Evidence of innocence

[Mark J D]

In early 1889, Joe Forsdike entered the St George’s workhouse and was said to be destitute.

-- How does a wife with (one assumes) detectable means off-load a husband onto the parish as 'destitute'...? I mean, quite apart from the loyalty and feelings one is meant to presume in such circumstances, how do you swing it with the authorities...?

What a piece of work she must have been...

You know, I'm beginning to sense a scenario in which son Charles is the Ripper and mum Maria Louisa is the Torso killer...

"Mother! Oh God, mother! Blood! Blood!"

M.

[Doctored Whatsit]

Pondering Lechmere's life and work from this admittedly immense distance ... growing up to be of less than average height, is about five inches too short to follow him into the constabulary.

M.

I didn't know this. Doesn't a rather diminutive Lechmere minimise the likelihood of him being JtR? There are, I think, no witness statements implicating a very short potential killer.

[Mark J D]

I didn't know this. Doesn't a rather diminutive Lechmere minimise the likelihood of him being JtR? There are, I think, no witness statements implicating a very short potential killer.

-- Readers will note the remarkable absence of challenge and pushback when I say something without proof that looks like it might get Lechmere off the hook...

M.

[MrBarnett]

-- How does a wife with (one assumes) detectable means off-load a husband onto the parish as 'destitute'...? I mean, quite apart from the loyalty and feelings one is meant to presume in such circumstances, how do you swing it with the authorities...?

What a piece of work she must have been...

You know, I'm beginning to sense a scenario in which son Charles is the Ripper and mum Maria Louisa is the Torso killer...

"Mother! Oh God, mother! Blood! Blood!"

M.

Yes, it’s a bit odd. As are the two Cable Street addresses. They had been at 1, Mary Ann Street the previous year. I don’t know if Ed or Christer have got to the bottom of all that, but it would seem their locations and occupations may well have been in flux in 1889. If Joe had been suffering from dementia in early 1889, perhaps Maria had already got into the cat’s meat game by then. Through her son, perhaps?

[MrBarnett]

-- Readers will note the remarkable absence of challenge and pushback when I say something without proof that looks like it might get Lechmere off the hook...

M.

I was just about to ask where you got that from. Unless you’ve worked it out from the photo, I reckon you made it up.

[jerryd]

awesome. thanks Jer. let me just cut to the chase.. wildbore and lawrence were the torso killers?

It would be unfair of me to name them as the killers or dismemberers of any women, Abby. There is a major lack of evidence. I feel that is true for any suspect/POI right now, though. The circumstantial evidence is certainly interesting plus as you probably know, I have about 10 different people I think could have played a role in one or both of the series of murders. I don't think they can all be guilty?!

[Mark J D]

I was just about to ask where you got that from. Unless you’ve worked it out from the photo, I reckon you made it up.

As I believe I bent over backwards to make clear, I was inventing a possible scenario to see where it came out. I have other scenarios in which he is taller. Do I need a licence for this? :-)

[Gary probably knows this, but some folks might not:]
There's a surviving corner shop & house in Carlton Road (as was) that has the same design of window arch we see in the background of the Lechmere photo. I'd like to think that trigonometry would be realistic; but it wouldn't be, even if it was his actual property, which apparently it isn't.

Bests,

M.

P.S. Agh! Just gone back to look and I see I said it was a 'fact' that he was five inches too short. That was sloppy writing: I should have noticed that and used a fluffier word instead! Now it's too late to edit... Damn... Sorry about that!

[Abby Normal]

It would be unfair of me to name them as the killers or dismemberers of any women, Abby. There is a major lack of evidence. I feel that is true for any suspect/POI right now, though. The circumstantial evidence is certainly interesting plus as you probably know, I have about 10 different people I think could have played a role in one or both of the series of murders. I don't think they can all be guilty?!

thanks jerry! i think wildbore just might be the best torsoman suspect we got. worked in the NSY. and as you say his route to and from work is practically a guide to the torso dumpings. anything else youve dug up on him shady? any criminal record or any other intriguing connections?

[Mark J D]

Yes, it’s a bit odd. As are the two Cable Street addresses. They had been at 1, Mary Ann Street the previous year. I don’t know if Ed or Christer have got to the bottom of all that, but it would seem their locations and occupations may well have been in flux in 1889. If Joe had been suffering from dementia in early 1889, perhaps Maria had already got into the cat’s meat game by then. Through her son, perhaps?

In a private exchange with Christer a little while back, I suggested (I won't bore you with the reasons) that Lechmere had lost his Pickford's job towards the end of 1888. He came back to me with, I think, mention of a later census form that suggested no change. Can I shyly ask if you've seen anything around that makes it possible this 1889 flux/upheaval involved Lechmere's job as well as his mother's activities?

M.

[Harry D]

What were his personal circumstances?

The following year his mother was selling horseflesh from a shop in the Highway. She later ran a corn chandlers shop in Wapping. In 1889, he was her only surviving child and she may well still have been receiving money from her father’s estate.

Where did Lechmere dismember the Battersea victims?

[MrBarnett]

Where did Lechmere dismember the Battersea victims?

I’ve no idea. I was addressing the suggestion that his ‘circumstances’ somehow precluded him from having a ‘chop shop’.

[MrBarnett]

In a private exchange with Christer a little while back, I suggested (I won't bore you with the reasons) that Lechmere had lost his Pickford's job towards the end of 1888. He came back to me with, I think, mention of a later census form that suggested no change. Can I shyly ask if you've seen anything around that makes it possible this 1889 flux/upheaval involved Lechmere's job as well as his mother's activities?

M.

No, sorry. In 1901 he described himself as a railway agent’s carman, which I’ve always assumed was Pickfords, but not necessarily I suppose.

[Mark J D]

No, sorry. In 1901 he described himself as a railway agent’s carman, which I’ve always assumed was Pickfords, but not necessarily I suppose.

AHA!! That's most interesting! Thank you!

M.

[MrBarnett]

No, sorry. In 1901 he described himself as a railway agent’s carman, which I’ve always assumed was Pickfords, but not necessarily I suppose.

Actually it was ‘carrier’ rather than carman, with ‘Carman’ being pencilled in above.

Go back to 1891 and it was just ‘carman’ and interestingly on that census his 14-year-old son, Thomas Allen, was recorded as a ‘vanguard carm.’

Thomas Allen would later be shown as being a carter/salesman of horseflesh/cats meat and at one stage lived in Winthrop Street a few doors away from Harrison, Barber’s yard.

Pickfords and Harrison, Barber had strong connections, and the Lechmere family were involved in the cats meat trade from at least 1890 until the inter-war years.

If I had to guess what CAL carried on his cart, I’d opt for horseflesh, though of course there is no hard evidence that he did so.

[Fisherman]

thanks jerry! i think wildbore just might be the best torsoman suspect we got. worked in the NSY. and as you say his route to and from work is practically a guide to the torso dumpings. anything else youve dug up on him shady? any criminal record or any other intriguing connections?

Hereīs my five cents, Abby:

Frederick Wildbore does look like a good fit for the Torso killer, based on the geography. There is also the fact that he would have been well aquainted with the layout of the vaults under the New Scotland Yard.

But that is as far as it goes, I think. If Jerry has more on him, it would be good to know.

Now, hereīs the problem, the way I see things. In my world, there can be no reasonable doubt that the Ripper and the Torso killer were one and the same. And so, if Wildbore was the Torso killer, then he was also the Ripper. And if that is true, then all the many pointers to Charles Lechmere are all coincidences; the fact that he found Nichols as she would still bleed for many minutes, the name swap, the disagreements with Mizen, the denial to help prop Nichols up, the geographical correlation with his work trek, with his mothers house, the correlation bewteen the two bloodied rags and his routes, his links to Pinchin Street and so on. It would all be coincidental.

And so I ask myself: Apart from the geographical correlation and the knowledge about the vault layout in the NSY, what pointers are there in Wildbores direction?

Did he disagree with the police? Did he give another name than the one he was registered by? Was he known to be violent? Did he have a criminal record? Is there any matter of this kind to incriminate him? This is where it would be nice to get Jerrys input, since he is the go-to source on Wildbore.

To me, a very crucial difference lies in how Wildbore found a torso from a woman who had been dead for many, many days or even weeks. Lechmere is linked to Polly Nichols at a time that is either spot on her TOD or very, very close to it. The torso was cold and rotting, Nichols was warm and possibly even still breathing.
I beleive that this too means that since Lechmere was in place with a body that was extremely recently killed, he must be told apart from all the other people who had reason to walk through Bucks Row. Many have said that there were lots of alternative killers, based on the geography only, but Lechmere stands out becaus he was actually alone with the body at the approximate time of death.
When it comes to Wildbore, the competition becomes more fierce - there will have been others who walked the same sort of treks that he did, and they do compare to him in that department in another way than the ones who may have walked the same type of treks that Lechmere did.
Maybe we could say that the ones who equalled Wildbore in this respect would not be aquainted with the layout of the vaults in the NSY, but it remains to be proven that the person who placed the torso in the vaults MUST have had intimate knowledge of the premises. And even if this is accepted, being aquainted with that layout is not as damning as being found alone with a freshly killed murder victim, the way Lechmere was.

This difference means that unless an alternative killer can be identified, Lechmere WILL become a suspect, whereas Wildbore will not. It would be a stretch to say that he is a person of interest, based solely on the finding of the torso. In my world, itīs not until we add the geographical correlations that such a suggestion may take some sort of flight.

Personally, I think it would be odd if Wildbore first placed the torso in the vault himself, then waited a couple of weeks, after which he grew tired of how nobody else found the torso and so he resorted to "finding" it himself in the end. This, however, could of course be overcome and it is no absolute guarantee for Wildbores innocence, it is just how I feel about it.

However! Another very interesting matter in the context represents a total guarantee for Fredericks innocence, though - at least to a prominent poster out here! Plus it offers quite a parallel to Lechmere.
The carman was quoted as saying that he at first thought that the body was a tarpaulin, and Caz has told me that this means that he could not have been lying; nobody would make up such a thing, I am told.

And Wildbore? Well, he said that he at first thought the torso was an old coat somebody had left in the gloom!

So if Jerry is trying to sell in Wildbore as the Torso killer, I know of one poster who would never fall for the idea ... (But donīt despair, Jerry - Caz may actually be completely and utterly wrong about these things!)