A new critique of the Cross/Lechmere theory from Stewart Evans

[Robert]

Hi Richard

Small point : I'm 60/40 for the Ripper killing Stride, but very much doubt that the Ripper was BS.

[richardnunweek]

Hello Lechmere.
Until we can disprove that the Ripper did not kill Stride, It is right to assume.
Are you saying it is unlikely that a killer would turn on a male, if forced into a position where he was protecting his freedom.
How much courage would it take to ram a blade into a mans body, and disable him, and slice his throat, also have we the physical details of Cross and Paul, if Strides Killer was indeed the Ripper he certainly was not the meek and mild type.and if he appeared to have broad shoulders , there's a good chance he was a meaty individual.
Are we really suggesting that all murders victims are women , and men are to timid to kill there own sex?
Regards Richard.

[Lechmere]

Richard you are assuming the Ripper was the BS man and you re making a lot of other assumptions abut the type of person he was.
It is one thing being brutal with an oldish and half drunk woman who cannot be able to put up much of a fight. It is quite another to rapidly disable and silently kill a man. He wasn't trained by the SAS.
As Abbey says, serial killers do not tend to turn on witnesses. It is exceptionally rare. So to raise it as an objection is a bit of a non starter.

Abbe - for some reason I have a soft spot for Dew - so I can't agree!

[richardnunweek]

Hi Abby,
I agree to a point, however if we look at the personality of Jack the Ripper, we have overall a picture of a person who was extremely violent, who in may cases appeared to have been oblivious to any danger take for instance to kill Chapman underneath windows, and run the risk of someone else entering the yard, not to mention Stride's attacker who was rough, and showed no signs of anxiety when seen to molest .
I should add Millers court ,when he would have been trapped in a corner if disturbed, one could not imagine he could have talked his way out of that situation..by saying ''Hey come and look at this woman''
Its a question how one perceives the killer to respond.
Mine would be in a violent manner.
Regards Richard.

[Abby Normal]

Hi
It has taken 286 posts to ask a simple question.
If Cross .or indeed Paul, was the killer of Nichols why did the killer let the witness live?
We have a man who was clearly a maniac, soon to be known as Jack the Ripper, let a person who they encountered, survive a situation when. that person would be a very damming to their survival.
He was armed with at least one knife , and was clearly not backward in using it in a revolting and savage manner.
So why did the non guilty one remain intact?
Answer .. Because it happened as it was told. and nothing more sinister.
Can anyone disagree with that observation?
Regards Richard.

Hi Richard
I can, because serial killers usually turn out to be cowards when faced with a situation where an antogonist is on more equal footing. In this case an able bodied man.

[Abby Normal]

In defence of Dew it was 50 years later and he must have largely been going on memory and who was there to contradict him!
I think given that his account is remarkably accurate.
Further as I think I said, his errors in the Nichols case are more understandable as it was in a different Division.

Hi lech
I would not defend. Not for an instant. Basically the whole premise of the article is fiction based on faulty memory and or not knowing in the first place Paul was found, was at the inquest and gave a statement. Pretty cavalier and irresponsible I would say and should make one question his credibility as a whole IMHO.

[richardnunweek]

Hi
It has taken 286 posts to ask a simple question.
If Cross .or indeed Paul, was the killer of Nichols why did the killer let the witness live?
We have a man who was clearly a maniac, soon to be known as Jack the Ripper, let a person who they encountered, survive a situation when. that person would be a very damming to their survival.
He was armed with at least one knife , and was clearly not backward in using it in a revolting and savage manner.
So why did the non guilty one remain intact?
Answer .. Because it happened as it was told. and nothing more sinister.
Can anyone disagree with that observation?
Regards Richard.

[Fisherman]

I still think that the reason was caution on the part of the publisher of the book (Blackie).

Giving the man's occupation and the location of his place of work could lead to enquiries being made in an effort to identify the family. Pointless in view of the fact that these details were already in the public domain, but at least the publisher could say they weren't gleaned from the pages of one of their books.

Apropos of Dew's account making a mystery of Robert Paul's identity, he was not the first. An even earlier account of the murders had identified Cross but referred to Paul as 'a stranger' and that he was 'never...heard of again' thus leading me to believe that Dew may have drawn on that account for details.

Well, I can´t provide a better reason myself - but that is not to say that I find it a very good reason. Keeping quiet about Annie Chapmans husband having been a coachman at Windsor fortyseven (47) years after the Ripper killings ...? Decidedly odd, no matter how shaky the publisher was.
But, as I say, lacking any better explanation, it´s the best yet.

The "incrimination" of Paul, if you will, is an interesting item. He may well have been looked upon with great suspicion back in 1888, and thus he may have been handled rather roughly by the police, partly also owing, of course, to his painting out of the Met as total amateurs and not very nice people.

The best,
Fisherman

[Lechmere]

There is much to ponder here. Most names were mentioned in the book.
Lechmere died in 1920 so could not be libelled. But they wouldn't know he was dead as they thought he was called Cross - is that an explanation?
The censoring of Windsor seems very odd.
And Llewellyn - the references to him make it quite clear who is being discussed yet his name in the book is given as _____

[Stewart P Evans]

Earlier article...

Here is an extract from the earlier article, published in 1929.

[Stewart P Evans]

Caution

Many thanks to Mr Evans for sharing the Thomson´s Weekly News article.
From this last clipping, we may see that the paper article contains, word by word, the exact same text as the memoirs, published three years later.
Any question of things being left out due to a wish to avoid legal proceedings can surely be ruled out when the word Windsor belongs to the words left unprinted...?
Anybody who can offer some sort of explanation as to why these words were left out in the memoirs?
All the best,
Fisherman

I still think that the reason was caution on the part of the publisher of the book (Blackie).

Giving the man's occupation and the location of his place of work could lead to enquiries being made in an effort to identify the family. Pointless in view of the fact that these details were already in the public domain, but at least the publisher could say they weren't gleaned from the pages of one of their books.

Apropos of Dew's account making a mystery of Robert Paul's identity, he was not the first. An even earlier account of the murders had identified Cross but referred to Paul as 'a stranger' and that he was 'never...heard of again' thus leading me to believe that Dew may have drawn on that account for details.

[Fisherman]

Many thanks to Mr Evans for sharing the Thomson´s Weekly News article.

From this last clipping, we may see that the paper article contains, word by word, the exact same text as the memoirs, published three years later.

Any question of things being left out due to a wish to avoid legal proceedings can surely be ruled out when the word Windsor belongs to the words left unprinted...?

Anybody who can offer some sort of explanation as to why these words were left out in the memoirs?

All the best,
Fisherman

[Stewart P Evans]

Chapman's husband

Mr Evans
That is very interesting.
I can just make out Llewellyn’s name also. I believe in the book he is referred to as Dr _____
I have checked the book and Martha Tabram’s husband is referred to as Samuel _____
Annie Chapman’s deceased husband’s previous place of employment is given as ______
There are probably others I missed, yet nearly all properly names are given.
I had natural assumed that the reason Dew had entered the dash was because he could not remember those details.
Do you know if these names are also given in the Thompson Weekly serialisation?
Is the general text in Thompson Weekly News exactly the same?
If the others are mentioned in the newspaper as well, it seems very curious why only these handful of names were replaced with dashes in the actual book.
A three year gap between serialisation and proper publication also seems a long time.

From Dew's article in Thomson's Weekly News of February 9, 1935, mentioning Chapman's husband.

[Lechmere]

In defence of Dew it was 50 years later and he must have largely been going on memory and who was there to contradict him!
I think given that his account is remarkably accurate.
Further as I think I said, his errors in the Nichols case are more understandable as it was in a different Division.

[Abby Normal]

Thanks to Stewart for posting this.


I am absolutely flabbergasted that so many police got so much wrong even the basic facts when writing(and publishing!)about the case later on. You would think that they would have been worried about getting at the very least the basics right and not looking like ignorant fools, especially since they never caught the ripper. Unbelievable.