by Ray Black
The Juwes are The men That
Will not be Blamed
For nothing
The piece of apron came from the murdered woman in Mitre Square and the police believed that the writing was the work of the killer. It is quite bewildering how the attacker could possibly have killed two women in such a short space of time without causing any suspicion, especially as the area was already on a careful watch for anyone that looked remotely suspicious.
The victim was quite easily identified as Catherine Eddowes, the daughter of a tin plate worker, as she had some pawn tickets in her pockets when she was found. When the police gave out that information John Kelly, the man with whom she had been living for the past seven years, came forward and was able to identify the body.
Catherine, or Kate as she was better known, was born in 1842. Her parents died when she was very young and at the age of sixteen she met Thomas Conway, who she went to live with as his common-law wife. They lived together for twenty years and had three children. However, due to Kate’s excessive drinking, and Conways physical abuse, the relationship ended in 1880. Although Kate’s friends were adamant that she was not a prostitute, there is some evidence that possibly when under the influence of alcohol she did sell her body on the streets.
Although the police did not seem to be getting any closer to catching the murderer, one important witness did emerge from the investigations. A man called Joseph Lawende, who had been in the Imperial Club with two friends on the night in question, saw a couple talking at around 1.35 a.m. at Church Passage which was close to Mitre Square. He described the man as being fairly young, of medium height, a small, light-coloured moustache and wearing a dark jacket, and deerstalker hat. He did not manage to see the woman’s face but was able to identify the clothes that Kate was wearing. It was only nine minutes after this sighting that Kate Eddowes was murdered.
Again panic rose on the streets of Whitechapel, especially after they discovered there had been two murders on the same night. Once again everyone stayed off the streets after dark and many of the prostitutes laid low in various shelters or stayed with family or friends. Police visited all the common lodging houses and interviewed over 2,000 of the inhabitants. They also had handbills printed and distributed in the neighbourhood, requesting people to come forward with any information they might possible have. The police questioned many people in professions where they would be proficient in the use of a knife and even tried using a dog to follow a single scent, but none of their efforts came to fruition.
MARY JANE KELLY
There hadn’t been an attack for over a month and once again the streets settled down to normality. Mary Jane Kelly was born in Limerick and had lived in Wales for a while. When she was twenty-one she came to London to work in a brothel. She was very popular as she was both young and attractive, and would probably have suited the prestigious West End clients as opposed to those of the grim streets of the East End.
In 1887 she met Joe Barnett who was a respectable market porter and, although they lived together, never really settled in one place. On occasion they would drink away their rent money and consequently get evicted. Following an argument, Joe left and Mary had to return to prostitution to earn her crust.
It was Friday, November 9, 1888, and the day of the Lord Mayor’s Show. Mary’s landlord was a man called John McCarthy, and on the day of the Show he sent his assistant round to 13 Miller’s Court to collect some rent from Mary. He knocked on the door, but as he got no answer, he put his hand inside the broken window and pulled back the curtains. He wasn’t quite sure what he had seen lying on the bed, so he went and got McCarthy for a second opinion. When McCarthy looked through the window, he was so sickened by what he saw he sent his assistant to go and fetch the police.
Bowyer soon returned with a Constable and the broke into the house by forcing the door. Once their eyes had become accustomed to the dim light they were totally horrified by their discovery. Mary’s body was lying sprawled on the bed and it had been unbelievably mutilated. She died from having her throat cut, and the rest of the horrific injuries were inflicted after her death. The whole surface of her abdomen and thighs had been removed, her breasts had been cut off, and there were several jagged wounds to the arms. The face had been mutilated beyond recognition. The contents of her abdomen were found in different places and the police were astounded at the ferocity of this murder.
THE RIPPER LETTERS
Following the spate of attacks the police, the press, and individuals who were involved with the investigations, received literally hundreds of letters – presumably from the killer himself. The name ‘Jack the Ripper’ came about because it was the name the writer used when he sent a letter to the boss of the Central News Office on September 25, 1888.
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 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 lady’s 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.
Yours truly
Jack the Ripper
Don’t mind me giving the trade name.
(from ‘The Times’ 1888)
The editor considered that the letter was a hoax and didn’t bother to forward it on to the police for a couple of days. It was the night of Liz Stride and Kate Eddowes murder when it finally arrived in the hands of the police. On the Monday morning following the two murders, the news agency received yet another letter in exactly the same handwriting. The police circulated the letters and placed copies outside every police station in the hope that someone would recognize the writing. This had no effect other than to encourage a few cranks to write a few hoax letters.
THE MAIN SUSPECTS
Only a few clues were ever unearthed by the very bewildered police force. Never before had detectives experienced the apparently motiveless, brutality of the world’s first serial killer. Pressurized by an angry public and indeed Queen Victoria herself, the police arrested several suspects on extremely flimsy evidence. Most of these suspects, who were merely scapegoats, were committed to mental institutions in an effort to rid the streets of the ‘mysterious monster’. It appeared no-one was above suspicion – Sir Charles Warren, the Chief of the Metropolitan Police – was himself suspected of being involved in a cover up. The prime suspects who are still to this day eligible to be dubbed ‘Jack the Ripper’ are as follows:
FRANCIS THOMPSON, 1894
In the book entitled Jack the Ripper by Stephen Knight, the British poet, Francis Thompson, is considered to be the culprit of the evil East End murders. Knight explains that Thompson had a violent childhood, flunked his medical training, had a growing fascination with murder, and eventually ended up as a vagrant due his dependence on drugs. Thompson apparently had a secret affair with a prostitute and its tragic ending reduced him to a frenzied delirium. Knight reveals the sordid events surrounding the murders and its sinister parallels to Thompson.
JOHN PIZER
John Pizer was a Jewish shoemaker, who unfortunately fulfilled the public’s view of the murderer’s profile. The profile being that of a butcher, a slaughterman or a craftsman, in fact anyone who had access to a 5-inch blade knife and a leather apron. Pizer was known to have an intense dislike for prostitutes, and added to that he had a previous conviction for stabbing which immediately went against him. He aptly fitted a description that had bee
n distributed of a short man with a dark beard and moustache who was thought to have a foreign accent. The press portrayed Pizer as a man with a ‘cruel sardonic look’, but when he provided a solid alibi the press were forced by the libel courts to make a compensation payment. Once more this left the already frustrated Police Force fumbling in the dark.
After the death of Annie Chapman and the subsequent pathology reports, the Coroner suggested that the murdered might possibly have an anatomical knowledge of dissection. This then forced the police to turn their attentions towards members of the medical profession. Based upon this assumption three major suspects came to the fore . . .
THOMAS NEIL CREAM
Thomas Cream was an American doctor who had already been arrested in connection with the poisoning of prostitutes. He also wrote to the police on numerous occasions giving false names and false accusations regarding a number of crimes. Cream was eventually hanged for the murder of the Lambeth prostitutes in 1892 and his departing words were: ‘I am Jack the Rip. . .’ just as the rope snapped tightly round his neck. There were many clues that pointed to Cream as being the Ripper. For example, an American had been making enquiries as to the availability of certain organs at medical schools in and around the Whitechapel district. Added to this, the letter received by the police just prior to the double killings of Liz Stride and Kate Eddowes which contained many ‘Americanisms’ he was certainly a prime candidate. Unfortunately, though, Cream was actually in prison at the time of the last murders attributed to Jack the Ripper.
MICHAEL OSTROGG
Michael Ostrogg was a Russian doctor was questioned by the London police, but was unable to reliably account for his whereabouts. Ostrogg was a confidence trickster who was known by various names – Dr. Grant and also a former surgeon in the Russian navy. He was in and out of police custody for different theft and fraud offences, and was clearly a complete rogue. He became a high profile suspect when it was stated in the Police Gazette to ‘pay special attention to this dangerous man’, after he failed to report to the police on charges of suspicion.
ALEXANDER PEDACHENKO
Another Russian doctor, Alexander Pedachenko was very tenuously linked to the Ripper murders when it was suggested that the name ‘Ostrogg’ was one of the aliases used by him. He was considered to be a Russian lunatic with distinct criminal tendencies. Added to this, Pedachenko had trained as a barber’s surgeon and had also joined the staff of the local Maternity Hospital. The Ochrana, the Russian Secret Police Gazette, described him as ‘the greatest and boldest of all Russian criminal lunatics’. Ochrana also associated Pedachenko with the Ripper in an effort to discredit the Metropolitan Police, and this act of propaganda appears to have been successful as Sir Charles Warren subsequently resigned from the Police Force. Pedachenko was then smuggled back to Moscow where he was immediately sent to a lunatic asylum for the murder of a woman in St Petersburg. Pedachenko died in the asylum but it seems he was merely a suspect of convenience for a short period of time.
PRINCE ALBERT VICTOR – THE DUKE OF CLARENCE
The theory that a royal conspiracy was behind the Whitechapel murders is probably the most popular one. This appealing theory unfolds like this:
Prince Albert was believed to have made several night-time trips to the East End of London to indulge in homosexual practices in a brothel in Cleveland Street. He is also supposedly to have learned the techniques of disembowelling on his many deer hunting excursions. He was also alleged to have had syphilis of the brain, which would have made him mad enough to commit the murders.
Another story goes is that Albert had an affair with a shop girl named Annie Crook who he kept in an apartment in Whitechapel. Annie, who was a Catholic, became pregnant with his child and, in one version of the story, married Albert secretly. A Catholic girl of low social standing was definitely a no-no for a future king and when the news got back to his grandmother, Queen Victoria, she insisted that the problem be resolved. The job was left to her physician, Sir William Gull. Doctor Gull supposedly had Annie taken away to a lunatic asylum where he savaged both her memory and her intellect, leaving her institutionalized for the remainder of her life. The key victim to link royalty with the murders was Mary Kelly. She was evidently the nursemaid to the prince and his wife around this time. As the story goes Mary and her friends Polly Nichols, Annie Chapman and Elizabeth Stride all knew about the affair between Annie Crook and the prince but, due to the fact that they were unable to keep the matter a secret, were consider a major threat to the Crown. Once again Doctor Gull was summoned to help alleviate the problem. He was asked to permanently silence these troublesome whores, and to cleverly disguise their disappearance, Gull devised the persona of Jack the Ripper. He was to pick up the women in the Royal carriage, slaughter them inside the carriage and then dispose of the body. This would of course explain the lack of noise and blood at the scene of the murders.
The Royal theories are mainly based on conjecture and have only really come to light in recent years. Would the Crown really have resorted to the murder of five unfortunate women in order to protect themselves? Of course we shall never know because there is no evidence to support this theory.
AARON KOSMINSKI
The chalk writing on the archway using the word ‘Juwes’ led the police to another suspect, Aaron Kosminski. The Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, Sir Charles Warren, had ordered the removal of the writing so as to avoid an uprising from the already agitated Jewish community, especially since the false arrest of Pizer was still fresh in their minds. However, despite this, another Jew, Aaron Kosminski became a prime suspect. Aaron was a hairdresser and had lived in Whitechapel since 1882. He was a man who had an extreme hatred of women, especially prostitutes, and he was definitely the most insane of all the police suspects. He was described as having strong homicidal tendencies and a history of related crimes. Following the night of the double killings, George Lusk, who was leader of the Whitechapel Vigilance Committee, received a letter. This letter told Lusk that the writer had fried and eaten half a kidney which had been removed from the body of Kate Eddowes. The uneaten half of the kidney accompanied the letter in a box, and the organ was found to be human and belonged to a woman in her forties who was suffering from Brights disease – as did Kate Eddowes. However, because the style of writing did not match the first ‘Jack the Ripper’ letter, it was concluded to be the writings of a crazed lunatic. Clearly the man who wrote the letter was deranged and Kosminski became a prime suspect. He was repeatedly identified by one of the witnesses even though Kosminski was not a medium build but a slender one. It was never proved that Kosminski was the perpetrator of these ghastly crimes, but he was removed from society in 1890 and placed in an infirmary for the insane. For the last 25 years of Kosminski’s life he was put in Colney Hatch Asylum where he degenerated to the point where he could no longer answer any questions. He died in 1919 of gangrene of the leg and was medically described as both demented and incoherent.
MONTAGUE JOHN DRUITT
Our last suspect is Montague John Druitt. He was a gentleman, a successful college teacher, a keen cricketer and came from a ‘good family’. Druitt didn’t become a suspect in the Ripper case until the year 1959. Case notes written by Sir Melville Macnaghten, described Druitt as ‘sexually insane’ and it was suggested that even his own family suspected him of being the Whitechapel murderer. Druitt’s personal circumstances also link him with the murders. He was an extremely intelligent man who had studied medicine for a time before switching profession to become a barrister. As a barrister he would have known that you would need to distance yourself as far as possible from the scene of the crime, if his case were to be defended with any success. Druitt was discovered playing cricket in Dorset after the murders of Mary Nichols and Annie Chapman, but his actual whereabouts on the nights concerned still remain unresolved. The main reason that Druitt became a suspect is that he feared he would go insane like his mother. Druitt wrote a suicide note saying that he felt like he
was going to be like Mother and the best thing for him to do was to die. His body was found drowned in the River Thames on December 31, 1888. His pockets were full of stones and the suicide note was discovered on his body. Druitt’s suicide came almost one month after the last Ripper murder and two days after he had been dismissed from his teaching job. His death still remains a mystery, as does his connection with the Ripper case. But what is certain is that the police closed their files after Druitt’s death and indeed there were never any more dreadful murders carried out by the Ripper. Was this pure coincidence or was Montague John Druitt really ‘Jack the Ripper’? Case closed.
SO WHO WAS JACK THE RIPPER?
The mystery still continues more than one hundred years later and I am sure this case will never be really solved. Doctors, members of the Royal Family, aristocrats, black magicians, writers, painters, slaughtermen, coachmen and policemen have all been suspected and accused of being the most famous killer of all times. Even a diary supposedly written by ‘Jack the Ripper’ has turned up, but as to its authenticity, no-one really can be certain. If only the foggy, dismal streets of the East End of London could tell their story we would actually know the truth but as they can’t all we can do is conjecture.
The Boston Strangler
Although no-one has officially been on trial for the spate of vicious murders in Boston from the period of June 1962 to January 1964, it has always been believed to be the work of a man called Albert DeSalvo. The most famous name he became known as was The Boston Strangler, but over the years he was also dubbed The Mad Strangler, The Phantom Strangler, The Measuring Man and The Green Man.
