Feigenbaum and the 1863 and 1872 London murders

[Debra A]

In his new book "The Evil Within," Trevor Marriott tries to make a link between the Whitechapel murders and two earlier unsolved, cut-throat London murders; the 1863 brothel murder of Emma Jackson and the 1872 murder of Harriett Buswell at Great Coram Street.

Trevor's suspect Carl Feigenbaum was said to be a merchant seaman, working as a fireman on vessels sailing from the German port of Bremen.

Having access to the Bremen ship's crew list for the years 1837-1873, I decided to repeat Trevor's original 1880's to90's search to see if there were any earlier crew listings for a Carl Feigenbaum, Carl or Anton Zahn.

The crew listings contain details of name, age, place of birth ,residence, name of ship and date of muster of ships crew sailing out of Bremen.

For the name Carl Feigenbaum (and variant spellings) five entries turned up amongst the lists and going by the year of birth and birthplace, these were obviously all the same man. The earliest entry I could find was for 1869

Name: Carl Feigenbaum
Age: 25
Birth Year: 1844
Birthplace: Demmin
Residence : Demmin
Date Mustered: 5 Nov 1869
Ship: Union
Port of Departure: Bremen
Destination: New York

Name: Carl Feigenbann
Age: 27
Birth Year: 1844
Birthplace: Demmin
Residence : Demmin
Date Mustered: 5 Sep 1871
Ship: Ohio
Port of Departure: Bremen
Destination: New York

Name: Carl Feigenbaum
Age: 29
Birth Year: 1844
Birthplace: Demmen
Residence : Demmen
Date Mustered: 21 Feb 1873
Ship: Schwalbe
Port of Departure: Bremen
Destination: England (possibly Goole according to press notices)

Name: Car Fagenbarem
Age: 29
Birth Year: 1844
Birthplace: Demmin
Residence : Demmin
Date Mustered: 5 Mrz 1873 (5 Mar 1873)
Ship: Hannover
Port of Departure: Bremen
Destination: Westindian

Name: Carl Fergenbaum
Age: 29
Birth Year: 1844
Birthplace: Demmin
Residence : Demmin
Date Mustered: 20 Mai 1873 (20 May 1873)
Ship: Koln
Port of Departure: Bremen
Destination: New York

This Carl Feigenbaum is 4 years younger than the decared birth year of 1840 for Trevor's suspect, the place of birth is also different although two different birthplaces were given at his trial.

I cross referenced these lists with the Bremen , Germany Sailors Registry. When a sailor wanted to sign up for a crew, he had to register. These registers are what comprise these service records. The records are generally arranged by individual so that all of the information on one individual is in one record, with information on multiple voyages listed below. There are generally four individuals listed on a page. The majority of the ships that were sailed on were fishing or cargo ships, rather than passenger ships.

The Carl Feigenbaum that appears in the ships crew lists appears also in the sailors registry. His full name is given as Carl Joh. Theod. Friedr.Martin Feigenbaum, his date of birth is given as 26th July 1844 in Demmin, he was also resident in Demmin at the time. he is listed as an 'ordinary seaman'
Only three of the sailings that appear in the crew lists for this Feigenbaum are listed in the personal registry record, showing that the records were not necessarily full or kept up to date, so a few sailing dates may also be missing from the crew lists as well as the registry.
Although this Carl Feigenbaum was fair haired as opposed to having the dark brown hair of Trevor's suspect, it was noted that this man's eyes were grey, the same as Trevor's man.

There was one entry for a Carl Ludwig Zahn also in the records but the birthdate was miles out at 1853, this man is also listed in the deserters records when he failed to report back to the Europa after docking in New York in 1872.

[Rob Clack]

Good work as always Debs, hope you get credit for it.

Rob X

[Wolf Vanderlinden]

It seems fairly certain that Feigenbaum was not his real name and that Zahm or Zahn was. The name Carl Feigenbaum was supposedly taken from another sailor that Zahm/Zahn either knew or from letters that he stole from him. It is possible, therefore, that the man you have found, Debs, is the original owner of the name and not the murderer of Mrs. Hoffman.

Wolf.

[Monty]

Debs,

Fascinating work, I agree with Rob.

Monty

[Debra A]

Cheers Rob, Monty
My only beef is that Trevor claims in his book that he 'uncovered two new, similar, Ripper-like murders' when in fact he posted on the boards asking for details of previous unsolved Ripper-like murders and the Great Coram Street and Emma Jackson murders were the two (and the only two) that I pointed out to him specifically! They had both been known about for ages by us 'armchair detectives' here at casebook

Thanks Wolf, that seems quite likely or it would be a very big coincidence. I knew that from letters found it was concluded that Feigenbaum was most likely named Anton Zahn but wasn't aware that they suspected he had taken on the identity of another seaman.
There is a number noted under this Feigenbaum's records that may relate to some other records, as the records are in German it's been a bit difficult figuring it out though (even with Sam Flynn's previous valued help)


One other little niggle I have relating to Trevor's description of the 1863 Emma Jackson case. Trevor states that the only details of the man last seen with Emma before her death were that he was 'foreign.' There were several descriptions given of the man suspected, in particular 'the marks of old wounds on the mans forehead and lips and the appearance of his eyes which were described as 'weak and sore' looking. I haven't looked at the details I had on the case for a while but I seem to remember some false eyewitness testimony was exposed which had pointed the police to a 'foreigner' in the first place, I may be mistaken on that though.
Trevor also says no one was arrested in the Jackson case when in fact a couple of men were arrested and charged with the murder at various times, (some on their own confession) One man even confessed periodically for 17 years, also one fitting the description of the man with scars and sore eyes. One of the main suspects (later cleared) was a suicide found drowned in the docks shortly after the murder.
It would have been more accurate to say no one was ever convicted of the murder.