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I don’t know about everyone else but I find the Crawford Letter intriguing. It was, of course, found by Stephen Ryder (in 2001) and was contained in a folder which contained material related to the late 1880’s and 1890’s. It was a letter to Robert Anderson from James Ludovic Lindsay, the 26th Earl of Crawford and 9th Earl of Balcarres.
2 CAVENDISH SQUARE
W.
My dear Anderson,
I send you this line to ask you to see & hear the bearer, whose name is unknown to me. She has or thinks she has a knowledge of the author of the Whitechapel murders. The author is supposed to be nearly related to her, & she is in great fear lest any suspicions should attach to her & place her & her family in peril.
I have advised her to place the whole story before you, without giving you any names, so that you may form an opinion as to its being worth while to investigate.
Very sincerely yours,
Crawford
…
So what can we possibly get from this?
The first, very obvious point would be that the woman was likely (almost certainly?) to have been from a high enough class of society that she not only felt comfortable in contacting an Earl in the first place but also that he actually agreed to see her and didn’t choose to palm her off on an underling. And then, after hearing her out, he took the trouble of contacting the Assistant Commissioner of the Met on her behalf. I’m unaware of the Earl having any particular interest in the case or that he was the kind of person who was employed as a kind of middle man to undertake business of a delicate nature. He was an MP but not a local one as his constituency was in Wigan but I seem to recall it being mentioned, in connection to Kosminski, that Crawford sat on a committee looking into the sweat shops in the East End and so a suggestion was that maybe someone met him while he was on an official visit and later decided to go and see him? It’s not exactly impossible but I just can’t see a lower class East End woman not only thinking of the Earl of Crawford as a solution but actually getting past the servants. In that rigidly class conscious time everything points me toward this woman being from a higher class of society. This of course is just my opinion. That Crawford advised the lady to “place the whole story before you, without giving you any names, so that you may form an opinion as to its being worthwhile to investigate,” might suggest that he himself felt the story at least worthy of a second look. The man was no fool and would surely have dissuaded the woman from further action had he detected an obvious waste of time. It’s also worth considering that he wouldn’t have wanted Anderson saying, although far more diplomatically of course, “why are you sending me time wasters?”
“..she is in great fear lest any suspicions should attach to her & place her & her family in peril.”
Does she mean actual, physical peril? Could her family have been Jewish and she feared that as foreigners any association with the Ripper might cause repercussions, or was she talking about the families reputation? Although I’m certainly leaning heavily toward a woman from the higher classes it’s difficult to see why such a revelation, however socially disastrous it might have been, would have caused physical danger? Panic inducing exaggeration perhaps? Unless it was danger from the object of her suspicion? The person that she suspected of being the ripper.
“She has or thinks she has a knowledge of the author of the Whitechapel murders.”
So Crawford isn’t revealing his own opinion here; he’s only saying that the woman appears confident that she knows something about the case, but surely she would have had to have told Crawford the full story before he could have decided that it was worth the time an effort of contacting Anderson? So does the fact that he did contact Anderson suggest that her story sounded at least credible?
…
So who could this intriguing woman have been? Yes, you know what’s coming.
Sometime in November 1888 Montague John Druitt’s aunt Isabella wrote an anxious letter to her daughter Emily saying that she had been to Cavendish Square (location of the Earl’s house) and that she feared that she may never be rid of this ‘encumbrance.’ What could this ‘encumbrance’ have been in November of 1888? Surely not her nephews suicide because what possible help/advice could anyone, even an Earl, provide that could have helped in any way? Could it have been connected to some great shame resulting from Druitt’s dismissal from the school? It’s a possibility but who could she have seen in Cavendish Square that could have helped with an issue of potential family shame? A lack of an answer doesn’t mean that none exists of course but it’s certainly a mystery. So, possibles….
I don’t know.
2 CAVENDISH SQUARE
W.
My dear Anderson,
I send you this line to ask you to see & hear the bearer, whose name is unknown to me. She has or thinks she has a knowledge of the author of the Whitechapel murders. The author is supposed to be nearly related to her, & she is in great fear lest any suspicions should attach to her & place her & her family in peril.
I have advised her to place the whole story before you, without giving you any names, so that you may form an opinion as to its being worth while to investigate.
Very sincerely yours,
Crawford
…
So what can we possibly get from this?
The first, very obvious point would be that the woman was likely (almost certainly?) to have been from a high enough class of society that she not only felt comfortable in contacting an Earl in the first place but also that he actually agreed to see her and didn’t choose to palm her off on an underling. And then, after hearing her out, he took the trouble of contacting the Assistant Commissioner of the Met on her behalf. I’m unaware of the Earl having any particular interest in the case or that he was the kind of person who was employed as a kind of middle man to undertake business of a delicate nature. He was an MP but not a local one as his constituency was in Wigan but I seem to recall it being mentioned, in connection to Kosminski, that Crawford sat on a committee looking into the sweat shops in the East End and so a suggestion was that maybe someone met him while he was on an official visit and later decided to go and see him? It’s not exactly impossible but I just can’t see a lower class East End woman not only thinking of the Earl of Crawford as a solution but actually getting past the servants. In that rigidly class conscious time everything points me toward this woman being from a higher class of society. This of course is just my opinion. That Crawford advised the lady to “place the whole story before you, without giving you any names, so that you may form an opinion as to its being worthwhile to investigate,” might suggest that he himself felt the story at least worthy of a second look. The man was no fool and would surely have dissuaded the woman from further action had he detected an obvious waste of time. It’s also worth considering that he wouldn’t have wanted Anderson saying, although far more diplomatically of course, “why are you sending me time wasters?”
“..she is in great fear lest any suspicions should attach to her & place her & her family in peril.”
Does she mean actual, physical peril? Could her family have been Jewish and she feared that as foreigners any association with the Ripper might cause repercussions, or was she talking about the families reputation? Although I’m certainly leaning heavily toward a woman from the higher classes it’s difficult to see why such a revelation, however socially disastrous it might have been, would have caused physical danger? Panic inducing exaggeration perhaps? Unless it was danger from the object of her suspicion? The person that she suspected of being the ripper.
“She has or thinks she has a knowledge of the author of the Whitechapel murders.”
So Crawford isn’t revealing his own opinion here; he’s only saying that the woman appears confident that she knows something about the case, but surely she would have had to have told Crawford the full story before he could have decided that it was worth the time an effort of contacting Anderson? So does the fact that he did contact Anderson suggest that her story sounded at least credible?
…
So who could this intriguing woman have been? Yes, you know what’s coming.
Sometime in November 1888 Montague John Druitt’s aunt Isabella wrote an anxious letter to her daughter Emily saying that she had been to Cavendish Square (location of the Earl’s house) and that she feared that she may never be rid of this ‘encumbrance.’ What could this ‘encumbrance’ have been in November of 1888? Surely not her nephews suicide because what possible help/advice could anyone, even an Earl, provide that could have helped in any way? Could it have been connected to some great shame resulting from Druitt’s dismissal from the school? It’s a possibility but who could she have seen in Cavendish Square that could have helped with an issue of potential family shame? A lack of an answer doesn’t mean that none exists of course but it’s certainly a mystery. So, possibles….
- The woman that met with Crawford was an unknown member of the middle/lower classes.
- The woman that met with Crawford was an unknown member of the upper classes.
- The woman that met with Crawford was Isabella Druitt.
- Isabella Druitt went to Cavendish Square on a serious matter not connected to Monty.
- Isabella Druitt went to Cavendish Square on a serious matter connected to her suspecting that Druitt was the ripper.
- Could this visit have taken place after Druitt had been sacked and no one knew where he was? Did she think that the family was in danger from him?
I don’t know.
