Framing Charles

[MrBarnett]

Why does a mother who has just bigamously married a younger man have her 10-year-old son Christened and put his living father’s name and occupation on record?

No doubt she received a Christening cert with the name John Allen Lechmere in fancy lettering. Which she then hid in the deepest, darkest drawer in the house so that her son couldn’t see it. ;-)

[Fisherman]

The first line of his inquest testimony was recorded as

Chas. Andrew Cross, carman, said he had been in the employment of Messrs. Pickford and Co. for over twenty years"

Are these the actions of someone who has something to hide?

Have you noticed that he did not give his home address here? How is that for starters?

When he first went to work at Pickfords 20 years previous he was clearly using the name Cross which he was entitled to do so given the family situation at that time. That id how he was known as at Pickfords

"Clearly"? He was clearly baptized in 1859, the year AFTER her mother married Thomas Cross bigamously, and he was baptized Lechmere. Clearly so.

He married in 1870, by the name of Lechmere. Clearly so.

The various authority contacts we have him answering or signing at this stage, he invariably answers or signs Lechmere. Clearly so.

Letīs try and be true to the facts instead of getting carried away by our own hopes and misconceptions, Trevor. Its Lechmere, not Cross.


So ambiguity now clarified, so we can safely say that there was nothing sinister about him using the name Cross-- Christer take note !!!!!!!!!!!

www.trevormarriott.co.uk

Just did, Trevor. And even if he WAS called Cross at work - something we cannot conclude at all - it STILL remains strange that he signed himself Lechmere with the police after a case of unlawful death. As has been pointed out to you, written on your forehead and tattooed on your forgetful behind, he NEVER used the name Cross otherwise in ANY contacts with any authorities.
Gabbing on about your own personal biased beliefs makes little sense when they are in conflict with the evidence, Iīm afraid.

[Michael W Richards]

I haven’t carried out a survey, but I’ve done enough digging into this stuff to know that most people used just the one surname. And when they used more than one for innocent reasons (such as informally adopting their stepfather’s name) and appeared as witnesses in court they very often felt it was appropriate to disclose both names. The concept of a ‘real’ or ‘proper’ name was firmly fixed in the Victorian psyche.

What you have is written phonetic interpretations of a name when formal identification isnt available, and often language issues to help confound the spelling and pronunciation. Ive found many cases where the name is given and the spelling is interpreted,.. and also where multiple variations are listed.

This was a time when people could give themselves a fresh start just by moving. They could become whoever they liked. Maybe thats why people like Mary Jane Kelly are so hard to find...maybe that dead woman was never officially named that. Kate used alias surnames twice her last 24 hours, 1 on a receipt and 1 for a profile form at Bishopsgate. Aside from street nicknames or "commonly known as" circumstances, people could essentially just give whatever name and background they chose to.

The point of my contention is that do we really have to make too much of people using aliases during that period?

[Fisherman]

What you have is written phonetic interpretations of a name when formal identification isnt available, and often language issues to help confound the spelling and pronunciation. Ive found many cases where the name is given and the spelling is interpreted,.. and also where multiple variations are listed.

This was a time when people could give themselves a fresh start just by moving. They could become whoever they liked. Maybe thats why people like Mary Jane Kelly are so hard to find...maybe that dead woman was never officially named that. Kate used alias surnames twice her last 24 hours, 1 on a receipt and 1 for a profile form at Bishopsgate. Aside from street nicknames or "commonly known as" circumstances, people could essentially just give whatever name and background they chose to.

The point of my contention is that do we really have to make too much of people using aliases during that period?

How much is "too much", Michael?

[Trevor Marriott]

Just did, Trevor. And even if he WAS called Cross at work - something we cannot conclude at all - it STILL remains strange that he signed himself Lechmere with the police after a case of unlawful death.

Again he was entitled to use either name nothing sinister

As has been pointed out to you, written on your forehead and tattooed on your forgetful behind, he NEVER used the name Cross otherwise in ANY contacts with any authorities.

Again he was entitled to use either name nothing sinister

Gabbing on about your own personal biased beliefs makes little sense when they are in conflict with the evidence, Iīm afraid.

There is no conflict he gave the name Cross under oath at the inquest. He stated he had been employed at Pickfords for the past 20 years. This was after he gave his police statement with the same personal details on. He was fully entitled to use any of the two names.

You cannot prove he was not using the name Cross when employed at Pickfords

You cannot prove that he came under suspicion at the time or any time thereafter

You cannot prove that the police did not check out his work details to confirm his name and address

Until you can do all of the above his status as a suspect is poorly deserved

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[MrBarnett]

There is generally a reason why people used ‘aliases’. Very few did. The main reasons were:

To avoid criminal detection or to minimise legal sanctions if caught.

To present a facade of ‘respectability’ e.g. women adopting the surname of the men they were living with out of wedlock.

Convenience e.g. a child informally adopting the surname of their stepfather. That was presumably why CAL was recorded as Cross in 1861, but 27 years later it would have made little sense for him to continue the practice.


Kelly is indeed a mystery, but then so was Alice ‘McKenzie’ until recently. She seems to have adopted that name very shortly after her husband (Joseph Kinsey) died and she had made her way to the East End. She spent twenty years in London and attracted numerous surnames but never, as far as I can see, used her married name (Kinsey) or her maiden name (Pitts) while there. I believe she deliberately hid under McKenzie etc because of the stark contrast between her life in the East End and the respectability of her family in Peterborough etc. A similar contrast existed between Maria Louisa and her sisters, and when you add to that the complication of double bigamy, a possible explanation for CAL’s actions becomes comes into view.

Try looking up the combination Charles+Allen+Lechmere on all censuses 1842-1911 across the whole of the country and you’ll find just two - our carman and one of his sons. Using that name in court would have ID’d him as the son of John Allen Lechmere who was very much alive when Maria Louisa ‘married’ Thomas Cross.

[Trevor Marriott]

Just did, Trevor. And even if he WAS called Cross at work - something we cannot conclude at all - it STILL remains strange that he signed himself Lechmere with the police after a case of unlawful death. As has been pointed out to you, written on your forehead and tattooed on your forgetful behind, he NEVER used the name Cross otherwise in ANY contacts with any authorities.
Gabbing on about your own personal biased beliefs makes little sense when they are in conflict with the evidence, Iīm afraid.

But that isnt a crime, and is not enough for you to suggest he is a killer., there is no conflict of evidence how many times do you need telling.

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[rjpalmer]

TC was a distant memory by then.

This is laying it on a little too thick, though, isn't it, Gary?

We know nothing about the relationship between Lechmere and Thomas Cross, and what emotional attachment it may have held. Maybe young Charles resented the guy; maybe he was indifferent; or maybe the ten-year-old became deeply enamored of a powerful rough-and-ready copper who arrested the bad guys down by the docks, and thought of him with something akin to hero-worship.

If anything, the memory of his birth father, John Lechmere, may have been utterly distant, and the name nothing more than a formality for legal documents, with no emotional attachment whatsoever.

As you say, criminals use aliases. We all know that, and we see examples among those many consider to be more legitimate suspects--off the top of my head, Klosowski used 'Chapman'; Tumblety used 'Townsend'; Ostrog used a whole mire of names, as did Deeming. Even poor Kosminski gave the name 'Abrams' when fined for walking an unmuzzled dog.

The thing is, these men have known criminal records. (Koz, just barely).

Lechmere has none.

And the name 'Cross' can reasonably be argued to be a name he wore proudly as a teen (now I'm laying it on thick) and was the same name he used when he went to work for Pickford & Co., and thus its criminal intent is not as blindingly certain and undeniable as the Crown prosecutor want us to believe.

But names are odd things. I'll use a criminal example.

Ian Brady was born 'Ian Stewart,' but his birth mother fostered him out, and he was raised by a family called Sloane, so he became 'Ian Sloane' during most of his formative years.

It wasn't until his later teens that his birth mother (with whom he had kept contact) married an Irish fruit porter named Patrick Brady. 'Stewart/Sloane' didn't even particularly like the guy, but he wanted a job at the fruit market, and he started working there under 'Ian Brady,' just like dear old step-dad.

The name stuck, and that's the name he was known under when arrested for the Moors Murders.

I have no idea whether 'Stewart' aka 'Sloane' ever legally changed his name to Brady, or used it on legal forms, but someone here might know.

PS. Let me not forget Grant/Grainger, and the various incarnations of Charles Le Grande. Can we really lump Lechmere's use of 'Cross' with these?

[rjpalmer]

just seems a tad odd to me.and yes suspicious.

That's the problem, though, isn't it?

Suspicion is in the mind of the beholder--it doesn't exist in the object.

Our suspicions against someone can be utterly frivolous and paranoid, or they can be legitimate and deeply insightful.

The Lechmere accusers have to convince us that their suspicions are the latter, and not the former.

[Trevor Marriott]

That's the problem, though, isn't it?

Suspicion is in the mind of the beholder--it doesn't exist in the object.

Our suspicions against someone can be utterly frivolous and paranoid, or they can be legitimate and deeply insightful.

The Lechmere accusers have to convince us that their suspicions are the latter, and not the former.

Well said that man !

[MrBarnett]

That's the problem, though, isn't it?

Suspicion is in the mind of the beholder--it doesn't exist in the object.

Our suspicions against someone can be utterly frivolous and paranoid, or they can be legitimate and deeply insightful.

The Lechmere accusers have to convince us that their suspicions are the latter, and not the former.

This isn’t a court of law. No ‘proof’ is required.

If you feel from what you know of CAL that it just didn’t occur to him that he should disclose what was almost certainly his legal name to the authorities, that’s your opinion.

I feel the opposite. Looking at how he used the name Lechmere throughout his life, it’s clear it wasn’t just a name on a couple of yellowing documents in a drawer - his kids used it at school, he advertised at least two businesses, not just as Charles Lechmere, but as Charles Allen Lechmere. There is little or no chance that he wasn’t widely known by that name.

A man who is a stickler for his middle name doesn’t have a one-(or two-)off memory lapse and forget his habit of using his legal name in formal situations when giving evidence under oath.

I think the legal position is that where someone is known by more than one name, the name that has been used more often in formal situations is considered their legal name. But it’s all a bit grey, there are examples of magistrates etc being confused by it all, so we needn’t get tied in knots about the legal position.

He gets married - his name is Lechmere. He records his kids’ births in the name of Lechmere; baptises them ditto; sends them to school ditto.

He opens a grocery shop as Lechmere and presumably displays that name above it; ditto a coffee shop.

But when he kills a child or finds a murdered prostitute in the street he feels it’s time to honour his stepfather by calling himself Cross and not even mentioning his legal name.

[MrBarnett]

Well said that man !

I agree - suspicions can be legitimate and deeply insightful. Such insights would be of little value in a court of law, but they are the lifeblood of Ripperology.

;-)

[Abby Normal]

That's the problem, though, isn't it?

Suspicion is in the mind of the beholder--it doesn't exist in the object.

Our suspicions against someone can be utterly frivolous and paranoid, or they can be legitimate and deeply insightful.

The Lechmere accusers have to convince us that their suspicions are the latter, and not the former.

Hi RJ
totally agree. subjective suspicion is the lifeblood of ripperology. or at least the suspect aspect of it.
which is why i keep an open mind and unless a suspect is ruled out (ostrog)or is a crackpot suspect (maybrick, royal conspiracy) i consider them a possibility, although i do rank them in my mind as which are the least weak.
one of my first criteria to even really consider a suspect valid, is whether or not they can even be placed in the area at all at the time. and then how many red flags they have (police suspicion, discrepencies , contact with victim etc.)

I dont consider myself a Lechmere accuser, more of a lechmere accuser apologist lol. hes in the frame for being Polly nichols killer at least, has discrepencies in his story and fits the profile of a local avg joe. (who IMHO the ripper surely was).

that being said, I still have somewhat of an issue with him killing on his way to work. I agree with the poster recently who noted it would seem more likely he killed after his shift was over, but hey, serial killers are opportunistic psychopaths who have been known to kill while even on the job. or maybe he was actually off on the murder days as i mentioned before, if they ever found work records that showed that, then he would really vault up my rankings.

at the very least he seems like bad news to me-killed a kid and callously left a woman in obvious need lying in the street... both times using a name he seemingly didnt normally use.

as wescott so succinctly put it-you could have a worse suspect. totally agree with that!

[Trevor Marriott]

This isn’t a court of law. No ‘proof’ is required.

If you feel from what you know of CAL that it just didn’t occur to him that he should disclose what was almost certainly his legal name to the authorities, that’s your opinion.

I feel the opposite. Looking at how he used the name Lechmere throughout his life, it’s clear it wasn’t just a name on a couple of yellowing documents in a drawer - his kids used it at school, he advertised at least two businesses, not just as Charles Lechmere, but as Charles Allen Lechmere. There is little or no chance that he wasn’t widely known by that name.

A man who is a stickler for his middle name doesn’t have a one-(or two-)off memory lapse and forget his habit of using his legal name in formal situations when giving evidence under oath.

I think the legal position is that where someone is known by more than one name, the name that has been used more often in formal situations is considered their legal name. But it’s all a bit grey, there are examples of magistrates etc being confused by it all, so we needn’t get tied in knots about the legal position.

He gets married - his name is Lechmere. He records his kids’ births in the name of Lechmere; baptises them ditto; sends them to school ditto.

He opens a grocery shop as Lechmere and presumably displays that name above it; ditto a coffee shop.

But when he kills a child or finds a murdered prostitute in the street he feels it’s time to honour his stepfather by calling himself Cross and not even mentioning his legal name.

But perhaps he didnt want to give his home address or it was agreed by the court that he should not give it.

From memory I think that he was one of the only main witnesses who didnt give a home address

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[MrBarnett]

But perhaps he didnt want to give his home address or it was agreed by the court that he should not give it.

From memory I think that he was one of the only main witnesses who didnt give a home address

www.trevormarriott.co.uk

Address?

The press managed to unearth it from somewhere, unlike the 1876 case when that Pickford’s Charles Cross’s address was never made public.