Tales of Sin and Madness

by Brett McBean

  “Numerous times I’ve been woken by the sound of a woman’s screams,” said Spedding. “First I thought it was coming from another house, but after a while, I realised it was coming from next door. It was always at the same time – shortly after 2am – and always the same scream – twice, short and sharp, unmistakably that of a lady’s.”

  “Oh I’ve heard crying from inside that awful house,” Mrs. Fiddymont admitted. “Usually around 2am, and the only word I can understand is ‘mother’.” Does she think it’s the ghost of Fred Deeming? “I’m sure of it,” Mrs. Fiddymont said with a firm nod. “I used to hear that man crying on occasion, and it sounded just the same.”

  And what of the sounds of digging? Well, according to both Mrs. Fiddymont and Mr. Spedding, a couple of times they have heard such sounds coming from inside no. 57, whenever they were in their outhouses in the middle of the night.

  I tell these stories to Mr. Stamford, but he just looks at me, shrugs his shoulders, and then takes me into the bedroom where Deeming buried his wife.

  The moment I enter the room, I’m hit with a feeling of dread. It’s like something is trying to draw the air from my lungs. My breathing becomes laboured. And though it’s been six months since the body of Emily Williams was discovered under the hearthstone, though the room has been thoroughly cleaned, I can still smell a sickening sour smell in the air, like rotten apples mixed with decayed meat.

  I ask Mr. Stamford whether he smells the horrid stench, and he simply remarks that he does smell a faint hint of death, but that it’s probably the stink still entrenched in his nose.

  Trying to put the smell and the sense of dread to one side, I look around the room. It’s a medium-sized room, with one large window opposite the door and a wardrobe over in one corner. Next to the wardrobe is the fireplace. Built into the brick wall, the fireplace is currently a black, empty cavity – no remnants of a fire, recent or otherwise, remain. Mr. Stamford leads me across the deserted bedroom, to the area in front of the fireplace.

  There is no evidence – aside from the smell – that a body was ever buried beneath the hearthstone. No evidence that the floor was ripped up to dig the putrefying corpse from its shallow grave. The area around the fireplace looks like any normal hearthstone.

  While crouched by the hearthstone, I begin to hear what sounds like scratching from beneath the floor. At first I think it might be a rat, but the sound is too deliberate; it sounds like fingernails scraping against wood.

  With a gasp I straighten and turn to Mr. Stamford, who is looking at me with a baffled expression. I tell him what I hear, but he says he can’t hear a thing.

  I listen again; the sound has stopped.

  With the stench of death getting stronger, finding it increasingly difficult to breathe, I leave the room. Out in the hallway, my head starts to clear and my breathing returns to normal.

  The entire house has a disturbed presence within its banal walls; but that room has evil in its heart. As I leave the house and step out into the foggy afternoon, I know I never want to enter that room again. A horrible crime may have been committed inside nine months ago, but something unholy still resides there.

  Whether it’s the ghost of Mad Fred Deeming, or simply some residual energy left behind, I’ll let the reader decide. Some people, such as Mrs. Fiddymont and Mr. Spedding, claim there are most certainly ghosts inhabiting the house; others, such as Mr. Stamford say there’s nothing out of the ordinary happening – other than the horrible memories of a ghoulish crime.

  Another person who thinks it ludicrous that Deeming’s spirit is haunting the streets of Melbourne is Walter Smith, the hangman at Melbourne Gaol.

  “I put the noose around his neck myself and then watched as he dropped through the hatch, his neck snapping as quick and clean as you like. There ain’t no way his spirit is up and walking around after that. Also, it just don’t make sense that Deeming’s spirit is restless and wandering around cutting up prostitutes. I know what he done was horrible, but he must’ve been a religious man, because when the Sheriff asked him if he had any last words before the lever was thrown, you know what he said? ‘Lord receive my spirit’. And the Lord don’t refuse a man such a request, no matter what he done wrong here on Earth. So Deeming’s spirit has to be in heaven, not trapped down here, causing more pain and terror. You know what I reckon? Now I don’t mean no disrespect, but I reckon some newspaper man is behind the murders, doing it to drum up business. They say it was a newsman who wrote that Dear Boss letter and come up with the name Jack the Ripper, not the killer, in order to sell more papers. That’s what these recent murders smell like to me – a way to sell more papers.”

  In the final part of this special report, we’ll take a look at the recent prostitute murders, where they were killed, and the similarities to two of the Ripper murders four years ago. We’ll also hear the startling revelations from a Melbourne Gaol doctor as well as a prison inmate of Deeming's, revelations which are bound to make you think twice about whether it’s the work of a copycat killer, or something otherworldly.

  THE ARGUS, THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 15, 1892

  MAD FRED PART 3

  —♦—

  LITTLE LON – THE SCENE OF THE LATEST PROSTITUTE MURDERS

  —

  WAS DEEMING JACK THE RIPPER? STARTLING REVELATIONS

  —

  THE MADMAN OF MELBOURNE: COPYCAT KILLER OR GHOST?

  The area known as Little Lon is well-known for its vice and crime. A dirty, cramped collection of weatherboard cottages and brick buildings, it’s a dark, smelly enclave full of prostitution, opium dens and the roughest pubs in Melbourne. This small slum area on the fringes of Melbourne city is a far cry from the theatres and boutiques of Collins Street. While it’s not quite the desperate slums of London’s East End, where thousands of sad and poverty-stricken men, women and children live in absolute squalor, Little Lon still isn’t a place any respectable person would want to travel through after dark. There are respectable families living in shacks amidst the choking stench of rotting refuse and industry, but they are outnumbered by the drunk and drug-addled denizens who crawl out after dark and while away the nights in a haze of immorality.

  Here you’ll find the many brothels owned by Caroline Hodgson, better known as Madame Brussels. Mostly two-story weatherboard terraces and large brick houses, these brothels seem to be everywhere on Lonsdale Street. You’ll also find a scattering of pubs, such as The Duke on Little Lonsdale, where the roughest types swill beer and gin till the early hours. Away from the meagre lighting of the main streets lie dark laneways, where vice and the unmistakable stink of opium chokes the rotten air.

  It was down one of these grim alleyways where the first prostitute was found murdered, in the early hours of August 31st. 42-year-old Emma Doyle, originally from Ireland, was found with her throat cut and her abdomen sliced open, her innards protruding slightly from the wound. Doyle, a known prostitute, had last been seen strolling east down Little Lonsdale Street, alone, at around 2am. At just after half-past three, a man coming home from work found her body lying on the bluestone outside his tiny brick cottage in Castletown Place, a dark, narrow alley running off Little Lonsdale.

  The time and date of the murder, as well as the injuries, were all consistent with that of Jack the Ripper’s third victim, Mary Ann Nichols, whose mutilated body was found in Buck’s Row, Whitechapel.

  Standing outside the row of six red-brick cottages in Castletown Place, I get a sense of déjà vu. The area eerily resembles the photos of Buck’s Row from the Whitechapel murders of four years ago; it’s almost like I’ve stepped back in time and place. Shining my bull’s-eye lantern on the ground outside the brick cottage, I can still see traces of blood on the cobblestone and in the gutter. I can almost see the mad killer crouched by the body, first slicing the poor woman’s neck, and then going to work on her stomach. Just like the Ripper slayings, nobody saw or heard anything, even though half a dozen families live in the string of cottages where the woman
was murdered.

  It’s just past 10 o’clock in the evening, the fog thick and the smell of rotting waste strong and putrid, but speaking with some of the locals, it’s clear that Little Lon stays open all night. According to one local man, who drinks regularly at the Black Eagle Hotel on Lonsdale Street, this small district flows with people all night. There’s no difference between 10 o’clock and 3 o’clock. A street walker I came across agreed – there are people everywhere, all the time, coming and going. And yet, with the murder of Doyle, nobody saw or heard a thing.

  It’s true, Castletown Place is an especially dark alley, with only one gas lamp not quite half-way down, leaving most of the alley cast in darkness. Still, standing here on a chilly spring night, I see people walking by constantly along Little Lonsdale. Not ten minutes go by before someone walks by me in the alley – either leaving for work, coming home from work, or using the alley for solicitous purposes. It’s hard to imagine how a person could kill and slice open a woman and not be caught red-handed.

  But, that’s just what happened in Castletown Place.

  And also what happened just last week, the second Melbourne prostitute murder.

  Less than a mile from Castletown Place, to the north of Little Lonsdale, is another alley, buried among the cramped housing and filth of the squalid city block.

  Cumberland Place is the long middle street within a grid of six other streets. It’s one of the wider alleyways in Little Lon, and in it resides families from Ireland, China and Eastern Europe. Bare-footed children run and shriek and laugh down the sloping alley, as dirty as the street itself. Horse manure sits in piles next to scraps of rubbish. Lines of clothing streak the back and even front yards and most of the cottages, while kept neat by the residents, are still flimsy-looking shacks that seem ready to tumble at the slightest breath of wind.

  Standing on the corner of Cumberland and McCormack Place, the morning chill having given way to a bright, uncharacteristically warm September day, I wonder how the killer ended up here, deep within the warren that is Little Lon. The nearest brothel is a few streets away, and though there are pubs in the vicinity, they’re not as notorious as the ones found on the main thoroughfares, such as Lonsdale Street. Yet, sometime in the early hours of the 8th of this month, a woman was brutally slaughtered in the backyard of the corner house on Cumberland Place. Like the murder a week prior, and like those in Whitechapel, no one heard or saw a thing – even though a family of five were sleeping inside the house.

  I’m shown into the backyard by one of the residents of the green weatherboard cottage, a lady by the name of Joyce Snell. The yard is entered from the street by a side door, one that, according to Mrs. Snell, is never locked. “Nobody locks their doors in this neighbourhood,” she said. “We all know one another, people are always coming and going, day and night. You don’t need a key to get into the backyard; anyone can open the door and step in.”

  The yard itself, like many in the area, is small and, aside from the toilet in the far corner and a table along one wall, sparsely populated. A path of cobbled bluestone leads from the back door steps to the small outhouse. Mrs. Snell shows me the spot where the woman was killed.

  “My eldest son found the body,” Mrs. Snell said, her voice shaking; she is clearly still in shock. “He was outside at around 6am, when he spotted something on the ground by the back wall.”

  Mrs. Snell points to the section of broken concrete near the stone wall that backs onto Providence Place, a narrow alley running parallel to Cumberland. There are still smudges of reddish-brown on the wall, between the cracks. “He first thought it was a pile of rubbish someone had dumped in our yard, or maybe one of the local men lying drunk. He went over to investigate and by the light of his candle, saw the body of the woman. She was all cut open.”

  46-year-old Tess Haynes, another known prostitute, was found with her head nearly severed from her body and her stomach sliced open. Her insides had been removed from her body and laid over her right shoulder. Some organs were gone entirely.

  “It was the most horrid sight I have ever seen, and will not likely forget it till my dying day. I see that poor woman with her belly lying open and her guts spilling out every time I close my eyes.”

  So neither she, nor any members of her family heard anything? A struggle, a cry for help?

  “No,” said Mrs. Snell heavily. “We’re all light sleepers, and yet no one heard a thing. And it must’ve happened not long before Johnny got up to go to the outhouse – my husband was out in the backyard around five, and he never noticed a thing out of the ordinary. I’m sure he would’ve seen the body lying by the wall if it had been there.”

  According to Mrs. Snell, the backyard is often used by prostitutes to conduct their business. A lot of the backyards in the area are known sex-hangouts, places to give prostitutes and their clients some privacy, somewhere out of direct view from the coppers.

  “We’ve had to shoo away many couples copulating in our yard,” Mrs. Snell said. “It’s not uncommon to come outside in the dead of night and find a man and woman involved in salacious acts. Sometimes the yard is used by drunks either too frightened or too full to go home for the night. So, they stumble into the nearest yard and curl up.”

  Will she and her family be locking the yard door from now on?

  “Heavens no,” Mrs. Snell huffed. “It’s a horrible thing that happened, but it wouldn’t be sensible to lock the door. Besides, who can afford a lock anyway? Still, I am sick of people coming by all the time and gawking into my yard; ghoulish folks eager to see the scene of the crime. And it’s not just kids, but adults, both men and women. They should know better.”

  In the short time I’ve been in the Snell’s backyard, at least a dozen faces have either appeared over the fence, or people have entered the yard to catch sight of where the second crime was committed.

  Having seen the body, does Mrs. Snell think the killer was that of the supernatural kind, or does she think merely some mad copycat?

  “I don’t believe in ghosts, and what I saw that morning was most definitely real. I’m sure it was some crazy person either trying to recapture the glory of Jack the Ripper, or is doing it for a sick joke. All the talk in the papers of Deeming being the Ripper, and with his ghastly crimes and recent hanging – it’s enough to make anyone mad. It could be anyone; someone in the neighbourhood I’ve known all my life – it could be you, for all I know.”

  Mrs. Snell laughs; I laugh back, and tell her it’s a ridiculous notion. I’m not even from around here.

  “I know. But for someone not familiar with the streets, you certainly found my house easily enough. Usually it takes reporters all day, and asking around at neighbour’s houses, to find our little cottage.”

  I can smell blood from miles away, I tell Mrs. Snell jokingly. It’s the reporter in me.

  So, we have two murders that resemble the infamous Whitechapel murders of four years ago, both in date, time and modus operandi. Are we dealing with a copycat killer or the ghost of Fred Deeming?

  “Most definitely a copycat,” police constable Adam Neil told me. “I’ve seen enough death to know that a man is behind those two butcherings in Little Lon, not a blooming ghost. And rest assured, we’ll do everything in our power to catch this maniac before he kills again. I mean cripes, whoever this guy is he ain’t doing a very good job of replicating the Ripper killings – he started with the third victim, so what does that tell ya?”

  Maybe Jack didn’t kill those first two women, I tell PC Neil. I’ve long been of the opinion that the Ripper was responsible for only five killings, not the nine that is generally attributed to the Whitechapel fiend, with Nichols being the first and Kelly the last. And if that is correct, then wouldn’t that mean that either the copycat is in fact very knowledgeable about the Ripper crimes, or go a long ways to substantiate the idea that it is the spirit of the Ripper committing the murders, the spirit of Fred Deeming?

  “Phaw!” PC Neil said, a deep frown creasing his
young brow. “That’s a tall one if ever I heard it. The Ripper killed nine women, and there ain’t no such thing as ghosts. So this joker cutting up street walkers, whoever he is, is a fool and don’t know his history, and we’ll catch him, don’t you worry ‘bout that.”

  So, was Deeming Jack the Ripper?

  We know that Deeming was capable of murder, and particularly violent and callous ones at that.

  Certainly the newspapers around the world were quick to connect Deeming with the Ripper. After all, he’s a Brit and killed his two wives and three children by slashing their throats. He admitted to buying knives in Whitechapel at the time of the murders, and a London dressmaker identified Deeming as being with her on both the night of the double murder in Whitechapel, and the morning after, where he showed great knowledge of the Eddowes murder. Apparently they were together on the 30th of September, and met up again the next morning. Though Deeming had told the lady his name was Lawson, the dressmaker identified the man she was with, and who frightened her with talk of the mutilations, as that of Fred Deeming when showed a photograph of him. It’s also interesting to note that Deeming’s father tried to commit suicide numerous times by cutting his own throat with a knife.

  “He had a great hatred for his father,” Doctor Shields, a physician at the Melbourne Gaol, told me. “His father used to beat Frederick as a child, savage beatings that must’ve taken a great toll on the boy, both physically and mentally. He turned to his mother, with whom he had a close relationship, and who, as a Sunday school teacher, drummed into him the wages of sin and punishment. He told me how much he loved his mother, and how devastated he was when she died in ‘75. Frederick was in his early twenties at the time. As much as he loved his mother, he loathed his father more. When I met with him in prison, I found him dull and moody; he told me he often fantasised about his past, that he wished his mother was still alive. He told me he talks to her, every night at 2am, and that she tells him things, including telling him to kill his wives and children. When I asked him about his father, he grew red-faced, incensed, and he roared how he wished he was the one who had slashed his father’s throat, because he would have done it properly; wouldn’t have botched it all those times like his father had. After speaking with the man, I have no doubt his mind was afflicted with a kind of madness, partly borne from his childhood, partly due to a disease of the mind from late stage syphilis. He told me that he had gone searching for a woman who had given him the venereal disease, intending to kill her. Of this he said with a peculiar voice: ‘I’ve had my own back, anyhow, as more than one of them found out.’ He believed in the extermination of all such women.”