Is Jack someone we have never heard of?

[Pcdunn]

I agree. The police had far more knowledge of the case, full reports, all witness statements, etc., etc. We are working with a fraction of the official documents which were produced, as well as newspaper articles contemporary to the age. Every year we get further away in time and space from the East End of the Ripper's heyday, and it becomes harder for us to separate real history from the dramatizations of books and films.

I think, though, that like many true scholars, we always hold forth hope that one more obscure article in a recently digitized newspaper will hold the clue that becomes the key to the mystery.

[The Good Michael]

Who are the top three suspects?

Kosminski, Druitt, James Kelly, probably not in that order.

Mike

[GUT]

Kosminski, Druitt, James Kelly, probably not in that order.

Mike

Certainly three you need to clear before looking further afield, in my opinion.

[The Good Michael]

Certainly three you need to clear before looking further afield, in my opinion.

They can't be completely and that is the problem. Instead, they are obfuscated by modern opinion until they are simply dismissed.

Mike

[GUT]

They can't be completely and that is the problem. Instead, they are obfuscated by modern opinion until they are simply dismissed.

Mike

That's right.

The big question is, what were they contemporary suspects, if we had all the original documents we may be able to easily dismiss them, but the simple fact is we don't know what it was that caused people like Swanson and MM to consider them high on the list.

[The Good Michael]

That's right.

The big question is, what were they contemporary suspects, if we had all the original documents we may be able to easily dismiss them, but the simple fact is we don't know what it was that caused people like Swanson and MM to consider them high on the list.

And even Kelly, though his name was largely forgotten until Tully wrote a nice book on him, was definitely searched for in London after Mary Kelly's murder, that would have made him a contemporary suspect as well.

Mike

[GUT]

And even Kelly, though his name was largely forgotten until Tully wrote a nice book on him, was definitely searched for in London after Mary Kelly's murder, that would have made him a contemporary suspect as well.

Mike

No arguments here.

[Jonathan H]

To GUT

What you are saying is not backed by the sources that we do have -- some only very recently discovered. We do know why these police chiefs settled on the Ripper solutions that they did, unfortunately none able to be tested in a courtroom, because they have told us.

Donald Swanson believed -- if we can take the "Marginalia" to be his opinion and not just repeating Anderson's -- that "Kosminski" was the likely fiend because a critical witness unhesitatingly identified this suspect, and the latter reacted so guiltily that he gave the game away, Further circumstantial evidence is that, sure enough, the Whitechapel murders instantly halted with the sectioning (and early demise) of this suspect. The highly regarded Swanson wrote those annotations entirely for himself and so would hardly lie.

Melville Macnaghten did not just have Druitt "high on his list" (there is no list in his 1914 account, just the un-named Druitt) but because he was the killer. In the same primary source, Macnaghten asserts that his "belief" was based on information received from the deceased killer's "own people" several years after he destroyed himself. Other comparable sources, albeit veiled, show that Druitt had confessed his crimes and the specific information he divulged later checked out for Macnaghten; e.g. with details that only the police and the murderer knew about said crimes.

[Charles Daniels]

Does anyone else on this forum believe that Jack the Ripper could be someone who has never been identified, named, suspected or written about?

Helena

It wouldn't surprise me if, somewhere in some police file which may or, far more likely, may not exist any more there's some little jot "Interviewed, no longer of interest", next to some name we've never heard of -- and that's person killed at least some of the victims.

My gut on this is because from what I've read about true crime, the guilty party often does land on the radar at some point but is overlooked or under-appreciated.

It's impossible to ever know, but it would be mildly surprising to me if the killer(s) were totally invisible to the police.

[Patrick S]

Does anyone else on this forum believe that Jack the Ripper could be someone who has never been identified, named, suspected or written about?

This is precisely what I believe. I feel as if the police - not having an understanding of serial murder - hadn't the first idea how to proceed in identifying potential suspects. I continually revisit the "suspect lists" (contemporary and of more recent vintages) and - as it occurs to me at this point in time - I don't find any of the names particularly convincing, or even all that intriguing.

I feel that the murderer began with Martha Tabram and concluded with Mary Kelly. I don't think he was suspected by anyone. I don't think he wrote any letters (I don't believe in the 'Lusk Kidney'). I don't think he was outwardly particularly "strange", at least in ways that would have drawn the attention of family, neighbors, police at that time. I don't believe he was a medical man. I believe he was a relatively young man, mid-twenties to early-thirties. I do not believe he was a married man. I do not believe he had children. I have an idea that he was employed and was comfortable enough to have lived alone, able to come and go as he pleased without fear of disturbing fellow lodgers or family. I believe he lived very close to where Tabram, Nichols, and Chapman were killed, probably mere meters from one of those murder sites. I believe he left London after the Miller's Court and likely committed similar crimes elsewhere. I believe he died (or was incarcerated) not long after Kelly, perhaps a year or two. I believe his name was never uttered by police, press, or the public in connection to the crimes of Jack the Ripper. I believe his name will never be known.

[Rainbow]

If he wasn't Lechmere, then I would go to believe some of occult phenomenons Colin Wilson steadily talked about, could be the reason for those crimes..



Rainbow•

[John Wheat]

If he wasn't Lechmere, then I would go to believe some of occult phenomenons Colin Wilson steadily talked about, could be the reason for those crimes..



Rainbow•

Was that a joke?

[Fisherman]

Patrick S:

I believe he lived very close to where Tabram, Nichols, and Chapman were killed, probably mere meters from one of those murder sites.

Why is that? Mere meters?? Some will have it that the first murder in a series is pepetrated close to home, so that would point to you talking about Tabram. Would that be the case?

I believe his name was never uttered by police, press, or the public in connection to the crimes of Jack the Ripper.

That´s just because he gave them the wrong name!

[Fisherman]

Was that a joke?

My money is on it being quite serious - the Ripper was always a phantom in the minds of people, generally speaking.

[John Wheat]

My money is on it being quite serious - the Ripper was always a phantom in the minds of people, generally speaking.

True but I don't think that's what Rainbow meant.