Evidence of innocence

[MrBarnett]

Point taken, but according to an article in the Pall Mall Gazette of 22nd September, 1889, ‘By the Act of Parliament a certain clear space has to be left for river traffic…’

And a last comment on the subject, in October, 1887 a sculling race was staged between London Bridge and Greenwich. The ELO of 4th November describes how one boat overtook the other ‘by the Tower Bridge works’. The river was never closed to shipping, so a small parcel of human remains could have easily got through.

[Mark J D]

Point taken, but according to an article in the Pall Mall Gazette of 22nd September, 1889, ‘By the Act of Parliament a certain clear space has to be left for river traffic…’

Point taken taken! To me, though, the thing is that a lot of barges sitting around with old bridge wreckage/new bridge raw materials in them -- even if they're bunched up near the embankments -- are to some extent an obstacle to the free movement of floating objects.

Astounding familiarity with the Pall Mall Gazette noted.

M.

[MrBarnett]

air castles my ass.
this and wheats post you responded to is very rude and belittling rj. both fish and jerry have done alot of great research into the mystery of both the ripper and torsoman cases. as well as the other great contributions to this thread by other good researchers like gary and others. they may be on the right track or not but either way alot of hard work has gone into it amd alot of new and relevant information is being discovered. i think you owe them an apology.

People who claim that Lechmere would not have had access to premises where he could have dismembered a body and state that his mother ‘probably’ didn’t get into the cats meat business until after her husband’s death are not being objective.

I can’t answer for Jerry or Christer, but I find it perfectly plausible that the family were in the business in some form or other prior to September, 1889. A shoemaker with dementia is unlikely to have been a reliable breadwinner. I think Ma may have had her inheritance to fall back on, but from 1890 to her death she ran businesses. I think it’s safe to say that her financial position was ‘probably’ the same between 1890 and her death as it had been from when her husband ceased to be financially supportive and 1890. If his ‘senility’ was so marked in late 1889 that it was listed as a cause of death, at what point would it have become an impediment to his wage earning ability? There had obviously been some issue as early as February, 1889.

[Fisherman]

I can’t answer for ... Christer ...

Oh, yes you can. And you just did.

[MrBarnett]

Oh, yes you can. And you just did.

And what an odd business for an old lady to suddenly take up and run from home where she lived with her granddaughter.

Here’s my ‘probably’: her sole surviving child, Charles, probably assisted her in some way. That’s how it works, isn’t it - sons do stuff for their ageing widowed mothers? It is in my world.

[Fisherman]

And what an odd business for an old lady to suddenly take up and run from home where she lived with her granddaughter.

Here’s my ‘probably’: her sole surviving child, Charles, probably assisted her in some way. That’s how it works, isn’t it - sons do stuff for their ageing widowed mothers? It is in my world.

It seems your world does not materially differ from mine in this respect, Gary. Yes, I do think that Charles may have helped his mother into the business. My personal guess is that Charles himself may well have sidelined in the trade for many a year. If he carted meat, that could have been what originally gave him a contact in the business. And it would help explain the skill described by the medicos on behalf of both the Ripper and the Torso killer.

Not in any way proven, but I find it a logical suggestion.

[MrBarnett]

Point taken taken! To me, though, the thing is that a lot of barges sitting around with old bridge wreckage/new bridge raw materials in them -- even if they're bunched up near the embankments -- are to some extent an obstacle to the free movement of floating objects.

Astounding familiarity with the Pall Mall Gazette noted.

M.

From London Bridge downriver to Limehouse was known as the Pool of London. It was always full of river craft.

I googled the PMG article. What I already knew was the Irongate Wharf people had complained about the blockage of their stairs as a result of the Tower Bridge works. If half of the Pool of London had been blocked off it would have been a huge issue.

[MrBarnett]

It seems your world does not materially differ from mine in this respect, Gary. Yes, I do think that Charles may have helped his mother into the business. My personal guess is that Charles himself may well have sidelined in the trade for many a year. If he carted meat, that could have been what originally gave him a contact in the business. And it would help explain the skill described by the medicos on behalf of both the Ripper and the Torso killer.

Not in any way proven, but I find it a logical suggestion.

Of course, the level of butchery skill attained by someone dealing in cats meat is where our opinions diverge somewhat. That said, I’m open to the possibility that CAL may have been involved with someone like Hart who didn’t play by the rules.

[FrankO]

[B]What is your explanation for the shallow cut along the full length from pubes to ribs, Frank? Only the vulva was cut through, the rest stopped at the omentum.
What is your take on this? He would arguably have had oceans of time.[B]

I don’t have a particular explanation, Christer. Maybe he made it in reference to the abdominal cuts the Ripper made, maybe he just felt like it at the time - the former seeming more likely than the latter. But if his object was to send the message that he was also the Ripper, then it didn’t work out.

The fct that the police never accepted the Pichin Street victim as one of the Rippers will have owed to a degree to how all dismemberment murders were regarded as either disposal murders or as efforts to disenable identification.

Then the Torso killer had to reckon with the fact that his murders were regarded as such when he thought about sending the message that he was also responsible for the Ripper murders. If he really wanted that to be known, that is.

If the concept of aggressive dismemberment had been known to them, I think we would have seen a very different reaction.

Agreed.

The GSG, which is your stand on that. Was it the killer, was it possibly the killer, was it probably not or could it simply not have been the killer?

I think you know me well enough to know that I don’t think it simply couldn’t have been the killer who wrote it.

Seeing that I’m on the fence regarding Stride as a Ripper victim, I’m less inclined to think the GSG was written by the Ripper. The fact that it was in a good schoolboys round hand and rather small letters, has always given me the impression that they were actually written by a schoolboy and makes me think of lines of punishment a schoolmaster gives. That aside, I don’t necessarily think it was written by the murderer, but I don’t exclude it.

However, if the GSG was written by the Ripper, then we could say that we’d have the same sort of vague message as the one you suggest was sent out by the Pinchin Street victim.

[FrankO]

So if the torso had been found a few streets north of Berners Street as opposed to a few streets south you’d be more inclined to consider it as a Ripper crime?

Correct, Gary. And if it had also been a cut that had opened up the abdomen, then I'd even be more inclined to consider it a Ripper crime, or, at least, a message by the one who murdered the Pinchin St. victim hinting that he was also the Ripper.

[MrBarnett]

Correct, Gary. And if it had also been a cut that had opened up the abdomen, then I'd even be more inclined to consider it a Ripper crime, or, at least, a message by the one who murdered the Pinchin St. victim hinting that he was also the Ripper.

And if the murder had taken place outside 38, Berner Street, you’d be more inclined to include it than if it had been outside 42… :-)

[rjpalmer]

air castles my ass.
this and wheats post you responded to is very rude and belittling rj. both fish and jerry have done alot of great research into the mystery of both the ripper and torsoman cases. as well as the other great contributions to this thread by other good researchers like gary and others. they may be on the right track or not but either way alot of hard work has gone into it amd alot of new and relevant information is being discovered. i think you owe them an apology.

I can’t speak for Wheat, but I strongly suspect he wasn’t referring to Jerry’s research, nor Wildbore, etc. I know I wasn’t.

I suspect he was venting exhaustion and exasperation at those endlessly accusing Charles Cross of a great slough of unsolved murders dating back to 1873, all predicated on the highly dubious fact that he found a body on his walk to work and he chose to use the name of the stepfather who raised him. Beyond that there is utterly nothing. It’s not even the beginning of a case against him.

Now they have him abducting a woman and keeping her in his mother’s kitchen for three days?

Sophistication of research is not a substitute for sound thinking. What are your thoughts and feelings about the theories of Edward Knight Larkins? Are you equally impressed? His research was exceedingly sophisticated, all done up with timetables, charts, etc., and even specific names. Hell, like the Lechmere theory, Larkins even seems to have convinced a QC.

And at the end of the day, Sir Robert Anderson still booted him out of his office.

[MrBarnett]

And if the murder had taken place outside 38, Berner Street, you’d be more inclined to include it than if it had been outside 42… :-)

London has often been said to be a series of villages.

I’d say Hanbury Street and Dorset Street were in the same village and Berner Street and Pinchin Street were in the same village. Although you’ll not find it marked on a map, the area bordered by the Commercial Road, Backchurch Lane, Cable Street and Christian Street was once known as ‘Tiger Bay’.

I’m not sure how useful drawing circles is in this context.

[jerryd]

I think we discovered that both Wildbore’s and Lawrence’s fathers had committed suicide? Jerry will remember.

Yes. I think you and Robert found a lot of that info, did you not? He was raised by his father's twin brother. I forgot about Lawrence and his father. I believe you are correct. I'll have to go back and look.

[MrBarnett]

Yes. I think you and Robert found a lot of that info, did you not? He was raised by his father's twin brother. I forgot about Lawrence and his father. I believe you are correct. I'll have to go back and look.

Yes, I think I found out about Wildbore’s dad and between us we also discovered that his colleague had had the same experience, but I couldn’t remember if it was Lawrence or someone else.