Ripper Timidity?

[Pettifogger]

I think we all have our views of the kind of individual who was capable of doing these murders.

Nevertheless, it must have been extremely difficult after the Chapman murder for prostitutes to readily trust any possible customer. Increase that multi-fold after the events of September 30, 1888.

Yet JtR moved among them with relative ease. I've never believed he was the cool confidence artist who lured his victims into their deaths by stealth and cunning.

Anyone else out there who thinks that JtR was a timid fellow who gave all outward appearances of being a milquetoast?

[Barnaby]

As with other prostitute killers, Jack could have been part of the scene; a known client who usually did not kill his dates. That would put his victims more at ease with him. Of course, this implies that Jack could function well enough sexually both in mechanical terms and with women partners not to raise suspicion, which conflicts with some theories of his motives/identity.

[kensei]

I think that the witness descriptions in the Chapman, Stride, and Eddowes murders are similar enough to indicate that the Ripper usually dressed in a standard outfit- dark overcoat and "deerstalker or peaked cap"- the "shabby-genteel" description that would have made him look like a slightly bedraggled version of Sherlock Holmes. It would have been a look that would not have raised particular attention in the area. In his manner, I do not think he was a regular user of prostitutes who usually didn't kill them. His motivation was to kill, but he would not have approached in a crazy threatening manner. He would have approached with a minimum level of false charm to put them at ease after the murders had begun. After all, fear or not, the women still had to stay out there if they wanted to continue to make a living.

[lynn cates]

personality of Jack

Hello. Answering the question depends a great deal on which suspect was actually the ripper. Suppose we concentrate on just 5 good suspects, the 2 D's (Druitt and D'Onston) and the 3 K's (Kosminski, Kaminski, and Klosowski).

Druitt was a professional. There is little doubt that he could be charming and sophisticated. A possible scenario (if the allegation of sexual insanity were correct) is that he was an occasional client of prostitutes (diversion, say, before a cricket match). At some point, he required "something more" for his satisfaction. (This might be some combination of pornography and violence. If it involved pornography, that could explain his dismissal from Valentine's school.) He would then "graduate" to his violent sexual fetish among those he formerly frequented.

Such a Ripper would, of course, be charming. It COULD explain Eddowes' posture with the suspect Lawende described. It might even explain why she thought she knew the Ripper. Perhaps she did and perhaps, upon confrontation, he charmingly allayed her fears. ("Oh, Monty! How could I have thought it was you?"). It could also explain the violent facial mutilations--anger for a possible identification.

If only the poor devil didn't live in Blackheath.

If D'Onston were the Ripper, he, too, could be charming. But his motivation would be vastly different. He would be more the type to pit wits with the police, going so far as to concoct a story about a black magic ritual to throw them off. (Incidentally, he is probably the only Ripper suspect who might actually have authored the GSG, all on his way back to the London hospital to slip into bed and continue his role as a whining neurasthenic.) He may, then, have been sociopathic, and these folks can be VERY charming.

If only the poor devil weren't so tall.

If Kosminski were the Ripper, he was likely more timid than any other suspect. In his case, the prostitutes may well have felt sorry for him. Charming? I don't think so. One is not likely to charm while eating from the sewer.

If only the poor devil were not such a poor fit.

Kaminski (Cohen?), if he existed, was supposed to be extremely violent. Could he turn charming and gentle? Timid? Possibly.

If only the poor devil could be proven to exist.

And then there's Klosowski (Chapman). Now HE could be charming around the ladies. He was married several times and described as capable of charm.

If only the poor devil could stick to 1 MO.

Lynn Cates

[Pettifogger]

A different perspective

I guess what I'm trying to say is that our victims approached JtR first and not the other way around.

That's the key clue in my view of the Ripper murders. They chose him...he didn't choose them.

I'm not stating they hadn't offered their services in the past to JtR. On the night of the murders, he finally took them up on their offer!

[lynn cates]

the move

Hello. I completely agree that the ladies made the move on Jack, not vice versa. And that is why I cannot believe in a glassy eyed, frothing at the mouth Ripper. He had to look rather mild and perhaps well to do. That might rule out the 3 K's.

Maybe a scholar/lawyer/sportsman type would fit?

Lynn Cates

[Jeff Leahy]

If Kosminski were the Ripper, he was likely more timid than any other suspect. In his case, the prostitutes may well have felt sorry for him. Charming? I don't think so. One is not likely to charm while eating from the sewer.

If only the poor devil were not such a poor fit.

Lynn Cates

Can we just once and for all dispense with this MYTH!

We just do NOT know what Aaron Kosminski’s condition was in the autumn of 1888.

Its Not known, and know one knows…however based on what is known today about the condition of Schizophrenia, it is unlikely, at this point during the on set of the illness that he was eating from the gutter.

People suffering the condition are often high achievers. Initial attacks start in waves usually about 12-week periods, which interestingly is about the length of the autumn of terror.

However we just do not know what Aaron looked like or his behavior at this time.

And if I see that damn ‘image’ used every time he is discussed, and currently on the front cover of a new book…

I THINK I WILL SCREAM!

Yours Pirate

[lynn cates]

schizophrenia

Hello. I agree that pure schizophrenia (not paranoid) takes many forms. I used to ride public transportation with one such chap. He was in the habit of standing up on the bus, looking at the window, and holding forth on the role of philosophy in a free society. These "sermons" could be lengthy.

Although inviting upon himself much scorn, not to mention a bit of verbal abuse, most of us patrons were not afraid of him. Indeed, we tended to snicker at his escapades. But perhaps he carried a concealed weapon?

Lynn Cates

[Pettifogger]

I tend to lean towards a bookworm who probably never made it socially to where he probably should have (or perceived himself) as being...perhaps a professor at a university.

My perception of JtR was someone who knew his way around a library. This was pre-Dewey Decimal system. He probably knew more than the librarians who worked those locales he frequented.

His psychosis developed around what he read. He began to see and/or hear things that weren't there. He may have thought he could hear colors or taste sounds. The JtR murder frenzy was a sort of mission. Perhaps the demons in his mind were initiating him into their world...or the JtR frenzy was his attempt at exorcising the demons from his mind.

[Mascara & Paranoia]

The name Jack the Ripper always gives me a mental image of the man seen by Lawende with 'Eddowes' (especially with regards to how the killer probably would've dressed).

I think it's safe to say that he would've looked and acted normal for a man in that district otherwise the prostitutes would've been wary of him and probably avoid him. So I'm gonna assume that whoever he was probably looked just as shabby as the rest of the men in the area and had an East London accent.

Now it's impossible to know how he spoke, but I doubt he would've beem a loudmouth or lairy (at least not when he was out on the pull for a kill), so he could've spoken quietly which could've given him a timid sort of appearance. Then again, he might've had a cocky and jack-the-ladish kind of body language about him; there's not much we can do really other than speculate.

But my personal feeling about whoever he was is that he was a lone wolf type of bloke, not in a timid kind of way, but more of a kind of guy who kept to himself and seemed a bit antisocial.

[Jeff Leahy]

Well Liz Stride would disagree.

She clearly new very soon after propositioning him that she had made a big mistake. Otherwise, why the 'quarrel' ?

Thats assuming BSM and Kosminski were one of the same

Pirate

[lynn cates]

accents

Hello. That makes sense to me. It also brings up a couple of questions.

1. How would a "Clapham" Ripper have been received in Whitechapel? Say his story was, "I'm lonely and looking for a bit of fun on the East Side." Would the prostitutes (at least the sober ones) have thought, "I've been waiting for this guy." or would it be more like, " 'Ere now. What's a bloke like that doin' over 'ere."?

2. Can not a clever British chap feign other accents? I know a few Yanks who can do an (almost) convincing east end accent. Why not someone from Blackheath?

Lynn Cates

[Sam Flynn]

... to indicate that the Ripper usually dressed in a standard outfit- dark overcoat and "deerstalker or peaked cap"... that would have made him look like a slightly bedraggled version of Sherlock Holmes. It would have been a look that would not have raised particular attention in the area.

Not if he wore the deerstalker with the flaps tied up over the head, which was apparently the fashion among dock-labourers.

[Sam Flynn]

2. Can not a clever British chap feign other accents?

It's easier to do that today when, thanks to mass electronic media, a person has greater exposure to more accents during childhood than an average Victorian would have had in a lifetime.

[Pettifogger]

The Ripper as a man of learning...

how many others agree that he was largely self-educated with an above average IQ?

Anyone think he attended university (briefly or graduated)?

Please note the difference between cunning and intelligence in stating your assessment.