From Hell (Lusk) Letter likely Fake

[lynn cates]

animosity

Hello Stacy. Thanks.

"Were the English known to have some animosity towards the Irish at the time?"

Yes--and conversely.

Cheers.
LC

[ChrisGeorge]

I think it's quite likely that this letter is fake because, if you believe (like me) the 'dear boss' letter is from the real killer, they can't be from the same person as the handwriting is slightly different and the 'dear boss' letter contains much better grammar.
But, then again, the 'dear boss' letter could be fake.

Ah, yes, but a theorist such as Patricia Cornwell, in talking about her suspect, Walter Sickert, has no difficulty in believing that most of the letters were authentic and written by Sickert, who as an artist and actor was able to vary his handwriting.

[Ayailla]

Hi Lynn.

That would be very possible. I have never known somebody be able to 100% replicate an accent without heavy study. It could easily be an English person attempting to pin the blame on an Irish person. Were the English known to have some animosity towards the Irish at the time? It is starting to feel a little like the Juwes situation all over again.

[lynn cates]

put on

Hello Stacy. Thanks.

What if it were an Englishman putting on an Irish accent?

Cheers.
LC

[Ayailla]

The interesting thing is, I just asked my boyfriend what he thought, and he said Scottish!

I think you are right, though. I don't think that this is somebody writing in their own accent, don't get me wrong, but it is somebody trying to emulate an accent and write it out phonetically.

Does anybody think that some kind of IPA transcription would be helpful? I would be more than willing.

Edit: Sorry, Bridewell. I didn't see your post. That was interesting to note. I should not forget that accents and dialects change over time. It is possible that it was more of an Irish thing back then, and it has drifted up into the North since.

I do wonder if the accents we associate with these places was the same in the late 1800s as it is now. I remember studying the accent of a Yorkshire farmer from the 1940s and I couldn't understand a word he was saying.

[ChrisGeorge]

Personally, I think, if the letter was written by an Irish person, they could have been writing phonetically, although, if he was an educated man, what the purpose of this would be eludes me. I could do some research into the Irish accent and transcribe how the letter would sound in the IPA, see if there is a match. I think the use of 'tother' indicates some knowledge of English slang, so it could have been an Irish person who had lived in London for a while.

The way the Lusk letter is written is a put-on. It's written in the accent of a "stage Irishman." Such comic characters were common on the British stage, or as depicted in cartoons in Punch and other satirical magazines. Not politically correct in our age, but common in that era. The writer most probably could spell perfectly well. There's a lot of commonality between the Lusk letter and the Openshaw letter, which is equally badly spelled but in the envelope for which the writer could spell "London Hospital" correctly but wrote "ospitle" in the body of the letter -- the accent apparently being emulated resembling more Cockney than Irish, in comparison with the Irishisms in the Lusk letter.

Best regards

Chris

[Bridewell]

T'other

Personally, I think, if the letter was written by an Irish person, they could have been writing phonetically, although, if he was an educated man, what the purpose of this would be eludes me. I could do some research into the Irish accent and transcribe how the letter would sound in the IPA, see if there is a match. I think the use of 'tother' indicates some knowledge of English slang, so it could have been an Irish person who had lived in London for a while.

I think "t'other" could also have Irish, as well as northern English, derivations. The following link is (I think) to an Irish blog:

http://www.politicalworld.org/showthread.php?p=307986

[Ayailla]

Personally, I think, if the letter was written by an Irish person, they could have been writing phonetically, although, if he was an educated man, what the purpose of this would be eludes me. I could do some research into the Irish accent and transcribe how the letter would sound in the IPA, see if there is a match. I think the use of 'tother' indicates some knowledge of English slang, so it could have been an Irish person who had lived in London for a while.

[Bridewell]

Hi Stacey,

Welcome to Casebook from me also. As Lynn says, much has been made of an apparent Irish flavour to the Lusk Letter, although the word read as 'Sor' is seen by some as 'Sir' but with a superfluous up-stroke at the end. It can, I think, be read either way. As you are a teacher of English - especially if you teach it as a foreign language - it would be interesting yo read your thoughts on it.

[lynn cates]

Irish

Hello Stacy. Welcome to the boards.

Some offer that the speech is meant to emulate an Irish accent. What do you think?

Cheers.
LC

[Ayailla]

Hello, guys.

This is my first post on this forum, and I haven't been looking deeper into the JtR murders for long, so please forgive me if anything I say has already been said, makes no sense, or has already been ruled out by major theorists.

I just wanted to go back to what somebody has said about the possibility that the letter was written by somebody foreign rather than an uneducated man. I think that this is a very distinct possibility.

I am a teacher of English and I have taught a lot of ESOL learners. The letter looks, to me, like somebody foreign (with a basic knowledge of English spelling rules) trying to write the letter phonetically, or even attempting to emulate an accent of some kind. Don't forget that the first rule of teaching somebody to spell is sound it out!

I'll post the transcription of the letter (copied and pasted from the Casebook page).

From hell.
Mr Lusk,
Sor
I send you half the Kidne I took from one woman and prasarved it for you tother piece I fried and ate it was very nise. I may send you the bloody knif that took it out if you only wate a whil longer

signed
Catch me when you can Mishter Lusk

If the letter really does say 'Sor', it could be an emulation of a specific accent. If I read it to myself out loud, it does sound like I am saying 'Sir' in an accent, but I can't place which (I am reminded of an old joke from school where people challenged you to say Beer Can without sounding like a Jamaican person saying Bacon). The lack of the Y in Kidney could also be to signify the accent. Personally, that's how I pronounce the word.

I liked the replications people have produced linking the spelling of 'prasarved' to an irish accent. Are there any other accents it could be linked to?

What I thought was interesting was the use of 'tother'. This doesn't seem like a mis-spelling. I read it as t'other. This is a distinctly northern (even Yorkshire) thing to say (as much as I hate the man, see 'comedian' Michael McIntyre's skit on the northern accent).

The more I look at the letter, the more I feel like it could be somebody foreign attempting to replicate an accent, or they could even be writing it in their own accent, but the inclusion of 'tother' makes me feel like they tried to include slang to convince Lusk that they were, indeed, English born-and-bred.

Now, whether this means that this was a hoax, or whether Jack the Ripper was a foreign man (or woman!), well... I have no freakin' idea. It's just a suggestion on my part. Feel free to refute everything I have said.

- Ayailla (Stacy)

[Bridewell]

I think it's quite likely that this letter is fake because, if you believe (like me) the 'dear boss' letter is from the real killer, they can't be from the same person as the handwriting is slightly different and the 'dear boss' letter contains much better grammar.
But, then again, the 'dear boss' letter could be fake.

Hi Rhiannon,

You're quite unusual in believing the 'Dear Boss' letter to be genuine. What leads you to that conclusion

[Rhiannon]

I think it's quite likely that this letter is fake because, if you believe (like me) the 'dear boss' letter is from the real killer, they can't be from the same person as the handwriting is slightly different and the 'dear boss' letter contains much better grammar.
But, then again, the 'dear boss' letter could be fake.

[John Bennett]

Hi K-453

That would be a good idea if someone can locate the original letter. To the best of my knowledge, no-one knows where it is.

Regards, Bridewell.

As far as I am aware, the original went missing after it was photographed in October 1888. All we have are copies.

One story has it that a Canadian collector claimed to have possession of the original in the 1960s, but this has not been substantiated.

[mariab]

Monty,
I'll wait.

You should have read Rob McLaughlins 2005 book, as he states McDonalds involvement then. Would have saved some research time.

Not exactly, cuz Rob contacted Mc Laughlin, sent him the Mac Donald letter I've located in Lyon, and Mc Laughlin's preparing a second edition of his book, plus researching Mac Donald's papers in DC.

Yes, MJK are copies.

I assume new copies made in the 1950s, while the original ones are not available anymore?