Sweet violets

[David Orsam]

And that is one of the reasons why I am discussing it with you. Perhaps you will make some point to help me realize that all the connections I have found from external data to "Sweet Violets" are spurious.

Well, at least it is worth a try.

Oh yes, "all the connections" you have found from "external data". I must have missed all those connections you found from the external data and only noted a single tenuous and clearly imaginary one.

But okay, well, the first point is that the Times reported that the person who said (on 9 November) that they heard Sweet Violets being sung at 1am lived opposite Kelly. The second point is that the woman who supposedly heard the song being sung at 1am had informed McCarthy of this at some point during 9 November, so McCarthy knew who the woman was. The third point is that Kelly singing at 1am is consistent with Cox's evidence that Kelly was singing continuously for about an hour from midnight.

Given those points, the notion that the killer planted the story in the press is really dead in the water. That's your first problem.

Then we have the fact that there is no obvious reason (and, indeed, no reason at all) for anyone reading the lyrics of Sweet Violets to think of a long forgotten play that had been published nearly 70 years earlier simply because the singer was singing about a woman called Zillah, especially bearing in mind that Zillah was a biblical name (and there weren't many more popular books than the bible!) which was also the name of many women living in England at the time.

Then we have the fact that clearly no-one did make the connection between Sweet Violets and Byron's play which supports my contention that there was no reason for anyone to do so.

But if anyone had thought to themselves "Oh, there's a character called Zillah in Byron's play 'Cain - A Mystery' who discovers the murder of Abel by Cain" they would surely not have thought anything of it because to even begin to consider that there is some sort of connection with Kelly's murder they would have had to have to believed that a woman had discovered the murder of Kelly but, even if that was their interpretation of "oh murder", they would only have thought it was a weak coincidence at best because they would have believed from the newspaper that Kelly sung the song at 1am - and she is hardly likely to have been able to predict that an unknown woman would discover her own murder and cry out "oh murder".

My final point is that for the killer to go to such trouble to insert into the newspapers a puzzle that not only was no-one going to solve but no-one was going to even recognize as a puzzle just does not seem to be in accord with how human beings, even serial killers, behave.

But really Pierre it shouldn't be for me or anyone to explain to you why this is a complete and utter nonsense. It should be for you to convince us that there is some plausibility in what you are suggesting.

[Elamarna]

If you read about closet dramas you will see that they usually are not performed on stage and therefore are not theatrical entertainment.

I did not say theatrical entertainment in my op i said an entertainment,which literature by definition is.

Having claimed it was a "Mystery Play", you now change that,when challenged to a "closet play", moving the goal posts all the time.

But all of that does not matter.

Agreed

The important thing is Zillah. My task now is simply to see now if anyone can find out the function of Zillah in Cain - A Mystery.

Have you not found it then?
If not, how can you even suggest it is significant?

For a hypothesis about the reference of Sweet Violets to the press having been an information from the killer, the lyrics must have an important substantial significance for the killer. If it doesn´t, the correlation is spurious.

Can one ask where this idea comes from? What suggests it to you?

Are you suggesting the killer got her to sing this specific lyric?

Are you suggesting the victim knew this lyric had significance for the killer?

Or are you suggesting the person who reported hearing the song, knew it had a significance and was attempting to lead the authorities?

Are you suggesting the killer made sure this was passed on?

Most interested in your response to those suggestions.

So Zillah must have a meaning, the flowers must have a meaning and the actions described in the lyrics must have a meaning.

Why must it have a meaning other than a name in a song?
There appears to be nothing to suggest it is anything more or do you have hard evidence, you know, historical sources to say otherwise?

I would like to dismiss all that - but when I construct a hypothesis I go all the way with it to test it. Therefore I must at first assume that this is what he did.

No you would not, you say the same every time you go off on one of the beyond science trips.

As Jeff and Pat say, entertaining but not going to lead anywhere or prove anything.
Sorry if i sound less understanding than normal, however this is not scientific at all.
Why not just come to London to get the last piece of information you need as you told me sometime ago you intended to do.

we must understand his world, and then we must understand a bit about 19th Century literature. (I believe that you know a lot about this, and I know very little).

How could we understand a killer in 1888 if we do not understand the cultural world he lived in?

But it was not the cultural world he lived IN.

The Play was published 60 years before and according to you to a limited audience.

Culture moves on, it changes constantly and always has.
In Britain in the 19th century we had the full development of the British Empire, bring great cultural change.
More importantly we had the full blown industrial revolution, changing both life style and culture of the population.
And while major works of literature do stand the test of time, a minor work written in the 1820's has little bearing on the cultural life in the 1880's.

Your failure to understand or at least take this into account fails to demonstrate the historical methods you so often tell us about.

I can only assume, once again that you are desperate to tie in another literary link to your man, whom I assume you can prove knew this work well.


Sorry Pierre


Steve

[MysterySinger]

Where does the statement by Catherine Pickett fit with this theory of Sweet Violets? She was annoyed by Kelly's singing around 12:30 am and was stopped from going to complain by her husband. "she was singing I plucked a violet from my mother's grave".

http://www.casebook.org/press_reports/morning_advertiser/18881112.html

[Mayerling]

Hi Steve, and thank you for noting my my comment and Pat's regarding the "entertainment value" of "Cain".

But again I have to hijack the thread a bit, aided by some further "Wikipedia" research that aims in several directions. Because it does I again question it's total value myself, but I feel obliged to bring it out.

I began looking up Byron, and that led to the article on "Cain" (which refers to the play as a "closet drama"). If you really don't understand the meaning of "closet drama", it means a poem or writing written in the form of dialog, like a play, but it is meant for reading in one's study, not for performing on stage. The best known readable examples are Plato's "Dialogs" (i.e., most of his surviving philosophical works) wherein Socrates is traipsing about Athens, and runs into various figures who will have a discussion on topics he will question them on (usually to show they are wrong or short-sighted).

Most of the poets of the 19th Century tried to write for the stage, and (except for Shelley, whose "The Cenci" has been produced in recent years), fell on their faces. Tennyson actually did get his works on stage, as did Browning, but none became permanent fixtures in dramaturgy - although W.S. Gilbert's spoof of Tennyson's "The Princess", became the basis for his Savoy Opera (not his best by the way), "Princess Ida". Browning's best known drama for the stage was probably, "Pippa Passes" (the opening quadrain actually being worth recalling, as it gave us "God's in his heaven, all's right with the world". It wasn't that these writers were devoid of literary merit, but it was in the form of readable poetry rather than spoken blank verse that they succeeded. The same was true in the 20th Century, where the only poet who succeeded on stage was T.S. Eliot, with "Murder in the Cathedral", and "The Cocktail Party" (but they are revived very infrequently - not so his unexpected musical triumph, "Cats").

The article on "Cain" pointed out some interesting facts. First "Zillah" is both sister and wife of "Abel", and Cain's sister and wife is "Adah". Given the fact that they are from the second generation (in the Old Testament's account of creation) of man, the fact that incest is mixed with marriage is inevitable, as there are only two parents for the human race (one wonders if after Abel's death Zillah will pair up with Abel's replacement brother "Seth" who is not a character here). However, as a side issue to this side issue - how did Byron, accused and loathed in good society for an affair with his half sister, feel about using such relations in his closet drama?

The major influence on "Cain" was John Milton's great poem "Paradise Lost", and "Cain" actually spoofs Milton. In books XI and XII of "Paradise Lost" Milton has an archangel reassure Adam of man's future hope by showing him the coming, ministry, cruxifiction, and resurrection of Christ. Instead, Byron has Lucifer show the existance of extinction (i.e. mass death) to Cain, in the form of the early geological theory of "catastrophism" championed by the leading pre-Darwin geologist of the 19th Century Baron George Cuvier of France. Cuvier concluded that historic mass extinctions of flower and fauna and other life on earth occurred in the recesses of prehistory due to masive disasters. As you can see this is a fairly good guess (that some species would have survived Cuvier was in no position to see), but in the poem the proof is the destruction of mammoths that is witnessed by Cain. The experience is devastating to Cain, and it leads to his eventually killing Abel.

All of this is very interesting as far as culture is concerned - how it relates to what happened in Whitechapel from August to November 1888, or more specifically to the events of Nov. 8-9, 1888 in Miller's Court, is anybody's guess.

However (sorry folks) there are more points.

The article on "Cain" mentions that besides "Paradise Lost" (which is readily available in many editions to read, and enjoy), two other works influenced the writing of the closet drama. One is "A Philosophical Inquiry into the Object of Our Ideas of the Sublime and the Beautiful" by the Rt. Hon., Edmund Burke, M.P. Not quite as well known as his "Reflections on the French Revolution", or his attacks on former Governor General Warren Hastings in the 1770s and 1780s, or his defense of the rights of the American colonists up to 1778 (he did not like our alliance with France), Burke is pretty well recalled as philosopher, statesman/reformer, and founder of modern political conservatism. He too is fairly easily available for reading.

The other one is less so, unless you are into now obscure 18th Century divines. It is William Warburton (1698 to 1779), bishop of Gloucester, and prolific writer. He wrote, "The Divine Legation of Moses". Mercifully I did not look this up. However I noted in his entry in "Wikipedia" two writers on his life and career.

The first is of considerable interest (i.e., it raises one's eyebrown a little): Rev. Dr. John Selby Watson. Selby Watson wrote many books - most are out of print. Twenty five years back I saw his translation of "Polybius" in a "Viking" publication of ancient Greek born historians. He is, unfortunately, best/worst remembered for killing his wife in a fit of anger in 1871, and ending up being sent ('mercifully"?) to Broadmoor as a result. Watson had been a poorly paid schoolmaster (hence his large, pretty dull, literary output), and had lost the post due to old age - without a pension! This led to an argument with his wife (who drank too much) and Watson lashing out at her in a fury - and then trying to hid her body behind some furniture (when that failed he tried suicide, but again failed). His fate was determined in Parliament, where during the discussion they dropped matters to question his translation of some Latin, and whether it was correct (fancy something like that today!). Watson spent the rest of his life in Broadmoor, dying in 1884 of a fractured skull when he fell on the stone floor of his cell from his hammock.

As for the other writer on Warburton, it is another clergyman writer, but one less involved in homicide. It is Rev, Dr, Mark Pattison (1813 - 1884), who was Rector of Lincoln College, Oxford. Pattison was writing from the 1840s onward, and wrote kuves if Stephen Langton, Archbishop of Canterbury (1845), St. Edmund, Archbishop of Canterbury, Isaac Causabon (1554 - 1614), a small essay on Milton (1879), and was working on a book on another divine, "Joseph John Scalinger" when he died. However, his death in 1884 did not prevent some posthumous publications, such as his collection of "Essays" in 1889. One of these was an essay that appeared in the North American Review (Vol. 177, No. 293 (April 1881) on pages 326-331, entitled "The Thing That Might Be". I looked it over before I wrote all this - the essay deals with man and progress, and how science works to guide our actions and thoughts on all matters. The introductory paragraph I recommend to you - it sounds like someone connected to this thread.

Jeff

[Pierre]

Reliability of the Times, David.

[QUOTE=David Orsam;390359]

Oh yes, "all the connections" you have found from "external data". I must have missed all those connections you found from the external data and only noted a single tenuous and clearly imaginary one.

You have not missed anything since they have never been discussed.

But okay, well, the first point is that the Times reported that the person who said (on 9 November) that they heard Sweet Violets being sung at 1am lived opposite Kelly.

No comments.

The second point is that the woman who supposedly heard the song being sung at 1am had informed McCarthy of this at some point during 9 November, so McCarthy knew who the woman was.

Your own hypothesis. Not supported by any data.

The third point is that Kelly singing at 1am is consistent with Cox's evidence that Kelly was singing continuously for about an hour from midnight.

Kelly might not even have sung "Sweet Violets".

Given those points,

Which did not help me to disprove the hypothesis, as I hoped. Have you any more?

the notion that the killer planted the story in the press is really dead in the water. That's your first problem.

No. "Sweet Violets" is the problem. Not the hypotheses about it. Hypotheses come and go. Sources remain.

Then we have the fact that there is no obvious reason (and, indeed, no reason at all) for anyone reading the lyrics of Sweet Violets to think of a long forgotten play that had been published nearly 70 years earlier simply because the singer was singing about a woman called Zillah, especially bearing in mind that Zillah was a biblical name (and there weren't many more popular books than the bible!) which was also the name of many women living in England at the time.

Just because David does not see a tree fall in the woods does not mean it did not fall.

Then we have the fact that clearly no-one did make the connection between Sweet Violets and Byron's play which supports my contention that there was no reason for anyone to do so.

You do actually not know anything about that, since you have no data for it. It is a "nothing happened and therefore nothing happened"-statement. You often make that mistake, David. Lack of sources and you think you can know what happened. I use sources. You use nothing.

But if anyone had thought to themselves "Oh, there's a character called Zillah in Byron's play 'Cain - A Mystery'

But if Hitler had thought "Oh, maybe I should not invade Poland..."

who discovers the murder of Abel by Cain" they would surely not have thought anything of it

...he would surely not have invaded it....

because to even begin to consider that there is some sort of connection with Kelly's murder they would have had to have to believed

because to even begin to consider that there was some sort of possibility for invasion he would have had to believed...

that a woman had discovered the murder of Kelly but, even if that was their interpretation of "oh murder", they would only have thought

that he had discovered Poland but, even if that was his intention, he would only have thought...

it was a weak coincidence at best because they would have believed from the newspaper that Kelly sung the song at 1am -

it was a good idea at best because he would have believed that Poland...

and she is hardly likely to have been able to predict that an unknown woman would discover her own murder and cry out "oh murder".

and Hitler is hardly likely to have been able to predict that the invasion of Poland would cause a world war...

My final point is that for the killer to go to such trouble to insert into the newspapers a puzzle that not only was no-one going to solve but no-one was going to even recognize as a puzzle just does not seem to be in accord with how human beings, even serial killers, behave.

My final point is that for Hitler to go through such trouble to invade Poland and start a world war that was not only expensive but no-one was going to even appreciate it as a meaningful political action just does not seem to be in accord with how human beings, even Reichkanzlers, behave.

AS YOU SEE DAVID: You have written a lot of nonsense about things you know nothing about, since you have no sources for them and can not know anything about whether they WOULD HAVE happened or not! Everything you write here is "would have"-presumptions from you without any sources. As I said, I use sources and you use nothing.

What you have used is your own imagination and nothing else.

But really Pierre it shouldn't be for me or anyone to explain to you why this is a complete and utter nonsense.

No, certainly not, since you are the Master of Nonsense.

It should be for you to convince us that there is some plausibility in what you are suggesting.

Why are you in such a hurry, David?

And now: The answer to your ideas about the Times and McCarthy:

Source:

Times (London)
Saturday, November 10, 1888
ANOTHER WHITECHAPEL MURDER.

The journalist(s) wrote:

None of those living at the court or at 26 Dorset-street, saw anything of the unfortunate creature after about 8 o'clock on Thursday evening, but she was seen in Commercial-street, shortly before the closing of the public house, and then had the appearance of being the worse for drink.

About 1 o'clock yesterday morning a person living in the court opposite to the room occupied by the woman heard her singing the song "Sweet Violets," but this person is unable to say whether any one else was with her at that time. Nothing more was seen or heard of her until her dead body was found.

Conclusion:

This is the first statement about the song Sweet Violets in the Times. It is the earliest reference.

The journalist(s) referred to John McCarthy:

The whole scene is more than I can describe. I hope I may never see such a sight again. . (COMMENT: “I” is referred to three times).

It is most extraordinary that nothing should have been heard by the neighbours, as there are people passing backwards and forwards at all hours of the night, but no one heard so much as a scream. (COMMENT: “I” is not referred to at all).

I woman heard Kelly singing "Sweet Violets" at 1 o'clock this morning. (COMMENT: “I” is not referred to at all.)

So up to that time, at all events, she was alive and well. (COMMENT: “I” is not referred to at all.)

So far as I can ascertain no one saw her take a man into the house with her last night. (COMMENT: “I” is referred to).

Conclusion:

This is the second statement about the song Sweet Violets in the Times. It is not the earliest reference.

Discussion and final conclusion:

In this second reference there is a problem in the text. They have written “I” instead of “A”. Statements referred to, where McCarthy speaks, contain the word I. He is the only one referred to with “I” in the text.

Therefore it is highly probable that the journalist(s) should write a sentence were they refer to McCarthy, which begins with “I”. But instead they wrote about the statement about “Sweet Violets”, where there should not be an “I”.

Therefore, the statement about “Sweet Violets” may not at all refer to a statement by McCarthy. It may be an excerpt taken from their own earliest text where they write about “Sweet Violets”.

“A person” has no gender, so we do not know anything about the gender of that person.

But since all the other papers state that it was “a woman” who informed the press about “Sweet Violets” and not a man, and not McCarthy”, and since the earliest reference in the Times is not to McCarthy, the reliability is higher for the information having been given by “a woman” and not by McCarthy.

This conclusion is therefore the most historically well established hypothesis.

Regards, Pierre

[David Orsam]

Where does the statement by Catherine Pickett fit with this theory of Sweet Violets? She was annoyed by Kelly's singing around 12:30 am and was stopped from going to complain by her husband. "she was singing I plucked a violet from my mother's grave".


http://www.casebook.org/press_report.../18881112.html

That statement doesn't appear to be supported in the link you've provided MysterySinger.

[Pierre]

[QUOTE=Elamarna;390361]

Can one ask where this idea comes from? What suggests it to you?

1. This song was not the song described by Cox. It was not described as having been heard at the same point in time as the song heard by Cox.

2. Did Kelly even sing it?

3. Who was "a woman", telling the press that this song was sung by Kelly?

Are you suggesting the killer got her to sing this specific lyric?

No. Kelly might not even have sung the song "Sweet Violets".

Are you suggesting the victim knew this lyric had significance for the killer?

No. Kelly might not even have known the song. But that is not significant.

Or are you suggesting the person who reported hearing the song, knew it had a significance and was attempting to lead the authorities?

That is a good description.

Are you suggesting the killer made sure this was passed on?

That is also a good description.

Most interested in your response to those suggestions.

Why must it have a meaning other than a name in a song?

Could you explain what you mean by that question, please?

There appears to be nothing to suggest it is anything more or do you have hard evidence, you know, historical sources to say otherwise?

There is a scary match between the reporting of the song Sweet Violets and the external sources.

That is why I am constructing a hypothesis and that is why I try to disprove it.

Regards, Pierre

[David Orsam]

And now: The answer to your ideas about the Times and McCarthy:

Source:

Times (London)
Saturday, November 10, 1888
ANOTHER WHITECHAPEL MURDER.

The journalist(s) wrote:

None of those living at the court or at 26 Dorset-street, saw anything of the unfortunate creature after about 8 o'clock on Thursday evening, but she was seen in Commercial-street, shortly before the closing of the public house, and then had the appearance of being the worse for drink.

About 1 o'clock yesterday morning a person living in the court opposite to the room occupied by the woman heard her singing the song "Sweet Violets," but this person is unable to say whether any one else was with her at that time. Nothing more was seen or heard of her until her dead body was found.

Conclusion:

This is the first statement about the song Sweet Violets in the Times. It is the earliest reference.

The journalist(s) referred to John McCarthy:

The whole scene is more than I can describe. I hope I may never see such a sight again. . (COMMENT: “I” is referred to three times).

It is most extraordinary that nothing should have been heard by the neighbours, as there are people passing backwards and forwards at all hours of the night, but no one heard so much as a scream. (COMMENT: “I” is not referred to at all).

I woman heard Kelly singing "Sweet Violets" at 1 o'clock this morning. (COMMENT: “I” is not referred to at all.)

So up to that time, at all events, she was alive and well. (COMMENT: “I” is not referred to at all.)

So far as I can ascertain no one saw her take a man into the house with her last night. (COMMENT: “I” is referred to).

Conclusion:

This is the second statement about the song Sweet Violets in the Times. It is not the earliest reference.

Discussion and final conclusion:

In this second reference there is a problem in the text. They have written “I” instead of “A”. Statements referred to, where McCarthy speaks, contain the word I. He is the only one referred to with “I” in the text.

Therefore it is highly probable that the journalist(s) should write a sentence were they refer to McCarthy, which begins with “I”. But instead they wrote about the statement about “Sweet Violets”, where there should not be an “I”.

Therefore, the statement about “Sweet Violets” may not at all refer to a statement by McCarthy. It may be an excerpt taken from their own earliest text where they write about “Sweet Violets”.

Oh dear Pierre. If you had been paying attention you would have seen that I explained earlier in this thread that the sentence "I woman heard Kelly singing "Sweet Violets" at 1 o'clock this morning" is a transcription error by the person who transcribed the text on Casebook. In the Times itself, the statement reads "A woman heard Kelly singing "Sweet Violets" at 1 o'clock this morning." So whatever mumbo jumbo you were concluding from this error is false.

Furthermore, your claim that one reference is earlier than another is ridiculous. Both references appeared in the Times on the same day. The order in which they appeared in the newspaper columns was an editorial decision. It's not possible to say whether McCarthy's statement was made earlier than the statement of the individual who informed the Times about "a person" having heard the singing.

I really have no idea what point you want to make about McCarthy's use of the pronoun "I". In respect of Sweet Violets he obviously wasn't talking about himself. He was talking about a woman who had given him this information.

The short point is that the reports in the Times are not consistent with your strange theory that the killer planted the story about Sweet Violets in the press.

[David Orsam]

Kelly might not even have sung "Sweet Violets".

Yes that was the first thing I said in this thread. The similarity of the lyrics of 'A Violet From Mother's Grave' might easily have confused people into thinking she was singing the song 'Sweet Violets'.

But the idea that she might not have sung the song 'Sweet Violets' because the killer planted the story in the press is one stop short of Upney (and if you know your District Line Underground route you will know that one stop short of Upney is Barking).

[David Orsam]

But if Hitler had thought "Oh, maybe I should not invade Poland..."

I don't follow your Hitler parallel I'm afraid. What I was saying was that there is no rational train of thought by which anyone reading the lyrics of Sweet Violets in 1888 would have thought that there could be a connection with an obscure play from nearly 70 years earlier let alone that the obscure play from nearly 70 years earlier could have any connection with the murder of Kelly.

You wanted a "sanity test" Pierre and you've got it.

[David Orsam]

If we follow Pierre's thinking on this issue then Samuel Miller, an umbrella maker who was born in Bethnal Green in circa 1852 and who in 1881 was living in Shoreditch and in 1891 was living in Hackney, has as much if not more chance of being Jack the Ripper than his own shady suspect.

Why?

Because his wife was called Zillah.

Yes, Zillah Miller! Fantastic.

Perhaps his wife was the woman who cried "oh murder!" and cheeky Samuel planted the story about Sweet Violets in the press as a way of taunting the police knowing that someone would surely make the lyrical connection with Byron's famous, sorry obscure, play in which Zillah discovers the brutal murder and mutilation of a woman, sorry, murder of Abel by Cain. It's just so obvious when you think of it....ooops, Pierre doesn't like me using the word "obvious", sorry again.

[GUT]

If we follow Pierre's thinking on this issue then Samuel Miller, an umbrella maker who was born in Bethnal Green in circa 1852 and who in 1881 was living in Shoreditch and in 1891 was living in Hackney, has as much if not more chance of being Jack the Ripper than his own shady suspect.

Why?

Because his wife was called Zillah.

Yes, Zillah Miller! Fantastic.

Perhaps his wife was the woman who cried "oh murder!" and cheeky Samuel planted the story about Sweet Violets in the press as a way of taunting the police knowing that someone would surely make the lyrical connection with Byron's famous, sorry obscure, play in which Zillah discovers the brutal murder and mutilation of a woman, sorry, murder of Abel by Cain. It's just so obvious when you think of it....ooops, Pierre doesn't like me using the word "obvious", sorry again.

CASE CLOSED!!!!!

[GUT]

Wonder if this is the missing data, by the great one?

[Joshua Rogan]

Where does the statement by Catherine Pickett fit with this theory of Sweet Violets? She was annoyed by Kelly's singing around 12:30 am and was stopped from going to complain by her husband. "she was singing I plucked a violet from my mother's grave".


http://www.casebook.org/press_report.../18881112.html

As David said, the article linked to doesn't seem to mention Mrs Pickett hearing the singing, but it does (probably) mention her knocking on Kelly's door in the morning;

"A flower-girl, named Catherine Pickell, residing in Dorset-street, states that at about 7.30 on Friday morning she called at Kelly's house to borrow a shawl, and that, though she knocked several times, she got not answer."

According to the witness section of Casebook;

"Catherine Pickett
Witness (though not called to Mary Jane Kelly's inquest).
Flower seller living in Miller's Court with her husband David. Although not widely quoted in the press, Pickett apparently heard Mary Kelly singing from her room at about 12.30am, 9th November 1888. The singing began to irritate Catherine who decided to go and complain, however she was stoppped by her husband.
"If it hadn't been for my Dave - that's my old man you must know - I should have come out of my room and caught the whitelivered villain! But Dave says to me , you just leave the woman alone so I stopped where I was - worst luck for the poor dear soul! - and goes to bed..."[1]
Later that morning, at about 7.30am, Pickett got up to go to the market; as it was raining and cold, she decided to borrow a shawl off Mary Kelly and knocked at her room, but there was no reply. Assuming Kelly to be asleep, she went on her way.[2]

Apparently, the song Kelly was singing was 'A Violet from Mother's Grave' which was also heard by Mary Ann Cox; it has contributed to the legends of Mary Kelly's last night."

Sadly the only link to a press article in her entry is the one above. Unless anyone can point to another one...?

[MysterySinger]

That statement doesn't appear to be supported in the link you've provided MysterySinger.

You are correct David. How about trying this link to a post on Casebook...

http://www.casebook.org/forum/messages/4926/19145.html