The broken window

[Bridewell]

Returning to the window and the claim that MJK reached through the window to open the door:-

You could undo a latch or bolt by reaching through the window but (before the invention of the Yale type lock) you would still need a key to undo a lock surely? Does that mean that MJK used to secure the door by a latch or bolt only as the lock was effectively unuseable? If so, who locked the door when the key was missing - or was it only ever latched/bolted? Perhaps the key was never missing at all and found in the keyhole on the inside - in which case there might be a need to invent a lost key to cover the embarrassment of using a pick-axe unnecessarily.

Sorry. That's a bit of a ramble but it's late evening and that's the way my mind runs.

[Rosella]

It's not quite clear who or what the handbill refers to. However, re Howard's conversation it's probably the grocer with a descendant. A member of the armed forces would not be advertising services on a handbill, that's all I know.

The older Bowyer, (Indian Harry) had been in the Indian Army hadn't he, for many years. Does this mean he was a miner before that? Surely someone has traced his place of birth before now, whether Wales or elsewhere?

[Robert St Devil]

And nowhere does it say how she opened the door for blotchy skin man?? Did she reach in thru the window to unlock it?

Does anyone else think its random that Jack Mack sends Tom Boy to collect on weeks worth of back rent on the very same morning that she is murdered? or was knocking on her door to collect some rent (like a deputy) part of his daily routine?? The story never indicates what type of collection arrangement Mack has with Barnett during October. Four (or six) weeks without payment seems like a long time for a PAYbytheWEEK slumlord like Mack.]

[RockySullivan]

It's not quite clear who or what the handbill refers to. However, re Howard's conversation it's probably the grocer with a descendant. A member of the armed forces would not be advertising services on a handbill, that's all I know.

The older Bowyer, (Indian Harry) had been in the Indian Army hadn't he, for many years. Does this mean he was a miner before that? Surely someone has traced his place of birth before now, whether Wales or elsewhere?

Hi Rosella, thanks ,

Are we sure the handbill is connected to Frank Cater/Carter?
CB says this :
"Printed handbill and according to a press report- a printed card for 'Frank Carter,305,Bethnal Green Road"

Is there any clear distinction that the handbill is somehow connected to the printed card or did she just have a random handbill AND ALSO a printed card?

[DJA]

A member of the armed forces would not be advertising services on a handbill, that's all I know.

Might have moonlighted as a bouncer or private investigator on weekends.
Police and servicemen are often found as the former.
Took a lot to stamp it out in Victoria. Still happens. Good pay,no tax.

Building tunnels and bridges will result in those broad shoulders.

Honestly,how many people with really broad shoulders do you know and how did they get them?

Rowers and weight lifters top my list.
A railway builder in NQ is right up there. One.
Some swimmers.
Some builders/brickies.

Cheesemongers....zilch.

Maybe the cheesemonger rowed the Thames in his spare time

All the Best!

[Wickerman]

I'm looking at the photo of Mary's room in Millers Court in the JTR A-Z now, the photo taken showing the relevant distance between door and smaller window with furthest pane. Even if it was the nearest pane that was broken that's an extraordinary length for a human arm to stretch to the door, (even if all the glass in the pane had gone which it hadn't.) You'd need simian length limbs to reach through and unlock anything. The door must have been left on the latch.

It might be a mistake to assume the broken pane that was looked through, was the same broken pane that was reached through, as more than one pane was broken.

[DJA]

random handbill AND ALSO a printed card?

Just to confuse things.....sometimes referred to as a carte....being either or a compromise between the two.

Small handbill or flyer.

[DJA]

It might be a mistake to assume the broken pane that was looked through, was the same broken pane that was reached through, as more than one pane was broken.

Reckon Phillips nailed it at the Inquest.

[Robert]

As far as I have been able to determine, there was no Frank Carter at #305 - just a gas fitter called James Steadman.

The newspaper accounts give Frank Cater as being at #405, but it was #400 in the census.

[Wickerman]

Returning to the window and the claim that MJK reached through the window to open the door:-

You could undo a latch or bolt by reaching through the window but (before the invention of the Yale type lock) you would still need a key to undo a lock surely? Does that mean that MJK used to secure the door by a latch or bolt only as the lock was effectively unuseable? If so, who locked the door when the key was missing - or was it only ever latched/bolted? Perhaps the key was never missing at all and found in the keyhole on the inside - in which case there might be a need to invent a lost key to cover the embarrassment of using a pick-axe unnecessarily.

Sorry. That's a bit of a ramble but it's late evening and that's the way my mind runs.

In the press the lock is described as a spring-lock. You need a key to unlock it from outside when it is left on the latch, or reach through the window to lift the latch, supposedly.

[DJA]

In the press the lock is described as a spring-lock. You need a key to unlock it from outside when it is left on the latch, or reach through the window to lift the latch, supposedly.

On exiting,Jack only needed a strip of metal to prevent the bolt from springing out fully.

Just pull the strip out as the door closes.

A knife would do the job.

[RockySullivan]

Might have moonlighted as a bouncer or private investigator on weekends.
Police and servicemen are often found as the former.
Took a lot to stamp it out in Victoria. Still happens. Good pay,no tax.

Building tunnels and bridges will result in those broad shoulders.

Honestly,how many people with really broad shoulders do you know and how did they get them?

Rowers and weight lifters top my list.
A railway builder in NQ is right up there. One.
Some swimmers.
Some builders/brickies.

Cheesemongers....zilch.

Maybe the cheesemonger rowed the Thames in his spare time

All the Best!

But there's no link between Cater and BS man either way. It is Carter, and he was a tunneler you might be on to something

[Rosella]

Weren't navvies tearing up part of Commercial Street during the whole of the Ripper period laying tacks for trams? Navvies have broad shoulders with all that digging and they might want the services of local women? I'm sure I read somewhere that they were disrupting trade during the day and then Jack's activities were the final straw as far as night trading was concerned.

Whatever Aussie soldiers do now most soldiers in the British army in the Victorian period were confined to barracks when they weren't on duty or given brief leave. I can't see permission being given for private tunnelling activities or moonlighting of any kind actually.

[DJA]

Prolly why he quit and became a private detective

[Rosella]

Perhaps Kate wanted to track Conway down!

I always found the fact that gangs of navvies were digging up Commercial St until mid November quite intriguing.
Halfway down the North Met Tramways section.

http://www.casebook.org/dissertations/rip-spratling.html