you. Keep this letter back till I
do a bit more work, then give it out straight. My knife’s so nice and
sharp I want to get to work right away if I get a chance.
Good luck.
Yours Truly
Jack the Ripper
Don't mind me giving the trade name wasn't good enough to post this
before I got all the red ink off my hands curse it. No luck yet. They
say I’m a doctor now ha ha.
With the publication of this letter, the
murderer was given the name that would launch him into legend. A name
that would become so well known the world over that the very mention of
it, even to those who have little knowledge of the actual murders, could
summon up vivid images of gaslit, foggy streets and of an unknown terror
stalking the night shadows on a murderous and chilling quest. The legend
of Jack the Ripper was born.
On the 16th October 1888 Mr George Lusk,
president of the Whitechapel Vigilance Committee sat down to his dinner
table. A small cardboard box about three inches square, was delivered in
the evening mail. Opening the package he discovered a letter addressed
“From Hell” and wrapped inside it, half a human kidney. The letter
read:-
Mr Lusk
Sor
I send you half the Kidne I took from one women prasarved it for you
tother piece I fried and ate it was very nise I may send you the bloody
knif that took it out if you only wate a whil longer signed Catch me
when you can Mishster Lusk
But did either letter actually come from
the murderer? The “Jack the Ripper” letter certainly did not. Indeed
several of the senior Police officers maintained that the letter was the
work of an “enterprising London journalist” with one adding that the
journalists identity was “known to senior Scotland Yard detectives”.
And the Kidney, according to the City pathologist Dr Sedgewick Saunders
was unlikely, as had, and has, been claimed, to be the one removed from
Catharine Eddowes. Indeed he declared that the fact the Kidney was
sodden in alcohol suggested that the Kidney had come from a hospital
dissecting room, where it would obviously have been preserved in Spirits
of alcohol.
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In the aftermath of the “Double
Event” police activity intensified throughout early October. The
“Jack the Ripper” correspondence had led to great media speculation.
The East End was in the grip of panic coupled with a grim curiosity that
saw morbid crowds gathering at the murder sites to speculate on the
killer’s identity and motives. As the Star of the East informed its
readers:
"The district of Whitechapel and
Aldgate is.. in a state of ferment and panic. All night long there have
been people in the streets, standing round coffee stalls and at other
points.....talking of the .latest horrors, and even the men seemed to be
in a state of terror. Extra police have patrolled the streets.. and the
police authorities... have come to the conclusion that publicity is the
greatest aid to the detection of the perpetrator.. and all information
is cheerfully imparted to the Press.”
Despite lurid rumours and several scares,
the intensification of police activity appears to have deterred the
“Ripper” and October passed with no further murders, although the
atmosphere remained tense.
And thus, November 1888 was ushered in on
a wave of panic and terror that held the Streets of the East End in a
steely grip. At 2am on the 9th November George Hutchinson met twenty -
five- year - old Mary Kelly on Commercial Street. She cheerfully asked
him for sixpence, to which Hutchinson replied that even this amount was
beyond his modest means.
She laughed, told him she’d “just
have to find it some other way” and continued to the junction with
Thrawl Street, where she met with another man. Hutchinson saw the two
chat a little, then watched as Mary led the man into Dorset Street,
where they entered her room in Miller’s Court. Forty five minutes
later neither had emerged from the room and Hutchinson left the scene.
Shortly before 4am several of Mary’s neighbours were woken by a cry of
“Murder!” but all chose to ignore it. At 10.45am when Thomas Bowyer
called to collect her overdue rent and discovered her body. She lay upon
her bed, her head turned to the left. The whole of the surfaces of the
abdomen and thighs had been removed and the abdominal cavity emptied.
The breasts had been cut off, the arms mutilated by several jagged
wounds and the face hacked beyond recognition. The uterus and the
kidneys, together with one breast, were found beneath her head. The
other breast lay by her right foot. The liver had been placed between
her legs, and the spleen by the left side of the body. The murderer had
left the tiny room in Miller’s Court and disappeared into the early
morning. What no -one gazing upon the body of poor, unfortunate Mary
Kelly could have realised was that, in the blood-bath of Millers Court,
the Ripper’s reign of terror would end as suddenly and mysteriously as
it had begun. As he left the bloody scene in that tiny room that
morning, the Whitechapel Murderer may have performed his swansong, but
the legend of Jack the Ripper was only just beginning.
__________________________
Richard Jones is an internationally
published author whose websites can be viewed at http://www.Jack-the-Ripper-Walk.co.uk
London
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