The International Working Mens Association/Wiiliam Wess

[perrymason]

OK Phil, enjoy the eggnog !

Mike,
If any of these women had upset them to that extent,wouldnt they have been dealt with in a more straightforward way? There are a few punishment "examples" from those days I can think of,involving murder, but none involve the Ripper"s gruesome involvement with his victim"s body parts.
All the Best
Norma

I think the stakes would dictate the gravity in which the matters would be dealt with Nats, yeah...and if the speculation has any merit, Im talking about men that would be hung for their offenses.... which might cause irreparable harm to their movement as a whole. These are men very much like the terrorists of today...in the sense that violence is a way to draw attention, the more graphic the violence,...these days thats the body counts....the more attention not only the event gets but also the cause that the offenders were fighting for.

They planned to blow up Parliament in 87, kill the Irish Secretary in 88, who knows what else.....violence isnt simply violence in the minds of revolutionaries. Its often perceived as a necessary evil, and as such, justified. Look what trouble Parnell got himself into when he suggested as much himself.

The gruesome aspect of some of the Ripper crimes tells me that some of them may well have been by a madman, but Im not sure that the degree of debauchery shown should eliminate something else as a cause...because I personally could think of no better way of disguising a murders intent than by mirroring some debauchery that was at the same time occurring.

And what if the police ran into some kind of evidence that suggested that....even for just 1 or 2 of the Canonicals?

The Ripper would be Special Branches problem then. On Monday Morning the day of Mary Janes Inquest, members of the Royal Irish Constabulary, Members of Parliament, and a Senior Post Office official visited room 13. They are not indicated as arriving or being together, but even as separate entities, what would their affiliations have to do with Jack the Rippers potential murder scene in room 13? What would require them to view the room at the height of the crowds on Dorset Street?

Ive heard simple curiosity mentioned....by all 3 bodies of authority? When they would require Police to help them even enter the archway? The second week after Parliament had reconvened after having most of the Fall off some Members take the morning off to go tourist?

Cheers Norma...my best as always.

[Natalie Severn]

Mike,
Ever since I began to look at this case seriously I have believed that if anyone of the police had really known who Jack the Ripper was we would too! That sort of "secret" would not have been kept whether it was hidden in a 118 year old Whitechapel file on Fenians or anywhere else!
None of them knew Mike,or even had the remotest idea who the ripper was----just like Abberline and Major Smith said.

Cheers
Norma

regarding Mary Kelly----Mike,Mary was a poor girl with a drink problem and a few lousy customers! She was no threat whatsoever to the Fenians or the British Government.The reason they congregated in her tiny slum room was because the East End was ready to rise up----as it did the following year when 200,000 unemployed men marched up commercial Street!They needed to catch him to keep the peace---that was all.

[perrymason]

Mike,
Ever since I began to look at this case seriously I have believed that if anyone of the police had really known who Jack the Ripper was we would too! That sort of "secret" would not have been kept whether it was hidden in a 118 year old Whitechapel file on Fenians or anywhere else!
None of them knew Mike,or even had the remotest idea who the ripper was----just like Abberline and Major Smith said.
Cheers
Norma

Of course you may be right Nats,.....but the secretive nature of politically based investigations would be something that no governmental organization would ever have to divulge....Home Office/Special Branch.....and I dont see that our need to know the truth would have any bearing on the subject.

These were women that were essentially already dead, and women that few of London cared about.

IF political ties were suspected, I suspect we would never hear a peep about it.......but my bet is that some Senior Ripperologists who have long established connections may have allowed them some knowledge of or even access to some of those secretive files.

My best regards again Nats.

[Archaic]

Dec. 1888 Article re: Transliteration of Languages In Whitechapel

Hi, Lynn, here's a quick article for you-

This letter was sent to a journal by a very early "Ripper tourist" who visited Whitechapel on Oct. 26, 1888.
His letter was published in December 1888.

He addresses the issue of the strange blend of Hebrew-German-Yiddish-English transliteration used in Whitechapel at that time, so I thought it might be of interest to you.

Cheers, Archaic

[lynn cates]

wow

Hello Archaic. Thanks!

Zounds! I would have thought the converse were true. Knock me over with a feather!

The best.
LC

[Phil Carter]

Hello Archaic. Thanks!

Zounds! I would have thought the converse were true. Knock me over with a feather!

The best.
LC

Hello LC,


Better than tickle you with one I suppose.. but ok.. whatever..lol

*Phil swings with said feather*

best wishes as you fall (apparently)

Phil

[lynn cates]

reply

Hello Phil. Well, my impression was that the majority of European Jews had nearly lost Hebrew and so spoke Yiddish--amongst other reasons for its being a German derivative and, as such, written in German script. Seems now that Yiddish is usually written in Hebrew script--and so are German and English.

(Nice find, Archaic.)

The best.
LC

[Phil Carter]

Hello Phil. Well, my impression was that the majority of European Jews had nearly lost Hebrew and so spoke Yiddish--amongst other reasons for its being a German derivative and, as such, written in German script. Seems now that Yiddish is usually written in Hebrew script--and so are German and English.

(Nice find, Archaic.)

The best.
LC

Hello LC,

This is interesting, not because I pretend to know anything about it, because I am totally innocent of knowledge in this area, but it is giving me a sense of the communication used at the time in the area amongst those of this background. Really good find Archaic (again!)

best wishes

Phil

[perrymason]

Found some more interesting stuff....this is an essay on Fredrick Engels entitled The life of a Revolutionary, by Lindsay German....part 2.....I found it at www.marxists.de/theory....this is regarding the establishment of the Association, referred to as The International, which is what the thread is about, and it has some very interesting segments.....

heres a bit from it....

"The International was an amalgam of very different politics, drawn from its two main national components, the English and French. Its main English support stemmed from the London Trades Council, a body which was beginning to feel its industrial strength after years when the working class had remained quiescent. But it represented only a minority of the working class, the skilled trade unionists, and its leaders – men like the shoemaker George Odger, the cabinet maker Robert Applegarth and the carpenter William Cremer – held politics a fairly long way from Marx’s."

A bit further on...

"Engels also maintained a strong interest in the situation in Ireland, which reached crisis point in the late 1860s. The Fenian movement of Irish nationalists organised a series of armed protests against the British state and so brought home the struggle against Irish colonial oppression to the British ruling class. The huge Irish immigrant population in cities like Manchester and London supported their struggle. The reprisals against the Fenians by the British ruling class were vicious and there was an outcry when the “Manchester Martyrs” were hanged in 1867. There was, however, just as in more recent times, a backlash against the Irish nationalists among English workers, especially when a bombing in Clerkenwell killed ordinary people."

and then this...

"The crucial lesson of the Commune for Marx was that “the working class cannot simply lay hold of the ready-made state machinery, and wield it for its own purposes”. Instead revolutionaries had to be prepared to smash the old capitalist state, which was there to protect the capitalist class and its property, and to establish in its place a workers’ state, based on the most complete form of democracy and on new forms of power: a workers’ militia which could protect the gains of the revolution and ensure that the capitalists did not regain power. This, Engels said, was what he and Marx meant by “the dictatorship of the proletariat”.

This I found interesting...

"A third group of socialists came into being in the mid-1880s: the Fabians. Unlike the other groups the Fabians exclusively attracted the educated middle classes, not workers. At first some of its members were sympathetic to left wing ideas, but the increasing class conflict in evidence in the second half of the 1880s, especially the unemployed riots in 1886 and the fighting in Trafalgar Square in 1887, led their leaders to move consciously away from any flirtation with revolutionary change and towards the theory of gradualism which eventually influenced the Labour Party."

Its starting to shape a new kind of picture for me anyway about how these various labor based movements shared some goals and supported each other throughout the 1880's....perhaps the vast crowds at Trafalgar Square and the harsh military response to the to that point peaceful demonstration was the evidence of that kind of union, and the evidence of some concern about real revolution on the part of the Senior Police.

My best regards all....and thanks again for making the thread work so well.

[perrymason]

Also came across a socialist by the name of Joseph Lane, (1851-1920).....he was responsible for the founding of several labor based movements in London in the early 80's, and there is some interesting data on him I thought.....from www.libcom.org

"By 1880, however, Lane was involved in several working-class organisations in central London which played an important part in the transition from radicalism to socialism on the British left. The first organisation was formed as the Democratic and Trades Alliance Association in 1874, and became the Manhood Suffrage League in 1875. Its members included several old Chartists, and from 1874 to 1877 its secretary was Frank Kitz, a leading activist in radical, socialist and then anarchist politics for nearly half a century. Lane is first recorded taking part in the discussion in the meetings at the Queen's Head in Little Pulteney Street in January 1879. The second organisation was the English Section of the Social Democratic Club, which was formed by Kitz in 1877 to link native radicals and foreign (mainly German) socialists living in exile in London, and which acquired its own premises in Rose Street. Its German Section was dominated by Johann Most, a former Socialist Deputy in the Reichstag who produced Die Freiheit, which began as a socialist weekly in 1879 but turned towards anarchism during 1880.

The third organisation was the Marylebone Radical Reform Association, which was formed in 1879. In January 1880 Lane took the lead in forming its third branch, which held meetings at the Black Horse in Marylebone High Street, near his place of work in Paddington Street. This branch soon moved to the left, and changed its name to the Marylebone Radical Association in April 1880. The fourth organisation was called the Local Rights Association for Promoting Rental and Sanitary Reform, and was actually a front for even more radical activity in 1880.

During the General Election of April 1880, which resulted in a landslide victory for the Liberal Party, Lane led the Marylebone radicals in pestering the two local Liberal candidates with traditional radical demands for Irish Home Rule, nationalisation of the land, and abolition of the House of Lords. Sometimes they went further. Lane later recalled that at one meeting they were asked whether they really wanted to abolish the House of Lords :

"I said, "Yes, and House of Commons too. "

Some more about him....

"Early in 1881, Lane moved to East London, where he spent the rest of his life. He first settled in Hackney, forming a new club, which was called the Socialistic Working Men's Association in May, the Homerton Section of the Social Democratic Club in June, and the Homerton Social Democratic Club in July. Its original affiliation was with the Rose Street Club, which supplied it with some literature, but it soon became independent. From the start it was unequivocally socialist, and Lane practised the same politics as he preached. He acquired a printing press to produce his own literature, and later recalled that he "used in my room to write leaflets, then set them up, and went out and distributed them and pasted them up in the streets," organising a "paste pot brigade to stick bills all over the district."

The Homerton club held meetings on Sunday evenings at the Lamb and Flag in Homerton High Street, until they were stopped at the beginning of 1882. It was reported by The Radical that the police "threatened the landlord of the Lamb and Flag with the loss of his licence if he did not get rid of his obnoxious tenants" (4 February 1882), and Lane later recalled that "the police inspector said because we printed Socialism so large on our bills." He complained to Scotland Yard and the Home Office, but got no redress. For the next few months the club's press notice read : "Shut by order of the police."

Heres a longer segment...

"When the Homerton Club was silenced, Lane widened his aim to cover the whole East End. He joined a group led by Kitz in organising open-air meetings at Mile End Waste, agitating about housing conditions in the slums, intervening in various meetings and demonstrations with provocative leaflets and banners. They caused a sensation by bringing a banner defending tyrannicide to the Hyde Park mass assembly against Irish Coercion in July 1882. The sensation must have been sharpened by the fact that the banner was a quotation from The Revolutionary Epick, a Byronic poem written in 1834 by none other than Benjamin Disraeli, the Conservative leader who had died in 1881:And blessed be the hand that dares to wave The regicidal steel that shall redeem A nation's sorrow with a tyrant's blood!

This militant activity soon brought results. In 1882 Kitz and Lane joined Ambrose Barker and Tom Lemon of the Stratford Dialectical and Radical Club in forming the Labour Emancipation League, based at Mile End and Bethnal Green, which soon became the most important working-class organisation in the growing socialist movement. Its programme included six traditional radical points (adult suffrage and secret ballot; direct legislation by referendum; abolition of standing army; free secular education; freedom of speech, press and assembly; free administration of justice) and two definitely socialist ones (equalisation of wealth; socialisation of production). When the first secretary, Aaron Moseley, soon resigned Lane took over and established himself as the most effective socialist organiser in London. His old organisation was not completely superseded by the Labour Emancipation League. It continued to exist as the Homerton Socialist Club, and Lane was one of its two signatories to the Manifesto to the Working Men of the World, an unsuccessful appeal for the re-establishment of the International Working Men's Association which was issued by the London socialist organisations in July 1883.

Lane never achieved much of a reputation as a writer or a speaker. Most of his writings were anonymous ephemera. In 1887 William Morris wrote that "his obvious earnestness and good faith make him a convincing speaker," but the Liberal Daily News described him as "a humble sort of man" who "dropped his h's recklessly" (17 March 1887). "

Last bit, closer to the Ripper period...

"Later in 1887 the political situation was sharpened by two dramatic events - the police riot known as "Bloody Sunday" in London, and the judicial murder of the Chicago anarchists, both in November. It is not surprising that the parliamentarist faction was finally driven out of the Socialist League at the fourth annual conference in May 1888; and it is appropriate that Lane helped to expose its intrigues, involving all three signatories of the majority report of 1887. But the Socialist League remained an unstable coalition, and the antiparliamentarists soon began to split between the anarchists and the rest, including Morris and Lane."

Nothing that I wanted anyone to conclude from any of this just thought these bits might be interesting.

My best regards again

[Phil Carter]

Michael,

Thank you for these postings. I find the splinter organisations, previously mentioned, and the directions the Association were leading to very interesting indeed.
I will take my time and re read these postings in order to understand them a little better.

best wishes

Phil

[richardnunweek]

Hi ,
Intresting as this thread is, it reminds me of the old theory of 'Someone out there knows something George.
We are heading in the direction of all the conspiracy beliefs, with MJK, as the climax, she is now a fenian that knew too much, and was silenced in copy cat fashion, Ripper mode..
I do not believe that for one moment, if indeed a member of the post office, and representative of the Irish police did visit room 13, then I would suggest it was less sinister then that , how about attempting to identify next of kin?
If Fiona is correct[ kendall] then her great grandmother sent kellys belongings on to her brother who was in the army, and as no relations were present at the funeral that would suggest that her mother either could not, or would not attend the funeral, even her brother was concerned that he would be connected to this murder, which could affect his army career.
Still as mentioned an 'Intresting Thread.'
Regards Richard.

[DVV]

I do not believe that for one moment
Regards Richard.

Neither do I, Richard,
a copy-cat would have gone with the uterus, not the heart.

Amitiés, and a merry Christmas,
David

[curious]

Hi ,

If Fiona is correct[ kendall] then her great grandmother sent kellys belongings on to her brother who was in the army, and as no relations were present at the funeral that would suggest that her mother either could not, or would not attend the funeral, even her brother was concerned that he would be connected to this murder, which could affect his army career.

Regards Richard.

Richard,
where could I find more about this?

Thanks,
Curious

And Merry Christmas to everyone!

[Phil Carter]

Hi ,
Intresting as this thread is, it reminds me of the old theory of 'Someone out there knows something George.
We are heading in the direction of all the conspiracy beliefs, with MJK, as the climax, she is now a fenian that knew too much, and was silenced in copy cat fashion, Ripper mode..
I do not believe that for one moment, if indeed a member of the post office, and representative of the Irish police did visit room 13, then I would suggest it was less sinister then that , how about attempting to identify next of kin?
If Fiona is correct[ kendall] then her great grandmother sent kellys belongings on to her brother who was in the army, and as no relations were present at the funeral that would suggest that her mother either could not, or would not attend the funeral, even her brother was concerned that he would be connected to this murder, which could affect his army career.
Still as mentioned an 'Intresting Thread.'
Regards Richard.

Hello Richard, all,

As someone who has written previously about "Someone out there knows somrething George", I hadn't actually thought down that line, believe it or not.... (amazing, but true)..

That visitation of the Irish police, as you know, I find unusual. Yes, identification, perhaps something to do with the letter correspondance from her mother, in the light of the Post Office Official being there with the Irish Constabulary.

However, the connection to Fiona's comment, I had not thought of at all.
The word conspiracy itself I do not like using. But then again, if two people conspire to withold the truth, then I suppose that is a conspiracy.

I wasn't actually thinking in terms of that climatic ending, as I am still in my mindset stuck in the goings on in and around Berner Street vis a vis the Stride murder. I think I ventured "outside" to the writing on the wall, and looked at the connection of a loose cannon anarchist.

So as yet, it is the antecedants of the people connected to the Berner St IWMC that attracted my immediate attention on this occasion. And the goings on within that little place and by whom.

Yes Richard, it is an interesting thread. And helps open things up a little. Not much, but a little. Enough to make it interesting, as you say.

best wishes and seasonal greetings

Phil