Faecal matter on apron piece

[lynn cates]

scholarship

Hello Colin. Really sorry you feel that way. I'm also sorry you have decided on personal insult regarding a couple of posters. But that's your choice.

Regarding scholarship, I just received a message from the world's leading expert on the chap who had a controlling interest in the CNA. Although I posted it elsewhere, I'll paste below.

(And I agree--we will reap what we have sown.)

Cheers.
LC

Dear Professor Cates,

I found myself quite absorbed by all the research material posted on your blog. Some of it was quite new to me. As you have seen in my book, I make much use of the 7 Sept 1895 NY World obit (#131-33), but I had not seen the even fuller long article dated 20 Dec 1891 (#38-45) on which the obit was based, or the one on 11 Dec 91 (#71-72).

You've provided lots of additional material on the Hurlbert-Evelyn fiasco. I am all the more convinced that I have the matter properly summarized in the book.

Thank you for item #161, the recollection of Betty Paschal. It rings true and provides an angle of vision that I had not before seen.

Thank you also for the fascinating New Republic piece on TW Higginson, 28 May 2001, by Caleb Crain.

I have to confess to deep doubts as to whether Hurlbert ever was involved in any violence, let alone lethal violence.

I would also add, apropos #210, that Hurlbert's fascination with radical ideas (or we might better say reformist-progressive ones) ended in the late 1850s, never to be resumed.

One last question, and this is apropos #198--why shouldn't I be surprised that WHH could pull off the diary at the same time he was masterminding the Obelisk project and editing a daily paper? This is quite an array of responsibilities, even if you have a ton of talent.

All best,

Dan Crofts

[lynn cates]

Mepo

Hello Rob. Thanks.

"What I mean is, the Metropolitan Police viewed them as a series of murders and they were investigated as such."

Absolutely.

Cheers.
LC

[Colin Roberts]

Lynn will claim the stats are invalid, Phil will state that the Police supported a myth and Simon will tell us all Jack did not exist.

"Lynn will claim the stats are invalid . . ."

No he won't. Validity is an adjective applied to deductive arguments. No deduction here. But he might state them inconclusive and unhelpful.

Does anyone remember those long-lost days when a sizable portion of posts to these message boards was actually informative?

I yearn for further meaningful message board contributions to our knowledge of this, our field of interest, from the likes of Stewart Evans, Chris Phillips, John Bennett, and Rob Clack; but the river has apparently run dry.

Debra Arif, to name one such contributor, drops in occasionally with the odd tidbit of informative substance, but I really don't know why she bothers. I really don't!

That the information pertaining to Registered Deaths of Female/Male Adults (Ages 20 - xx) throughout England, Classified as 'Murder', by way of 'Cut Throat', found within the Annual Reports of the Registrar-General of Births, Deaths, and Marriages in England, could be described as being "unhelpful" says it all.

Inconclusive?

The statistical¹ data contained therein conclusively proves – beyond any shadow of any reasonable doubt – that cut-throat murders were plainly and simply uncommon throughout England, during the late Victorian era.

¹ That's right: Statistical!

I can already here the snickers of the enlightened non-Jackster members of this community …

Statistics. Splendid. (heh-heh)

And of course, my chosen population, i.e. Female/Male Adults (Ages 20 - xx), is far too narrow: Never minding, of course, the fact that the data is provided in five-year age intervals, and whilst I initially felt that ages 18 and 19 were relevant, so too did I feel that ages 15, 16, and 17 were not.

My chosen parameters, I am afraid, have been questioned to the point that I feel as if my integrity has been questioned.

Maybe one day I will compile and present the relevant data for a larger population: Females/Males (Ages 5 – xx). Will that do? Don't ask for (Ages Infancy - 4). Their inclusion, needless to say, would skew the data beyond reason.

While I am at it, should I include deaths attributable to … let's say … playing football²? There were after all 13 registered deaths of males, throughout England, in 1888, that were attributable to just that.

After all, if what we wish to do is demonstrate just how common death was throughout England, during the Victorian era, so that we can downplay and marginalize the exceedingly extraordinary nature of the so-called 'Double Event', then why not?

² For the benefit of my Septic brethren, the game of Football is played with a round white ball that is moved about on a playing surface with ... for the most part ... the foot. Imagine that!

In any case, I will - at a minimum - augment my chosen population with the inclusion of Females/Males (Ages 15 – 19).

Why? Because of Jayne MacDonald, that's why!

Who's she? She was a very pretty sixteen-year-old that apparently gave a certain Peter Sutcliffe the impression that she was a prostitute, simply because of her attire and the fact that her homeward trek, one fateful summer evening/morning in 1977, from the Leeds City Center, took her along Chapeltown Road. Sutcliffe assumed what he did, and proceeded to ambush her without first engaging her in any way.

A killer of prostitutes that actually set upon a female that wasn't actually soliciting: Does anyone believe that? I most certainly do not!

Jayne MacDonald didn't exist!

Neither did Anna Rogulskyj, Olive Smelt, Maureen Long, Josephine Whitaker, Barbara Leach, Marguerite Walls, Upadhya Bandara, Theresa Sykes, or Jacqueline Hill!

None of them existed! How could they have? Women that weren't prostitutes, brutally murdered simply because … they were prostitutes, in one man's depraved perception?

As sure as 'Jack the Ripper' didn't exist, neither too did any of these unfortunate women, God rest their souls.

Perception is 99.99% of reality, and if Peter Sutcliffe thought that each of these women was a prostitute, then each one of them might as well have been. His distorted perception was all that mattered. Just as the perception of a presumed individual that may have murdered Martha Tabram, Mary Ann Nichols, Annie Chapman, Elizabeth Stride, Catherine Eddowes, and Mary Jane Kelly was all that mattered. Whether we think that any one of these women was soliciting sexual favors immediately prior to her demise is irrelevant! Period!

Did anyone here realize that Sutcliffe prematurely aborted seven of the twenty attacks, for which he was convicted, feeling in each of those instances that he had somehow been 'disturbed'.

Some of those 'disturbances' were indeed tangible, and in Sutcliffe's perception quite real. Others, however, involved nothing more than his realization that his choice to begin his attack was a bit hasty, in as much as there were just too many people around.

Imagine that! A sexual serial killer being 'disturbed': In fully one third of the attacks that he is known to have committed. In some instances, because something as insignificant as ... let's say ... a change in the wind's direction, compelled him to have second thoughts about his hasty decision to attack.

Anna Rogulskyj, Olive Smelt, Marcella Claxton, Maureen Long, Marilyn Moore, Upadhya Bandara, and Theresa Sykes didn't exist!

Irene Richardson was struck on the back of the head with Sutcliffe's hammer whilst crouching to urinate on the grass of Roundhay Park, in Northeastern Leeds, just minutes after he had picked her up in his white Ford Corsair, in an area that was closer to Chapeltown.

Imagine that: A prostitute accepting an opportunity to make a few quid (or in Eddowes's case, presumably, a few pence or maybe even a few bob), even though needing to urinate.

Irene Richardson didn't exist!

Patricia Atkinson was murdered by Sutcliffe in the friendly confines of her own apartment, and the resulting extent of the mutilations that she sustained was accordingly quite significant.

Imagine that: A prostitute murdered in her own flat by a sexual serial killer that committed the other nineteen of the attacks, for which he was convicted, ... outdoors.

Surely, Patricia Atkinson was a Provo in disguise!

---

I haven't posted here for several months, and may or may not ever post here again. So, I would ask those readers that might feel so inclined to refrain from extending me any sort of 'Welcome Back'.

I am not 'back': At least not for the time being.

I don't believe that I would share a taxi with the likes of Simon Wood, if my very life depended upon my doing so.

More so, I do not wish to be a part of any community that would allow itself to be dragged through a pigsty of Trevor Marriott's moronic bullshit by having him speak at one of its Conferences.

This community will reap what it has sewn; and right now it's credibility along with the legitimacy of its field of interest as an academic discipline (given that the message board component must surely be considered an integral part of the field), could not possibly be any lower than it is!

[Errata]

Wait, wait. Back up. I don't understand.




There are rock cellists?

[Rob Clack]

Hello Rob. Thanks. Five one offs? Don't think so. I have always found the similarities in Polly and Annie stark--even when I believed in the C5 and Jack.

Yes, I understand they were women. My remarks were about the mathematics of a series. I would be delighted to drop math observations. Of course, that would include both probability and statistics.

If I was pushed I would say there was five by one hand and six one offs. One of those six one offs, the Pinchin Street victim, the murderer may have committed some of the other torso murders. The other one offs were spread over a period of three years.

I didn't quite pick up on your remarks about all the WCM. I take it you were not suggesting one hand throughout?

Cheers.
LC

What I mean is, the Metropolitan Police viewed them as a series of murders and they were investigated as such.

Rob

[lynn cates]

math

Hello Rob. Thanks. Five one offs? Don't think so. I have always found the similarities in Polly and Annie stark--even when I believed in the C5 and Jack.

Yes, I understand they were women. My remarks were about the mathematics of a series. I would be delighted to drop math observations. Of course, that would include both probability and statistics.

I didn't quite pick up on your remarks about all the WCM. I take it you were not suggesting one hand throughout?

Cheers.
LC

[Rob Clack]

Hello Rob. No, I have not read that one. Is it worth a read?

Cheers.
LC

Peter Turnball suggests that each murder was a copycat killing, so those that believe in more than one killer should find it interesting.

Hello (again) Rob. Thanks.

From one who is silly and naive, permit me to suggest that there is a sense in which I agree to a series.

Please to consider the following.

A. 1, 3, 5, 7, 9 . . .

B. 1, 4, 9, 16, 25 . . .

C. 6, 11, 19, 3 . . .

These are all, technically, a series. A is formed by taking all the odd numbers and listing them sequentially. B is formed by taking the square of each positive integer. C is a slapdash random listing of numbers.

Polly and Annie began a nice, neat sequence--same kind of double cut, same overt marks of strangulation, same undamaged clothing. That portion of the series then terminated. The other 3 are merely "put" there, as in C above--although Kate, I will agree, fits better than Liz or MJK.

Cheers.
LC

These are women we are talking about, not numbers and not just the Macnaghten five. People seem to be forgetting about Smith, Tabram, Mylett, McKenzie, Pinchin Street victim and Coles. The Met files were about 'The Whitechapel Murders' a series of eleven murders.

Rob

[lynn cates]

series and series

Hello (again) Rob. Thanks.

From one who is silly and naive, permit me to suggest that there is a sense in which I agree to a series.

Please to consider the following.

A. 1, 3, 5, 7, 9 . . .

B. 1, 4, 9, 16, 25 . . .

C. 6, 11, 19, 3 . . .

These are all, technically, a series. A is formed by taking all the odd numbers and listing them sequentially. B is formed by taking the square of each positive integer. C is a slapdash random listing of numbers.

Polly and Annie began a nice, neat sequence--same kind of double cut, same overt marks of strangulation, same undamaged clothing. That portion of the series then terminated. The other 3 are merely "put" there, as in C above--although Kate, I will agree, fits better than Liz or MJK.

Cheers.
LC

[lynn cates]

worth it?

Hello Rob. No, I have not read that one. Is it worth a read?

Cheers.
LC

[lynn cates]

style

Hello Neil. Thanks.

"And whilst you are performing the probability these women were murdered in a series remains very good. Certainly better than Jack the Ripper never existed."

As you know, probability is a way of calculating what we don't know. And "Jack's" non-existence looks much more "probable" after 125 years of futility.

"Mainly due to the lack of supporting evidence, especially re Nicholls, Chapman and Eddowes."

Again, at least you are pushing only 3. I see glaring discrepancies in Kate and the other two.

"SOME evidence is better than NO evidence or a RELIANCE on OPINION."

Completely agree. Hope to see some soon.

"Fact remains women were being throat cutted in a small area and having their bodies ripped open. Be that 3 or 5 or any in between."

Yes, Neil. And some people are shot in the head, hands tied and kneeling. It's called "Gangland style." One hand?

"I never said you did attack did I? Again, your point is?"

If you did not intend me, I beg pardon. I assumed from context--rather like assuming the C5. (heh-heh)

"Somehow I don't think the Palladium will be calling you."

Sure they will. Did you hear the one about . . . ?

Cheers.
LC

[Rob Clack]

Of course it was a series of murders. To suggest otherwise is extremely silly and naive.

Rob

[Michael W Richards]

I think its fair and accurate to state that a series is but one of many unproven possibilities for these crimes. It is not accurate at this time to state it was a series.

Best regards,

Mike R

[Rob Clack]

I take it very few people here have read "The Kiler who never was" by Peter Turnball then?

Rob

[Michael W Richards]

I'm afraid you're getting Bond mixed up with Phillips in this instance. Bond did believe the murder of Alice McKenzie showed traits of the previous murders.

We don't know what Bond's opinion of Tabram's murder was. Anderson did not submit her file to him for evaluation.

I did missplace my irony Hunter, thanks, it was the skilful cuts suggestion when he had pronounced no skill or knowledge for the Canonical killer in the summary.

Cheers,
Mike R

[Monty]

I'm still waiting for the smart arsed 5% to stated I've only accounted for 95% Lynn,

And whilst you are performing the probability these women were murdered in a series remains very good. Certainly better than Jack the Ripper never existed. Mainly due to the lack of supporting evidence, especially re Nicholls, Chapman and Eddowes.

SOME evidence is better than NO evidence or a RELIANCE on OPINION. Fact remains women were being throat cutted in a small area and having their bodies ripped open. Be that 3 or 5 or any in between.

I never said you did attack did I? Again, your point is?

Somehow I don't think the Palladium will be calling you.

Monty