Lusk Letter sent to George Lusk of the vigilante committee

[Doctor X]

Thanks!

--J.D.

[perrymason]

I think Glenn raised a good point when he mentions that the letter lacks the most popular nickname of the area at the moment, yet purports to have something "He who shall not be named" has taken.

I think another interesting fact is the lack of mention of the first killing of the night...one which I personally feel was not committed by HWSNBN anyway. That for me gives it some credibility....a hoaxer would have claimed both and Mrs Browns cut throat if he could....(she was the third woman that Double Event night who got her throat cut).

I think not signing it and not mentioning Stride fits perfectly with the Goulston St evidence...where he leaves a piece of only the Mitre Square murder evidence, and possibly a note on Jews and blame.....considering the site of the first murder is All Jewish, and virtually every witnesses is, and the "blame" might be their (Club steward, and the meetings speaker that night) blaming the Ripper from the first moment they sought help, based solely on a dead woman found inside their gates.

If I may put myself in the "human" part of Jacks shoes and address that situation,... had I finished a murder and upon heading back to the house hear that I'm being blamed for another one too, 45 minutes earlier, because a woman was found dead in the yard of a Jewish Mens Club, I might be inclined to call them liars in some fashion, but not murderers....bad form,... since I am one in this case as well.

I think thats why the GSG message may be real, a real mad killer would probably not damn someone else for killing, ...because he himself kills, and he might believe he's not a bad guy. But he might accuse them of lying.

Cheers all.

[Vigilantee]

What! A trained doctor can't tell a human kidney from an animal kidney, come on! Thats stretching credulity just too far.

Can we? The problem is we do not know the condition of the kidney. "Microscopic examination" means . . . what? Did they section it? Stain it? Or did he just look at it under a low power microscope and say, "yup! Human!"?

Now, to be fair, I think one should speculate it was human unless someone can show that an improperly preserved kidney could appear as a human kidney with glomerulonephritis.

And . . . whilst we speculate . . . since it is described as half of a kidney with a trimmed renal artery, could it be a stolen specimen stuck in spirits for a bit?

Who knows?

This reminds me of any mythic reconstruction--you have to start with some assumptions, and the argument is about as solid as the assumptions.



Raven!!

RAVEN!!!

Yours truly,

--J.D.

[Vigilantee]

Hmmmmm, I'm still not convinced, surely a medical student would know how to preserve something and could steal some medical spirit. Perhaps a porter would be more ignorant. However I dont know how they did things then but I've never seen a medical specimen NOT in preserving fluid, so why not take the correct preservative too. Unless the porter fancied himself as a surgeon when no ones looking.

'Tother' makes sense for Victorian speech, it may even have been a legit word then, but I agree 'signed' is strangely correctly spelt. Whats more strange is that someone who cant spell would actually use the word 'signed' at all. It could be a hoaxing porter, but my moneys on an impoverished immigrant with partial English ability, perhaps copying from a text book....

The kidney had been preserved in wine - not medical spirit - but Swanson concluded in his report that such a kidney could easily be 'obtained from any dead person upon whom a post mortem had been made'.
I am no medical expert and certainly have no experience how to establish the origin of a kidney, but all medical men involved came to the conclusion that it was human. Some of them even went as far as establishing that it was from a human adult or full grown human being. I have no idea how they came to this conclusion but it is a very specified statement.
Openshaw, however, admitted that he could not determine if it was from a woman or a male. And since it had been preserved in wine, he couldn't established how long it's been since it was removed from the body.

Personally I agree with people like Lusk and Swanson that it probably was a hoax by a medical student - several other letters clearly showed that seemingly ordinary and respectable people could go to great lengths and display quite morbid tendencies, just for the sake of the thrill and without any necessary motive. The feeling and excitement of being a part of the police investigation is generally 'motive' enough, plus that some gets the chance to fulfill their inner macabre fantasies. Many of the so called Ripper letters are quite bizarre and morbid, some are laughable while some are more disturbing (if we exclude the kidney many are in their content even more bizarre and revolting than the From hell letter).

The only thing that I really might find compelling and interesting is the fact, that - during a time when most people were very much ispired and taken by the new exciting name Jack the Ripper (and copied ech other and things in the press) - this letter writer chooses to NOT sign the letter Jack the Ripper or give himself another taunting trade name. What he (or she) does, is running his own race and completely doing his own thing.
However, it is no evidence of that the letter might be genuine, only that it's an interesting detail.

As for the spelling mistakes, one must note that although many indicates an Irish (or attempt of Irish) accent, a couple of very difficult words to spell if you have insufficient writing skills - like 'signed' - are correctly spelled. While some spelling errors and the word 'Tother' (possibly a merge of 'the' and 'other') seems constructed and a bit 'over the top'.
But again - we will never know.

All the best

[Doctor X]

What! A trained doctor can't tell a human kidney from an animal kidney, come on! Thats stretching credulity just too far.

Have you ever looked at a human and animal kidney under low magnification?

Have you also read my post?

Yours truly,

--J.D.

[Vigilantee]

So was this what was used at the time to preserve specimens in hospitals, if so it makes sense, and I'd plump for 45% chance porter, 55% chance jack, if not I think we still have a problem....

Hi JD,Spirits of wine seems to have been fairly ubiquitous in Victorian Britain, seemingly only costing a few pennies per bottle. Trawling through the Times between 1840 and 1890, I found that it had many and varied applications.

It was used by practitioners of such humble professions as stick-makers in making varnish. You may recall that Israel Lipski used cheap brandy for the same purpose.

Tin cases, filled with spirits of wine, were used by explorers as portable "cookers" to warm their food. Metal rods or bamboo poles bearing a wad of cotton-wool or similar material, impregnated with spirits of wine, were used as "tapers" to light chandeliers in theatres and concert-halls.

In 1858, some 211,352 gallons of "spirits of wine or pure alcohol" were sold in Britain "for home consumption". That probably means "not exported", by the way - God forbid that it was quaffed around the dinner table!

That's not to say it didn't have its domestic applications - spirits of wine was used in making tinctures of opium, camphor, peppermint (etc) and other weird and wonderful home remedies. The substance was also applied in cleaning and polishing domestic furniture and paintings.

It's clear that the stuff was available to, and commonly used by, more than just doctors and medical students.

[Doctor X]

Next Lesson: you do not have to FULL QUOTE a post.

Just . . . quote the parts you respond too.

--J.D.

[Vigilantee]

But would he identify with his failures, or pretend they never happened?

And unless I'm mistaken on this, wasnt there a Jewish socialist club right near both sites? Could he have tagged on to a little group heading between the two. Between Mrs M going in and D arriving in his cart?

I think Glenn raised a good point when he mentions that the letter lacks the most popular nickname of the area at the moment, yet purports to have something "He who shall not be named" has taken.

I think another interesting fact is the lack of mention of the first killing of the night...one which I personally feel was not committed by HWSNBN anyway. That for me gives it some credibility....a hoaxer would have claimed both and Mrs Browns cut throat if he could....(she was the third woman that Double Event night who got her throat cut).

I think not signing it and not mentioning Stride fits perfectly with the Goulston St evidence...where he leaves a piece of only the Mitre Square murder evidence, and possibly a note on Jews and blame.....considering the site of the first murder is All Jewish, and virtually every witnesses is, and the "blame" might be their (Club steward, and the meetings speaker that night) blaming the Ripper from the first moment they sought help, based solely on a dead woman found inside their gates.

If I may put myself in the "human" part of Jacks shoes and address that situation,... had I finished a murder and upon heading back to the house hear that I'm being blamed for another one too, 45 minutes earlier, because a woman was found dead in the yard of a Jewish Mens Club, I might be inclined to call them liars in some fashion, but not murderers....bad form,... since I am one in this case as well.

I think thats why the GSG message may be real, a real mad killer would probably not damn someone else for killing, ...because he himself kills, and he might believe he's not a bad guy. But he might accuse them of lying.

Cheers all.

[Vigilantee]

Oh like the internet is running out of space.

Next time I'll double it up just for that....

Next Lesson: you do not have to FULL QUOTE a post.

Just . . . quote the parts you respond too.

--J.D.

[Sam Flynn]

Hmmmmm, I'm still not convinced, surely a medical student would know how to preserve something and could steal some medical spirit

No need for a medical student/porter to steal it - spirits of wine was used by many people in many walks of life.

[perrymason]

To address your points addressed to me Vigilantee,..the site of the first murder was on International Mens Club property, a primarily Jewish socialist club, and Lawende, Harris and Levy I believe had just left the Imperial Club, when encountering who we think was Kate Eddowes and an unknown man.

As far as identifying with his failures, that had nothing to do with my post, as I had suggested he was re-directing blame upon those that must have killed Liz......the Mitre killer knowing where she was found,.. and that he didnt kill her. The only off-site artifacts that turn up from the Double Murder night are the apron piece, and the alledged Eddowes kidney section with From Hell. A single murder referenced. And if the grafitto refers to Jews, and was written by a Mitre killer who is Gentile, you can be fairly certain the word "blame" is not insignificant when interpreting it.

Interesting notion of having him joining some sort of Jewish Caravan from Berner to Mitre before Diemshutz arrives, and still assume that this is Jack the Ripper. Surely the ONLY reason to still include Liz is if her killer was interrupted by Diemshi(u)tz....something that is by senior medical opinion at the scene, on time of throat cut, impossible.

I dont believe this Ripper fellow that youve got pegged can be reasonably attributed to even one "failed" killing during that period. Considering that his real target is almost certainly the midsections of his victims.

Liz had her throat cut so that she would die, end of story. And if thats a representation of what you believe to be a Jack the Ripper killing, thats your prerogative. But the way I see these, This Ripper guy wants what comes after the throat cut.

[Vigilantee]

No need for a medical student/porter to steal it - spirits of wine was used by many people in many walks of life.

I just meant if he steals the kidney from the morgue (cos he cant get it anywhere else) why not take the juice too? What else does he carry it in?

[Vigilantee]

To address your points addressed to me Vigilantee,..the site of the first murder was on International Mens Club property, a primarily Jewish socialist club, and Lawende, Harris and Levy I believe had just left the Imperial Club, when encountering who we think was Kate Eddowes and an unknown man.

Right, whose Dutfield by the way?

The only off-site artifacts that turn up from the Double Murder night are the apron piece, and the alledged Eddowes kidney section with From Hell. A single murder referenced. And if the grafitto refers to Jews, and was written by a Mitre killer who is Gentile, you can be fairly certain the word "blame" is not insignificant when interpreting it.

I doubt that he wrote it. The only reason they thought that was because it was said to be 'fresh', but that seems to relate to the assumption that had it been there long it would have been removed, which isnt necessarily true if it wasnt a Jewish neighbourhood. Another witness said it was blurred, which as its unlikely the first cop would have touched it means it was either old and someone had tried erasing it, or Jack had tried erasing it, perhaps with the apron. Either way this would indicate he didnt write it, but did stop there.

Interesting notion of having him joining some sort of Jewish Caravan from Berner to Mitre before Diemshutz arrives, and still assume that this is Jack the Ripper. Surely the ONLY reason to still include Liz is if her killer was interrupted by Diemshi(u)tz....something that is by senior medical opinion at the scene, on time of throat cut, impossible.

Someone may have disturbed him yes, perhaps the man with the black bag who Mrs M saw go past just before 1am. He looked at club, maybe he heard Jack or the (hypothetical) people about to leave. Either of these could have disturbed Jack, the fast footsteps of the bag man or the people leaving (the footsteps Mrs M heard?).

Liz had her throat cut so that she would die, end of story. And if thats a representation of what you believe to be a Jack the Ripper killing, thats your prerogative. But the way I see these, This Ripper guy wants what comes after the throat cut.

Yes thats how he starts, asphyxiation or strangulation, then throat cut on ground, then he gets interrupted.

[Sam Flynn]

Hi Vigilante,

I just meant if he steals the kidney from the morgue (cos he cant get it anywhere else) why not take the juice too? What else does he carry it in?

It'll stay fresh for a good few hours after liberating it from the body - no need to steal the juice as well. Besides - no morgue necessary: it might have been a pig's kidney.

[perrymason]

".....Right, whose Dutfield by the way?"

I have little information on him but I understand he is the former owner of the property. The name was never erased.

"I doubt that he wrote it."

That is the majority position I believe.

".... this would indicate he didnt write it, but did stop there."

There is no doubt that the killer from Mitre Square was there in the entranceway to the Model Dwellings, but when, and whether the juxtaposition of the writing is happenstance, is in doubt.

"Someone may have disturbed him yes, perhaps the man with the black bag who Mrs M saw go past just before 1am. He looked at club, maybe he heard Jack or the (hypothetical) people about to leave. Either of these could have disturbed Jack, the fast footsteps of the bag man or the people leaving (the footsteps Mrs M heard?)"

Dr Blackwell arrived with a watch at 1:16am. He examined the woman, and declared that she was cut as recently as 20 minutes earlier, but no later than 1/2 hour. That has Goldstein seen walking past at the latest of those 2 times, and a full 4 minutes ahead of Diemshutz's arrival time. There was no interruption in Dutfields Yard....and Liz's demeanor in death says it all. There was a murder...of a woman seen assaulted by a witness approx 1 to 11 minutes before she is cut.... once.

Or, we could split Blackwells estimate.... to be fair, after all why should it happen at the very latest of those estimates. So say 25 minutes earlier. Still interrupted?....or is he deciding.

Regards