There may have been more prolific serial killers than the murderer of prostitutes in Whitechapel in 1888, but few have captured the public imagination, not the same way. The ferocity of the crimes coupled with the mystery surrounding it only adds to the fascination. Much is known about the Jack the Ripper murders, but despite (or perhaps because of) the hundreds of books, movies and documentaries about him, there’s still a ton of misguided conjecture and just flat – out wrong information out there. Educate yourself on some true facts about Jack the Ripper.
It is generally accepted by Ripperologists (people who take a keen interest in the case) that there were 5 murders, known as the canonical five. However, by the time murder #1 occurred, the press already referred to this as “another” murder. Police were still considering murders in 1891 to be courtesy of Jack the Ripper. The murder of Francis Coles on February 13, 1891, was widely believed by the press and authorities to be his work. In all, the press attributed 11 murders to Jack the Ripper.
Polly Nichols met her end on August 31, 1888, and is the first canonical murder. There is a strong case for Polly being number two. Martha Tabrum (also known by her common - law name Turner), died August 6, at the hands of an unknown murderer. She received 39 stab wounds to her abdomen and neck, and her dress was raised, indicating either sexual intercourse or that the killer raised her dress to inflict the wounds (it was later determined there was no sexual intercourse). The similarities to the canonical five are apparent, most notably the attacks to the groin and upper pelvic region. Of the six non – canonical murders, Martha Tabrum has the best chance of being committed by Jack the Ripper.
All the women murdered were prostitutes, and all except for one ---- Elizabeth Stride ---- were horribly mutilated. Violence to prostitutes was not uncommon and there were many instances of women being brutalized, but the nature of these murders strongly suggests a single perpetrator.
All Jack the Ripper murders took place in a one square mile area of the East End and the City of London surrounding Whitechapel.
The “Double Event” Probably Wasn’t :
Of the canonical five, two murders occurred on the same night, dubbed “Double Event” by Ripperologists. The prevailing theory is that something interrupted Jack during his first murder of the evening, driving him to a more frenzied second attack. Certainly there is little doubt that Catherine Eddowes, the second of the women, was killed by Jack the Ripper.
The murder of Liz Stride, however, the first of the Double Event, is markedly different from the other canonical five. Stride fit the age of the victims, but everything else about the attack was quite different. Around 12:45am, Israel Schwartz witnessed a man pull a woman into the street and throw her to the ground. Schwartz ran after the attacker tossed a racial slur at him (“Lipski,” meaning Jew). Stride was dead 15 minutes later. Schwartz later identified her as the woman he saw thrown to the ground. This attack occurred 45 minutes before the murder of Catherine Eddowes.
There are a number of differences between Stride and the other canonical five. Stride was likely murdered from the front; she was facing her killer. The three prior (counting Tabrum) were struck from behind. The location seems quite different. Jack preferred very quiet, secluded places, yet Schwartz saw the attack first occur in the middle of the road. Her wounds were caused by a different knife to the one used to kill Eddowes 45 minutes later. Famous modern – day profiler, John Douglas, believes this is not significant, as of course Jack would have more than one knife.
Douglas strongly supports the Double Event theory. He reasons that two unrelated murders occurring in such close proximity on the same evening would be too much of a coincidence, and therefore that they were both committed by the same hand. So does John Douglas think that John Brown is Jack the Ripper?
Who is John Brown? Brown murdered his wife Sarah on the evening of September 29,1888. His deed occurred two hours and three miles from the Double Event. Yet you’ll never hear Brown mentioned as a suspect. And rightfully not ---- just because he committed murder on the same evening as two others doesn’t mean he committed all three. Location isn’t always a factor in murders. The only thing linking the Double Event is proximity.
The day after the murder, a citizen mob formed outside of Berner Street protesting the continuation of the murders and the seemingly slipshod work of the police to catch the Ripper. From here on in, the Ripper is public enemy number one, and Home Office begins to consider offering awards for his capture and arrest.
Eddowess’ cause of death was hemorrhage from the left common carotid artery. The death was immediate and the mutilation were inflicted after death. The wounds on the face and abdomen prove that they were inflicted by a sharp, pointed knife, and that in the abdomen by a knife six inches or longer.
The media and police received over 700 pieces of correspondence claiming to be from “Jack.” Two are considered credible by Ripperologists. The first letter to gain notoriety, the infamous “Dear Boss” letter addressed to he Central News Agency. The affixed signature “Jack the Ripper” gained notoriety when a threat in the letter to “ clip the ( next victim’s ) ears off” was carried out with the murder if Catherine Eddowes. The true author of there letter remains a mystery. Three prominent police officers stated that a newspaper man wrote the letter. A personal letter by John Littlechild, head of the Special Branch of the London Metropolitan Police, went further and actually named the newspaper who wrote it: “Bullen (real name Thomas Bulling). There is debate over whether the police truly knew the origin of the “Dear Boss” letter, but in 1888, the police thought it was a hoax.
George Lusk, President of the Whitechapel Vigilance Committee, received another noteworthy letter, claiming to be “From hell.” Included in the crudely written letter was half a kidney, which the author claimed came from a victim (Catherine Eddowes). A doctor stated that the kidney belonged to a woman, roughly 45 years of age, and suffering from alcoholism (in other words, Eddowes). However, that would have been virtually impossible to medically conclude at that time. It’s interesting that the letter went to someone hunting after the murderer, rather than someone covering the case, however, Lusk considered the letter to be a hoax. It remains possible that none of the Jack the Ripper correspondence was by the real killer.
“Dear Boss” was written in red ink. A few days later, a postcard arrived at the Agency smeared with blood. It appeared to be in the same handwriting as the letter and referred to a double murder that had happened the night before. At the time, the police thought the two items might be genuine. The hoax letters are now stored at the National Archives. Most are addressed from London, some are from other parts of Britain, and there are even letters from America and France.
One key document for Ripperologists is a 1891 letter from Sir Melville Macnaghten (Assistant Crime Commissioner) to the Sun Newspaper regarding the arrest of a Thomas Cutbush, for the crime of stabbing several women in the buttocks, and the Sun’s accusation that Cutbush was Jack the Ripper. Macnaghten pointed out that Cutbush had never killed anyone and listed three suspects who were better candidates for Jack:
“(1) A Mr. M. J. Druitt, said to be a doctor and of good family ---- who disappeared at the time of the Miller’s Court Murder, and whose body ( which was said to have been upwards of a month in the water) was found in the Thames on December 31st ---- or about seven weeks after that murder. He was sexually insane and from private information, I have little doubt but that his own family believed him to have been the murderer.
(2) Kosminski ---- a Polish Jew ---- and resident in Whitechapel. This man became insane owing to many years indulgence in solitary vices. He had a great hatred of women, especially of the prostitute class, and had strong homicidal tendencies: he was removed to a lunatic asylum about March 1889. There were many circumstances connected with this man which made him a strong ‘suspect’.
(3) Michael Ostrog, a Russian doctor, and a convict, who was subsequently detained in a lunatic asylum as a homicidal maniac. This man’s antecedents were of the worst possible type, and his whereabouts at the time of the murders could never be ascertained.”
It’s possible that Macnaghten intended the letter only to demonstrate how unlikely a suspect Cutbush was, not to identify any of the three men as legitimate “main suspects,” but rigorous Ripperologists cannot afford to make that assumption.
The fact that the murders soon stopped after Druitt’s suicide is suspicious, but pay slips found in his pockets indicate that his death was unrelated. It seems that he was fired from his teaching position days before the suicide, likely as a result of a homosexual scandal ---- That is the terrible trait that “sexually insane” refers to.
The third candidate, Michael Ostrog, was a con artist and petty thief. He had no ties to any of the victims or the crime scenes, and the crimes he did commit had grown less intense over his career, not more, and although he had had occasional violent outbursts, they were never planned or methodical. He is not considered a serious suspect.
That leaves Kominski. Although modern minds will find it hard to condemn a man on the basis of his “solitary vices” (masturbation), there are more legitimate indicators. Aspects of his childhood (witness to sexual brutality, absent father) fit the classic serial killer profile. Several witnesses said the killer looked Jewish, although his is suspect as anti-Semitism was rife at the time. The one witness who specifically identified Kominski was Jewish himself, however, although he refused to officially testify. And Kominski was interred in a lunatic asylum not long before the murders ceased. One theory goes that the police knew Kominski was the Ripper, but had him sent to the asylum rather than arrested, because they did not have the evidence to convict him, But if that was the case, why have no internal documents turned up to corroborate it? Nevertheless, Kominski must be considered a highly plausible candidate.
The Macnaghten Memorandum not only provided a possible answer, or answers, as to the identity of the unknown killer of 1888, it has also generated much heated debate and theorizing by students of the subject. Whether it provides the answer to the killer’s identity in the three named suspects, Druitt, Kominski and Ostrog, is a problem that will probably never be resolved. But, quite rightly, all three have been looked at as possible ‘Rippers.’
It is fair to say that Ostrog may be omitted from the list with relative safety, in view of his incarcerations subsequent to the murders, and his possible indisposition at the time of the murders. Indeed, it is hard to see why he is on the list in the first place.
Jack the Ripper might be the most famous southpaw killer, along with Billy the Kid. But of course you know that Billy was right – handed. Jack the Ripper probably was too. The principle identification of Jack the Ripper as a lefty comes from Dr. Rees Ralph Llewellyn. He carried out the post mortem of Polly Nichols, the first victim (or maybe second, depending on how you feel about this list). The specific passage is:
“. . . Her throat had been cut from left to right, two distinct cuts being on the left side, the windpipe, the gullet, and the spinal cord being cut through; a bruise apparently of a thumb being on the right lower jaw, also one on the left cheek, the abdomen had been cut open from the center of bottom of ribs along right side, under pelvis to left of stomach, there the wound was jagged; the omentum, or coating of the stomach, was also cut in several places, and two small stabs on the private parts; apparently done with a strong bladed knife; supposed to have been done by some left-handed person; death being almost instantaneous. “
Dr. Llewellyn‘s claim that the killer was left handed was based on bruising and the direction of the cuts (Left to right ---- it was thought at the time that Jack slit his victims throats from behind), but how closely were those observations made? According to the Times and The Telegraph (September 1, 1888) accounts state that the doctor “will make no actual post mortem until he receives the coroner’s orders.” In other words, Dr. Llewellyn decided the killer was left handed prior to carrying out the autopsy.
Lefties at that time were viewed with suspicion at best, and we’re often associated with the Devil. Early criminologist Cesare Lombroso claimed that left-handed people were three times more likely to commit a crime than their right-handed brethren.
Further studies of the crime scene demonstrated that Jack had strangled his victims front on, then lain them on the ground to mutilate them. This contradicted Llewellyn’s theory, and the doctor himself later retracted it, but the so – called “sinistral –-- theory” had already caught hold in the public imagination, and anti lefty prejudice made it hard to budge.
Whether or not these assertions are true is irrelevant. They were perceived to be true, and they help explain why the conception of the Ripper as left handed became so widely accepted. Dr. Llewellyn’s initial belief that Jack the Ripper was left-handed became absorbed into Ripper lore, a place which it has sustained long after subsequent doctors had disagreed, and Dr. Llewellyn himself had disagreed, and Dr. Llewellyn himself had retracted his initial statement.
Jack the Ripper didn’t just kill at random. Like modern serial millers, he had a “type.” Four of the five canonical victims were approximately the same age ---- late 30s to 40s. His highly specific method of killing is stated in the last entry. He struck on weekends or bank holidays (including Martha Tabrum). And obviously the reason he’s so well remembered ---- besides never being caught---- is the graphic nature of the wounds. If you throw out the Stride murder (either because she wasn’t killed by Jack or because he was interrupted during her murder), they all had some pelvic mutilation.
Catherine Eddowes and Liz Stride were the only murders to occur in what would be considered “late at night” ---- 1 am or so. The others occurred between 3 am and 6 am. That might seem late in modern times, but in the 1880s, that was just a bit before morning rush –hour. People on their way to work found canonical victim #1 Polly Nichols at 3:40 am. That would indicate Jack had employment.
The murders (apart from Stride’s) were in secluded places. Jack had a pretty good knowledge of Whitechapel. Catherine Eddowes was murdered between walking shifts of patrol officers, which indicates that he was either very lucky or paid attention to where police (and other people) would be in planning his crimes. All of these murders occurred on a weekend, or within one day of, and happened towards the end of the month, or within a week or so after.
One of the more well – known theories pins the Whitechapel murder on Dr. William Whitney Gull, Queen Victoria’s own doctor. It’s the story portrayed in the movie From Hell, based on the graphic novel by Alan Moore, itself based on Steven Knight’s book The Final Solution. The movie is actually pretty good, the graphic novel even better, and both are completely and hopelessly wrong when it comes to the case.
According g to Knight’s theory, the murders were part of a Masonic conspiracy that included a royal scandal, ritualistic murder, and a giant cover-up. Gull was first fingered as a suspect by several American newspapers in the 1890s, who had strong political motivations for maligning the British aristocracy. Gull’s advocacy for women’s involvement in medicine also made him a suspicious figure.
Born in 1816, Dr. Gull would have been 71 at the time of the Jack the Ripper murders (witnesses put the murderer in his 30s). He had a stroke 10 months before the murder of Polly Nichols, putting him in incredibly poor health. Further, the conspiracy relies on certain high – ranking individuals being Freemasons, when Masonic records show they definitely were not. Dr. Gull was most assuredly not Jack the Ripper.
The mutilations perpetrated on the victims involved careful removal of the uterus, kidneys and other organs, and this in fact has led many people to believe Jack the Ripper must have been a doctor. However, knowledge of the anatomy could be gained by the laymen by viewing public dissections of criminals, and there were other professions with anatomical knowledge as well ---- historian William Stewart claimed in 1939 that the killer might have been a woman, a “mad midwife,” or abortionist.
The Jill the Ripper theory is an interesting one, but many consider it to be extremely weak. Many cite the fact that too much emphasis is on the killer being blood – stained by the murders ----in fact, if the murderer strangled his victims as is commonly believed, the blood circulation would no longer be sufficient to cause large amounts of blood to be splattered during the mutilations. Also, many criticize this conclusion due to the fact that no victim other than Kelly, was known to be pregnant and, in fact, due to many if them being alcoholics, the possibility of them being pregnant is quite slim. One final note of interest ---- Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, creator of Sherlock Holmes, believed that Jack the Ripper disguised himself as a woman in order to avoid capture and become more readily accessible to other women.
Want to know who Jack the Ripper wasn’t? Prince Albert Victor. As grandson of Queen Victoria, his name comes up often as part of a vast conspiracy of Sadism and privilege, reaching all the way to the crown itself. The allegation that a Prince was killing paupers was first claimed in a 1962 book but it probably started a bit earlier. While it makes a good story, it’s simply not possible: the Prince was nowhere near London when the murders occurred.
London had a population of around four million at that time, meaning there were thousands of people with no alibi who could in theory, be the Ripper. So it’s suspicious that so many writers are convinced it had to be a celebrity, and in particular accuse the who it would be especially shocking if they turned out to be murderers, like members of the royal family, or children’s book authors.
Richard Wallace claimed, in a 1996 book, that Lewis Carroll not only liked prostitutes in the East End, but hid clues to it throughout Alice in Wonderland. Those “clues” involve rearranging the letters of random passages from the book into brutal descriptions of prostitute murder. The problem is that you can do that with almost any book at all ---- especially if you were willing to switch out letters that didn’t fit, as Wallace did. That is literally his only piece of evidence against Carroll, and even that doesn’t hold up. Since Carroll was such a clever and creative wordsmith that if he wanted to insert playful murder –clues into his books, he could have come up with something a lot better than the ones Wallace suggests.
Carroll was just one of the many, many men in the same city at the same time as the murders happened. Keep that in mind when you hear any other famous name associated with the Whitechapel murders, such as Winston Churchill‘s father (also alleged to be part of a Masonic conspiracy) or the Elephant Man.
All of the multiplicity of theories that abound as to the identity of the killer and the many films, documentaries and TV programs that portray an unending search for the ‘truth’ are nothing more than elaborate smokescreens, born from the deliberate confusion engendered by the Elite to protect the guilty, as is their usual modus operandi. This is another tiny example of how easy it is for the psychopaths to provide us with a completed distorted view of both the past and our existing reality.
The common notion that Jack the Ripper killed silently and departed without a trace is a myth. Specifically, he left clues to his identity and location when he killed Catherine Eddowes. Joseph Lawende was walking along with two others around 1:35 am on the night of her murder. He saw a man with a woman he identified as Eddowes (from her clothing ), and later described him to The Times as “of shabby appearance about 30 years of age and 5 ft 9 in in height, of fair complexion, having a small fair mustache, and wearing a red neckerchief and a cap with a peak.” Eddowes was dead 10 minutes after she was spotted with the man. Witnesses to the other murders confirm most details of this description, although usually have him wearing more genteel clothing.
Almost 90 minutes after Eddowes’ murder, Police Constable Alfred Long discovered a bloody piece of her apron, very close to some graffiti. It read: “The Juws are the men that will not be blamed for nothing.” It was quickly removed by police for fear it would incite a riot. It is much debated whether Jack the Ripper was an anti-Semitic, or whether he was Jewish and wrote it to point the police in the wrong direction, or if someone else wrote it to capitalize on the murder.
The more useful clue is the location of the apron. Eddowes’ murder occurred southwest of Whitechapel. Technically, it was in London, not Whitechapel. Jack the Ripper traveled back toward the heart of Whitechapel. Jack the Ripper resided in Whitechapel, not London proper.
On route from Mitre Square to Goulston Street, the apron was used, quite possibly, by the Ripper to clean his hands and / or knife from the carnage dealt to Mrs. Eddowes. Considering the time from the murder to the discovery of the apron piece, is it stretching the imagination to say, at least, that a rat, a dog, or even the wind could have blown the rag to that precise location? The Ripper could have dropped it anywhere, but he didn’t, did he? Even the notion the Ripper tore off the apron piece to serve in a hygienic capacity is speculation. The only thing we know, after all, that the apron piece was found underneath a freshly written graffiti, and that the Ripper was the last human being to have had his hands on that apron piece. Which route he took is open to speculation; what is not speculation is that he had time to drop the apron and write the message.
Amateur sleuths have advanced the Jack the Ripper case to the point where it seems plausible that the case will be solved. Yes, really. Many records were destroyed during the London Blitz, but others were only lost and still being rediscovered.
For example, in 1993, a letter by the aforementioned John Littlechild was discovered revealing an entirely new suspect : Francis Tumblety. Tumblety was a quack American doctor in Whitechapel at the time of the murders, and to learn that he was considered as a suspect by police is explosive information for Ripperoogists. Further research turned up a contemporary of Tumblety, Colonel Dunham, who said the doctor had jars and jars of uterus specimens, and that, when asked why no women had been invited to dinner, “his face turned as black as a thundercloud, “ he replied “No, Colonel, I don’t know any such cattle, and if I did I would, as your friend, sooner give you a dose of quick poison than take you into such danger” and that he then “fiercely denounced all women and especially fallen women.”
Historical census data is now available online, and is easily cross – referencable in a way that simply wasn’t possible in 1888. This has brought to light facts that, had they been available at the time, would have interested Scotland Yard very much indeed.
Charles Cross was the first person to find the body of canonical victim #1, Polly Nichols. In fact, he was found with the victim, by a second witness. Cross lived within a few minutes of the crime scene, but as this was the first murder, no one found this particularly suspicious. They should have. Modern researchers have since established that two of the other canonical victims were killed on the route between his home and work. Polly Nichols was not as badly mutilated as some of the later victims, and while serial killers often do escalate in intensity, it could also have suggested that the killer was interrupted ---- making Cross an even more likely suspect.
As of now we don’t have he information to determine whether either of those individuals was Jack the Ripper, but it was modern research by amateur sleuths that discovered inconsistencies in their testimonies, and that of some other suspicious “witnesses.” Many important documents or clues were seized as souvenirs at the time of the murders and later by Ripperologists. When these documents come to light over the coming years, we may finally be able to solve the biggest murder mystery of the last 200 years.
The murders were opportunistic. Most were quickly done in public places and victims were discarded where they were killed. From the murderer’s point of view these crimes were possibly unsatisfying. The possibility that the murder was a local person was taken seriously.
The Jack the Ripper killings remain a great unsolved mystery. Little is known except that between the months of August and November 1888, six prostitutes were found horribly murdered within a one square mile radius of London East End. The frequency of the attacks caused terror in the district. It exposed the powerlessness of the police force. In the days before forensic science there were few clues for the police to chase up. Several men were arrested, but all were released without charge. The killer was never caught.
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