Jill The Ripper Theories

[Steve S]

I'm sure I read somewhere that there was a theory that Jill the Ripper was a midwife who could get away with being bloodstained by saying she'd just delivered a baby. Apparently she'd bungled an abortion and so she killed the woman involved, abortions being illegal at the time. Five times in a couple of months.
Seems a bit of an extreme way to cover yourself, doesn't it?

Think that idea was promoted by an ex-copper in a newspaper series?
Steve

[steje73]

I'm sure I read somewhere that there was a theory that Jill the Ripper was a midwife who could get away with being bloodstained by saying she'd just delivered a baby. Apparently she'd bungled an abortion and so she killed the woman involved, abortions being illegal at the time. Five times in a couple of months.
Seems a bit of an extreme way to cover yourself, doesn't it?

[Uncle Jack]

Thanks for that Jeff

Regards,

Adam

[Mayerling]

Hi Uncle Jack,

The main theory about "Jill the Ripper" is that of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.
He once suggested that an insane midwife might have been responsible for the killings. But he did not go into great detail. I believe he mentions it in his autobiography MEMORIES AND ADVENTURES.

So far the lead "female" candidate (and a weak one) is the murderess Mary Eleanor Pearcey (actually Mary Eleanor Wheeler) (hanged in 1890). Mrs. Pearcey had a confrontation with her successful rival Phoebe Hogg in Pearcey's home in St. Johns Wood (which is still standing), and bloodily blugeoned Phoebe to death. She wheeled Phoebe's dead body in the perambulator that Phoebe's baby was in (thus suffocating the baby as well), from her home to Hampstead Heath, where she dumped the cargo and perambulator. At the time that the crime broke, before the newspapers learned it was based on jealousy between the women over Mr. Frank Hogg, the state of Phoebe's body, and its being left out in public, made some newspapers compare it to the Ripper murders of a few months earlier. However, there were no other murders of her own linked to Mary Pearcey
(her father, Thomas Wheeler, was hanged for a burglary murder in 1880 - a rather unique father/daughter joint fate there). As I said she is the lead candidate for "Jill the Ripper" but a weak one.

Best wishes,

Jeff

[Uncle Jack]

Does anyone believe Jack The Ripper was a woman and if so, what good cases have you got to put forward? I would love to hear your opinions as the theory has always intriuged me....