William Bury website

[Wyatt Earp]

Excellent work on the site, bravo!

I wonder about

Any idea what he's refering to?

I also wonder how it's known that she was a prostitute? Inferred from the court transcripts about James Martin's house or?

Thanks, Kattrup.

We don't really know what Bury was referring to when he mentioned Ellen's character.

Ellen was a worker at a brothel being operated by James Martin and Kate Spooner. At this time, she was renting a room from Elizabeth Haynes. Haynes noticed that Ellen was never in her room at night (Macpherson, The Trial of Jack the Ripper, p.45). Later, Ellen admitted to Haynes “that she had worked as a prostitute for James Martin for the whole of the time she had been a tenant with her” (p.48).

[Abby Normal]

Hi Abby,

Thanks for your response and opinions. It's always difficult to trade thoughts with people about the probable actions of a lust murderer. For some reason, people just think it's weird.

I still get twisted in knots over Alice McKenzie, but I do agree with Keppel for the most part - though I also agree with your earlier comments that profiling is far from perfect. For every instance we hear how well a profile worked, I fear there's several instances where it did not. To me, AM is a close call, but not enough to convince me she had to be a JTR victim. And as I cannot get away from thinking WHB was most likely the Ripper, I'm willing to let the differences in her murder differentiate and remove her as a JTR crime. Had she been completely "opened up" and had organs removed we'd be having a different discussion.

EDIT: I'm curious, what are every one's thoughts on Rose Mylett as a possible "incomplete" Ripper victim? I know Bill Beadle considered her a good possibility for Bury, as she was within close proximity to his home (at a time when Bury had sold off his transportation) and was possibly killed with a ligature in the same fashion as Ellen Bury. Was this WHB's first attempt to step away from throat slashing?

Mu own personal opinion is thay she was not a ripper victem. Not enough similarities there to make the call. Sorry

[Single-O-Seven]

Hi Abby,

Thanks for your response and opinions. It's always difficult to trade thoughts with people about the probable actions of a lust murderer. For some reason, people just think it's weird.

I still get twisted in knots over Alice McKenzie, but I do agree with Keppel for the most part - though I also agree with your earlier comments that profiling is far from perfect. For every instance we hear how well a profile worked, I fear there's several instances where it did not. To me, AM is a close call, but not enough to convince me she had to be a JTR victim. And as I cannot get away from thinking WHB was most likely the Ripper, I'm willing to let the differences in her murder differentiate and remove her as a JTR crime. Had she been completely "opened up" and had organs removed we'd be having a different discussion.

EDIT: I'm curious, what are every one's thoughts on Rose Mylett as a possible "incomplete" Ripper victim? I know Bill Beadle considered her a good possibility for Bury, as she was within close proximity to his home (at a time when Bury had sold off his transportation) and was possibly killed with a ligature in the same fashion as Ellen Bury. Was this WHB's first attempt to step away from throat slashing?

[Abby Normal]

I think that Bury probably did assume that a policeman would be on the way. That's why he didn't stay to mutilate.

After Schwartz and Pipeman had left, he could have eliminated Stride and been off into the shadows of the night in less than a minute.

hi earp

I too think stride was definitely killed by broad shoulders. and bury makes a good fit for him too IMHO.

charmer, thug, well spoken, drunk, mercurial, bad temper, woman beater. killer. sounds like BS man to me!

[Abby Normal]

Hi Abby!

Alice McKenzie is an interesting thorn in the debate of Bury's candidacy as JTR. Outside of Tabram through Kelly, she is the next best fit in the entire Whitechapel series as being a possible JTR victim. However, I think the "mild" abdominal cuts (described almost as scratches) suggest she was not a JTR victim. I just don't see why he wouldn't have cut deeper given he had the chance to do so.

Perhaps a similar argument could be made for Ellen Bury (though her wounds were deep enough to expose her intestines), but I feel her immediate connection to Bury likely gave him cause to hesitate. He wanted to explore that lust/fascination that satisfied him, but given she was his own wife this may have impacted his desire to do so, perhaps out of fear of looking too inescapably like the Ripper.

With AM, I cannot quite get what her killer was otherwise trying to do. By making the abdominal cuts was he making her murder seem Ripper-like but did not have the nerve (let alone the need/desire) to fully inflict the sort of savagery JTR did? And what became of her killer? Why did he not strike again, or did he end up moving away/incarcerated/dead? There is a whole worthwhile mystery in just AM's death, but it may, I'm afraid, be more hopeless to find a solution for it than for the rest of the series.

Hi Single!

Alice McKenzie is an interesting thorn in the debate of Bury's candidacy as JTR. Outside of Tabram through Kelly, she is the next best fit in the entire Whitechapel series as being a possible JTR victim. However, I think the "mild" abdominal cuts (described almost as scratches) suggest she was not a JTR victim. I just don't see why he wouldn't have cut deeper given he had the chance to do so.

yup. I agree. but perhaps he was wasted, had the wrong knife, was sick etc. But the fact remains the sig and MO have many similarities to the ripper: same victimology, same place, time of night, unsolved, similar wounds and the clincher for me-on back with skirt hiked up to expose the abdomen.

Perhaps a similar argument could be made for Ellen Bury (though her wounds were deep enough to expose her intestines), but I feel her immediate connection to Bury likely gave him cause to hesitate. He wanted to explore that lust/fascination that satisfied him, but given she was his own wife this may have impacted his desire to do so, perhaps out of fear of looking too inescapably like the Ripper.

absolutely. I agree. if he was the ripper, my explanation would be-he just couldnt help himself. Plus he was effed up and it is his wife-so could easily explain the differences and why he didnt go all the way.

With AM, I cannot quite get what her killer was otherwise trying to do. By making the abdominal cuts was he making her murder seem Ripper-like but did not have the nerve (let alone the need/desire) to fully inflict the sort of savagery JTR did? And what became of her killer? Why did he not strike again, or did he end up moving away/incarcerated/dead? There is a whole worthwhile mystery in just AM's death, but it may, I'm afraid, be more hopeless to find a solution for it than for the rest of the series.

personally I think he probably moved away after AM, but that's just me.

yes it is a twisted goat rope for sure.


but you will not find me arguing to hard against Bury, because as I said, hes one of the better candidates for the ripper.

[Abby Normal]

The problem you have, Abby, is that the person who is the world-class expert on signature evidence, Robert Keppel, he and his team of criminologists looked at the Alice McKenzie murder and the Pinchin Street torso case, and determined that neither one of them could be linked to the Ripper through signature analysis. McKenzie and the torsos are both dead ends, and you should abandon them.

LOL. thanks for that rather frank advice Wyatt, but I think not. : )

Many of the police at the time thought Mckenzie was a ripper victim and with good reason. The (somewhat) final straw with me is she was found on her back with the skirt hiked up-like the others.


as you also may well know, the pinchin torso also had a vertical gash to her midsection and I lean toward the torsoman and the ripper being the same man.


both McKenzie and pinchin are right in rippers wheelhouse, and close in time. what we know now about serial killers and there changes to MO I think it would unwise to rule them out based on a preferred suspect.


re Keppel-meh. the average casebooker knows more about the ripper case than he does, and profiling is more art than science any way. having lived through the beltway sniper serial killer case, and how badly the FBI profilers jacked that assessment up, I tend to take it with a grain of salt.


now that all being said, I still think bury is one of the best bets for the ripper and concede that AM may not have been a ripper victim, but it would be one hell of a coincidence if she wasn't.

[Kattrup]

Excellent work on the site, bravo!

I wonder about

"I have communicated to you my motive for the crime but as it concerns so closely the character of my wife I do not wish you to make it Known publicly."

Any idea what he's refering to?

I also wonder how it's known that she was a prostitute? Inferred from the court transcripts about James Martin's house or?

[Busy Beaver]

The original police photo-fit of the Yorkshire Ripper was spot on according to a surviving victim.

[Wyatt Earp]

This is certainly a possible scenario but I think a reasonably prudent person would have to assume that Schwartz and/or Pipeman had scurried off to find the nearest PC and the best course of action would be to get the hell out of there as quickly as possible.

c.d.

I think that Bury probably did assume that a policeman would be on the way. That's why he didn't stay to mutilate.

After Schwartz and Pipeman had left, he could have eliminated Stride and been off into the shadows of the night in less than a minute.

[c.d.]

I’d suggest things could have transpired like this. After Schwartz and Pipeman had left, he told her that he was going to pop her in the chops if she didn’t go into the yard with him and give him what he wanted. Stride, having done business with him before and survived it, decides discretion is the better part of valor, picks herself up, dusts herself off, and grudgingly agrees to go into the yard with him. He either hands her the cachous to distract her, or she takes them out on her own to calm her nerves after that little tango outside the gate, and that’s when Bury strikes.

This is certainly a possible scenario but I think a reasonably prudent person would have to assume that Schwartz and/or Pipeman had scurried off to find the nearest PC and the best course of action would be to get the hell out of there as quickly as possible.

c.d.

[Single-O-Seven]

Did the police even make use of sketch artists then? It seems they would have done so if they did. The newspapers certainly used them. To the point that many of the images we have of popular figures we know from the JTR case come by way of their newspaper illustrations - Bury included.

[c.d.]

Good luck tracking down Jack the Ripper with a picture of a man with a moustache.

Well if Schwartz (and possibly Pipeman) could give a detailed description of the man they saw in an altercation with Stride and a police sketch artist was reasonably competent couldn't they have taken that drawing around to pubs and other establishments in Whitechapel asking if anyone knew this man? A long shot but not impossible.

c.d.

[Wyatt Earp]

Police sketch artist?

c.d.

Good luck tracking down Jack the Ripper with a picture of a man with a moustache.

[c.d.]

But if Schwartz and Pipeman did not know his name, he would not have been in danger from them.

Police sketch artist?

c.d.

[Wyatt Earp]

hi single and wyatt
I too think Bury is one of the best candidates for Jack the ripper. However, my main problem with him, ironically is based on signature evidence.

I have come to the conclusion that Alice Mckenzie was undoubtedly a ripper victim, mainly on the signature evidence-slashed throat and mutilated abdomen. (along with same victimology and location).

but of course she couldn't have been killed by Bury as ripper, obviously since bury was dead by this point.

what say you?

The problem you have, Abby, is that the person who is the world-class expert on signature evidence, Robert Keppel, he and his team of criminologists looked at the Alice McKenzie murder and the Pinchin Street torso case, and determined that neither one of them could be linked to the Ripper through signature analysis. McKenzie and the torsos are both dead ends, and you should abandon them.