Why Hanbury St. No. 29?

[Lechmere]

Well Tom, yes I guess I am suggesting that Cross committed the next murder at Hanbury Street to throw suspicion on Paul (not for revenge, K).

I don't think Isenschmid had anything to do with it as when he was in a violent mood it would seem that he acted in a very strange and obviously deranged manner. This would make it virtually impossible for him to silently stalk someone (even a butchers shop) or put a prostitute at her ease when going down a dark side turning.

I do think Isenschmid played a pivotal role in the overall case as he distracted the police for a key period prior to the double event.

[Tom_Wescott]

Hi Lechmere, thanks for that. Although I don't agree with all your theories, I'm always impressed with how many rational interpretations you can tease out of the Nichols case. Let me ask you this, do you think either/both Stride and Eddowes were killed by the same man who killed Nichols and Chapman?

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Lechmere]

I think they were all by the same hand (including Tabram, Kelly and McKenzie) - Cross or not. I don't think its credible that two people were operating at the same time and place, with a similar attack plan and similar victims at a similar time of day. Also murders of that kind were exceptionally rare. Unsolved murders were actually rare.
I am sure that if this were a modern case they all would be provisionally chalked up to the same person.
The similarities far outweigh any differences.

Also if this were a modern case, I am sure the assumption would be that the culprit would probably be a localish nobody who seemed outwardly normal.

[Tom_Wescott]

Hi Lech. Thanks for the insight into your thinking. What about Emma Smith?

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Rubyretro]

Le Marquis de Lechmere
I won't keep banging the 'number 29' peg for much longer, however :

“Why those particular roads?”
To work out why the murders took place adjacent to those particular roads you really have to have a suspect that fits the bill I think

.
Which is the danger of being fixed on a favourite suspect (and I of course, should know). I don't think that having one theory in mind should exclude looking at the murder locations from every aspect, or we might throw the baby out with the bathwater.

It makes sense that a serial killer who wanted to find a potential victim who would be relatively easy to kill in a secluded spot would pick on prostitutes late at night. They would mostly be found plying their trade on the main roads at that time

.
Chapman was not murdered late at night, but early in the morning. Personally
I would go for the idea that the noises that Cadoche heard was not Annie being murdered and I think that Long saw a different couple....however,
it is generally thought that the murder took place when people were getting up for work, and Cadoche mentions men in the street when he left his house.
Not to mention the 'Mrs Longs' scurrying along. If the killer was a local man, then he would have run the real risk of being recognised in the company of the woman he was about to murder -an incredible risk if he had already been
seen standing over a body, and one that defies belief.
He would surely have wanted to get into the secluded spot as quickly as possible with the minimum fuss, and with some sense of security that he was familiar with the place and it's frequentations.
Buck's Row is a whole different ball game, and probably unplanned. However, I think that the killer set out for Hanbury Street with the intention of murdering there if he could, and he knew that he might find one close to
number 29, because that's where they often used, and it was fit for his purpose.

To recapitulate -it makes it at least worth considering every angle of that specific house, to see if we can't tie a suspect to it.

.While it’s possible he may have suggested No 29 for some specific reason and Annie Chapman agreed,

Thankyou !

I fail to see ‘the point’. It was just a back yard

.
The point is that, if he wanted to try some more complicated mutilation (Polly having been spontaneous experimentation), then he might have been fantasising about it between the two murders. It seems natural to me that
from getting excited about the prospect of the deed, his mind might flick through possible locations that afforded more privacy than Bucks Row.
They would have to be locations that he knew, and where he was pretty sure that no one would be likely to want the privy at that time, or be starting work.

After picking up his target he would I presume have been focussing on checking that no one was about and that no one had got a clear view of him. Simultaneously trying to steer his victim into a specific corner seems to me to be an unnecessary complication when she would take him to a nice secluded spot anyway.

[/QUOTE]
I repeat -if the murder took place at the generally accepted time, then too many people were about to 'check out'.
I have mentioned before that there are prostitutes working the next road to mine (they rent rooms, but don't live there). I often observe how the deal is done with their clients; The men walk normally along the road (they think normally -they look shifty), they mutter something quickly to the prostitute as they draw level, and can't wait to get off the street as quickly as possible, so as not to be noticed. If they see me watching, then they
just keep walking, but if I turn round fast, I see that they have doubled back.
I submit that thus was it ever, and the prostitutes were as near to the spot
that they intended to use as possible, specifically to allow the men some secrecy.

[ianincleveland]

i think Annie led him to the back of 29 as she felt safe there for whatever reason.im also coming to the conclusion that JTR often used prostitutes but unless he felt really confident didnt murder and butcher them,i think he only murdered when he felt secure,and possibly lots of prostitutes escaped with their lives.I find it hard to believe he didnt go out in October in the hope of finding a victim

[DVV]

Hi Ian

i think Annie led him to the back of 29 as she felt safe there for whatever reason.im also coming to the conclusion that JTR often used prostitutes but unless he felt really confident didnt murder and butcher them,i think he only murdered when he felt secure,and possibly lots of prostitutes escaped with their lives.

Yes, probably. However, using prostitutes is also a matter of money, and we don't know how poor he was.

[Lechmere]

But mademoiselle Retro, wasn’t the rear yard of no 29 also a dangerous spot to chose for your preconceived purpose for such an attack? The presumption is that he would have been like a rat in a trap. Isn’t it?

I think he was disturbed at Bucks Row - evidenced by the dress being pulled down - with Nichols and Stride being the only victims not left ‘on display’. Even Tabram was left with her dress right up.
Hence the limited mutilations at Bucks Row, plus he was on a learning curve. And Nichols's stays were an impediment.
But he may have intended more.

No 29 was more or less a small but heavily populated block of flats with a lot of people coming and going. Hence the front door was left open.
His choices for a suitably secluded spot were limited by the physical environment though. He had to work with what he had. No 29 was not a haven of peace and quiet.

However a prostitute would not take a client to a location where people would be likely to be coming and going – which is why I think he could safely leave it to the prostitute to chose the location. Also as has been said numerous times by different people, he could always make his excuses and scarpa if he got to the scene and didn’t like the look of it.

On your soliciting observations, I would suggest that if the location for the act was not owned by the prostitute (i.e. it was not a private flat but more a semi public back yard that belonged to a small crowded block of flats inhabited by respectable people), then the solicitation would probably not take place immediately outside as this would draw the irritated attention of the inhabitants. I would suggest the more likely location for the meet and greet would be a short distance away. Then they can walk off to the ‘scene’ as if they were a happy well acquainted couple and nip straight in and down the corridor.
I agree the initial contact would often be as you describe, with the man being self conscious and inhibited.

Is it illegal in France by the way?
I should have thought that if a young lady such as yourself was hanging around such a street then you might attract unwelcome advances?

I am unsure when this attack took place – it is one of those very many conundrums associated with this case. But anytime between 4.00 am and 5.25 am is the night time as far as I am concerned.

[Lechmere]

Tom
I wouldn’t include Emma Smith as it seems to have been a gang attack and no knife was used.
Perhaps less satisfactory as a reason for her exclusion is that she doesn’t fit my suspect! He only moved to the area in June which meant his perambulations along Wentworth Street only commenced two months after her death.

The Emma Smith case has significance though as it helped generate the hysteria that followed the Nichols murder. Also it may have given the actual Ripper ideas if he was aware that it had happened. He may have heard on the local grapevine from someone who witnessed it. After all, from June onwards he will have walked past the crime scene every day on his way to work.
(Sorry not every day - on at least one day, and probably two, he decided to go via Hanbury Street)

[lynn cates]

JI and behaviour

Hello Lechmere. I think we may be at loggerheads concerning JI's disorder and subsequent behaviour. If you read his charts carefully, I think you'll find his symptoms approximate paranoid schizophrenia. I paste below a snippet from the corresponding Wikipaedia article to illustrate my meaning.

"Delusions or auditory hallucinations are present, but thought disorder, disorganized behavior, or affective flattening are not. Delusions are persecutory and/or grandiose, but in addition to these, other themes such as jealousy, religiosity, or somatization may also be present. (DSM code 295.3/ICD code F20.0)"

And if this is the case, why not #29 Hanbury? After all, wasn't there a man found sleeping once in the passage way, a man with a foreign accent? We know JI perambulated throughout the neighbourhood--with knives, no less. He was also found out in Clerkenwell in some person's house.

Cheers.
LC

[DVV]

Hi Lechmere

I wouldn’t include Emma Smith as it seems to have been a gang attack

That's what she said, but there's nothing to back it up.
Ada Wilson also said her assailant knocked her door, but we know it wasn't the case.
And we undestand why they lied.

[Rubyretro]

QUOTE=Lechmere;198678]But mademoiselle Retro, wasn’t the rear yard of no 29 also a dangerous spot to chose for your preconceived purpose for such an attack? The presumption is that he would have been like a rat in a trap. Isn’t it?[/QUOTE

]
He was, but no one was coming down to use the privy (for example), as Cadoche did. Maybe there were similar habits every day.

I think he was disturbed at Bucks Row - evidenced by the dress being pulled down - with Nichols and Stride being the only victims not left ‘on display’. Even Tabram was left with her dress right up.

I don't think that Bucks Row was planned -and I agree that he was disturbed. Still he 'discovered' mutilation in Buck's Row...something that he hadn't yet thought of with Tabram. From then on he needed more privacy to indulge his new curiosity.

Hence the limited mutilations at Bucks Row, plus he was on a learning curve. And Nichols's stays were an impediment.
But he may have intended more.

exactly.

His choices for a suitably secluded spot were limited by the physical environment though. He had to work with what he had. No 29 was not a haven of peace and quiet.

Maybe the best he had thought of at that time, though ?

However a prostitute would not take a client to a location where people would be likely to be coming and going

–
No. But he might have thought of the place, knew that prostitutes were going there, and then gone looking for the prostitute who was indeed going there at the moment he wanted (and abandonned if he found no one).

On your soliciting observations, I would suggest that if the location for the act was not owned by the prostitute (i.e. it was not a private flat but more a semi public back yard that belonged to a small crowded block of flats inhabited by respectable people), then the solicitation would probably not take place immediately outside as this would draw the irritated attention of the inhabitants. I would suggest the more likely location for the meet and greet would be a short distance away. Then they can walk off to the ‘scene’ as if they were a happy well acquainted couple and nip straight in and down the corridor.

"short" is the important word -as short a distance as possible.

Is it illegal in France by the way?
I should have thought that if a young lady such as yourself was hanging around such a street then you might attract unwelcome advances?

I have no idea whether it is legal or illegal in France...it is obvious and upfront
in these streets, so I suppose legal. It is a constant source of annoyance to me, to which I have an ambiguous and unresolved attitude i.e. I always greet the prostitutes with a cheery greeting when I pass (they having been 'neighbours' for many years and I have nothing against them as people), but I despise the men tapping softly on my door, or masturbating
under my windows (true !) if by inadvertance I forget to draw my curtains when sitting still reading a book, or -very strangely- when cooking.
I am good at rude hand signals, swearing, and the occasional bucket of water
(also true !!!!).
.[/QUOTE]

[DVV]

I have no idea whether it is legal or illegal in France...it is obvious and upfront
in these streets, so I suppose legal. It is a constant source of annoyance to me, to which I have an ambiguous and unresolved attitude i.e. I always greet the prostitutes with a cheery greeting when I pass (they having been 'neighbours' for many years and I have nothing against them as people), but I despise the men tapping softly on my door, or masturbating
under my windows (true !) if by inadvertance I forget to draw my curtains when sitting still reading a book, or -very strangely- when cooking.
I am good at rude hand signals, swearing, and the occasional bucket of water
(also true !!!!).

Aaaarff...tout ça dans la cités des Papes ?!

[Lechmere]

Demoiselle Retro
You haven't got strip lighting by your window have you? Or red bulbs?
If so change them.
But I can imagine you are indeed proficient at rude hand signals and swearing.

However that may be your experience makes the point. I suspect that Chapman did not solicit outside 29, but a short distance away - maybe at the corner with Brick Lane or the corner with Commercial Street.
To me these details are not of major significance - nor is the detail of who actually chose no 29.
However I think the most likely answer is that the solicitation took place on Commercial Street and she chose 29.

Lynn I will review JI's behavours as described by witnesses and the medicos - but I can't see an obvious lunatic being the crafty and silent killer, nor is it at all likely that more than one person was at work and he was locked up prior to the double event.

[lynn cates]

do

Hello Lechmere.

"I will review JI's behavours as described by witnesses and the medicos "

Splendid.

Cheers.
LC