Did Jack carry a lantern?

[Barnaby]

Maybe JTR only has enough money to pay one victim and needs the money back. So he kills Stride without even wanting to mutilate. He goes on his way to kill Eddowes and mutilate in a much brighter area.

Interesting side issue. Presuming he paid in advance, is it not the case that he always retrieved his money?

[Cap'n Jack]

Dan, the choice is yours.
A penny dreadful actually written in 1888 by a journalist with first hand knowledge of the crimes, or
a twelve dollar dreadful written in 2008 by a bunch of dinosaurs, and edited by some bloke who thinks everyone in England says 'cor blimey'?

[Monty]

Various lanterns

Its true, lanterns and lamps were used by criminal of varing degrees.

They ranged from your bog standard candle lamp to the hi tec shuttered, oil powered Bull Eye as used by the police.

The problem with Jack and a lamp is they are awkward to use, not reliable, smell, smoke and, in an age of darkness, stand out like a spotlight.

At the Stride scene, it would have been difficult to extinguish.

[Monty]

sorry...

I posted before I finished.

I mean it would be hard to extinguish an oil lamp at the Stride scene without leaving a trace.

There is no evidence a lamp was used, apart from tin match box empty of course.

Light was ample enough for the killer to see by, so we are told, and in Chapmans murder, daylight graced the scene.

[Natalie Severn]

Wee Willie Winkie carried a lantern and Cap"n Jack can tell ya"ll that Tommy Cutbush,like wee Willie was upstairs an d downstairs and running through town- in his nightgown !
Natalie

[The Good Michael]

Wee Willie Winkie

This has to be the most unfortunate name a man could have.

Mike

[Natalie Severn]

This has to be the most unfortunate name a man could have.

Mike

......and you never know but this may have caused a number of problems down below

[Dan Norder]

A penny dreadful actually written in 1888 by a journalist with first hand knowledge of the crimes,

Fiction is fiction. Unless a reliable source makes the same claim you can't even know if it was intended seriously or if it was invented up on the spot to advance the plot.

And the journalists didn't even have first hand knowledge of the crimes anyway... Even if it were in a newspaper article intended to be nonfiction it'd most likely still be fiction.

[Cap'n Jack]

Here is the reference from the 1888 penny dreadful:

'By the side of her head was a small dark lantern, while over her stood a man, or rather a monster, with, in one hand a long knife, in the other a penknife, and with both these instruments he was hacking away at the poor body.'

The writer got the two knives right, so why not the lantern?

[Cap'n Jack]

And where would Jack carry his lantern?
In his hat of course.
Don't believe me?
From an actual Old Bailey trial:

'BARNARD JEFFERY . I am constable of the parish. The prisoner was delivered to me; I took him to the office, and from there to the watch-house, and when I returned, the things had been put back into the drawer: I asked Mrs. Burn for them, she said she would look them out; she gave them to me on Saturday; when the prisoner was given into my charge, I asked who and what he was, he made no reply; I searched him, and in his coat and waistcoat pockets found twelve skeleton keys; I have tried them to the door, and this one will open it; I also found on him some matches and a phosphorus bottle; I found in his hat a dark lantern, a candle, a pair of gloves, a comb, and handkerchief; I took him to the office; he made a resistance to get from me - that is all I know.'

[Natalie Severn]

I cant see this Jack murderer rattling round Mitre Square looking like a cross between Robinson Crusoe and a pot holer with a box of tricks on his head- Kate would have run a mile .

[Doctor X]

The writer got the two knives right, so why not the lantern?

Where did he get the details of the former and latter from?

Yours truly,

--J.D.

[JSchmidt]

Would a prostitute actually get involved with someone carrying a lantern?

[Doctor X]

Would not seem very bright. . . .

Yours truly,

--J.D.

P.S. I do not know . . . I would think one of the apparent genuine witnesses would notice it or someone would notice the light.

[Robert]

Perhaps Jack killed the women because they got on his wick.