Tweet
The Ripper murders occurred in a quarter square mile of each other. Even contemporary reports in newspapers suggested the victims might have first been weakened by alcohol or laudanum. All autopsies on the victims show there was no struggle. Thompson boasted to Wilfrid Meynell, that his dissecting scalpel was literally razor sharp. Of course Thompson, aged 27, could have killed these women. Its true that Everard Meynell mentioned Thompson's having only one functioning lung. This indicates a dissection. At least one biographer on Thompson prior to me has used this important detail in EM’s biographer to question the circumstances surrounding Thompson’s death. For EM to state this was a fact could only have been ascertained in 1907 if there had been a dissection. If this had been done, then it would have been, unnecessary, unrecorded and illegal. Besides this his cause of death was said to be due to tuberculosis. This disease, typified by the coughing up of mucus mixed with blood, was a condition not previously known to have been evident. He didn’t even have a cough and biographers have doubted this bizarre explanation. High physical fitness and strength was a major requirement needed for Thompson to enter medical school. As was needed for him to enter the army, as he did. One biographer has told that when he left his Manchester home in 1885 he walked the 300 kilometers to London. In London his odd jobs had him carrying heavy bundles of newspapers, and racing about town on errands for employers he worked briefly for such as a John McMaster in Panton Street. All biographers tell of him being a keen hiker walking all over the hills of Sussex and Wales. Could have Thompson walked a quarter square mile and cut a drunk or drugged woman’s throat, then sliced into her with his practiced surgeon’s ease and a sharp knife? Probably.