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I recall reading somewhere that during the height of the Ripper murders, police solicited advice from top medical experts to assist them in tracking down the killer. Among those contacted was Dr. Harvey Littlejohn, eminent pathologist from Edinburgh, who undertook a study of the entire police file including autopsy reports and inquest testimony. He asked friend and colleague, Dr. Joe Bell, a skilled diagnostician and inspiration for Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes, to work with him. Together they went over the evidence and closely examined Scotland Yard’s handful of major suspects, as well as a few of their own. The two physicians, working independently, came up with the same suspect and immediately reported their conclusion to “the officers investigating the Ripper case.” Apparently, police never followed up on the lead, but according to Bell’s biographer Ely Liebow, the murders stopped a week later. No trace of any communication between Littlejohn-Bell and Scotland Yard concerning the Ripper case has been found, and apparently neither man ever disclosed the suspect’s identity to anyone else. Perhaps for this reason, no one on Casebook seemed very interested when the subject was brought up here at least twice in recent years.
To my mind, it is certainly believable that Littlejohn and Bell corresponded with London police on the Ripper murders, and that they offered up the name of a suspect that both agreed on. Their investigation must have occurred soon after the Kelly murder, and their suspect was probably (though not certainly) on the Scotland Yard list. Donald Rumbelow is reported to have opined that the name was that of Montague Druitt, but that’s doubtful since Druitt was dead before he was considered a suspect!
If nothing remains in the Ripper files concerning Littlejohn-Bell and their suspect, perhaps documentation exists in some other file, say at the Home Secretary or the Special Branch, or in the personal papers of some long-deceased police official now kept in some archive. Perhaps some of our members with contacts in the Department can pursue this matter further and possibly track down something more substantial than brief mention in one or two biographies. I do think it’s worth the effort to find out what two eminent, investigative physicians of the day had to say about the man called Jack the Ripper.
Hopeful John
To my mind, it is certainly believable that Littlejohn and Bell corresponded with London police on the Ripper murders, and that they offered up the name of a suspect that both agreed on. Their investigation must have occurred soon after the Kelly murder, and their suspect was probably (though not certainly) on the Scotland Yard list. Donald Rumbelow is reported to have opined that the name was that of Montague Druitt, but that’s doubtful since Druitt was dead before he was considered a suspect!
If nothing remains in the Ripper files concerning Littlejohn-Bell and their suspect, perhaps documentation exists in some other file, say at the Home Secretary or the Special Branch, or in the personal papers of some long-deceased police official now kept in some archive. Perhaps some of our members with contacts in the Department can pursue this matter further and possibly track down something more substantial than brief mention in one or two biographies. I do think it’s worth the effort to find out what two eminent, investigative physicians of the day had to say about the man called Jack the Ripper.
Hopeful John
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