The GSG - Did Jack write it? POLL

[Monty]

Michael,

Most carried them upon their belts until required.

Monty

[perrymason]

Michael,

Most carried them upon their belts until required.

Monty

Hi Monty,

I know the lantern design, and I would guess that few would want that heat right against their waist and/or upper leg for too long. I also know they offered very poor light overall, so my "between the lines" suggestion that he had the lantern at arms length when passing dark entranceways isnt to say I feel the light it would cast would certainly be enough to have spotted the apron section had it been there the first pass by after Kates murder. I do feel he would have had it extended at arms length into the darkness when passing a dark entrance though.

The records,... if accurate as they are..., suggest that there was perhaps some 70 minutes between the taking of the apron section and the discarding of it off Goulston. I think that alone suggests that the apron wasnt casually discarded. If not casually, then purposefully. If purposefully, the how can a message so close to it be considered unconnected? If connected, then it stands to reason the message concerns the Stride murder, as the apron section absolutely only addressed the Mitre Square murder. Considering the scenario and the lack of Ripper like mutilation in the case of Stride,...Id say he was right, on that night, "The Jewes/Juwes/Juewes are the men that will not be blamed for nothing". Because the circumstances even using the club members statements verbatim, left it quite possible that her murderer came from inside the yard...therefore, possibly from one of the Socialist European Jews that was inside at the very moment, drunk and singing. Considering that according to Anderson, the investigations door to door in his absence revealed that the killer of Polly, Annie and perhaps Martha was most probably a poor local European Jew, ....they dodged a real bullet by putting Ripper spin into the Stride story they told....I believe in part thanks to a theatrical looking Hungarian, a "passer-by".

All the best Monty...and have fun at the Conference next month, looking forward to hearing about it.

Cheers mate

[Fictionnaire]

First time poster here... Think I'm redeveloping my interest in the Jack The Ripper killings. Doing some watching and reading while trying to not take things at face value. First off... This is a great site. Just a couple of questions.

Does the "Juwes" refer to the Jews. Possibly from a bad speller or someone pretending to be a bad speller. Or is it a family name?

And I'm not at all certain if the graffito has anything to do with Jack The Ripper.

Again, I'm thankful to this site. I'm writing a fictional story about Jack The Ripper for entertainment. And found this very informative and actually better than any part of it that I've read before.

[swagman]

Hi. I've just landed on this old thread like yourself. My vote is instinctively is YES, he did write the GSG.
The issue of the spelling of Jews / Jewes raises many questions. Here's a couple to get things going again.

a) It could mean 'Jews' and is incorrectly spelt. If so, this raises a debate on how educated the killer was. Is it likely that he wouldnt know the correct spelling of such a common word ? If you favour a paricular suspect then this is a question to ask yourself.

b) The spelling could be correct and refer to the masonic JEWES. I'm not an expert on this but believe there is reference to the 'Jewes' being three priests who were responsible for the murder of the high-priest in Masonic mythology - Can anybody expand on this in the context of the GSG.

I also note that a couple of posts ask the question as to why the killer would leave graffiti in GS and then not again - I agree that someone with a desire to write graffiti would show a tendency to do so again and again.

This got me thinking of the graffiti written on the walls of William Bury's house in Dundee...... Bury also had a Masonic ring on him when he was hanged..

[perrymason]

In the most simple terms possible, what can be made of such a message when it is found in a location that all the Jewish tenants of the Model Homes would see...some 80-90% of the total resident number there, and suggests some blame has been evaded by "Juewes/Juwes/Jewes".....

For me it suggests that the author was not a Jew, for one. Misspelling aside, the location seems to me to rely on the traffic that would pass by to deliver the message to the intended parties....in this case, I believe that was Jews,....because of the overwhelming numbers of them, comparatively, at that location. It was noticeable as you went through the entranceway on the dado,... it did not face the street directly, but to the person passing through there. That to me suggests it was directed at the people who would walk through there.

If this was a message from the guy who left the apron, perhaps a note from him to the anarchists who placed the "blame" on the kill on their property on Jack immediately...them my bet is someone identifiable and connected with the Club resided in those dwellings, and Jack knew that. The apron is in lieu of a signature.

Its telling them that HE knew what happened, and who they blamed. Its probably a threat.

Cheers all

[Lemonburst]

If the GSG to be from Jack I think think you have to ask 1. Why no other messages at/near other murder scenes, Kelly would have offered the chance to write a book if he wanted, 2. Why such a cryptic message? Without the apron there would have been nothing to associate it with the murders. Had the apron blown away or not been removed most likely the message would have never been connected with Edowes or the ripper. Martin Fido's explanation that the graffiti was written by a disgruntled customer from one of the nearby Jewish sweatshops seems to make more sense to me.

[perrymason]

If the GSG to be from Jack I think think you have to ask 1. Why no other messages at/near other murder scenes, Kelly would have offered the chance to write a book if he wanted, 2. Why such a cryptic message? Without the apron there would have been nothing to associate it with the murders. Had the apron blown away or not been removed most likely the message would have never been connected with Edowes or the ripper. Martin Fido's explanation that the graffiti was written by a disgruntled customer from one of the nearby Jewish sweatshops seems to make more sense to me.

All we do know is that neither Halse nor Long saw any apron section when they went through Goulston around 2:20ish, Long was adamant the cloth was not there until he spotted it next pass nearer to 3am, so the GSG will always be something that might have been there before the apron placement.

What you have to ask yourself is was the apron dropped casually?

The answer seems to be that it was not left at its final location until just over 1 hour after Kates murder. Since the walk from Mitre Square would have been approximately 5 or 10 minutes at the most to Goulston, that leaves a great deal of time unaccounted for.

Does that time indicate that he must have been indoors somewhere because we now have a murder in the Metro and one in the City that is under investigation....surely hes not hanging around an alley with organs in his pockets and blood on his hands for an hour.

Is it more probable based on that delay that the apron was not "casually" discarded? Of course it is. Then that must mean that its possible the location was a "choice", not a place on a path he would need to take to get home from Mitre Square.

Since the Model Homes through that entrance were occupied almost solely by Jews, it seems a likely place to leave a message that concerns Jews to me.

Why would he leave any messages?

Well, this was the only night that he was thought to have killed 2 women, one with a simple throat cut, and the first murder occurs on Jewish property at a Mens Club with some 28 men still in attendance, and the second one takes place right around the corner from the Great Synagogue and the Imperial Club, that 3 Jewish Men,....Lawende, Harris and Levy left minutes before seeing Kate.

Seems to me that killers sometimes write to claim victims of unsolved murders as their own, and sometimes they write to taunt and make mischeif, and sometimes they write to correct things that have been written about them....like blaming the killer for murders that he didnt commit.

Jewish men, blame, and their avoidance of it.

Seems to me the writing may be blaming Jews for the murder that is not claimed by the killer who leaves the apron section.

Best regards

[The Good Michael]

Maybe not the place for it, but I think we can't be sure what the spelling of Jewes/Juwes was. It may even have been Jews for all we know. The spelling then becomes unreconcilable and we are left with intent only. I know what it means to me, but as time passes, it's meaning has changed. Regardless, we need to get away from the spelling and onto intent only. I fear that will leave us at an impasse as well. What is left then is the understanding of the message by the killer, for if he didn't write it, (and I think he didn't), he read intent into it and it became, as it were, his message regardless of authorship. Why? Because it is too coincidental in my mind, that the apron could have been left at the very foot of the message when there was a good 15-20 minutes of street he could have left it on.

Cheers,

Mike

[perrymason]

Maybe not the place for it, but I think we can't be sure what the spelling of Jewes/Juwes was. It may even have been Jews for all we know. The spelling then becomes unreconcilable and we are left with intent only. I know what it means to me, but as time passes, it's meaning has changed. Regardless, we need to get away from the spelling and onto intent only. I fear that will leave us at an impasse as well. What is left then is the understanding of the message by the killer, for if he didn't write it, (and I think he didn't), he read intent into it and it became, as it were, his message regardless of authorship. Why? Because it is too coincidental in my mind, that the apron could have been left at the very foot of the message when there was a good 15-20 minutes of street he could have left it on.

Cheers,

Mike

Hi Mike,

I do think we can be sure at least the the spelling wasnt "Jews", no-one who took notes as to the spelling had it less than 5 characters in length.

I think your idea that he may have punctuated the message by leaving the apron section as his "good one" message to the grafitto author is possible, but I think that a message that was intended to show that the Jews involved with that particular nights activities "will not be blamed for nothing" is more probable.

Because the spelling suggests the author was not a Jew, the location is almost 100% Jewish, and the other crime that is not represented in physical evidence left in Goulston was committed on Jewish Socialists property while there were 28 or so members on location.

The writing was in fact quite accurate.....even with 2 murders that night, one on Jewish property with almost all Jewish witnesses, and the second with only Jewish witnesses before the crime, they were not blamed for anything. In fact, the evidence on this night goes directly against what the police were surmising all of September, that the Ripper was a Jew.

I see "blame" as the operative word in those 5 lines of chalk.

Best regards

[The Good Michael]

Because the spelling suggests the author was not a Jew,

It absolutely suggests no such thing. It depends upon one's translation.

MIke

[perrymason]

It absolutely suggests no such thing. It depends upon one's translation.

MIke

Sorry.....it suggests either a gentile, or a Jew who is illiterate or one who intentionally misspelled it. Since neither of those possibilities are the most probable given the nature of the message and the nature of the evening itself, they have synchronicity....in your example that would be coincidental or accidental.

Im sure Sam would agree that "coincidences" often are the answers that we are looking for, however, there are few things Ive studied in my lifetime that have as many "coincidences" as the records of the Ripper investigations do.

The apron by its appearance timing may have been intentionally placed at that location some time after the murder, not casually dropped just after it, and the proximity of the 2 makes for a stronger argument that they were left there together after Long and Halse had been by once before. Long was sure that the apron was not there.

You may have a point that the author may have been a Jew, although the man seen with Kate wasnt obviously Jewish by other Jewish men who saw them together, nor was the man seen with Liz,.... in fact the man seen with Liz is almost certainly NOT Jewish if Israel Schwartz's account is accurate.

Sure...it may have been an illiterate Jew or one pretending to be one so he can write what seems to be a suggestive remark that Jews may indeed have been guilty of some "things" and have avoided being seen as such, ....or it could have been a Gentile who didnt know how Jews should be spelled but wanted to suggest possible impropriety by the Jews...(of which some 90% of the Model Dwellings residents who walk right through that entrance way were)...and that they had or were avoiding some Blame for that impropriety.

I vote for the Gentile because for an example I would find it hard to swallow that a German killer would write his own nationality as Girmen, or Gyrman, or Jirmen....literate or not.

Best regards.

[The Good Michael]

No Mike, I'm not saying a Jew wrote it. I'm saying we don't know. I think it was interpreted as pro-Jew by the murderer, but I don't know what the author's intention was.

To be fair, if we take any piece of graffiti in the area where the preponderance of residents were Jewish, odds are a Jew wrote it. If we absolutely knew the intent of the message, we would know for sure. Without knowledge of intent, it's in favor of Jewish authorship. That's only the odds I'm talking about.

Cheers,

Mike

[perrymason]

No Mike, I'm not saying a Jew wrote it. I'm saying we don't know. I think it was interpreted as pro-Jew by the murderer, but I don't know what the author's intention was.

To be fair, if we take any piece of graffiti in the area where the preponderance of residents were Jewish, odds are a Jew wrote it. If we absolutely knew the intent of the message, we would know for sure. Without knowledge of intent, it's in favor of Jewish authorship. That's only the odds I'm talking about.

Cheers,

Mike

Hi Mike,

Thats one very odd conclusion that they made to be frank.....that the message was thought to have been down on Jews and therefore inflammatory, yet the wording doesnt suggest that they should be blamed for anything...just that they wont be. To me it could have been a Jew saying, "look into your own sect for this killer cause Jews didnt have anything to do with these killings."

But it also could be a snide remark....as the Police figured it was. If thats the case, then I believe its less likely that we would find slander towards Jews written on what amounts to be their own doorstep. Because that would have to have been written after dark that same night to be allowed to remain unerased....and that would have had to go unnoticed by every Jewish person who walks through there to go into their homes that same night,... and that would mean that within hours of a grafitti slur being etched on that wall by a nobody, a killer would have to find it there and decide to leave the cloth under it.

If the killer didnt bend down, he might never have seen the grafitto if it pre-dated the arrival of the cloth, neither Long or Halse could state that the writing wasnt there, however Long stated the cloth was not.

I see too many stars having to allign just right to have this writing have lasted an evening of Jewish traffic in and out. But if its written just before its found, thats not an issue, and there are no coincidences.

All the best Miguel

[The Good Michael]

Thats one very odd conclusion that they made to be frank.....that the message was thought to have been down on Jews and therefore inflammatory,

But inflammatory in what way? Since it was in a Jewish area, the only inflammation possible is from the Jewish community. And what would inflame them, or cause an uprising? Certainly not a snide remark. They would have been used to such things. The only thing that may have done it is something that stood for solidarity and a 'we ain't gonna take it' message. That's what I think the police thought the message intended. I can't see anything else being worthy of having an immediate removal, can you?

Cheers,

Mike

[perrymason]

But inflammatory in what way? Since it was in a Jewish area, the only inflammation possible is from the Jewish community. And what would inflame them, or cause an uprising? Certainly not a snide remark. They would have been used to such things. The only thing that may have done it is something that stood for solidarity and a 'we ain't gonna take it' message. That's what I think the police thought the message intended. I can't see anything else being worthy of having an immediate removal, can you?

Cheers,

Mike

Sarcasm......thats what I feel maybe at the heart of the confusion on this, because he didnt punctuate or emphasize...he just wrote 5 lines. He may have wanted to italicize for all we know, in one version I believe he did capitalize "Men" for some reason ......

If you can imagine that Jack always "rips" and that the Double Event is not 2 "rippings", you might also imagine that the killer who left Mitre Square might no nothing of any earlier murders. We have evidence that suggests its quite possible he went indoors for a period of time after killing in Mitre, then returned to the streets to drop the apron where it was found near 3am.

That gives him the opportunity once returning to the East End just after the murder to hear something about the murder in Dutfields Yard, or hear about it when he pops into a lodging house he stays at, and then pop back out to make perhaps the only communication attempt he ever makes.......to suggest sarcastically that Juwes are the men that are evading blame that night, not he. He leaves the apron as proof of who he is and that he accepts his own guilt, he does'nt evade it.

If that kind of interpretation is correct, then to me that suggests a man that is working out his madness with some skewed code of ethics or honor. Like its ethical for him to communicate with them by using a piece of murder evidence to convince them of the authors identity, but unethical for the Jews to be blaming someone else for a crime in all likelihood they committed.

All he needs to know to suppose their guilt is that a woman was found dead with a single cut on the property of Jewish anarchist Socialists while some 28 were drunk and in still in attendance at the club,...only the members themselves testify about key elements for that murder, such as the number of people if any in the yard at the time of the murder.

If he is like many Gentiles in that area at that time, he doesnt like immigrant Jews, but also as likely he has to deal with them daily...maybe for food, or some tailoring....maybe as a client or a vendor.

So his antisemitism is suppressed somewhat as a result....and he only hints at what he truly feels towards them in sarcastic remarks.

I think some of the above may apply here....IF the guy that left the apron also wrote the message. And the Mitre Square killer doesnt have to be "Jack"....he may well be ,but the scenario works if he wasn't too.

All the best Mike