The from hell letter

[Marlowe]

Hi all,

Even if it was a hoax...it wasn't a hoax!!!

The "Stop Time" and "From Hell" communications contain too much "knowledge". One thing is for certain -- they are clearly linked to one another by their symbolism. What is implied was not well known back then. Even today, most people would have no idea why the letter is unsigned or why the kidney was divided in half. Perhaps a priest or exorcist had a hand in the construction of "From Hell"...but only a "hand"...

Ever wonder why Jack was so happy that Lusk was frightened? Trust me, you don't want to know....


Marlowe (back to fixing a "rip" in the Space-Time Continuum)

[Sam Flynn]

Then, gentlemen, feel free to run a Google image search of your own.

I recommend, instead, that you go to your local market, and look at some real kidneys there. There are clearly some weird kidneys on Google.

[Dave James]

Letter analysis

Hi all,
This thread is getting really interesting. Here are my latest musings for your consideration.
I’ve been going through some old notes regarding the ‘From Hell’ letter and found this. You are all probably aware of it, but….
In 1968, Canadian graphologist C M McLeod analysed the letters and concluded that the ‘From Hell’ letter was genuine. The results were published in the Criminologist that year. What interested me were some of the conclusions regarding the sender.
He would be a ‘Hale fellow and well met’ type of person who liked to eat and drink.
He would attract the type of women that were his victims by animal magnetism, but was probably a latent homosexual yet passed as a ‘man’s man’, one of the boys, chauvinistic, with the ‘women are only there to be used and discarded’ attitude.
McLeod proposed that the killer could be a coach driver, someone who had a legitimate reason for being anywhere at any time. In other words he was one of the ‘invisible people’, the ones who are seen but not noticed, policemen, doctors etc.
I also found some notes of my (amateur) analysis of the letter, of the language used and spelling. The writing itself is in an educated hand which stands out against the so called spelling mistakes. It doesn’t look just like a schoolboy hand.
The spelling and vernacular(s) seem forced – Sor, Mishter (Irish?). Tother (North of England t’other).
Unobvious spelling mistakes – Kidne, surely this would have been kidny? The same with Knif more obviously nife? Then there is Whil which to my mind would have been more likely to be wile.
I know that it has been proposed several times that the writing is disguised, but to me it seems that when this letter was composed, a lot of thought went into the subject matter but the writer wasn’t familiar with vernacular and illiterate spelling (or not spelling).
I don’t claim to be an expert on this, but I did work for five years with disadvantaged unemployed youngsters, so I came across quite a lot of ‘unusual’ spelling. (Also, if it wasn’t for spellcheck and auto correct, god knows what my own writin wud luk lyk).
All the best
Dave

[claire]

I think it was actually preserved in spirits of wine ("rectified spirit"), Claire - which had more than just medical applications at the time. Whilst it was hardly a "domestic" substance, it wasn't exactly hard to come by - even if this wasn't the case, then that just tells us about the liquor in which the piece of kidney was preserved, and little about the kidney itself.

Thanks for the clarification ...my point, though, wasn't the availability of the preserving liquid according to someone's possible profession/occupation, but rather that someone took the trouble to preserve it at all. Nevertheless, it's a bit moot for me, since there's little really to suggest that the whole package came from the killer.

[DVV]

Well, me for a start, Dave - and I'm happy to stand by it. I believe that some medics may have suggested the same at the time, but I won't swear by it. Even Major Smith, for what it's worth, says that some "solons" (doctors) wrote saying that the kidney could have been that of a dog, but my money's on a pig.

Hi Sam,

that's the problem I have regarding the "pig solution".
The possibilty of a hoax has been seriously considered in 1888.
Thus if a pig and a human kidney are so similar, how comes that neither Openshaw nor Brown etc, did suggest that it could easily be a pig's kidney ?
Why do we hear about dogs, medical students, etc, but not about pigs ?

Amitiés,
David

[claire]

Dave, I think your points about the unusual spelling are interesting, and pertinent. To me, as you imply, they don't look like 'natural' or instinctive misspellings, but are an approximation, an impression of poor English prepared by someone who was trying to disguise his own literacy. This, to me, is interesting, as we might naturally assume that the killer, in sending the kidney (were it authentic) and the accompanying letter, is in some way attempting to reveal himself. The deliberate (or what look to me to be deliberate) misspellings indicate quite the opposite: someone trying to conceal themselves.

Not, of course, that this necessarily rules the package out as a hoax: clearly the perpetrator would wish to continue concealing himself, but it is quite unusual to find the intent so at odds with the execution. That said, if one looks at a corpora of communications by killers, they often attempt to sound like someone else (either the victim, if they are trying to conceal the offence, which clearly wasn't the case here), or another person that they are trying to put in the frame.

Personally, I tend to the view that the package was sent by someone who believed they knew the identity of the killer, was savvy enough to send it to Lusk (possibly with the belief that Lusk would also be in a position to form some views about that), and seized on the opportunity that the information about Eddowes' missing kidney to make the whole communique look more authentic.

[lynn cates]

Irish

Hello Claire. I agree that those spellings are an oddity. I believe Gareth considers them an approximation of something like "stage Irish." That is, the kind of Irish a Yank might use when aping an Irish character.

Perhaps you might ask him?

The best.
LC

[KatBradshaw]

It certainly does have an 'Oirsh' feel to it. Like someone trying to sound Irish. That being said doesn't mean its not an Irish person writing it phonetically.
I have to say that of all the letters this is the one I think could be by the Ripper.
The trouble is that as with all of these we will never prove its authenticity or not.
For me the fact that it does not used the moniker 'Jack the Ripper' is interesting as this does appear to be adopted by other cranks after the 'Dear Boss' letter. Could it have been Eddowes Kidney, well if it was preserved then I guess so. Would the killer give away one of his trophies though? If he took these for excitement or personal gain in some way, why post it to Lusk? It may be intended to prove the letter is real but then again it seems strange that he would let it go. Does anyone know of any other cases where killers did this?

[DVV]

Wild wild wild speculation

That is, the kind of Irish a Yank might use when aping an Irish character.

LC

Fleming and Mary.

Amitiés,
David

[lynn cates]

Brits

Hello DVV. Those guys were proper Brits right enough--weren't they?

The best.
LC

[claire]

Hi Lynn,

I seem to recall Gareth saying something like this at some point in the dim and distant. Beyond the stage Oirish, though, there are other odd spellings (like Dave pointed out before--Kidne, knif et c) that don't have any regional oddities (obviously) attached to them...possible, of course, that they were genuine misspellings.

Hi David,
Fleming and Mary...what are you implying??? (if anything)

[KatBradshaw]

Hello DVV. Those guys were proper Brits right enough--weren't they?

The best.
LC

What do you mean by proper Brits Lynn?

[lynn cates]

Brit/Yank

Hello Kat. Well, I mean only they weren't Yanks.

The best.
LC

[KatBradshaw]

Ahhh, no, not Yanks.

[lynn cates]

conditional proposition

Hello Kat. So if the letter were written by a Yank impersonating an Irishman (a huge IF), it would not be those chaps.

The best.
LC