where do you stand?

[Wickerman]

... he showed all the hallmarks of a sado-sexual offender, and the fact that he engaged in extensive post-mortem mutilation suggests that his needs extended beyond inflicting pain.

And how, precisely, is that being class dependent?

There was a disturbed, exploratory element to the mutilations and eviscerations,...

I think you'll find that the outcome of 'being disturbed' is the same across all classes.

Regards, Jon S.

[Fisherman]

Thanks Christer, I missed that

Youīre ever so welcome, Jon!

All the best,
Fisherman

[Fisherman]

Hello Christer. Thanks.

"it went from uncomfortable to tasty in no time at all"

Do you mean a freebie? In Scotland? (heh-heh)

Cheers.
LC

Okay, since you force me, Lynn: I have rarely met more generous people than the Scots. And I have equally rarely met worse drivers - it was a fortnight of sheer terror on the roads. So maybe the freebies are very generously distributed too ...?

The best,
Fisherman

[Ben]

Have you counted how many well-dressed men were seen in her company from Thursday night through to Friday morning?

Have you counted how many of those were discredited?

I make it - let's see now - one...two...three...four. All of them!

Astrakhan - discredited.

Britannia man - not "well-dressed".

Bowyer bloke - completely non-existent as proved by his actual inquest evidence.

And the less said about "Mrs. Paumier" and "Sarah Roney" the better.

How many 'dossers' was Kelly seen with?

Ah, now we get to the actual inquest evidence, i.e. the stuff taken seriously by the police at the time. This is much more like it. As Phil points out, Blotchy could easily have been a dosser, and so could the man in the wideawake seen by Sarah Lewis.

Look at Stride, the man she was with at the Bricklayer's Arms, then three witnesses in Berner St. all describe a well-dressed man, the exception was Schwartz, but thats like 4-1 in favor of my argument.

Exactly, Jon.

The man who almost certainly killed her (the broad-shouldered man) was not described as a well-dressed man, at least not in Swanson's notes of the police report. It therefore follows pretty logically that the man (men?) seen by William Marshall and PC Smith was not her killer. All quite aside, of course, from the question of whether or not Stride was even a ripper victim.

And then Chapman, the witness Thimbleby saw a 'well-dressed' man running from the scene.

Oh yes, "Thimbleby".

That well-known star witness who definitely saw the actual killer, and who gave evidence at the inquest...oh, wait.

So, a local man, yes.
Respectably dressed, yes.
Some anatomical knowledge, yes.
Ability with a knife, yes.
Adept at strangulation, yes.

So, a local man, yes.
Respectably dressed, no.
Some anatomical knowledge, no.
Ability with a knife, yes.
Adept at strangulation, yes.

Just fiddling with the above to make it more evidence-compatible. Don't mind me.

Regards,
Ben

[Ben]

Hi Fisherman,

Once that was established, it went from uncomfortable to tasty in no time at all. Wee drams anīall that!

If you're into your Scotch, it's all about Laphroaig quarter cask. At 48% it's a bit naughty, but it's about the nicest thing possible in liquid form. And the peatier the better as always!

The reason for cutting the throat was to kill, and since the heart was no longer pumping, there would be no pulsating and no splatter.

A good point, Mike.

All the best,
Ben

[lynn cates]

the sporran

Hello Christer. Thanks.

"I have rarely met more generous people than the Scots."

Shhh! Else a centuries old, carefully perpetuated stereotype will be shattered.

Cheers.
LC

[Wickerman]

Have you counted how many of those were discredited?

Oh you and your discredited nonsense again, heaven preserve us!

Astrakhan - discredited.

Britannia man - not "well-dressed".

Bowyer bloke - completely non-existent as proved by his actual inquest evidence.

I think it necessary to suggest, you should be in attendance at a court sometime, you will be able to educate yourself just how restricted a witness can be.
- You only speak when you are spoken to.
- You only respond to the questions you are asked.

I'll give you another little gem you can write down for future reference.
In 19th century vocabulary, the afternoon extended well into the evening, not like today. There is nothing inconsistent in when Bowyer said he saw Kelly.
You must have been away licking your wounds when we reviewed that little point of fact.

And the less said about "Mrs. Paumier" and "Sarah Roney" the better.

Then why bring it up?

Ah, now we get to the actual inquest evidence, i.e. the stuff taken seriously by the police at the time. This is much more like it. As Phil points out, Blotchy could easily have been a dosser, and so could the man in the wideawake seen by Sarah Lewis.

The answer Ben, was One. That was the reason I posed the question.
Your loiterer was not with Kelly.

The man who almost certainly killed her (the broad-shouldered man) was not described as a well-dressed man, at least not in Swanson's notes of the police report.

That is due to the police not using such descriptive terminology.
Ergo, your subsequent assumption is, like the rest of them, falsely based.

Oh yes, "Thimbleby".

That well-known star witness who definitely saw the actual killer, and who gave evidence at the inquest...oh, wait.

I see you repeatedly forget the purpose of an inquest.

Just fiddling with the above to make it more evidence-compatible. Don't mind me.

Thats ok, we're used to you fiddling to make things look the way you want them to.

Regards, Jon S.

[Ben]

Oh you and your discredited nonsense again

I'm afraid you're the one who keeps relying on the "discredited nonsense", and apparently because you're anxious to avoid a local, shabby blue collar worker as the ripper despite the evidence making this the more probable solution.

I think it necessary to suggest, you should be in attendance at a court sometime, you will be able to educate yourself just how restricted a witness can be.
- You only speak when you are spoken to.
- You only respond to the questions you are asked.

Yes, but before that they would have provided a police statement, where they would have provided their evidence more as a narrative.

In 19th century vocabulary, the afternoon extended well into the evening, not like today.

I'm afraid I'll need to see some sort of evidence that this was the case before I accept this as a "gem" worthy of being "written down for future reference". As it stands, Bowyer's inquest evidence is wholly incompatible with the silly press quote attributed to him involving a man with "very peculiar eyes". Bowyer last saw Kelly alive "on Wednesday afternoon, in the court", according to his inquest evidence.

That is due to the police not using such descriptive terminology

It's due to the police having no reason to use the expression "well-dressed" or any synonym thereof, because they had no reason to think the suspect was any such thing. You can't seriously think that they'd withhold such a detail because they're incapable of being descriptive (and "well-dressed" was hardly Shakespearean).

Thats ok, we're used to you fiddling to make things look the way you want them to.

Less of the "we're", please. There's hardly a huge chorus of people queuing up to agree with you.

All the best,
Ben

[Jonathan H]

A Bearded Jack?

Thanks Lynn and the Wicker Man

Let me be clear about the Top Hat Toff.

I do not mean that 'Jack' was dressed like that in the East End.

By 'Jack' I mean Druitt, whose probable culpability hinges on Macnaghten being a reliable source, and who made as thorough an investigation, albeit posthumous, as he could.

'Mac' was a highly regarded police administrator even if his gifts were perhaps more for managerial affability and positive public relations: eg. a natural propagandist hence the 'drowned doctor' fact-into-fiction solution.

The police seem to have considered Joseph Lawende the best witness and may have used him twice with sailor suspects, as he had described a youngish man dressed something like a seaman.

A man around 30, of medium build and medium height, with Gentile features (a small,fair moustache) and this is certainly a generic fit for the sporty Druitt at least as he looks in his high school pictures.

Particularly the more recent pictures found at Winchester by Andy Spalleck (and published in an issue of 'Ripperologist') in which he looks much broader in build (he also looks remarkably like the atypical picture of a thinner faced Sims on the cover of 'The Social Kaleidoscope' of 1879 -- minus the beard).

I believe that if Druitt was Jack then of course he dressed down to blend in.

In 1907 Sims describes his uncanny resemblance to the un-named mad doctor, linking it to the [alleged] sighting of the fiend by a coffee-stall owner who thought that the fiend looked like Sims -- but only the thinner Sims with his hair parted in the dead center as pictured on a leftist pamphlet.

Sims also mentions a description of a man with a beard, which again shows Macnaghten's powerfully retentive memory as there was, indeed, such a minor witness description.

Here is Sims:

'Various witnesses who had seen a man conversing with a woman who was soon afterwards found murdered said that he was a well-dressed man with a black moustache. Others described him as a man with a closely-trimmed beard.'

This is the consolidation of the Ripper as the toff-gentleman doctor complete with a satanic beard -- a detail which did not stick in later illustrations -- though not specifically with a top hat.

Earlier in the same article he had written about a possible sighting by a Bobbie on his beat:

'One man only, a policeman, saw him leaving the place in which he had just accomplished a fiendish deed, but failed, owing to the darkness, to get a good view of him. A little later the policeman stumbled over the lifeless body of the victim.'

Later on he has this same cop, who is fictitious, see the Polish Jew suspect (the un-named 'Kosminski') but only see a similar silhouette:

'The policeman who got a glimpse of Jack in Mitre Court said, when some time afterwards he saw the Pole, that he was the height and build of the man he had seen on the night of the murder.'

I believe that Macnaghten manipulated Sims, and massaged the data as he pleased depending on the audience.

For example the 'solitary vices' of the Polish suspect are gone in the 1907 article, instead replaced with him having worked in a hospital in Poland -- eg. he had 'anatomical knowledge'. Predictably there is no evidence that this is true of Aaron Kosminski.

Instead Macnaghten wanted to put forward the Ripper as a Gentile, as a well-dressed doctor with a beard, which spins the story well away from a young barrister dressed down as a seaman and seen by a Jewish witness, not a cop.

Sims claimed in 1903 that Major Griffiths (a fellow officer of the state with Mac) had seen the 'Home Office Report', but he never claimed the same privilege himself.

I think that Mac simply told Tatcho that the policeman in Mitre Ct. had seen the suspect leaving but could not identify him beyond his outline. Mac expanded on this bit of deceit by further claiming that the same cop had a look at the sectioned Polish Jew, later on in the asylum, and could not come closer than that outline (this bit of fiction triggered, I argue, Anderson sincerely confusing-conflating Lawende's 'yes' to Grant with 'Kosminski').

In the 'Aberconway' version, now excluded from some secondary sources, Macnaghten had shown, in 1894, that he knew the Pole was still alive and not deceased as wrongly believed by Anderson:

' ... He was (and I believe still is) detained in a lunatic asylum about March 1889. This man in appearance strongly resembled the individual seen by the City PC near Mitre Square.'

Not by 1907 he doesn't.

For now the cop has a second look just to make sure and reveals that he barely saw anything useful at all.

In his memoirs Mac was more explicit (while dropping all other suspects and witnesses):

' ... The madman started off in search of another victim, whom he found in Catherine Eddowes. This woman's body, very badly mutilated, was found in a dark corner of Mitre Square. On this occasion it is probable that the police officer on duty in the vicinity saw the murderer with his victim a few minutes before, but no satisfactory description was forthcoming.'

A reader of that big, 1907 article would be led to think that the coffee-stall owner had a clear view of the real Jack, not the cop, because Mac, via Sims, is directing them away from the Polish Jew suspect to the drowned doctor -- who is here Sims' doppelganger: a well-dressed toff with a beard.

Since Sims also bore a resemblance to King Edward VII (the droopy eyes, the naval beard, the rotund figure) the Ripper, in an unpleasant echo, apparently looked like the current sovereign, at least when he was the younger, rakish Prince of Wales.

[RivkahChaya]

I think you misunderstood my point RivkahChaya. The reason for cutting the throat was to kill, and since the heart was no longer pumping, there would be no pulsating and no splatter.

The reason for the throat cut was to NOT get blood on themselves while doing business in the abdominal region.

Since what I said was pretty much, "A stab to the abdomen of a live person can produce a huge gush of blood, if it happens, and there's a good chance of it doing so, to hit the aorta; therefore, it makes a lot of sense to kill the women by slitting their throats first, even though JTR had no special interest in the throat, and proceeded to go to work on the abdomen and genitals as soon as the victim was dead. As an added benefit, a woman stabbed in the abdomen might get in one pretty good scream before she died, even if getting stabbed in the aorta kills almost as quickly as getting one's carotid cut through."

I don't see where you think I misunderstood, so I guess I must not have been clear.

Yet a second added benefit to throat cutting is that it is, if anything, more effective if done from behind, giving the killer an element of surprise. There's going to be a moment of visual recognition, if he comes at the victim from the front with a knife, giving her more time to scream, or even pick up a rock, or something. One the other hand, attempting to stab someone, especially someone corpulent, in the abdomen, from behind, isn't easy. Either you hit the aorta right away, and make a mess, or miss, and she has time to scream, and even possibly get away and alert someone.

[Wickerman]

I'm afraid you're the one who keeps relying on the "discredited nonsense", and apparently because you're anxious to avoid a local, shabby blue collar worker as the ripper despite the evidence making this the more probable solution.

There is no "more probable" solution, but if you insist on a tally...

It was not a blue-collar worker seen by Mrs Long (1-0), neither was this a blue-collar worker seen by PC Smith (2-0), nor by Schwartz, who incidently used "respectable appearance" as part of the description (3-0).
The man seen by Marshall was "decently dressed.....appearance of a clerk" (4-0).
With Millers Court we have one of each, a well-dressed man or men?, and a shabby sort in Blotchy (5-1).
The man at Church passage could have been either one, so where do we see an overbearing consensus?

A simply tally of prominent suspects provides an overbearing consensus in favor of a respectably dressed killer.
Was that easy to understand?

Yes, but before that they would have provided a police statement, where they would have provided their evidence more as a narrative.

Agreed, and as the police were interested in how he discovered the body then this is what we get, and all we get. The police do not ask questions with voluntary statements.

You should notice, the question about 'Wednesday' was posed by a Juror. Which was basically off-topic with respect to the immediate inquiry and why Bowyer was summoned. Which is why this sighting was not included as part of a narrative in his pre-inquest statement.

I'm afraid I'll need to see some sort of evidence that this was the case before I accept this as a "gem" worthy of being "written down for future reference".

Its all here on Casebook, in fact you can find some specific quotes among the press reports where 6:30 in the evening, and 8:30 at night, are both specifically referred to as 'afternoon'.

It's due to the police having no reason to use the expression "well-dressed" or any synonym thereof,

Well, yes they do, if the witness used it, but only if the witness used it, like Schwartz, by way of example.

Less of the "we're", please. There's hardly a huge chorus of people queuing up to agree with you.

No Ben, I don't need accolades or the proverbial 'pat-on-the-back', I stand on my own two feet.
I was actually referring to 'readers', nothing more.

Regards, Jon S.

[Fisherman]

Hi Fisherman,

If you're into your Scotch, it's all about Laphroaig quarter cask. At 48% it's a bit naughty, but it's about the nicest thing possible in liquid form. And the peatier the better as always!

All the best,
Ben

We really need to cherish the things we agree on, Ben - and we agree totally on this. My son has just built me a beauty of a liqur cabinet in massive oak. And if itīs not a good and preferably peaty whisky, then thereīs no space in that cabinet for it. Ardbeg, Lagavulin, Caol Ila, Talisker ... love it. And the cask Laphroaig is the perhaps best one of them all.
I first tasted it some years ago on a whisky testing on the small island of Ven outside the coast here, where there is a Swedish whisky Brewery (yes - we have two!), and though it was a blind test and though I had never tried it before, there was asolutely no doubt about what it was. Been a great favourite ever since.
You should try Mackmyra some time, if you ever get the chance. Itīs Swedish whisky, and itīs a really nice range of tastes, some mild, some peated, all aged in very small oak barrels. I was sceptical until I tried, but no longer!

All the best,
Fisherman

[Phil H]

Coming back to this thread, after a good night's sleep and in a detached, benevolent mood, I found myself chuckling.

The social "class" of the killer - which is something I only mentioned in connection with how the writing on the case has evolved over the past 50 years or so, is pretty irrelevent.

We simply don't have enough descriptions or evidence to go on - and by and large, I suspect all of us shape our "image" of the killer to our preferred suspect or suspect "type". Hence a Kosminskiite will favour a lower class killer - perhaps actually reading evidence or rationalising away elements that don't sustain that mental view; while a Druittist (as an example) needs a middle-class killer, and no doubt shapes his view of the case accordingly.

It is all pretty subjective.

The debate is also warping this excellent thread which was started for wholly different reasons.

Phil

[Jonathan H]

I realize that among certain of the Orthodox it is resented that all roads lead back to the police sources and the original suspects.

For example, a researcher does not choose Kosminski because they have a penchant for rough trade but rather because they have judged Sir Robert Anderson (and/or Donald Swanson) to be the most reliable of those primary sources.

If Anderson had chosen Druitt, or somebody else, then such a researcher would argue [provisionally] that that is probably Jack, because the best professional, cop source of the day decided as much.

Writing people off as Druittistalites and Kosminskinauts, and such like, is missing the point.

Though it is a way of never dealing with the specifics of an argument.

We cannot get to the layer of evidence, if it ever existed, behind those top cops' opinions (although Tumblety has a rich record for grotesquerie and chicanery, and Aaron kosminski threatened a woman with a knife, and belief in Druitt as Jack emerged from Dorset not London, and obviously Chapman was a proven killer).

The original thread-starter asked about how many murders?

If you take Druitt and Tumblety out of the equation then you can have seven, or nine victims -- there is no longer a reason it has to be Macnaghten's five.

[curious4]

They named a whisky after a scottish ant?

C4