The increasing acceptance of Martha Tabram...

[Abby Normal]

Why must one? How long could one expect any lone killer's "rising level of violence" to continue before fatigue, falling fitness levels, the natural ageing process or some other physical or mental factor caught up with him? How could one imagine the level of violence rising much further after MJK anyway? It doesn't follow that a lone killer would give up entirely if he couldn't maintain the violence or raise it to another level after giving it his best shot. I see Mylett, McKenzie and Coles as potential damp squibs following the firework display in Miller's Court.

If your suspect for Nichols and Chapman had been free to kill again and done so, how much longer could he have carried on producing victims like carbon copies? How many attacks do you suppose he could have notched up before his physical strength and capabilities began to desert him and showed in the injuries inflicted? Or do you think he would have stopped himself before it got to the point where he was beginning to go off the boil?

Love,

Caz
X

as usual Caz, well said.

[Supe]

Ginger,

If it's the same murderer as that of Polly Nichols, then he learned from his mistake and came with a better plan a few weeks later.

What makes you think the murderer of Martha Tabram thought he had failed or made mistakes? That is applying your logic to an act that may well have been illogical from the start.

Otherwise, I quite agree with what my quondam colleague, Chris George, wrote. Well said Chris. I would only aded that the murder of Alice McKenzie could be an example of evolution by Martha's killer, especially when you consider the way her throat was cut.

Don.

[Cogidubnus]

Personally I think Ginger's is a good point...which doesn't preclude this being the first in a series with a slightly different M.O.

All the best

Dave

[Supe]

Dave,

which doesn't preclude this being the first in a series with a slightly different M.O.

With all due respect, it is a very different modus operandi. Tabram seems to have been a random, likely frenzied, multiple stabbing of neck and torso whereas the murder of Polly was accomplished with two precise slices to her neck in a quite professional manner. That the technique was learned in a scant three weeks rather stretches probability.

Don.

[sdreid]

My acceptance of Tabram as a Ripper victim has decreased not increased.

[Cogidubnus]

Dave,

which doesn't preclude this being the first in a series with a slightly different M.O.

With all due respect, it is a very different modus operandi. Tabram seems to have been a random, likely frenzied, multiple stabbing of neck and torso whereas the murder of Polly was accomplished with two precise slices to her neck in a quite professional manner. That the technique was learned in a scant three weeks rather stretches probability.

Don.

Hi Don

I hate to disagree with you but it might be that part of his technique worked, and part didn't...

He picks up a woman soliciting, and allows her to select an unwitnessed venue (somewhere she's pretty sure they won't be deserved)...He gets half the killing method right - he gets her down (strangulation?) to use the knife but alas his "stabbing" method, dictated by his choice of knife, proves both inefficient and unstimulating...so next time he simply uses a larger blade, which allows "slicing/ripping" and the subsequent refinements of his "art"...

Put another way, let's turn your statement on it's head Don;

the murder of Polly was accomplished with two precise slices to her neck in a quite professional manner. That the technique was learned in a scant three weeks rather stretches probability.

Sir Melville posits that Nicholls was the first...that Jack parachuted himself in, cold, with an almost perfected technique...I'm not sure that's realistic...So where and when was it learned or developed? We know that killings of this type are very rare...where is the evidence he learned it/refined it elsewhere? Where lies the more gradual progression?

In short I'm not sure Sir Melville can be right...and if there is a learning curve, (necessarily a steep one because of the paucity of cases), where (apart from Tabram) is it?

All the best

Dave

[Mr Lucky]

Hi Cog

Here's a puzzle for you...

The longer of the two wounds in Nichols neck was 8 inch long, so the question is how do you get a 'precise slice' like that with a knife that was in Dr Llewellyn words 'not an exceptionally long-bladed weapon.' and was only 'moderately sharp'.

Best wishes

[lynn cates]

powerful

Hello Lucky.

"The longer of the two wounds in Nichols neck was 8 inch long, so the question is how do you get a 'precise slice' like that with a knife that was in Dr Llewellyn words 'not an exceptionally long-bladed weapon.' and was only 'moderately sharp'."

The assassin would need to be quite powerful.

Cheers.
LC

[Mr Lucky]

"The longer of the two wounds in Nichols neck was 8 inch long, so the question is how do you get a 'precise slice' like that with a knife that was in Dr Llewellyn words 'not an exceptionally long-bladed weapon.' and was only 'moderately sharp'."

The assassin would need to be quite powerful.

Hi Lynn

Is powerful the same as strong, then yes I agree, shifting boxes for Pickford's probably ? but, leaving that aside.-

An 8 inch long wound in the throat, with a shortish bladed knife only moderately sharp? All the way down to the vertebra, too? While she was lying on the ground?

I think how the wounds on Nichols throat were done, are a lot more like Tabrams than everyone else I suppose.

I think Llewellyn gives us another clue when he says it's 'a pointed weapon with a stout back'

[Phil H]

In short I'm not sure Sir Melville can be right...

I'm not here to defend MM, but to answer your question:

...and if there is a learning curve, (necessarily a steep one because of the paucity of cases), where (apart from Tabram) is it?

The previous attacks could be there in the record but we are not perceiving them as such.

Alternatively, "Jack" came from elsewhere OR as Odell hypothesised in the 60s, had training in a different sphere - butchery, as a Shochet (Odell's choice); as a barber surgeon.

I short, "Jack does not need to have been the killer of Tabram, nor is Tabram required to fill in some mythical "hole" in his story.

Phil

[bolo]

Hi all,

the possible switch from stabbing to throat cutting is one of the questions that I find interesting to ponder on in case of Martha and Polly. Is it really that big of a jump to change from a comparably slow and thus dangerous way of killing someone to a method that is as old as the invention of the knife, pretty reliable and much quicker? I don't really think so but of course I'm open for other opinions on the matter.

There are a few similarities between the Tabram case and the following C5 murders (some are a bit speculative):

- Even though Martha got killed in the staircase of a tenement building, no one saw or heard anything.

- According to Dr Killeen, the breasts, belly and private parts were the main targets.

- Abberline thought of her as a Ripper victim.

- Martha most probably led her killer to the first-floor landing of George Yard Building.

- The murder took place early August which fits to the "rhythm" of the other ones.

Of course there are just as many arguments against Martha as a Ripper victim, that's why I'm still not sure where to put her.

Any thoughts?

Regards,

Boris

[lynn cates]

power

Hello Lucky. Thanks.

"Is powerful the same as strong, then yes I agree, shifting boxes for Pickford's probably?"

Or manhandling rather large hogs. (heh-heh)

"An 8 inch long wound in the throat, with a shortish bladed knife only moderately sharp? All the way down to the vertebra, too? While she was lying on the ground?'

Absolutely. And if we take this seriously--as I think we should--it eliminates many a poor suspect. Put another way, "Only the powerful need apply."

Cheers.
LC

[lynn cates]

I got rhythm.

Hello Boris.

One thought here.

"The murder took place early August which fits to the "rhythm" of the other ones."

Rhythm?

Cheers.
LC

[bolo]

Hi Lynn,

what I meant to say is that the C5 murders took place either early or late in the month and Martha's death in the early hours of August 7th fits to the pattern.

Regards,

Boris

[Cogidubnus]

Hi Cog

Here's a puzzle for you...

The longer of the two wounds in Nichols neck was 8 inch long, so the question is how do you get a 'precise slice' like that with a knife that was in Dr Llewellyn words 'not an exceptionally long-bladed weapon.' and was only 'moderately sharp'.

Hi Mr Lucky

As Lynn suggests you'd probably need someone pretty powerful...powerful enough, perhaps, to drive a relatively small bladed knife clean through the breastbone, leading a doctor to believe that a longer bladed knife had in fact been used?

All the best

Dave