If we ignore the "McNaughton Five" for a moment...

[emlodik]

Okay, at the risk opf sounding like an ignorant troll, *cough*perrymason*cough* and at the risk of inviting ignorant trolls like perrymason to slaughter this thread...

Anyway, if were to ignore the "official" five Ripper victim roster, which do you think were the most likely candidates to be killed by the same person? Here's mine...

1. Martha Tabram
2. Mary Ann Nichols
3. Annie Chapman
4. Catharine Eddows
5. Mary Kelly
6. Alice MacKenzie

I kept Mary Kelly because I agree with the theory that she was just a casualty of "opprotunity," since she just happened to be a young and attractive woman who inadvertantly proposition the Ripper and lead him inside her flat, thus giving him more time and cover to act out his perverse fantasies. The bastard must have thought he won the lottery when he shut the door of Miller's Court 13 that night...

As for Alice MacKenzie, I just think she is more likely to be an "interupted victim" than Elizabeth Stride. However, I don't rule out the plausible theory that might have been killed by her lover/pimp and then mutilate to set suspicion on the Ripper.

So, what's everyone else's list?

[mariag]

Isn't this just another variation on the countless "who were the victims?" threads? Do we really need another?

[emlodik]

Isn't this just another variation on the countless "who were the victims?" threads? Do we really need another?

Well, I am sorry if it came off that way, but I was just wondering whether everyone agrees with the McNaughton list or whether they have their own "roster." It's just that I haven't been on this board as long as most.

[String]

I kept Mary Kelly because I agree with the theory that she was just a casualty of "opprotunity," since she just happened to be a young and attractive woman who inadvertantly proposition the Ripper and lead him inside her flat, thus giving him more time and cover to act out his perverse fantasies. The bastard must have thought he won the lottery when he shut the door of Miller's Court 13 that night...
:

A small question was it very unusual for these ladies to take their clients home? In other words was business normally conducted down alley ways?

[Dan Norder]

In other words was business normally conducted down alley ways?

Only for those who didn't have rooms and couldn't get the johns to pay for a room somewhere for the night.

[Sam Flynn]

A small question was it very unusual for these ladies to take their clients home?

I doubt it, String. Many of those who had their "own" homes would have used them, and even some lodging-house berths would occasionally be used for the purposes of prostitution. There were rules and regulations that would have forbidden such behaviour - as there are in rented accommodation today - but it's a safe bet that these weren't always adhered to, nor enforced, in all cases.

BTW - we can't speak of "these ladies" as if they were all regular prostitutes, because (a) we really don't know that they were, and (b) the social dynamics were rather different back then anyway. For many "unfortunates", the primary driver was doing whatever one could to get a drink or a roof over one's head for one night - in this sense, a sexual favour was a tactic of last resort, employed by ordinary, desperate women as a bargaining chip.

Think of it like this: If a female teenager in a gang of males offered a friend a five-knuckle shuffle in return for some of his beer or cigarettes, would that make her a "prostitute" and him a "client"?

[Glenn Lauritz Andersson]

Maybe one could start by actually spelling Macnaghten's name correctly?

All the best

[emlodik]

Maybe one could start by actually spelling Macnaghten's name correctly?

All the best

Sorry about that, I meant no harm.

[Glenn Lauritz Andersson]

Don't worry, emlodik.
A lot of people spells his name incorrectly; I did that myself in the beginning.

Just thought it should be mentioned, though.

All the best

[Jeff Leahy]

Think of it like this: If a female teenager in a gang of males offered a friend a five-knuckle shuffle in return for some of his beer or cigarettes, would that make her a "prostitute" and him a "client"?

Yes technically it would. Money may not have changed hands (ho Ho )..but prostitution is the oldest profession in the world..i'm sure they started with the 'barter' system..

I think your confussing prostitution 'per se' with a modern idea of professional prostitution...

What your saying is of course correct Sam, they jsut did what was needed to survive...but it was still prostitution in the correct sense of the word.

Pirate

[c.d.]

Don't worry, emlodik.
A lot of people spells his name incorrectly; I did that myself in the beginning.

Just thought it should be mentioned, though.

All the best

You're right. Some spells it one way. Some spells it another.

c.d.

[String]

BTW - we can't speak of "these ladies" as if they were all regular prostitutes, because (a) we really don't know that they were, and (b) the social dynamics were rather different back then anyway. For many "unfortunates", the primary driver was doing whatever one could to get a drink or a roof over one's head for one night - in this sense, a sexual favour was a tactic of last resort, employed by ordinary, desperate women as a bargaining chip.

Sorry I didn't mean it come over as a derogatory term, God knows it must have been a hard life for them.

I was just interested in the fact that 4 out of the conical five were murdered outside. Maybe Jack killed them before they got to lodgings or purposely kept them outside. Anyway it's outside the scope of this thread.

[Sam Flynn]

Hi Jeff,

I think your confussing prostitution 'per se' with a modern idea of professional prostitution...

...no, I think almost everybody is confusing what the middle-aged wrecks of Whitechapel did to survive with the modern idea of prostitution. I honestly feel that thinking about them, and Jack, in such terms all-too-often distorts the way in which we look at this case.

[sdreid]

I can ignore his five and still pick the same five.

[DVV]

There is a sentence about Tabram in Paul Begg, the Facts, that says: "She should, perhaps, be placed in the canon."
But when? And by who?
Who has now the authority to change the canon?- which origins are...let's say dubious (Macnaghten, Bond, maybe Knight and the movies he has inspired...).

Amitiés,
David