Torsoman vs The Ripper

[Debra A]

Ironic, considering his real rank.

Wow. Thanks. I haven't been around so much for the past year so completely missed this.

Debs
Little Office Paper Replenishment Co-ordinator.

[Trevor Marriott]

there is no conclusive evidence as to who disposed of your brains or where or when.

Naughty naughty Abby, now go sit on the naughty step and write 100 lines I must stop being a numpty !!!!!!!!!

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[Trevor Marriott]

I'm afraid that Elizabeth Hurran disagrees with you.

"There was a certificate of death; a certificate of body removal; a certificate of notification to the hospital; a certificate of undertaking for removal; a certificate of receipt by the anatomists, a notification to the Anatomy Inspectorate that the body had arrived; a return certificate saying that the dissection was complete; a notification of removal for undertaking; a certificate of collection; a certificate to request a Christian burial; a certificate for the funeral; and, finally, a certificate of internment."

There was no bill of sale where body dealers and their illegal activities were concerned, under the terms of the anatomy act those provisions you have stated did apply but very rarely adhered to.

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[Fiver]

The trade in bodies and organs was illegal so there was no such thing as a bill of sale.

I'm afraid that Elizabeth Hurran disagrees with you.

"There was a certificate of death; a certificate of body removal; a certificate of notification to the hospital; a certificate of undertaking for removal; a certificate of receipt by the anatomists, a notification to the Anatomy Inspectorate that the body had arrived; a return certificate saying that the dissection was complete; a notification of removal for undertaking; a certificate of collection; a certificate to request a Christian burial; a certificate for the funeral; and, finally, a certificate of internment."

[Fiver]

I'll always be the mouthy subordinate in Trevor's eyes.

Ironic, considering his real rank.

[Abby Normal]

There is no conclusive evidence as to who disposed of the remains or where or when

www.trevormarriott.co.uk

there is no conclusive evidence as to who disposed of your brains or where or when.

[Trevor Marriott]

Excellent question FrankO
I imagine that any seller of illegally removed organs from a woman who'd died during a botched abortion would want to maximise their profits given the double risk they were taking dismembering the corpse and dumping it in the Thames etc. , plus why not just illegally sell the body as a whole and minimise the risk of being caught dumping the remains?

There is no conclusive evidence as to who disposed of the remains or where or when

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[Trevor Marriott]

The purpose of medical schools obtaining bodies was to teach their students about anatomy. That means they needed whole bodies, not random severed body parts. Fortunately, the the Anatomy Act of 1832 had made it easy for medical schools to obtain whole bodies with zero risk that they would be helping a murderer conceal and profit from their crimes.

There were never enough organs for medical research which it why body dealers prospered

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[Abby Normal]

Thanks Abby. As long as others see it then it doesn't bother me
I'll always be the mouthy subordinate in Trevor's eyes.

your subordinate to no one. : ) and thanks again for your participation and all the info!!

[Debra A]

Here's a link to some of Professor Elizabeth Hurren's writing (mentioned by Trevor) on body dealers and the circumstantial links to Dorset Street and Jack the Ripper and his victims for anyone who hasn't read it before:

https://www.jtrforums.com/forum/the-torsos/27999-school-of-anatomy/page2

For anyone interested (as if you haven't been punished enough! ) - here is also a link to a thread on JTRForums dealing with body selling from the workhouse, based on workhouse records dealing with the subject, and discussion of such practices being relevant (or not) in relation to the torso cases 87-89.

https://www.jtrforums.com/forum/the-torsos/27999-school-of-anatomy/page2

[Trevor Marriott]

It's curious, then, that the contemporaries referred to these affairs as "The Whitehall Mystery," the "Battersea Mystery", etc. etc., when there was no mystery--just the wild imagination of later researchers.

I have no idea what this statement is even supposed to mean, Trevor.

Its simple RJ researchers have made these torsos into murder mysteries when they can't even prove a cause of death so there can be no murder mysteries

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[Trevor Marriott]

It's your theory, so the burden of proof is on you. So far you have provided no evidence that there were still body dealers almost 50 years after the passage of the anatomy act. And you aren't theorizing body dealers, you're theorizing organ dealers, who would be spending large amounts of time and effort to make their product less valuable and then wasting much of the product by throwing it away.

Read Professor Elizabeth Hurrans's books on the activities of body dealers in and around Whitechapel

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[Trevor Marriott]

the very idea of entirely dismissing a theory in order to bolster a hypothesis is ridiculous if not remarkable

on the one hand, you dismiss Murder as a cause of death because it was never proved
on the other hand, you hypothesize the organs were a means of profit without providing a bill of sale

The trade in bodies and organs was illegal so there was no such thing as a bill of sale

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[Pcdunn]

I don't know about organized trades in organs in London, but in America, Francis Tumblety was said to have a collection of wombs he liked to show people. (Reference for this is likely an article I read somewhere on this site.)

And H.H. Holmes was discovered to have boiled down his murder victims and sold their skeletons to medical schools. (Reference for this is the book, "The Devil in the White City.")

Still, skeletons are a far cry from whole or dismembered bodies. And female organs in glass jars kept by mad "doctors" veers into horror movie terrain.

[Fiver]

You mean like:

Juwes = Jurors
Apron = sanitary towel
Missing organs = rogue mortician

PC Marriott has never been one to let facts get in the way of a perfectly bad theory.