September 30,1888- The night of Clues?

[Lewis C]

Hi Lewis,

It is entirely possible, likely even, I misremembered how confident he was in his identification. Regardless, my main view is we have to consider both possibilities, the woman may have been Stride, or not. The implications of which side of that choice we make may simply result in some tweaks to a theory, or it may make a theory untenable if one of those options is true. My view is that a theory of the first sort is one worth more consideration than one of the latter simply because it survives in one form or another regardless, while the latter hinges on guess the right way.

- Jeff

I agree with that.

[Simon Wood]

Jewish Chronicle, 18th March 1887.

[Paddy Goose]

Thank you Simon,

Jewish Chronicle, 18th March 1887.

Imperial Club sounds like a groovy place - with aspirations, hence the name.

[Patrick Differ]

Strictly Kosher cuisine. Sounds like it's open to the Public or at least the local Whitechapel Businessman? Great find.
Makes you wonder if Joseph Hyam Levy was being class conscious when he said, " I dont like going home with these characters about !". ??
sounds like an upscale club.

[New Waterloo]

I think Brown is a viable witness in many ways. I think he certainly tells the truth as he sees it. His statement tells us quite a bit of what was happening in that part of Fairclough Street at 12.45am. It is true to say that we cannot be certain that the woman he sees is Stride. Never the less he does see a couple and is clear in his evidence that the man is wearing a long overcoat.

If the woman was Stride then she is not with the man she was with earlier. Browns evidence tells us that.

If the woman was not Stride then the couple is one of the couples in the area at the time. (sorry all a bit obvious really)

It is important to note that Brown lives next door to the Beehive Pub. So he walks from the pub to the chandlers and back again.

The same pub that Spooner is standing outside with his girl friend.

However whilst walking to the chandlers and back he only reports seeing one couple. The woman and the man with the long overcoat. Where are Spooner and his girlfriend?

It is feasible that they are just around the corner of the pub on Christian street out of sight. but the mystery continues. When Brown opens the window after hearing some shouting he sees a person who he thinks is a policeman and as Jeff suggests may be Spooner.

Now this gets really problematic. If it is Spooner (which is likely as if he was the male part of the couple he saw earlier he would be wearing a long overcoat such as a policeman would wear. But Brown does not mention Spooners girlfriend.

When Spooner looked out he would have seen Spooner AND his girlfriend. Once more no sighting of her. In fact no sighting of Spooners girlfriend by anyone. Just his word for it.

Had Spooner somehow bumped into Stride after she had parted with cutaway coat man and it was Spooner and Stride having the conversation by the Board School. He wouldnt wanted to have divulged that to his girlfriend would he. Stride may have said no to him and walked off the the direction of the club.

Brown tells us a lot, He tells us only sees one couple and Brown lived next door to the Beehive and was leaning out of his window during the shouting

NW

[Paddy Goose]

Hello Scott and welcome to Casebook,

Whitehall treated Whitechapel as a colony of foreigners . Constables at fixed points, like prison guards.

Actually there were fix points in every Metropolitan Police District, as enumerated in Dickens' Dictionary of London. The points were manned from 9 PM to 1AM for the convenience of local residents.

[Lewis C]

I think Brown is a viable witness in many ways. I think he certainly tells the truth as he sees it. His statement tells us quite a bit of what was happening in that part of Fairclough Street at 12.45am. It is true to say that we cannot be certain that the woman he sees is Stride. Never the less he does see a couple and is clear in his evidence that the man is wearing a long overcoat.

If the woman was Stride then she is not with the man she was with earlier. Browns evidence tells us that.

If the woman was not Stride then the couple is one of the couples in the area at the time. (sorry all a bit obvious really)

It is important to note that Brown lives next door to the Beehive Pub. So he walks from the pub to the chandlers and back again.

The same pub that Spooner is standing outside with his girl friend.

However whilst walking to the chandlers and back he only reports seeing one couple. The woman and the man with the long overcoat. Where are Spooner and his girlfriend?

It is feasible that they are just around the corner of the pub on Christian street out of sight. but the mystery continues. When Brown opens the window after hearing some shouting he sees a person who he thinks is a policeman and as Jeff suggests may be Spooner.

Now this gets really problematic. If it is Spooner (which is likely as if he was the male part of the couple he saw earlier he would be wearing a long overcoat such as a policeman would wear. But Brown does not mention Spooners girlfriend.

When Spooner looked out he would have seen Spooner AND his girlfriend. Once more no sighting of her. In fact no sighting of Spooners girlfriend by anyone. Just his word for it.

Had Spooner somehow bumped into Stride after she had parted with cutaway coat man and it was Spooner and Stride having the conversation by the Board School. He wouldnt wanted to have divulged that to his girlfriend would he. Stride may have said no to him and walked off the the direction of the club.

Brown tells us a lot, He tells us only sees one couple and Brown lived next door to the Beehive and was leaning out of his window during the shouting

NW

Hi NW,

Good post, but on the part that I underlined, I believe that you meant to say "when Brown looked out".

One other point is that Brown only saw the couple on this way back to his house, not on his way from his house, meaning that when he saw them, they probably hadn't been there for very long.

[New Waterloo]

Hi Lewis C. Thanks for the response. Yes well spotted. A mistake should be when Brown looks out. Yes a good point you make about them (whoever they were) not being there when Brown walks out.
Did a little rough research. I think Spooner married a Catherine Sullivan a year or so after strides murder. I suppose if would could find an address for her we may be able to see if she lived nearby and went home just before the chasing about looking for a policeman. There was a family called Sullivan with a 4 year old Catherine living in Back Church Lane in 1871 but they would have probably moved. Will keep looking
NW

[Patrick Differ]

A note on the Imperial Club. The advertisement is revealing as this looks like a members only Club, reading between the lines. This would make sense if your members are wealthier Middle Class business owners. The Anglo Jewry crowd.
There were 2 Jewish Factions in play here. The Rothschilds and the Radical Berner Streeters. This is described in Fishmans East End Radicals.
The Imperial Club appears to be the brainchild of the Rothschilds to raise funds for two issues- protecting Jewish Prostitutes and , to fight the surge of the Radical immigrants from Russia.
The Berner Streeters were Unionizing and calling for funds through the Arbeiter Freund publication and meetings. They were gaining members and gaining traction. The immediate impact would be felt by the " Masters" and higher classes. Attack on the Status Quo.
Lady Rothschilds was especially invested in the Jewish Prostitutes issue and expected the Masters to put up the funds to fight Berner Street.
I don't know if there is any connection to the fact that Mitre Square and Berner Street were possibly targeted by the Ripper or if it was just coincidence. It might be less coincidence if the Ripper wrote the graffiti?
I know the idea of the Ripper framing the Jews has come up before. Especially since they were already being blamed?

[Scott Nelson]

With respect to Simon's posting of the announcement of the opening of the Imperial Club in #197 above, Manager John Hyman also sponsored Daniel Kosminski's Naturalization application in 1887. Daniel was a hairdresser who lived on Houndsditch (as did Hyman) near the club on Duke Street.

[Patrick Differ]

Scott- that is very interesting. So there appears to be a possible tie with JH Levy and Martin Kosminski, the Imperial Club and Daniel Kosminski.
Ive read where there was real competition to recruit immigrants away from the Berner Street Radicals.

Just a thought here but would JH Levy or Lawende, as Levy's best friend , turn in either a Levy or Kosminski?

Might not mean anything...but then again

[Robert St Devil]

Jack the Ripper slaughtered...
[animals|horses|pigs]

Many appreciations, Patrick Differ your recent posts had me incidentally revisiting the forensic aspects of the Catherine Eddowes inquest while reading Halse & Long's variation of the Goulston Street Grafitto.

Whether a butcher was also an animal-slaughterer in L8ND8N is a step beyond my reach presently.
But why you ask a slaughterer? Or one who was familiar with slaughtering?

While reading through once more the inquest, a dear-departed question returned phantasmically, one buried in the recesses of 'the cornucopia'... regarding slashing-methodology.

Now there are 3 methods that I can fathom to slash a person's throat: 1) the bread-slicing method; 2) the vegetable-chopping method; and 3) the slaughterer's method.
1) The knife is placed flat against the neck & it is [pulled|sawed|sliced] across the throat... like cutting a loaf of bread.
2) The point of the knife is placed into a surface aside the neck & the blade of the knife is brought down upon the throat... like chopping carrots or lettuce.
3) The point of the blade is stuck in the neck to the spine & while it is stuck in the neck it is pulled around like a lever.

It was by this third method that Jack the Ripper did kill these women. The proof is as simple as the presence of knife-notches on the neck-vertebrae.

Jack the Ripper plunged his knife into that open area of the neck underneath & nearly in-line with the ear, he plunged his knife until its pointed-tip touched her spine in certain search of cutting her carotid, he pulled the blade of the knife around her throat to sever the vessel notching her vertebrae in the process, and then he turned her on her side and bled her out in the manner that an pig-slaughterer would. That is the reason that Polly Nichols and Catherine Eddowes [and Annie Chapman?] had two throat-cuts and a unifying aspect that these women were felled by the same hand; the purpose of the first cut was made in order to let out her blood.

But why a slaughterer?
The clue on 188809300144 is in how he cut Catherine Eddowes' abdomen being that he cut her from pubes to sternum as evidenced by his knife notching her xiphoid process. In other words he cut her open in a manner similar to opening a pig's abdomen. Much like his M.O. with Annie Chapman Jack the Ripper diverted around Catherine Eddowes' navel and in her case he accidentally cut through the length of the colon nearest the rib-cage thereby letting out excrement.

Why pig-slaughterer?
"number one squealed a bit" - Jack the Ripper
"ha not time to get ears"... Pig ears are considered by many to be a delicacy

A Jewish pig-slaughterer?
If so, I'd have inclinations to believe that he was an Eastern European Jew because Russian Jews didn't have the same kosher reservations about the pig as their Jewish counterparts.

** VIEWER DISCRETION ADVISED **
For purposes of visualization, I am including a link to Justin Rhodes How to Butcher a PIG: https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=pLj6-wkp5Mc

Of particular interest in the video are:
0:39 - 1:21 Explanation of cutting the throat
2:30 - 3:30 Inserting the knife and pumping out the blood
4:18 - 4:27 "Unzip the whole throat" or "Punch towards the heart" [Martha Tabram stabbed in the heart]
5:00 - 7:57 Cutting to the spine & locating the entry point by the jowl and ear
16:38 - 18:20 An example of big & small butcher knives [Martha Tabram killed by 2 knives]
22:20 - 22:23 An oval cut?? [An oval cut around Annie Chapman's navel]
22:59 - 23:06 Cut from pubic bone to sternum
26:58 - 27:24 The kidney & offal
27:25 - 27:52 Frying kidney and buttermilk for soaking the kidney ["tother piece I fried and ate"]
35:48 - 35:51 "Cut off the ears"

Wickerman Tom_Wescott

[Patrick Differ]

Hi Robert- the Doctors involved in this case did not discount slaughterers or butchers likely because of what you mention?

From what I've read the Kosher Slaughterers and Butchers would buy and sell from each other and that was regulated and based on a specific process. They would sharpen and examine their knives after each cut. Im not sure whether slaughter of a sheep would be any different than the pig in terms of gutting? Birds were butchered on their backs and occasionally so were smaller animals. I believe this points to profession and the same process used on the victims.

The immigrants appeared to be either orthodox or Socialists. Its not clear if they would have brought a non kosher butcher trade into London but it's possible. It would need investment to buy in to it.

IF Metro interviewed 76 butchers in their jurisdiction did they go west into London? Some of the Butchers Row slaughterers were definately from Eastern Europe.

Perhaps Census from 1871,1881 and 1891 would capture potential new suspects. Or has it likely been done. Does such a list exist?

Cheers.

[Robert St Devil]

Patrick Differ i've moved on from simply not discounting to full-on belief
Which is strange since I tend to keep an open-mind towards the case
However I can't deny the forensics
And what we have is a serial killer who has demonstrated two different methods of bleeding out a victim which are common to humane animal slaughter

https://www.hsa.org.uk/bleeding-and-pithing/bleeding

I also believe that it is indication of an evolving modus operandi

Jack the Ripper incapacitated Martha Tabram in the same way as the other victims which is evidenced by many of the womens' fingers being [clenched|closed|bent] at the time of their death. My thoughts are that while standing behind the women he wrapped each one tightly in his left arm while suffocating them with his right hand. Their arms being pinned to their body by his brute strength would explain why their hands where relatively free of [blood|hair|dirt|&c.], and it may also explain why some of the women had a bruise on one of their hands, which may have been caused by him squeezing on her hand while he pinned her arms; it might even explain why Elizabeth Stride was still clutching a pack of cachous. As for indications of manual suffocation, see the morgue photo of Polly Nichols but also Dr. Brown reports about Catherine Eddowes: On the left cheek there were two abrasions of the epithelium. There were also similar abrasions under the left ear... which were probably caused by his 4 fingers as his hand covered her nose & mouth. With smaller women like Polly Nichols and Catherine Eddowes, manual suffocation would be easier; however, it was not so easy with a robust woman like Annie Chapman who was able to put up a struggle.

After incapacitating Martha Tabram, Jack the Ripper dispatched of her like a pig by stabbing her in the heart except there was a development, that being, he couldn't bleed her out because in order for this method to work she would need to be hanging upside down in a manner similar to animal-slaughter. That is why his modus evolved into the other method of slaughter which entailed cutting their throats instead.