Jack The Rippers Real Name? Anyone Know Or Have Any Idea?

haha
thanks.

I find it interesting and a bit annoying that youd thank the post that suggests we are old farts but not the one that offered support and some answers to your questions.

I do back the wrong horse sometimes. Good luck with your studies.

Cheers

[lauren_ox]

haha
thanks.

[Ashkenaz]

To everyone that has criticized, im a 15 year old girl who is doing a project on Jack the ripper, is there any harm in that? and yes i have come back to my post.
dont say i cannot be bothered i can ive been very busy working on my project as its a gcse project!!

stop pointing out about my punctuation, seriously its a reply to a thread!

STOP CRITICISING ME!

Hi Lauren. Welcome aboard, it's good to have a young person among us. There are too many crusty old farts in here,just ignore them.

[lynn cates]

Mann

Hello Lauren. I think there are 2 or 3 threads that deal with Mann as a suspect. You might look under the "suspects" category--the very last sub-category under that.

Cheers.
LC

[lauren_ox]

Anyone else watching Jack the ripper: killer revealed, on discovery channel?

The historian on there, believes he has uncovered who jack the ripper really was, Robert mann. (is that how it is spelt?)
Ive never heard of him as one of the suspects, has anyone else?

okay so i was trying to do some research to find out his real name and/or who he was and some people said his name was really jack but some people was saying its not.

i have a feeling it was jack other wise where would they have got 'jack the ripper' from if his name wasnt jack, correct me if im wrong please

In answer to your first post........

Jack the Ripper is a name that was taken from a letters' signature, specifically "Dear Boss" dated September 27th, 1888, and sent to *Central News in late September 1888..... (*the Associated Press of their day, in London). It is a nickname....a pen name....a pseudonym....there is no "Jack" person who we can say committed the crimes. This murderer was thought to have committed 5 murders within 2 1/2 months in the Fall of 1888 in East London's Whitechapel/Spitalfield districts.

The person who wrote the letter likely chose the name Jack for a few reasons, there were other infamous historical murderers that used or were given that given name Jack...Springheel Jack for one. The Ripper part is obvious....at the time the 1st letter was written 2 women had already been terribly "ripped" open after they were killed. When the police made the letter public there had been one more "ripping" murder in Mitre Square.

Jack the Ripper, like Zodiak, and The Unibomber, and The Yorkshire Ripper are names that were given to killers who were unknown at that time. 2 of those crimes sprees were solved and someone was arrested and jailed, but Jack and Zodiak are still unknown murderers.

Best regards

To everyone that has criticized, im a 15 year old girl who is doing a project on Jack the ripper, is there any harm in that? and yes i have come back to my post.
dont say i cannot be bothered i can ive been very busy working on my project as its a gcse project!!

stop pointing out about my punctuation, seriously its a reply to a thread!

STOP CRITICISING ME!

HI Lauren,

I dont see any harm in asking questions like you have, nor do I think many people who you feel are picking on you. Its just that some here respect the work that knowledge requires and want to be sure that anyone who is discussing these issue here understands that.

When youre discussing things here you do so with some people who are among the leaders of Ripperology, people who wrote the books others want you to read, people who have actually made some of the discoveries you can read about, and people who had spent decades studying these crimes and others.

Dont take a comment personally...few if any here will write something just to be mean. Try to remember that many here are the experts, and that its a real privilege to be able to ask questions directly.

So ask what you like.....we are all friends here.

Best regards Lauren

[lauren_ox]

To everyone that has criticized, im a 15 year old girl who is doing a project on Jack the ripper, is there any harm in that? and yes i have come back to my post.
dont say i cannot be bothered i can ive been very busy working on my project as its a gcse project!!

stop pointing out about my punctuation, seriously its a reply to a thread!

STOP CRITICISING ME!

I do not believe that Levy's 'reluctance' was caused by anything more than the fact that he had been told by the police not to discuss the case before giving his inquest evidence. He stated, under oath, that "The man I should say was about 3 inches taller than the woman. I cannot give any description of either of them." To suggest anything more than that moves into the realms of unfounded speculation.

Thanks for addressing that Stewart, I didnt feel it was anything more than that nor did I feel you would either, I was just probing a bit to see if you had been looking for anything tangible there perhaps.

Best regards as always

[Stewart P Evans]

Unfounded Speculation

Hi Stewart,
Sorry to bug you on a point again, but on the above, is it your belief that the reluctance of Levy to get involved as a witness might having something to do with his known relationship with a Martin Kosminski, and a possible familial connection to Martin with the man he and Lawende and presumably Harris saw with Kate?
My best regards

I do not believe that Levy's 'reluctance' was caused by anything more than the fact that he had been told by the police not to discuss the case before giving his inquest evidence. He stated, under oath, that "The man I should say was about 3 inches taller than the woman. I cannot give any description of either of them." To suggest anything more than that moves into the realms of unfounded speculation.

[AdamWalsh]

Chances are he was no one on our radar = just a local misfit who hated women probably because of his insecurities about his looks/body, and so angry at them for not liking him he "punished" them - for crimes they never knew they were committing by ignoring him.

The fact that no first name is given for Kosminski should also be noted as being possibly relevant. However, I have to agree that as current knowledge stands, and in view of the facts given, Kosminski is most probably Aaron Kosminski.

Hi Stewart,

Sorry to bug you on a point again, but on the above, is it your belief that the reluctance of Levy to get involved as a witness might having something to do with his known relationship with a Martin Kosminski, and a possible familial connection to Martin with the man he and Lawende and presumably Harris saw with Kate?

My best regards

We are all familiar with Macnaghten’s description of ‘Kosminski’ as one of the suspects cited by him as ‘more likely’ to have committed the series of murders than Cutbush. In his description of the cases of the three men he cites, ‘M. J. Druitt, said to be a doctor’; ‘Kosminski, a Polish Jew’; and ‘Michael Ostrog, a Russian doctor, and a convict’; he writes of ‘Kosminski’ ‘There were many circs connected with this man which made him a strong “suspect”.’

It has been said that we do not know what these ‘many circs’ were, that made him ‘a strong “suspect”.’ We must, then, carefully examine Macnaghten’s words in the context in which they appear. First the date, and the report is dated 23 February 1894. Secondly the three ‘suspects’ are offered, not as the murderer, but as men ‘more likely’, than Cutbush, to have committed the murders. Also it may be very relevant that Macnaghten places the word ‘suspect’ in speech marks. The ‘many circs’ are described as being the reason for Kosminski’s status as a ‘strong’ suspect. So they deserve serious consideration as they support Kosminski’s suspect status.

The term ‘circs’ is common police parlance for ‘circumstances’, being merely a shortening of the word. As the name implies here whatever these ‘circumstances’ were they were only circumstantial to the consideration of him as a suspect. They do not indicate the existence of any hard evidence which we do not know the nature of as witness Macnaghten’s preceding, and qualifying remark, “…no shadow of proof could be thrown on any one.”

They must also be viewed in light of the fact that Macnaghten later clearly indicated that he viewed M. J. Druitt as a stronger suspect, indeed Druitt was his own ‘preferred’ suspect, and not Kosminski. The fact that no first name is given for Kosminski should also be noted as being possibly relevant. However, I have to agree that as current knowledge stands, and in view of the facts given, Kosminski is most probably Aaron Kosminski.

Macnaghten wrote – “Kosminski, a Polish Jew, & resident in Whitechapel. This man became insane owing to many years indulgence in solitary vices [i.e. masturbation]. He had a great hatred of women, specially of the prostitute class, & had strong homicidal tendencies; he was removed to a lunatic asylum about March 1889. There were many circs connected with this man that made him a strong “suspect”.” And that is all we have in the report about this suspect. There are further important considerations.

The Aberconway version of Macnaghten’s report, almost certainly the earlier draft version, varies in that includes the statements that “He was (and I believe still is) detained in a lunatic asylum” and “This man in appearance strongly resembled the individual seen by the City P.C. near Mitre Square.”

The latter statement has been much discussed and analysed in the past with detailed speculation that a City PC did, indeed, see the suspect. I have, obviously, considered this carefully and it is my firm belief that this was a mistake by Macnaghten, that did not find its way into the final, official, version. We have to retain common sense and logic when looking at this and it is patently obvious that the surviving official records, both City and Met, clearly show that there was no PC witness. What there was, was a City Police witness, i.e. Lawende, whose description of the suspect he saw was widely circulated, and I think that was what Macnaghten confused.

So we now move to the ‘many circs’ that we are considering here. A careful reading, I think, shows that Macnaghten was referring collectively to all the circumstantial evidence surrounding Kosminski, in summary, that he had listed. That may be summed up as follows –

(a) He lived in the immediate vicinity (Whitechapel).
(b) He was insane.
(c) He hated women, especially prostitutes.
(d) He had ‘strong homicidal tendencies’.
(e) In appearance he strongly resembled the individual seen by Lawende at Church Passage.

I do not believe that Macnaghten would have had much more, if anything, than this and certainly if there had been anything of a stronger nature I am sure that he would have mentioned it. The identification later alleged by Anderson (in 1910) and Swanson (in the ‘marginalia’) would have taken place prior to Macnaghten penning this 1894 report, in 1890 or early 1891. Had it taken place as described then it is unthinkable that Macnaghten would not be aware of it. So (e) above might be a loose reference to the fact that ‘Kosminski’ had been ‘identified’ by the Mitre Square witness.

All of which, of course, does not make Kosminski a prime suspect nor, I would suggest, a strong suspect; merely a suspect. I am aware that many who espouse the 'Polish Jew theory' in one of its many forms may not agree with the foregoing, but it is, I believe, the most likely answer to the questions posed.

Hi Stewart,

Loved the podcast by the way, and Im pleased to hear the interest is still burning.

In Ripper A-Z its suggested that perhaps Macnaugtens mentioning that "many homicidal maniacs" were looked at should indicate that the 3 suspects singled out were from that group....there was no emphasis on the strength of the cases against anyone as I recall.

My best regards as always "Mr-E"

[lynn cates]

young lady

Hello Mr. Evans. Thanks. It's funny how the young lady on the cover of the DVD looks nothing like Polly or Annie.

The best.
LC

[Stewart P Evans]

Correction

...I was interested to see your comment about the murderer's known direction of travel after the Eddowes killing - stated as 'movement to the northeast'. This has always been touted as one of the few clues left by the murderer. But what is the true value of it? There were three exits from Mitre Square available to the murderer. They were -
1. Into Mitre Street.
2. St James Passage into St James PLace.
3. Church Passage into Duke Street.
I have always thought that his most likely route out of the Square would have been 3 on this list, St James Passage, the main reason being that he probably heard PC Watkins approaching in Mitre Street and had very recently heard PC Harvey walk to the bottom of Church Passage and back. That leaves 3 as the best option...

Correction, the above should read 2 as the most likely route out and the best option.