Is this a realistic theory?

[Ben]

Hi Mike,

Even if one were to address the victims strictly in isolation, you'd discern a similar pattern with regard to the "knowledge" evinced by the mutilations in each case. Polly Nichols' murderer was never described as skilful, either with the knife or in terms of his anatomical knowledge, and only one out of four examining medical experts thought that the Eddowes mutilations betrayed anatomical knowledge.

Best regards,
Ben

[jonwilson]

I believe these mutilations were carried out within a short period of time and in near darkness conditions. Some doctors said Jack had medical and surgical knowledge and others didn't. Donald Rumbelow (ripper expert) believed that Jack had some knowledge. Supposedly, these removal or the organs are taking place within a short period of time and in near darkness conditions. This is what I heard anyways.

[jonwilson]

Did Jack the Ripper have medical knowledge?
Added: 2003-03-13 17:55:25

The idea that the Ripper may have had some level of medical knowledge is derived from the fact that, in some cases, certain organs were removed from the bodies of his victims. Some doctors believed they detected medical precision in his cuts – others claimed he had no training whatsoever, not even that of a butcher.

There is no standard answer to this question, unfortunately. It would seem likely that the killer had at least some rudimentary understanding of anatomy, to have been able to remove both the uterus and a kidney in near pitch-black conditions. Whether that understanding came from a medical background, or from experience as a butcher, it is difficult to say for sure.

[Reynard]

Ben, you question the partial severence of the carotid artery. But think about this, even if a doctor knew where to cut, that doesn't mean that he would every time.

Do you remember that she had blood on her right hand, a lot of it. From what the doctor's could see, what probably happened was that the killer grabbed Stride, maybe from behind, and struck at the neck. The blood on her hand could have come from her grabbing her neck after that one blow. She was killed standing up.

In the game I plaued all of this was deduced and there was a comment that Jack might have anticipated a bit more trouble from Stride so he changed tactics a bit. I can see why, wasn't Stride supposed to be tall, like 5'7"? He took her by suprise from behind in a manner that would ensure the least amount of struggle or create complications.

With the other two previous victims, he hadn't done so because he was able to strangle or partially strangle them.

But like I said before I liked the idea of Jack having at least some level of anatomical knowledge since he did everything in the dark and human night vision is basically only good for peripheral vision. I just didn't know if an East Ended could get a job like that.

Perrymason, I was hoping to include social information, I always love that in a story. Don't worry, I never had a curly mustache in mind (If I had the victims would die by being tied to train tracks ). I also didn't have a top hat in mind, though I am finding it difficult to get rid of the mental picture of one.

You know, with all this conversation going on it makes me want to let the whole thing out. Do you guys want to hear everything or would you rather not know?

[tnb]

Reynard - I am pleased to hear you appreciate (and seemingly didn't need) my 'warnings' about the perils of the sinister, top hat, moustache etc charicatures, and are already thinking along the social detail lines. Very pleased indeed. Even if you did attribute my comments to Michael (perrymason)! :-)

Only you know whether you are comfortable and ready to 'let the whole thing out'. One practical point I would make is to be aware of the vagaries of copyright on internet message boards, etc. I am not suggesting anyone here would rip you off - but bear in mind anyone can read these boards even if they are not a member, and as you have seen a great deal of aspiring writers no doubt do so in the course of their research. It is an old fashioned tactic but perhaps print out whatever you are going to post first, sign it and send it to yourself with a dated slip from the post office, and wait for it to arrive before posting anything on here. Like I said, I doubt anything untoward would happen but it may just make you sleep easier at night. It really is up to you though - even with the best copyright lawyer in the world, if someone takes the ideas of your piece and writes something similar but not identical, rather than stealing lines wholesale, it will be very hard in such a saturated field with so much inevitable crossover anyway to argue any kind of intellectual rights.

If you choose to do so, post it in the 'creative writing' section rather than here, as I'm sure you would have figured out anyway.

If you do decide to then I for one will certainly be both interested and more than willing (if you want) to give you any constructive feedback I can.

One comment re. Stride - I accept that serial killers may change tactics out of necessity, human nature or whatever (usually still within a recognised pattern) and that if 'Jack' (if he did even kill Stride, welcome to a world of a thousands ifs and maybes!) did find Liz put up more of a fight than he had expected then he may have been forced to 'change tactics' as you suggest, but I would not think it likely that he would have attacked her if he ANTICIPATED 'a bit more trouble' from her. Serial killers, like burglars, are very good assessors of risk, and just as a burglar will pass by a house with an interior light on, or a barking dog, or an alarm system, in favour of the dark, quiet house just down the street, I can't see that if the killer thought 'she's a bit tall, might be a handful' that he would have gone to the danger of initiating an attack, given the large number of other potentially easier prey within likely less than a few minutes walk.

Unless they are deliberately targeting one house, victim or whatever that is; but that is a whole other debate!

Isn't it amazing that after all these years the question of medical knowledge can STILL kick off so much debate? Personally I have always come down on the 'no' side, and feel that the various doctors and other officials who felt knowledge was evident (and let's not forget that many didn't) were biased by their own knowledge and practices. To put it frankly, any incision can be described in specific medical terms and when done so can appear to the 'layperson' to sound like an impressive, deliberate surgical wound; similarly, to a doctor used to performing abodminal surgery removing a uterus may be a tricky, time consuming process (he is concerned that the patient will live afterwards for instance) but to a man unconcerned with the hows and the whys of his actions it may be a damn sight less difficult, as he is not setting himself the same standards. Does that make sense? One man's wild slash puncturing something squishy is another man's 3 inch incision running from the anterior margin of the peritoneum and dividing the bladder wall at a 45 degree angle, for example. To a doctor that may suggest a specific operative technique, that does not mean the killer had the same intent in mind or would even recognise the terms. When I look at the evidence 'cold' I see little evidence of genuine knowledge or skill. I say this with a little surgical experience (not performing it, mind you) and a good working knowledge of the ways in which doctors minds work - which in many ways doesn't seem to have changed much since the Victorian age!

Michael - the amount of detail in the newspaper reports at the time (the sensitive Victorians, eh?) has crossed my mind before too with regard to just how much 'rough' medical knowledge the avid reader could have picked up via the press. Glad to see I am not the only one to have considered the point. Have you read Dan Norder's dissertation where he proposes that the murderer (if indeed there was only one) may have been in a way 'copycatting' his own developing legend in the newspapers? I would be interested to hear your opinions.

I think Lynn etc are opening up an important debate, however. At least 3 of the 'canonical 5' have gone unchallenged for too long, and while I may not be quite convinced enough to jump on the bandwagon yet I look forward to reading more...

One final thought Reynard - download the Tumblety podcast, there is some fascinating stuff on there about how he started out as something akin to a 'doctor's assistant' and exactly what kind of duties the role included (everything down to sweeping the floor, apparently).

[Ben]

Hi Reynard,

Ben, you question the partial severence of the carotid artery. But think about this, even if a doctor knew where to cut, that doesn't mean that he would every time.

Yes, but why wouldn't he?

If the killer was a doctor who knew about the carotid artery, why only sever part of it? One could argue that Dr. Jack misfired a bit on account of Stride's struggling, but it's nowhere near as simple or as logical an explanation as an inexperienced killer who slashed at the throat and only managed to cut part of the crucial artery. If she was killed standing up, one would expect evidence or aterial spray, but none was recorded.

An ability to perform mutilations in the dark is not an indication of anatomical knowledge, since doctors are accustomed to working methodically, not at speed, and in good lighting conditions.

Best regards,
Ben

[perrymason]

Hi Mike,

Even if one were to address the victims strictly in isolation, you'd discern a similar pattern with regard to the "knowledge" evinced by the mutilations in each case. Polly Nichols' murderer was never described as skilful, either with the knife or in terms of his anatomical knowledge, and only one out of four examining medical experts thought that the Eddowes mutilations betrayed anatomical knowledge.

Best regards,
Ben

Hi Ben,

Happy Holidays mate... by the way!

In the summation at the Nichols Inquest the Coroner ties the probable motives for her death and the method with which she was dispatched as being of the same character and focus as Annies murder showed, and that he felt based on Phillips remarks concerning the level of skill shown with Annie, which was evident to Phillips in this reply to whether he thought any knowledge was shown..."I think there was. There were indications of it. My own impression is that that anatomical knowledge was only less displayed or indicated in consequence of haste. The person evidently was hindered from making a more complete dissection in consequence of the haste."

The eerie similarity between the murders of Polly and Annie suggest the same killer, and he didnt just suddenly get his knowledge between those 2 murders. But we can say with authority that Bucks Row was a far more dangerous location.

The kidney that Kate has removed was said to have been done so "skillfully", and in conversation with an Internal Medicine practitioner I learned that this type of surgery under those kinds of conditions almost assures that he had some skill and knowledge.

No skills or knowledge was required to kill Liz, and the only thing reminiscent of the earlier murders in the case of Millers Court is the repetition of the skin flaps that were used to access Annies abdomen, something that had been in print several times in September.

My best regards mate

[Ben]

Hi Mike,

Happy holidays to you too!

Firstly, I'd exercise extreme caution when contemplating the "theory" proferred by Wynne Baxter with regard to the killer's motive. It was quickly dispensed with by the British Medical Journal who observed that the organs-for-profit hypothesis was no longer entertained by its original author, which could only have been Baxter himself. Phillips was of the controversial opinion that Chapman and Eddowes fell victim to different killers - a view so likely to be wrong that it cannot help but tarnish any serious consideration of his suggestion that a skilled doctor performed the Chapman eviscerations.

The kidney that Kate has removed was said to have been done so "skillfully"

But only one of the doctors who examined Eddowes thought so. The other three did not detect any skill, and one of them, Dr. Sequeira, suggested that the killer could have stumbled across the kidney without knowing what it was.

Have a great Christmas!

Ben

[Phil Carter]

Hello Ben, Happy hols to you, and all,

I am no expert in any way on this, but I was told the following many years ago during a conversation with a surgeon.... that trying to locate and extract a kidney, in the dark, or poor light, in a hurry, must be quite a job, because the kidney is covered in a tissue that makes it very difficult to find when the cut is from the front of the body.

I cannot verify that statement, I only repeat it. If true, and the light in the street in Mitre Square has, in other threads here, been shown to be at best minimal, then I would say that unless Jack was very very lucky (a la Sequiera)... he knew what he was doing. That, to me, indicates medical knowledge.

best wishes

Phil

[perrymason]

Hi again mate,

On the first section of your reply,...I actually wasnt referring to the questionable reason Baxter suggests the killer wanted to obtain organs, only that in Annie's case even a layman can see the ultimate objective was the postmortem activities. I believe he was correct in assuming that Polly would have looked just like Annie if the venue had been a better choice.....something that indicates at least to me that he was "inexperienced" before Mary Ann.

I agree with the wobble room on Kate,...and that is one reason why I state often that the first 2 murders seem to have been connected by the killer, and the 4th victim seems to have used the identical methodology used in the first 2 murders. I personally feel that Kate may have been "bait"...used by the Police. One explanation for her turning left out of the police station is that she was going to meet with someone rather than heading to look for John who according to him, she sleeps with almost every night.

My best regards Ben

[Ben]

Hi Phil,

I am no expert in any way on this, but I was told the following many years ago during a conversation with a surgeon.... that trying to locate and extract a kidney

But that's if he was specifically targetting a kidney. I don't believe he was. I share Sequeira's inference that he was probably just fumbling around in the darkness for something of interest and alighted upon a kidney in the process. Neither luck nor knowledge would have been required for such an expedient. The fact that the kidney wasn't accessed from the back for simplicity's sake is another indicator that it wasn't specifically targetted as an organ of preference. The "darkness" issue has always struck me as a red herring as far as supposed "knowledge" goes, since doctors are neither trained or encouraged to locate specific organs by touch in poor lighting conditions.

Fundamentally, though, Brown's attribution of skill to Eddowes' killer was still a minority-endorsed opinion.

Best regards,
Ben

[perrymason]

Ben there is one huge flaw with the perception that he "accidentally" finds the organs he takes....in Kates case he had to literally dig through her midsection to get at her kidney,..... (which is not as easy to locate as you might think...especially in the pitch black),... which contain plenty of things he could have taken easier..including the uterus.

Considering that this killer likely had no more than 6 or 7 minutes total time carving a woman in the dark after getting her to the location and fully subduing her..and considering in this case he takes extra time to cut and rip her apron.....I would think he either grabs the first thing he can grab if he is the type of man you suggest,...which would not be her left kidney, ...or he gets what he wanted to get with time to spare.

I think the evidence shows the second option seems to be most accurate.

Best regards Ben

[Ben]

I disagree, Mike.

We're not talking about a huge array of evisceral options here, but rather a very small region encompassing a petite woman's torso and abdomen. Once the abdominal cavity had been emptied of the intestines and uterus, it wouldn't have been particularly difficult to chance upon a kidney after further fumblings. If he was intent upon cannibalism, like other serial killers who have harvested body parts, then a plausible case can be advanced that he reached around for something both solid and easily transportable - the liver and intestines being too large and conspicuous for concealment.

I would think he either grabs the first thing he can grab if he is the type of man you suggest,...which would not be her left kidney, ...or he gets what he wanted to get with time to spare.

Again, it depends what purpose he had for the organs. It could also have been an exploratory process, reaching around inside the abdominal cavity out of perverted and morbid curiosity, perhaps with the intention of "improving" upon his earlier explorations of Chapman's innards. If so, his behaviour would be quite consistent with that of his serialist successors.

Best regards,
Ben

[perrymason]

I disagree, Mike.

We're not talking about a huge array of evisceral options here, but rather a very small region encompassing a petite woman's torso and abdomen. Once the abdominal cavity had been emptied of the intestines and uterus, it wouldn't have been particularly difficult to chance upon a kidney after further fumblings. If he was intent upon cannibalism, like other serial killers who have harvested body parts, then a plausible case can be advanced that he reached around for something both solid and easily transportable - the liver and intestines being too large and conspicuous for concealment.



Again, it depends what purpose he had for the organs. It could also have been an exploratory process, reaching around inside the abdominal cavity out of perverted and morbid curiosity, perhaps with the intention of "improving" upon his earlier explorations of Chapman's innards. If so, his behaviour would be quite consistent with that of his serialist successors.

Best regards,
Ben

Hi Ben,

The one thing I would never agree to is that whomever killed Kate Eddowes, her killer wasnt just "exploring". Its too much to accept that he "skillfully" excises an organ he had no experience with and one he happened upon. I can accept that Jack may have done this or even someone with some similar knife skills and anatomy background, but not an ill informed "newbie" without some skill.

And Annies uterus was taken "cleanly"....those 2 acts could perhaps be duplicated by someone with no experience and no knowledge, but not outdoors, not in the dark, and not in what some experts believed was in short order. And not under the extremely stressful situations the killer was in at those times.

Best regards again Ben...and fair warning...Im not the pit bull Fisherman is, so if I cant get you to accept the terms the contemporary medical men themselves suggest about the operations performed on at least those 2 women....I will consider you a lost member of the flock, and let this go with my good wishes.

[Ben]

Hi Mike,

Again, I can't stress enough the fact that the supposed "skill" evinced by the Eddowes eviscerations was only detected by one out of four examining medical professionals. Phillips, Sequeira and Saunders did not detect any skill, leaving Brown effectively outnumbered. I go with the majority in this case. The killer certainly wouldn't have been a "newbie" in the strictest sense, since his earlier victims would have afforded him at least some experience with both the knife and the female body.

The ability to perform quickly in the dark is not an indicator of professional experience for the simple reason that no professional doctor or butcher is ever trained or encouraged to rush through the process in darkened conditions, and as far as the Chapman murder is concerned, I would reiterate the caution I urged earlier. Considering that Phillips was almost certainly in error in assigning Eddowes and Chapman to different killers, it's more than possible that the inordinate amount of skill he attributed to Chapman's killer could have been equally errant.

Reciprocal good wishes!

Ben