Is it plausible that Druitt did it?

[Graham]

I haven't really been following this thread, because I think it's gone somewhat off course, but -

Long before 1888 the pastime of 'slumming' was popular, not only in London but in other major cities such as New York, Paris, etc. In London, omnibus companies actually laid on tours for toffs to see how the riff-raff lived and behaved, and Whitechapel was a popular place to go. Seven Dials and other of the seedier parts of the East End were also on the tourist trail. This was bad enough, but for further amusement toffs could actually have tours of insane-asylums, just for the jolly! If anyone thinks that 'slumming' was a peculiarly Victorian pastime, it went on well into the 20th century, when coach-loads of, for example, Oxford and Cambridge undergrads would take the tour of the working-class parts of London. Maybe then, it was a case of 'know thine enemy'...

However, if any well-heeled gent from the West End fancied a bit on the side, nothing would induce him to pay for sex outside his own environment, and there were high-class knocking-shops a-plenty out West. From what I can make out, most of the 'ladies' in these establishments were there of their own free will, and making an absolute bloody mint. Some of these darlings were actresses 'by profession' - the name of Lily Langtree springs to mind.
She entertained the upper crust just about as far up the crust as you could go - to The Prince of Wales, amongst others. In stark contrast the the sex-pedlars of the East End, who sold themselves for the plain and simple reason that their bodies were all they had left to sell. And as we Ripperologists all know, a quick jump in some dark alley was for a few pennies.

Maybe someone like Druitt did the slumming tour, for kicks, but I honestly doubt if an educated, well-bred gent would ever even consider paying for sex on the streets of the East End. He wouldn't be seen dead on the sh!t-strewn pavements, let alone go with some woman who trod them. If the Ripper came from the better-heeled, better-educated, classes, then for my money he'd have been someone like a doctor or a lawyer who had good reason to spend time in the East End.

I'm probably just repeating what's already been written on this thread, but I've not had the time to wade through all the posts.

There y'are.

Graham

[anna]

Sam! I wanna go on that omnibus! Trying to decide whether I'd love to climb the spiral stairs for a read,or go inside to peer through the curtains!I think i've read they were free.

[Sam Flynn]

Youd have to multiply your picture by a few hundred.....that would be a torrent.

I doubt that the prurient sight-seers of Old London Town who would drive through the slums in their coaches (as we might drive through a baboon enclosure in our 4x4s) would have hired convoys of hundreds, MrP. Therefore your suggesting that "torrents" of slummers visited was a bit - ahem! - "imaginative" of you, methinks

As to the toff/non-toff debate: please don't let's have one here!

Ben, old chap - if you're reading - take a deep breath, bite your tongue, or start another thread on the subject

[Graham]

I think my post crossed a couple of others in a similar vein....

Graham

[Simon Wood]

Hi All,

Regarding toffs fancying a trollop on the side in 1888, it should be remembered that many of the hotels in and around The Strand, Haymarket and Charing Cross rented out rooms by the hour and half-hour.

Still do, probably. Check with the concierge.

Respectability is in the eye of the beholder.

Regards,

Simon

[Mr Poster]

Hi ho

However, if any well-heeled gent from the West End fancied a bit on the side, nothing would induce him to pay for sex outside his own environment, and there were high-class knocking-shops a-plenty out West. From what I can make out, most of the 'ladies' in these establishments were there of their own free will, and making an absolute bloody mint.

Well thats your opinion but its not true probably. Because if you take a walk through any skanky district, you will find people there who could afford much better.

But Hugh Grant gets caught on the dirty side with what could never be called a "high class" hooker with her head in his lap. According to you that couldnt happen as there were plenty of high class hookers in the better parts of town.

The guys outside the windows in Amsterdam are as likely to be lawyers as poor immigrants despite the fact there are plenty of high class whores in Holland.

I imagine that for some, who like "buying" women, getting them cheap is just an amplification of some sort of odd sexual thing.


As to the omnibus......we know they were taken there by omnibus...not "an" omnibus. Some SamF's picture of one omnibus is meaningless.

As to toffs......we have been assured that Druitt would not have been down there as he could have gotten better elsewhere and better class people didnt go there.

I disagree.

But I dont think Druitt is possible. Most probablybecause he has a soon to be published alibi in the offing and for the fact that there is no reason to suspect him.

p

[Sam Flynn]

SamF's picture of one omnibus is meaningless.

It has meaning, MrP, inasmuch as it illustrates precisely what an omnibus-full would actually have constituted: viz., "not many people". Certainly nowhere near as many as your colourful depiction of "torrents" of non-locals, "streaming" via omnibus into Whitechapel, would suggest.

[Graham]

Lars,

I bow to your infinitely greater, and obviously more hands-on, experience than mine - and ask "what you doing next weekend?"

Hugh Grant never knew 19th-century Whitechapel, either.

Cheers,

Graham

[Mr Poster]

hi ho Graham

One doesnt need experience......its the same drive that spurs people like George Michael into sex with skanks in the bushes when he could have afforded a brace of greasy teenagers up to his hotel room.

London might have had a load of hooker spots but a certain proportion would have drifted into the spot we are interested in to join th eassorted well intentioned chariteers, not so well intentioned drug buyers and crim's, workers, commuters and business men. A crowd of people who made up the mileau of types that meant that residents said in court that they were used to all sorts down there.

p

[Mr Poster]

hi samF

You think there was only one omnibus, that people only arrived by it and that it wasnt used by the author to demonstrate that he wasnt talking about one or two people?

p

[dougie]

Hi Dougie,If so, there were plenty of those available closer to home, without necessitating his crossing the Thames to find them. There was still less of a necessity to confine his activities to a region of East London barely 0.5 square miles in extent, if he'd decided to go there in the first place.

sam,
but thats using logic that a sane person would employ, jtr and possibly mjd werent sane....who knows what drove them? and "driven" the ripper certainly was.
regards

[Sam Flynn]

You think there was only one omnibus, that people only arrived by it and that it wasnt used by the author to demonstrate that he wasnt talking about one or two people?

Five omnibuses? Ten? It's really immaterial, MrP. My point is that in order to achieve your "torrents" of non-locals, it would take a rather large number of omnibuses.

In point of fact, Seth Koven does not mention "torrents" of non-locals streaming into Whitechapel in omnibuses at all. Here is the relevant passage:

"In 1884 [Punch magazine] published In Slummibus, an ironic visual satire depicting a preening clergyman surrounded by two demurely attractive young ladies... The title of the image undoubtedly makes fun of the fad for hiring omnibuses to take visitors through East London's poorest neighborhoods without soiling their shoes and clothes."

- Seth Koven, "Slumming", Princeton University Press, 2004

Koven's interpretation of "In Slummibus" may be incorrect anyway: there's not an omnibus in sight in the cartoon, and an alternative explanation might be that it's a pun on "E pluribus unum" - the vicar, his lady companions and the "East Endians" around them illustrating the pluralism of society.

Koven's mention of the "omnibus fad" is cross-referenced in the "Notes" section to a poem by Amy Levy, in which she "captured well the demotic pleasures of seeing the city from the top of an omnibus" (Koven's words). Imagine my horror when I discovered that this doesn't refer to Whitechapel at all, hence Koven's reference seems to be out of kilter with his text at this point. Here's the relevant section of Levy's poem, Ballade of an Omnibus:

Some men to carriages aspire;
On some the costly hansoms wait;
Some seek a fly, on job or hire;
Some mount the trotting steed, elate.
I envy not the rich and great,
A wandering minstrel, poor and free,
I am contented with my fate -
An omnibus suffices me.

In winter days of rain and mire
I find within a corner strait;
The 'busmen know me and my lyre
From Brompton to The Bull-and-Gate.
When summer comes, I mount in state
The topmost summit, whence I see
Crœsus look up, compassionate -
An omnibus suffices me.

...now, I don't know what Crœsus was doing in Whitechapel, or what Whitechapel was doing in the West End (Brompton) or Northwest London (The Bull and Gate) for that matter. Geographical points aside, the poem is clearly about the poor "wandering minstrel", Amy Levy, climbing onto a 'bus so that she can look down on the rich in parts of London miles away from the streets of Whitechapel, both physically and metaphorically.

No trip into the baboon enclosure this, I'm afraid.

[Pilgrim]

Imaginary Fault Lines.

As to Druitt....I dont doubt his alibi is forthcoming. Im arguing that this notion that only scumbags were down there is nonsense. We KNOW it is from contemporary records. We KNOW it is from residents.

Part of it is caused by people (not necessarily you) seeking to distance themselves from the Epitome of Non-Suspects, Knights Gull. To show their non-susceptibility to guff.....they flee with fervency to the antithesis of the toff....which is the scumbag.

To copperfasten their new found credentials as non-toff-ists, they now seek to prove that no one except scumbags were ever down there. Which is patent nonsense..

p

This has been my perception too, for some considerable time. The "local scumbag theory" may have some rational merit, but I'll say the uncritical belief in it may seem to stand in need of some further explanation.

"Slumming", of various kinds, is a historical fact. And it is a fact that "The East End" was the perhaps most infamous slum area in Western Europe during the years leading up to these murders. A major reason would probably be the fact that London was the capital of the British Empire, which made its perceived fault lines, real and imaginary, stand out all the more clearly. The "slumming" phenomenon would of course tend to follow the same fault lines; it hardly matters if a few even darker spots might have been found some other way.

So, it is a historical fact that people of better means did visit the East End, and for a number of reasons. And I would say a general underlying idea, would be the perception, real and imaginary, of the East End as an "antipodean creature" - "synonymous with poverty, overcrowding, disease and criminality." (#162) If some people find it necessary to argue against this historical fact, I'll say it would seem to stand in need of some external explanation. The most obvious reason would perhaps be that they simply are defending "the local scumbag theory". But I would tend to agree that any too uncritical belief in that theory might be well explained along the lines suggested in the above quote. I would think Barrett, Cornwell, Knight et al may have something to answer for here.

My Regards.

[Mr Poster]

Hi ho Pilgrim

Couldnt agree more.

Out of interest..........what does this mean:

This is a snippet from East End 1888 by prof. William J Fishman:,

BEVAN Emily 63 Philpot St, attempted rape by resident 207
BILLING Revd R C An anti-immigration cleric, Rector of Sptlflds147
BLACK Clementina Gave info to Commons Select Committee 75
BLACK Clementina Represenative of Womens' Protection League 285
BLANK Joseph E Secretary of Jews' Temporary Shelter 66
BLOOM Henry Seaman, lost his coat (see Regan/Crawley/Shea)184
BOLTON Sarah Stole mangling from grandson (Webb) 182
BOSWELL Susan 15, assaulted by Richard Tabb 202
BOYLE John D at London Hosp. Wealthy but slumming habits. 29
BRADY Inspector C.I.D., evidence against Ellen Driscoll 183
BRAND Henry W'chapel Union charge:wife:149 Katherine Bldgs 92
BRAY Joseph Age 14,Forest Gate Sch, picked for "Exmouth" 96
BROCKINGTON Mary Ann S Grove Workhouse, illtreated 1888 100
BROWN George 7 days for assaulting constable Poplar High St193

What is of course obvious from the book is that the East End was chock full of all sorts: working there, living there, playing there and passing through.

Now we will here the usual "Oh but they didnt live near Miller Court" or whatever. or we mightnt hear it as the goal posts make noise while being shifted.

The East End and Whitechapel were not exclusively scummy, and the number of non-local (As in born and bred), non-scumbag, non-working class folk working in, living in, playing in the area was substantial enough that it neither raised the eyebrows of the local scumbags and by the same token.....we should not assume that the "probability" is that the killer was some kind of local Artful Dodger based upon ridiculous notions like his having exhibited some inate feral knowledge of the back streets. Which there is no evidence for his having done so.

p

[Varqm]

The only thing going for Druitt is Mcnaughten mentioned him and nothing else.
Thats the problem with Druitt as a suspect. All the scenarios I read about him as a suspect were all made up.That he died on December 1888 does not mean anything. Just to mention him alongside Ostrog who was an impossible or close to impossible JTR gives a possible picture about how weak his evidence was. So Mcnaughten's word cannot even be a strong basis if at all.

To his credit Kosminski at least was mentioned by Andersson and Swanson.