Mutilated in the Mortuary?

[diana]

Polly Nichols was found by Cross and Paul. A little later Dr. Llewellen made a brief examination before the body was taken to the mortuary. The fact that he noted no mutilations is always put down to incompetence or carelessness.

At the mortuary Sergeant Spratling instructed that the body was not to be stripped. However, contrary to those instructions the mortuary workers not only stripped the body, they washed it and when it was seen again the mutilations were present.

A new possibility dawned on me. The murder of Nichols could have involved a slit throat only and was not committed by Jack. One of many savage homicides in Whitechapel. When the body arrives at the mortuary, Jack is working there. He has fantasized about mutilating a body. He strips this one and mutilates it and then, maybe to cover evidence, washes it.

This would have been the beginning of Jack's career. The rest of the victims would have been murdered by Jack.

Working in a mortuary he would have had access to dissecting knives and perhaps would have gotten a rudimentary understanding of anatomy.

Of course this theory would have excluded Tabram.

[joelhall]

i dont quite know where to begin with this one...

[DVV]

Let's be simple.
Spratling noticed the wounds just after Nichols body was placed in the mortuary, at least one hour before the arrival of Hatfield.
Several police were on the spot: Enright, Thain, Spratling.
All rippers!
But they could not finish the job because of Robert Mann.

[DVV]

Hello Diana,
a little bit more seriously, I think you may find in Ripper Media the review of a French book said to throw suspicions on mortuary's staff, especially Hatfield, if I am correct. "L'affaire Jack l'Eventreur", par Christian Coudurier.
I did not read it myself.
The last French book I read on the case almost killed me.
I took too much garlic to recover.

Friendly,
David (broken-English poster)

[diana]

OOPs

I did a little research and found out that Sugden records that Helson was present when the body was being stripped.

So much for that theory.

[Chris George]

Hi Diana

Certainly the fact that the abdominal mutilations were not noted by Dr. Llewellyn when he saw her body in Buck's Row is very odd but we have to remember that it was pitch black and the darkness might have prevented him seeing everything that Jack had done to Polly.

Llewellyn didn't do a complete examination at the scene and was just there long enough to ascertain that she was dead. He would know that she would receive a complete examination at the mortuary.

Bear in mind that at this point there was no reason to anticipate that she had been disembowelled. Remember also that it was reported in the press that there was a lack of blood in Buck's Row and that this led to the initial idea that she had been murdered elsewhere and her body dumped in Buck's Row.

All the best

Chris

[diana]

When you Think About it

Well, I suppose it would be a little odd for Llewellen to have said, "Yup, she sure is dead. Better check and see if he mutilated the abdomen." Such things were unlikely, and I surmise that Llewellen was planning a more in depth examination later in any case and intended to pick up on anything else at that time. Bear in mind it was 3:30/4:00 AM and he had been roused out of bed. He probably thought that since there was nothing he could do for Polly, it would be OK for him to go home, catch a few more z's and finish his examination in the morning. It being Whitechapel, there's no telling how many murders he had had to process like this in the middle of the night.

[DVV]

Please Diana, don't think Whitechapel was Bogota!
On how many murder's cases do you guess LLewellyn would have to deal with, within a day????

Amitiés,
David

[Jon Guy]

Hi Diana

Polly was mutilated whilst she was wearing her stays, as all the wounds were still visible when they put them back on her at the mortuary. This and the fact that her skirt was pulled up when found by in Bucks Row.