How Many Victims Were There?

[Fisherman]

with just the ripper (not including the possibility that he was the same as torso man) all the victims were relatively close, including millwood, tabram and polly, so that not sure that it helps pinning down his location, except that he was close.

Some little way to the northeast to be exact.

[Abby Normal]

Yes - he listed Sickert as the torso killer in an earlier post on this thread.

thanks fish thats what i thought.

AP
assuming youve got sickert for the 80s torsos you only correct?

[APerno]

I´m thinking we need to go all the way back to the 1873 torso victim (and probably beyond). And we do not know where she was picked up OR where she was killed, so it seems to be a futile exercise...
In 1873, the man you seem to favor for the torso murders, Walter Sickert, was 13, by the way!

OK! -- Assuming the 1870s torsos are from the same hand. -- If you take that premise, and also believe that Saucy Jacky was the torso killer, how old does that make the Ripper in 1888

[APerno]

thanks fish thats what i thought.

AP
assuming youve got sickert for the 80s torsos you only correct?

I only knew of the three surrounding the Ripper killings. -- Plus one of a young boy found in a playground. Can't speak to the 1870s killings, need to learn more, maybe rethink.

I like Sickert as torso killer for several reasons based on speculations out of Cornwell's book.

[APerno]

In regards to connecting all the torso murders, you have to take into account that quartering a body is the easiest way to dispose of it, e.g. Snatch.

Plus quartering bodies does seem to be a British fetish; it was for a time State policy.

So one shouldn't be too quick to assume all quartered bodies found were from the same hand, especially over such a prolonged period. But of course, maybe they were.

[Damaso Marte]

I'm 90%+ on Nichols, Chapman, Eddowes, and Kelly.

I'm something like 60% for on Stride and 40% for on Tabram.

Let's call it 5.

[Fisherman]

OK! -- Assuming the 1870s torsos are from the same hand. -- If you take that premise, and also believe that Saucy Jacky was the torso killer, how old does that make the Ripper in 1888

My candidate for both series is the carman Charles Lechmere, who was born in 1849. That makes him 24 when the 1873 torso murder was carried out and 39 when the Ripper murders occurred.

Regardless of whether I am correct on this or not, if we accept that the Torso murders, including the 1873 and 1874 torso murders, were carried out by the Ripper, then away go suspects like Kosminski, Druitt, Chapman, Sickert, Tumblety, Bury etcetera.

I'm sure you can see how that proposal is not looked upon favorably by many.

The interesting thing is that I was of the meaning that Lechmere was the Ripper long before I read up on the torso murders and came to the conclusion that they were victims of the same hand as the Ripper victims. So to me, it all panned out.

Others, however, were quick to say that I only say that the torso murders are connected to the Ripper murders BECAUSE I opt for Lechmere as the Ripper.

That encapsulates what Ripperology is sadly about on many occasions.

[Fisherman]

In regards to connecting all the torso murders, you have to take into account that quartering a body is the easiest way to dispose of it, e.g. Snatch.

Yes, that is true. And I do think that disposing of the body was one underlying reason for dismembering the torso bodies. But I also believe that the torso killer belonged to the third category of dismemberment killers, the rarest category as it were: the ones who have an underlying pathology that urges them to cut up a body.
There is also the very obvious probability that this killer carried out his deeds in a bolthole that could be tied to himself. In that respect, he HAD to get rid of the bodies. This, however, would not have applied to the Ripper victims, who were killed in public spots or in places that did not have any ties to the killer.

Plus quartering bodies does seem to be a British fetish; it was for a time State policy.

The torso bodies were not quartered, though. They were cut up in various other ways. The 1873 victim was cut up in a round dozen parts, for example. The common denominator is that the cutting work was very skilful in these cases - Dr Galloway, who examined the Rainham victim in 1887, was baffled about it, and said from the outset that the perpetrator must have been surgically trained. The cut surfaces were very clean, and the cutting angles exact. The limbs were not crudely sawn through which is the common thing to do; the joints were cut open and skillfully disarticulated.

So one shouldn't be too quick to assume all quartered bodies found were from the same hand, especially over such a prolonged period. But of course, maybe they were.

The 1887-89 victims, four of them, (Rainham, Whitehall, Jackson, Pinchin) were all examined by Charles Hebbert, who did not hesitate to say that they were cut up by the same person. The cutting work was quite similar in all respects.

Hebbert never saw the 1873 and 1874 victims, but we know that the 1873 victim was also very skillfully cut up and the joints were dismembered in that case too. There is also another reason, that I have so far chosen not to disclose, to accept that the 1873 victim was killed by the same man who killed Mary Kelly.

In all of the Ripper victims and torso victims we can see that there are no clear indications of any torture applied; there are no bite marks, no burn marks, no evidence of severe beatings. These are common inclusions in many cases, but here, it seems that the killer was first and foremost intent on gaining access to a dead body. After that, we know that the Ripper took out the uterus from Chapman, the uterus and the left kidney from Eddowes and all inner organs from Kelly. We also know that he cut away the abdominal wall or large parts of it in flaps from Chapman and Kelly.
The torso killer cut out the uterus and the heart and lungs from Jacksons body, and the heart and lungs were also missing from the Rainham victim, although the medicos did not establish how they had gone lost. There were also organs missing from the Whitehall torso, but whether they were taken away by the killer or if they went lost as collateral damage during the process of cutting and/or transporting the body was never established. My own take is that once we KNOW that he DID eviscerate Jackson, then the logical conclusion is that eviscerations lie behind all missing organs from the torso victims.

The clincher to my mind is the fact that the killer cut away the abdominal walls in flaps from some of his victims. As I wrote, this happened to two out of five victims in the Ripper series, Chapman and Kelly. But it ALSO happened to Liz Jackson in the Torso series - her eviscerated uterus was found floating in the Thames, the foetus having been removed from it (she was pregnant when killed), together with the chord and the placenta. All of these parts had been neatly packed up inside two large flaps of flesh from the abdomen. The flaps represented "the whole of the lower abdomen" according to what was written in the papers.

So either we have two or more killers at work in the late victorian London who were into procuring freshly killed bodies to eviscerate, and who were into taking away the abdominal walls from victims in large flaps, and who were described as very skilled with the knife and possibly surgically trained.

Or we have just the one.

To me, its an absolute no-brainer. Much as I think it would be fair to leave some learoom for the possibility that this was that moment when lightning struck twice at the same spot and time, I am perfectly aware that this is not in any shape or form even remotely likely to happen.

As an aside, I would like to add that I am of the meaning that the ultimate goal of the killer was NOT to eviscerate and take out organs. This was only one side of his urge, as far as I am considered. What I believe he was about would always involve cutting into the bodies of his victims, but not necessarily in order to get at the organs. As far as I am concerned, cutting the flesh from a face or taking away a limb could reflect what he was after just as well as any eviscerations. I recommend not to put too much trust in what is so often said about how he was after sexually oriented organs. A kidney is not sexually oriented, generally speaking, nor is a heart or the flesh of a face. But cutting away these things could well be linked to a very odd sexual orientation within a killer.

Now I predict that some posters (I can easily name them) will emerge from the woodwork and claim that I am nearly deranged and that I am twisting and lying. Which is why I recommend that you do not take their OR my word for granted. Instead, go to the sources and check whether what I am saying is true or not and then decide for yourself what to make of it!

[Michael W Richards]

I think Fisherman one must remember just how available the basic slaughterhouse/butcher skill set was in that area at the time. Much of what you mention is excising and how that was done was likely very similar from man to man. Little specific differences to be sure, but essentially using the same procedural methods. There are murders though within all these unsolved murders where the skill set and the target was much more refined and specific. The ultimate objectives more evident. The possible pool of Suspects more narrow. Co-mingling these with other butcher style murders, or simple throat cutting murders, muddies the water to the extent that clarity is impossible.

I say scrutinize the ones we can say with some certainty had a high probability of linkage by killer and find out why they happened. Use any answers you find when reviewing other cases. Its the key points that have to match, specific actions per se aren't the evidence that can link the killer, why the murders took place can.

The Torso murders were conducted differently, over a long span of time one might imagine, and the body parts do not have any recognizable attraction to the killer, one that is clearly present. They are discarded. In the cases I mention, the women are killed and mutilated quickly, the cutting is objective oriented, and the bodies are left to be discovered shortly after the deed, the women grotesquely displayed. This is one element of the killer that so many people ignore, his demonstrated desire to shock.

[Harry D]

My list would involve the 1873 torso victim, the 1874 ditto, the 1884 torso victim, the Rainham victim, Tabram, Nichols, Chapman, The Whitehall torso, Stride, Eddowes, Kelly, Liz Jackson, Alice McKenzie and the Pinchin Street torso as very likely victims of the same man. Then there are others who are likely in varying degrees, but all of them less clear candidates.

Hello Fish. Interesting that you would include Tabram. How do you reconcile the frenzied stabbing with the Torsoripper's signature?

[rjpalmer]

My candidate for both series is the carman Charles Lechmere, who was born in 1849. That makes him 24 when the 1873 torso murder was carried out and 39 when the Ripper murders occurred.

Regardless of whether I am correct on this or not, if we accept that the Torso murders, including the 1873 and 1874 torso murders, were carried out by the Ripper, then away go suspects like Kosminski, Druitt, Chapman, Sickert, Tumblety, Bury etcetera.

Hi Fish. A correction. While I don't think it has been proven that there was a 'Torso Killer,' let alone one also connected to the Whitechapel Murders, you're wrong about putting Frank Tumilty ('Tumblety') on your list. He was romping around the UK during most of 1873-1874. It wouldn't eliminate him.

[Sam Flynn]

Regardless of whom we suspect, it doesn't strike me as particularly likely that any East Ender in his early 20s would be into chopping up women and dumping their remains in Battersea and Putney.

[Fisherman]

Hi Fish. A correction. While I don't think it has been proven that there was a 'Torso Killer,' let alone one also connected to the Whitechapel Murders, you're wrong about putting Frank Tumilty ('Tumblety') on your list. He was romping around the UK during most of 1873-1874. It wouldn't eliminate him.

He was in the US when the 1889 torso victims fell prey, though. So out he goes!

[Fisherman]

Hello Fish. Interesting that you would include Tabram. How do you reconcile the frenzied stabbing with the Torsoripper's signature?

If you read my post to A Perno, you would see that I am saying that I don't think that eviscerations was the hallmark of the Ripper/Torso killer. It was cutting into a body. In that respect, Tabram fits the bill.
I of course agree that she deviates form the other victims to a significant degree, but she fits the bill in many other respects - the victimology is there, the geography is in place, the timing is correct, she was a prostitute, her death was a strangely silent one and so on.
She received 38 stabs and cuts to her body, all of them inflicted with a smallish knife such as a pen-knife. It seems to me that such a weapon would not be suited for any deep cutting and/or eviscerations. The finishing blow was by means of a dagger like, heavy implement, and that is not the type of weapon an eviscerator would opt for either.
I am thinking that this was perhaps not a planned deed, but instead a spur-of-the-moment slaying, perhaps led on by a sudden rage. Then the killer made use of whatever weapon he carried in himself or took from her to kill her.

One interesting perspective is how it is possible that he never actually intended to take his business to the streets, but once he killed Tabram and got lots of publicity, it may have encouraged him to go for a sideline. And since that sideline earned him a lot more publicity, he may have kept it up for that reason.

This is of course all guesswork, but guesswork is what we are left with. When it comes to Tabram, I would not go "Its not possible!" if it was proven that she was not a Ripper victim, the way I would with, say, Nichols, Chapman, Kelly, the 1873 victim, the Rainham victim and Jackson. There are and will always be levels involved. But overall, I find Tabram very likely belongs to the tally.

I hope that satisfies you.

[rjpalmer]

Unfortunately, no homicide detective in the world would endorse your methods, Fish. It would be foolhardy in the extreme to eliminate a suspect in one murder case by bringing in other theoretical cases that may or may not be connected.

It's precisely why the police are hesitant to 'link' unsolved cases. It leads to false impressions and may give alibis to suspects that truly don't deserve them.