From Hell (Lusk) Letter likely Fake

[MsWeatherwax]

Serial killers certainly enjoy contacting medias, police and government, the way Jack the Ripper exposed his victims, has something to do with his trend to 'show'..
°

I'm afraid that's not true. There are very, very few serial killers who contact anybody, it's extremely rare.

[Rainbow]

Albert Fish's letters, the Zodiac's letters, the BTK letters, Colin Ireland....


The Ripper was enjoying what he was doing..

Thats why he can't be someone like Druitt, unhappy with himself going to be mad and killed himself..

or Bury, unhappy after killing his wife and spent time thinking what he should do, confessing to his guilt and asking for mercy..


Rainbow°

[John Wheat]

Albert Fish's letters, the Zodiac's letters, the BTK letters, Colin Ireland....


The Ripper was enjoying what he was doing..

Thats why he can't be someone like Druitt, unhappy with himself going to be mad and killed himself..

or Bury, unhappy after killing his wife and spent time thinking what he should do, confessing to his guilt and asking for mercy..


Rainbow°

Of course a random witness is a much better suspect than Bury.

[Fisherman]

I'm afraid that's not true. There are very, very few serial killers who contact anybody, it's extremely rare.

That is an important point. The notion that serial killers enjoy taunting the police by communicating with them is only true in a small minority of the cases. However, if we look at what Rainbow mentions, he writes about "Albert Fish's letters, the Zodiac's letters, the BTK letters..."
All plural. Letters.
And this is where I entertain my main doubts about the "From Hell" letter - serialists who open up a conversation with the surrounding society, most commonly with the police, seem very interested in media coverage. Rader, for example, was furious about how the papers wrote far too little about his exploits. These kind of men will send letter upon letter to the police, but there is only one letter coming from the "From Hell" author, as far as we know. And that letter related to the Eddowes murder. The same thing goes, by the way, for the proposed communication in the shape of the GSG; it is attached to the Eddowes murder, and then there is no more graffiti that we know of, purportedly connecting to the murders (at least there is no clear evidence of any such thing).

So if the killer suddenly developed a taste for communicating with the police and society, why did it only happen after the double event night? And, perhaps more importantly, why was there no communication at all after the Kelly murder?

[Henry Flower]

I'm just wondering why he wrote "Signed" and didn't really sign his name... Maybe it was written by a forger who had wanted to sign with the sender's name but changed his/her mind at the last moment and signed with no name at all in order to perhaps provide fewer clues as to who the sender was. If it was written by the murderer, maybe he didn't sign his name due to some personal issues that could be significant -- e.g. self hate that made him not want to write his name, perhaps. All speculative, of course. But this odd thing of "Signed"-but-not-signed could just be a significant thing.

But the writer did write "Signed". And then, he didn't really sign, and suddenly addressed Lusk again. That's a little puzzling to me... Is it normal to write "Signed" and not write your name after it?

He's teasing. Taunting. Playing a game. He writes "signed" because of course that's the information everyone would want. And then no name, just his mockery - catch me when you can Mr Lusk.

I would've thought that was fairly clear...

[ChrisGeorge]

He's teasing. Taunting. Playing a game. He writes "signed" because of course that's the information everyone would want. And then no name, just his mockery - catch me when you can Mr Lusk.

I would've thought that was fairly clear...

Hello Henry

I agree entirely. The Lusk ("From Hell") letter was written by a mickey-taker, a person who delighted in punning and funning the recipient. The missive may or may not have been sent by the killer.

The so-called Openshaw letter is very much of the same ilk as the Lusk letter. Irish dialogue for the Lusk letter, and Cockney, with a bit of Cornish thrown in (long-time observers will know why), for the Openshaw letter.

There is a good possibility that the same mickey-taker and prankster sent both the Lusk and Openshaw letters.

Cheers

Chris

[Michael W Richards]

Three things make the From Hell very possibly an authentic communication......1. The letter was not addressed to the police or the press, it was to someone who headed up a vigilance committee looking for "Jack", ...2. The biological material included cannot be disproven as being from Kate Eddowes, and 3. The author only claimed one victim. The last point is important as the man who saw more Canonical women in death than any other did not believe Kate was killed by the same person as the one who committed the preceding murders. Nor did he see Liz Strides murder as "similar" to the preceding.

[Joshua Rogan]

Three things make the From Hell very possibly an authentic communication......1. The letter was not addressed to the police or the press, it was to someone who headed up a vigilance committee looking for "Jack", ...2. The biological material included cannot be disproven as being from Kate Eddowes, and 3. The author only claimed one victim. The last point is important as the man who saw more Canonical women in death than any other did not believe Kate was killed by the same person as the one who committed the preceding murders. Nor did he see Liz Strides murder as "similar" to the preceding.

Agree with 1 and 2, but not "3.The author only claimed one victim."
The letter simply said "I send you half the Kidne I took from one woman", implying that there was at least one more.
Also, if the letter writer killed only Eddowes, then he wasn't the "Jack" that Lusk was looking for, and so had no real reason to send the letter to him.

[Michael W Richards]

Agree with 1 and 2, but not "3.The author only claimed one victim."
The letter simply said "I send you half the Kidne I took from one woman", implying that there was at least one more.
Also, if the letter writer killed only Eddowes, then he wasn't the "Jack" that Lusk was looking for, and so had no real reason to send the letter to him.

I see what you are saying about "implications", but I see no other written evidence that "other women" what was intended to be conveyed. He may have killed only one woman in the growing list of women being murdered, and he wanted to convey that....and we know that list of murdered women only includes 1 that had a kidney taken.

I believe it entirely possible that the author of the letter killed just one woman, but may have had other issues with Lusk. Lusk thought he was being watched and had other threatening communications addressed to him...one calling him "Boss".

[ChrisGeorge]

I see what you are saying about "implications", but I see no other written evidence that "other women" what was intended to be conveyed. He may have killed only one woman in the growing list of women being murdered, and he wanted to convey that....and we know that list of murdered women only includes 1 that had a kidney taken.

I believe it entirely possible that the author of the letter killed just one woman, but may have had other issues with Lusk. Lusk thought he was being watched and had other threatening communications addressed to him...one calling him "Boss".

Or perhaps, even more likely, the authors of the letters killed nobody but instead were getting a rise out of the authorities as well as out of secondary actors such as Lusk and Openshaw.

Cheers

Chris

[Michael W Richards]

Or perhaps, even more likely, the authors of the letters killed nobody but instead were getting a rise out of the authorities as well as out of secondary actors such as Lusk and Openshaw.

Cheers

Chris

Hi Chris,

Well if thats the case they sure picked a minor character in the mix to harass. I personally dont see any reason to consider any of the letters sent in to be from the multiple killer at large, but I do see reasons for considering this particular message with parcel as possibly being from Kates killer....who for the record I dont believe killed any other Canonical women, but may well have been a nefarious local character on his own.

In Kates case, and in no other of these unsolved murders, we have what might be Kate attempting to blackmail who she thought might be responsible for the murders in the area. Thats a motive, as perhaps is the love triangle Mary Jane was in.

[Karl]

Hi Chris,

Well if thats the case they sure picked a minor character in the mix to harass. I personally dont see any reason to consider any of the letters sent in to be from the multiple killer at large, but I do see reasons for considering this particular message with parcel as possibly being from Kates killer....who for the record I dont believe killed any other Canonical women, but may well have been a nefarious local character on his own.

It could have been someone who knew Lusk personally, and thus had a personal motive for sending this particular letter to him. Or Lusk could have gotten someone he knew to obtain the kidney and send it to him along with the letter, in the hopes of becoming more than a minor character in the mix. There are numerous possibilities, any and all of which were surely considered by the authorities at the time, and ultimately it was discarded as a hoax.

[Abby Normal]

Hi Chris,

Well if thats the case they sure picked a minor character in the mix to harass. I personally dont see any reason to consider any of the letters sent in to be from the multiple killer at large, but I do see reasons for considering this particular message with parcel as possibly being from Kates killer....who for the record I dont believe killed any other Canonical women, but may well have been a nefarious local character on his own.

In Kates case, and in no other of these unsolved murders, we have what might be Kate attempting to blackmail who she thought might be responsible for the murders in the area. Thats a motive, as perhaps is the love triangle Mary Jane was in.

Hi MR

Well if thats the case they sure picked a minor character in the mix to harass

agree, why would a hoaxer send to a minor character? if your going through all the trouble to do such an elaborate thing-one would think you would send to a more important source-like the press or police.

now your local avg Joe serial killer sending it to someone local first makes more sense.

for these and many more reasons in all likelihood it came from the killer.
and no-police never came to the conclusion it was hoax. I think the uninformed on here are getting it confused with the Dear Boss.

[Harry D]

agree, why would a hoaxer send to a minor character? if your going through all the trouble to do such an elaborate thing-one would think you would send to a more important source-like the press or police.

Lusk headed up the vigilance committee, who were in the business of patrolling the streets on the lookout for the Ripper. I'm gonna out on a limb and say that some of the local crooks in the neighbourhood didn't appreciate their presence. Lusk was already being stalked, and had a strange encounter with a man in a pub. Seems to me like someone was trying to get at him, but rather than an attention-seeking serial killer, I think it was a conspiracy to intimidate the vigilance committee.

[ChrisGeorge]

Hi Chris,

Well if thats the case they sure picked a minor character in the mix to harass. I personally dont see any reason to consider any of the letters sent in to be from the multiple killer at large, but I do see reasons for considering this particular message with parcel as possibly being from Kates killer....who for the record I dont believe killed any other Canonical women, but may well have been a nefarious local character on his own.

In Kates case, and in no other of these unsolved murders, we have what might be Kate attempting to blackmail who she thought might be responsible for the murders in the area. Thats a motive, as perhaps is the love triangle Mary Jane was in.

Yes but there's no evidence whatsoever that the half a kidney was from Catherine Eddowes. It appears to be more likely that the kidney was sent to give the letter a cachet of authenticity. As Christopher-Michael DiGrazia wrote, it's not even clear that the piece of kidney was human, let alone from the Ripper victim. Major Smith's assertion that the renal artery remaining in the body matched that with the kidney appears unsubstantiated and likely erroneous.

http://www.casebook.org/dissertations/dst-cmdlusk.html

Best regards

Chris