Who was Julia?!

[j.r-ahde]

Hello you all!

Quoting this statement from the Victims presentations of the Casebook again:

"...Barnett states at the inquest that he left her because she was allowing other prostitutes to stay in the room. "She would never have gone wrong again," he tells a newspaper, "and I shouldn't have left her if it had not been for the prostitutes stopping at the house. She only let them (stay there) because she was good hearted and did not like to refuse them shelter on cold bitter nights." He adds, "We lived comfortably until Marie allowed a prostitute named Julia to sleep in the same room; I objected: and as Mrs. Harvey afterwards came and stayed there, I left and took lodgings elsewhere."

Does anyone know, who this person called "Julia" really was?!

Any definite tracks about her anywhere?!

All the best
Jukka

[Jon Guy]

Hello Jukka

Julia was a friend of Kelly`s :

from Casebook :Julia Van Turney says that Joe Barnett is of good character and was kind to Mary Jane, giving her money on occasion.

[j.r-ahde]

Hello Jon!

Yes, now I remember people connecting Julia with Julia Van Turney!

But then some people think, that it wasn't this Julia...

Probably Julia Van Turney wasn't the only Julia in Whitechapel...

All the best
Jukka

[Chris Scott]

For a variety of reasons I think it highly unlikely that the woman named Julia, mentioned by Barnett, and Julia Venturney were the same person.
There are two official documents (as opposed to press reports) originating from Barnett - the police statment made by him on 9 November, and his inquest testimony made on 12 November. In his police statement, made on the day of the murder, Barnett makes no mention of Kelly taking in other women. His reason for their separating is worded as follows:
"I have lived with her altogether about 18 months, for the last 8 months in Millers Court, until last Tuesday week (30 ulto) (i.e. 30th October) when in consequence of not earning sufficient money to give her and her resorting to prostitution, I resolved on leaving her..."
Three days later, at the inquest, Barnett deposed as follows:
"I separated from her on the 30th of October. I left her because she had a person who was a prostitute whom she took in and I objected to her doing so, that was the only reason, not because I was out of work."
This account became more and more detailed as press accounts were published of interviews with Barnett. Recently I posted just such an account from the Manchester Times of 17 November. This included the following passage:
"We lived comfortably until Marie allowed a prostitute named Julia to sleep in the same room. I objected and as Mrs Harvey afterwards came and stayed there, I left her, and went and took lodgings elsewhere. I told her I would come back if she would go and live somewhere else."
The Mrs. Harvey referred to is Maria Harvey who on the day of her murder gave her address as 3 New Court, another court off Dorset Street which ran parallel to Millers Court. Harvey's police statement includes the following:
"I slept two nights with Mary Jane Kelly, Monday and Tuesday last. I then took a room at the above house (i.e. 3 New Court.) I last saw her about five minutes to seven last night Thursday in her own room."
This makes it clear that Harvey slept at 13 Millers Court with Kelly on the nights of 5 and 6 of November, and visited her on the evening of 8 November. After her two night stay (i.e. on the Wednesday) she took her room at New Court. Three facts must be borne in mind with regard to Harvey's statement.
1) There is no indication that Harvey was a prostitute and the list of clothing that she left at Kelly's strongly supports the contention that she was a working laundress
2) The fact that she took a room at New Court on the Wednesday suggests to me the perfectly plausible motive that Kelly was merely helping out a temporarily homeless friend with a roof over her head
3) This two nght stay commenced some five days after Barnett had already left and so cannot have contributed directly to his decision to leave

With regard to Julia Venteney (the correct spelling of her name), background details can be found at:

http://www.casebook.org/ripper_media/book_reviews/non-fiction/castofthousands.julia-venturney.html

At the time of the Kelly murder Julia Venteney was 47 years old. Her former husband, Antony Venteney, a photographic artist, is a mysterious figure, the only mention of whom I have found on the birth certificate of one of their two daughters. At the time of Kelly's death she described herself as a widow, but no trace of her husband's death, or their marriage, has been found to date.
In her statements Venteney said she was living at 1 Millers Court, her room being opposite Kelly's. She said she was a charwoman and lived with a man named Harry Owen. The identity of this Harry Owen is not known, but there was a married man named Henry Owen listed at 26 Dorset Street in the 1891 census.
IF the Julia mentioned by Barnett was the cause of his leaving, as later accounts claim, then this person staying must have occurred on or shortly before 30 October, the date of Barnett's departure. As Venteney had her own room at 1 Millers Court before and after the murder, one has to wonder why she would have needed to stay with Kelly. It is possible - but unprovable - that there may have been a "domestic" similar to that mentioned by Sarah Lewis which caused her to need a bed for the night.
However, we must remember that in Barnett's very first statement, made on the day of the murder, no mention whatever is made of the other woman or women staying with Kelly being the cause of his leaving. This version of events first appears at the inquest, three days later. This omission can hardly be to spare Kelly's reputation, as he says in that first statement that she had resorted to prostitution. I think it is the change of emphasis that is important. In his first statement, Barnett specifically says he left because he was not earning enough money and she went back on the streets. However, at the inquest, Barnett flatly contradicts this, saying "I left her because she had a person who was a prostitute whom she took in... that was the only reason, not because I was out of work."
I suspect - but it is only supposition - that Barnett felt guilty about leaving Kelly and maybe even felt to some degree responsible for her death, and possibly invented a more plausible motive for his departure - the presence of Kelly's unwanted guests - than the purely economic ones which probably prompted his departure with its awful consequences.

[Wolf Vanderlinden]

You might find this interesting. It's from an interview with Barnett from a Canadian newspaper.

“He left her because she was too tender hearted, and would allow the poor miserable women whom she knew to come in occasionally, if they had no other shelter, and share the room in which they lived. The rupture came when Marie Jeannette allowed a miserable creature named [Harvey], who had not a penny for lodging, to share their one bed two nights in succession.”
13 November, 1888.

Wolf.

[Chris Scott]

Hi Wolf
Many thanks for that
The mood of the comments you posted is very much reflected in the conclusion of the Manchester Times I mentioned above:
"She would never have gone wrong again and I should never have left if it had not been for the prostitutes stopping at the house. She only let them in the house because she was good hearted, and did not like to refuse them shelter on a cold bitter night."
But again, the blaming of Harvey does not square with other testimony. At the inquest it was stated that Harvey's two night stay occurred on 5-6 November, but Barnett left on 30 October. It is possible that Harvey had stayed with Kelly on more than one occasion, but no mention is made of this in either Barnett's or Harvey's own testimony.
Regards
Chris

[j.r-ahde]

Hello you all!

Thanks for all the enlightening posts!

I have a faint memory about someone telling Julia being a German...

Anyway, it seems to be, that she has remained even more as a mystery than her friend MJK!

All the best
Jukka

[Carrotty Nell]

This is who I think Julia was. The woman Mrs Maxwell saw. It fits everything as far as I can tell.

MJK must have been something of an awe-inspiring figure to the other street girls. She was good looking, apparently decently educated and from a respectable background so far as we can tell, and she had her own home. It may have been a grotty little hovel by our standards but I can imagine it was quite a status symbol among these people at that time.

Mrs Maxwell described the women she saw as 'little and dark and with a speech impediment'. Everyone else described MJK as some variant of tall and fair. So I think the dark, unprepossessing, homeless and untalented little Julia heroine-worshipped the dazzling paragon in Miller's Court and maybe passed herself off as MJK to several local people including Mrs M. That might be why MJK gave her marching orders.

What I think happened is this. Julia came to Miller's Court on the morning of the murder and went into the room, either because she had taken the key with her when she left or by using the broken window. Unsurprisingly, she came straight back out again. Morris Lewis saw her doing so.

Mrs Maxwell then sees Julia by the archway. She has vomited in the road after what she has just seen, but lies to Mrs M and blames the puke on bibulous excess. Julia has been crying. Mrs M describes her eyes as 'funny, as if she had a cold'.

Julia like JTR then disappears and is never seen again. There could be any number of reasons why she did not come forward as a witness. A criminal record perhaps.

[Chava]

I don't know if I'd agree about that 'status symbol'. A bunch of local whores seemed to rent rooms around there. Mary Ann Cox for a start. And she doesn't strike me as a cut above.

As for the women sharing Kelly's room. How big was this room? I thought it was about 12 by 12. A tight fit for three people sharing what looks like a single bed...

[Uncle Jack]

Finally I have the solution - The mysterious Julia was Jill the Ripper and murdered MJK before passing herself off as her....

Regards,

Adam

[j.r-ahde]

Hello C.N.!

Not a bad theory, but; MJK was tall (5'7"). But some have described her as 5'4", so mixing Julia and MJK could have been possible to people like mrs. Maxwell, who didn't know MJK that well...

Chava, at least to my eyes there seems to have been a spare-bed or something under the "real" bed - so to say - in the crime-scene photo!

Hello Uncle Jack! Now all we have to do, is to look for all the Julias in the East End, just like we've been looking for a match with MJK for years...

All the best
Jukka

[Mike Covell]

Hi Jukka, I thought the item inder the bed was an old metal bath, similar to the tin baths my parents were bathed in, in front of a roaring fire!

(After a good night of drinkin' I have slept in a bath, but on better nights, I just crashed on the bathroom floor!)

[j.r-ahde]

Hello Mike!

Yes, it's a bath!

I thought, that there was a wooden structure and under that another wooden structure. Now I noticed it was only a mattress on the bed-structure.

So, I am getting ever-more far-sighted, sorry!

All the best
Jukka

[anna]

Hi all,
I have wondered before if Danny were Daniel Barnett.Would be natural for Kelly to want to have a chat,if she saw he was in the pub at the same time as her.
Although,I suppose Barnett would have mentioned this in his statement.

[Chris Scott]

A press report I read today strongly implies that "Julia" was, in fact, another name for Maria Harvey
It is well known that Harvey stayed with Kelly on occasions in the period leading up to the murder, and that she left various items of clothing in Kelly's room
At the inquest, Harvey said:
I knew the deceased as Mary Jane Kelly. I slept at her house on Monday night and on Tuesday night. All the afternoon of Thursday we were together.
[Coroner] Were you in the house when Joe Barnett called ? - Yes. I said, "Well, Mary Jane, I shall not see you this evening again," and I left with her two men's dirty shirts, a little boy's shirt, a black overcoat, a black crepe bonnet with black satin strings, a pawn-ticket for a grey shawl, upon which 2s had been lent, and a little girls white petticoat.
In the Ipswich Journal of 16 November 1888, an article about the Kelly murders includes this:
"A woman, who is known by the name of Julia, and who was in the habit of continually visiting Kelly's room, states that she knew she had two cotton shirts there. These the police are unable to find."