Jack the Ripper in America

[Adam Dalgliesh]

James Kelly/John Miller

Had a look at the passenger list for the Zaandam on the 7th October 1890 to New York, there is no James Kelly or John Miller on the list.

[RivkahChaya]

This was just on again yesterday; I DVR'd it, and now have watched it through for the first time. I quit watching it when it was on before, because it looked like a bunch of sensationalist crap. After I read this thread, and seeing that it named James Kelly as the primary suspect, I decided to watch it, because I've always been impressed with him as the one of maybe two or three people suggested only recently, which were not a lot of conspiracy-type WTF? along the lines of Lewis Carroll, or the masonic conspiracy.

A couple of notes, since people asked, and they never really got answers:

The sketch is "modern"; I think that was the word they used. It was slipped in really quickly, and then the narrator added "based on witness descriptions," or something like that. They don't say which witnesses, whether it's supposed to be a composite of different witnesses, or just one description that seemed more reliable than the others. The moustache on the age-regressed photo is a complete guess, based on "styles of the time." They don't even know whether Kelly had a moustache at all.

That means it's entirely possible they had ten artists each draw a picture from every witness statement, and then picked the one that looked like Kelly. I don't know that, but I do know that the sketch was made for the show.

Also, from what I can tell, no one actually looked over autopsy reports in each murder in the cities that Kelly claimed to have visited. In at least some cases, the idea that they were Ripper-type murders was based on the fact that there was a newspaper article with a headline (not a front page headline) calling them "Ripper" murders. Not necessarily "Jack the Ripper," just "Ripper" murders. Some of the reporters did say something like "has Jack the Ripper come to our shores?" but most simply seemed to be using the term as a point of reference for the reader, rather than detailing all the injuries.

It's a sophisticated form of begging the question. There were Ripper murders in the US, because there were murders here that people called Ripper murders, because after the fall of 1888, "Ripper murders" became a thing, sort of like when a brand name becomes the name of the generic item, like aspirin, or in the US, Popsicles, and Windex.

At least, that's what I get from Googling. If I were going to publish on the subject, obviously, I'd need to order up, at the very least, microfiche copies of the papers, and at best, actually go to the cities, and look at archives.

[Cogidubnus]

The moustache on the age-regressed photo is a complete guess, based on "styles of the time." They don't even know whether Kelly had a moustache at all.

Didn't the 1880s photo presented in "Prisoner 1167" have a moustache?

All the best

Dave

[Cogidubnus]

Had a look at the passenger list for the Zaandam on the 7th October 1890 to New York, there is no James Kelly or John Miller on the list.

Hi AD

I've just dug out "Prisoner 1167" and checked the account therein, which suggests that the journey on the Zaandam to America was actually undertaken in 1892...although the book suggests there were a number of other transatlantic crossings.

With regard to my previous posting, yes there's an alleged photo of Kelly in the book, dating to 1883...and yes there's a moustache...good to know the old memory sometimes works!

All the best

Dave

[RivkahChaya]

Didn't the 1880s photo presented in "Prisoner 1167" have a moustache?

Whether it did or not is irrelevant. When I say "they" don't know he had a moustache, I'm referring to the producers of the show, because, obviously, if they had a copy of the 1880s photo used in the book, they wouldn't need to age-regress the other photo. The ex-cop who narrates the show says something like "I don't have a photo of him when he was young," or "from that time," or something.

I mean, that's only logical, right? Besides, anything else would be disingenuous, or downright dishonest, wouldn't it?

Unless, for some reason, the author or publisher of Prisoner 1167 holds the copyright to the photo, and wouldn't let them use it, but then you'd at least think they'd say something along those lines, and add, "But he had this style of moustache," before they 'shopped it onto the age-regressed photo.

Or am I being naive?

[Cogidubnus]

I don't know Rivkah, but either way, provided the 1883 photo in Prisoner 1167 is ok, what the show producers have to surmise vis a vis Kelly's 1880s appearance is irrelevant, yes?

Whether or not you end up believing in Kelly as JtR, in my opinion the James Tully book is a cracker and well worth reading...ok it lacks detailed references and contains certain assumptions regarding people's emotional states (vide Fido!)...but it's very readable nonetheless, and poses some interesting questions...

Gotta be worth a couple of bucks and a few hours reading?

All the best

Dave

[RivkahChaya]

Sorry. I should have put some sarcasm tags on that last post.

I have read Prisoner 1167, and it is very good. Honestly, I'm not convinced any identified suspect is JTR, but if I had to pick someone, I'd probably pick Kelly as the least weak, or fanciful, case, if that makes sense.

That said, I read Prisoner 1167 a long time ago, and I don't have a copy at hand, so I couldn't check a picture had I remembered that there was one. The show on the other hand, really should have done better. I'm not sure why the sketch of the Ripper had the moustache it had-- I looked at the witness statements that are quoted in the JTR A to Z, and didn't see anything, but it was a cursory look, and anyway, not every possible thing is in the book, is it?

What does Kelly's moustache look like in the 1883 picture? does it look like the sketch? I suppose if it does, and that is their reason for choosing that style, they wouldn't have admitted it, because that then brings up the question of "Why not use the 1883 photo for comparison?"

Well, gosh darn, looks like there're sources for the photo online: let's see if this posts correctly:



I guess I can see how they'd want a clearer image, but that's the wrong moustache, assuming that it comes from a witness description, or something.

Here's the modern sketch side-by-side with the age-regressed photo, for people who don't know what we're talking about:



Looks like old James Kelly was a lot thinner than young James Kelly.

[Errata]

It's funny, but I always thought that If Astrakhan Man really existed, he would be Persian or Algerian.

[RivkahChaya]

It's funny, but I always thought that If Astrakhan Man really existed, he would be Persian or Algerian.

[Mr. Candlebridge]

just saw it

I just saw this show just aired last night...and while I don't think the show alone shows hard proof...it does offer Kelly up as a plausible contender above a lot of the others because of the extension into America...as serials don't just quit indefinately, but the spree in whitechapel, ending with the horrific Mary Kelly mutilation, may have satiated him until he picked it back up in the USA. Interesting.

[RivkahChaya]

Kelly is a plausible candidate without the US connection, and the US murders are very, very tenuous. I don't think that James Kelly committed them, and I don't think any of the people who committed any of the JTR murders committed those particular US murders that were featured in the show; however, if any of the Whitechapel murders turn out to have been committed by someone already identified, I think Kelly is a very strong candidate.

As for the "other US murders" that were not detailed, those appear to have been identified simply from newspaper reports of murders that were described as "rippings," or "Jack-the-ripper"-like. They were not identified from witness, police or coroner's reports. Reporters will sensationalize to sell a story, and what's more, since all the stories were several years post-Whitechapel, I think "ripper" as an adjective is meaningless, forensically. If someone found a US news article from before 1888 that used the word "ripper," that might be significant, because you'd have to wonder what moved the reporter to choose that word. But it's too easy to use the sensationalism of the word as a selling point, after 1888, to think that a reporter carefully considered whether the wounds on a body looked enough like the canonical Whitechapel victims to be actually by the same hand, before choosing it.

[Mr. Candlebridge]

Great response Rivkah...and I think you show well how JtR lore is mudded through decades of sensationalism.

[Barnaby]

I agree that the inclusion of American victims probably results in people taking Kelly less seriously as a JTR suspect. Having said that, if Kelly was JTR, then there probably are other victims in Europe and the U.S. If someone could be a very strong suspect with just about zero evidence against him, Kelly is it. An intriguing case...

[RivkahChaya]

I think someone else has already mentioned it, but of the ex post facto candidates proposed, Kelly is the one person actually known to have killed a woman with a knife. That puts him a head above say, James Maybrick, Prince Eddy, or Lewis Carroll. On top of that, having killed someone, and then escaping the incarceration that resulted, is Kelly's only claim to fame-- the only reason his name has come down to us. It makes a lot more sense to look for JTR among known knife-killers, then among the otherwise-famous, because a sensational crime must have a sensational solution. Also, Kelly doesn't have any impossible barriers, like having been known to be in Joliet prison, or in Scotland, in the royal court, at the time of any of the murders.

I am not here to say that I'm betting the rent on Kelly. I'm in the "probably someone we've never heard of" court, plus "maybe not even one person, anyway."

However, I simply would not be surprised at new and incontrovertible evidence that Kelly killed one or all of the C4/5, the way I would be absolutely gobsmacked if someone came up with Lewis Carroll's signed confession, or the cut pages from the Maybrick diary, covered with photos, fingerprints, and DNA, all connected to James Maybrick and his wife.

[Futzbucket]

Something I found interesting about Kelly, is during his 40-year exodus, he made several attempts to turn himself in to London police, each time something happened to keep him free. For example, one time his ship arrived a day early, so no one was there to meet Kelly, who waited around and eventually just left.

It's assumed that he was only interested in being re-committed. If that's the case, then why go to the police? If all he wanted was to be let back in the hospital, then he would have simply knocked on the door, like he eventually did.