Did Mary know her attacker?

[richardnunweek]

Hi Guys,
The Title of the Thread is 'Did Mary know her attacker'?,
The obvious answer is Yes, albeit mayby not actually well, but at least was aware of the man that was soon to kill her.
There are three men that are in the frame for the murder of Mjk during the evening/morning of the 8th/9th nov88, they are ..
a] Blotchy,
b] Astracan.
c] Mrs Maxwells porter.
All three of these [ if existed] Mjk would have been aware of.
Blotchy. Because of a song and a drink.
Astracan . Because of a fair walk back to her room in Millers court, from where she was seen to encounter this man.
Porter..
The most likely suspect simply because he was the last man to have been seen in her company, even if it goes against the grain[ witnessed by Maxwell]
The fact of the matter is the three people mentioned, are the only suspects that presented themselves during that night/morning, that however is not to say that a break-in is not possible or other alternatives.
Regards Richard.

[perrymason]

Dan,

Lets just say I havent your years of study behind me, so my errors might be forigiven. You would think you should know better, right?

To summarize your answers are:

Your single piece of accepted evidence she went out?.....predictably, a discredtiited witness account, dismissed that same week.

Your single account of Mary bring a client in? An explanation on how Victorian whoring actually took place based on your research, first with refreshments and song off and on for over an hour. You don't seem to understand that whores were actually just women too.

Your single piece of evidence that Mary told anyone of her possible eviction for arrears?...I'm on crack.

Your single account of the Canonicals that whored after paying for their food, booze, and bed?....a mistaken comparison using Polly Nichols....who did not go whoring after paying for her food, bed and lodgings. She earned it and spent it instead. So evidently did Liz.

You neglected to answer one....a single account that shows Mary had given any of the money paid to her by both Joes towards her arrears. I dont blame you for not addressing it, because it surely would have come out in McCarthys testimony, or any of her friends living in the court would know she was paying down her debt, Bowyer might have known. Barnett apologized to Mary for not having money the night of the 8th, Is it your contention he didn't care what she used it for? That he didn't think at least some was for back rent they ran up when he lived there? Hear of any arrears being paid?

You may know details Dan, but putting things together based on a plethora of circumstantial evidence is not your forte. If I were you Id stick with the research. Because all you'll ever know is "who" died, "when", and "where" and "how" many cuts ....you obviously don't have either the RAM, the humanity, or the common sense, for "why".

Surely you know by now that one beacon for me to know Im looking in the right places is your derision of the idea, and your insults.

Regards.

[Sam Flynn]

You neglected to answer one....

...because they are unanswerable, as I've already pointed out. The evidence simply does not exist - and that cuts both ways. We don't have any evidence that she stayed in either. Conversely, we have plenty of evidence about the habits of other East End prostitutes of the period. We even have evidence of the movements of those prostitutes who lived in Miller's Court on the morning of Mary's death - and they were out and about long after midnight.

[perrymason]

Sorry, Mike, but you haven't yet provided one shred of "accepted" evidence that Mary Kelly was in her room for the 2-3 hour time-slot during which no witnesses were around to notice. It all boils down to the old maxim: "absence of evidence is not evidence of absence".

As to the other challenges you posed to Dan, well none of us can answer them. I daresay that many of the people who were there at the time couldn't have answered most of them either - on that basis, the likes of you and I have no chance with such questions.

There's not much point throwing down the sort of gauntlets that you can't even pick up yourself

Sam,

Since I am the one using the accounts provided at the Inquest to formulate my opinion of activity in that court that night, it is not I who has to prove anything. We have no witness account, we have multiple corroborations for the state of her room until at least 3am. A state entered into before Elizabeth Prater came in. Which means if Mary left when her room went dark,...its either that or she is is in with Blotchy or alone, she would almost have to pass Elizabeth in the archway, or have run into Mary Ann when stepping out of her room.

If you want to suggest that she took a trip later on, even using Hutchinson as the reference for that statement, if you like the odds with Carrie Maxwell, its your business. Its just that the records show no such trip witnessed, and they dismissed the single account that made such supposition possible.

I am not trying to convince anyone of anything. The witnesses testified, the details of the night are based on their accounts. Its there, you see it or you dont.

But dismissing my idea without providing any contrary proof doesn't seem ethical, or very fair to those trying to solve cases by actually using the evidence, rather than a subjective opinion of what all whores would do, or how they acted.

Anyway, as I said, Im not selling anything,...I dont have a myth I need to perpetuate to keep me in sheckles. So I dont need the hassle for just offering some ideas. Seems few of the ones around for 120 years have panned out so well....

Moving on....thanks for the lovely dinner.

Best regards

[Sam Flynn]

The witnesses testified, the details of the night are based on their accounts. Its there, you see it or you dont.

I see the gaps in between the witness testimony, Mike. The witness observations account for the most fleeting of moments that night, whereas the gaps in the record amount to some hours.

[Ben]

We don't know if it was because her time of death wasn't reliable enough to know that Hutchinson's sighting was the killer or not, or if he had identified someone as the person he saw who for whatever reason satisfied the police that he couldn't have been the killer

If the police believed Hutchinson had seen a man with Kelly, they had an obligation to keep his description in circulation whether they believed that suspect to have been the killer or not, and irrespectve of any ambiguity over TOD. Suspects observed near a crime scene or in the company of the victim before her death are worthy of investigation until they can be satisfactorily eliminated from police inquiries, which Hutchinson's suspect could not have been unless the contemporary police had occasion to believe that the suspect description had been fabricated. Even if he'd identified a man with a proven alibi in Weston-Super-Mare on 9th November, that was still no reason to discard his evidence completely or assume he told the truth about his initial sighting.

This is an entirely seperate argument, of course, from the premise that Hutchinson had seen Kelly, which isn't as easy to cast aside.

[jason_c]

"If you want to suggest that she took a trip later on, even using Hutchinson as the reference for that statement, if you like the odds with Carrie Maxwell, its your business. Its just that the records show no such trip witnessed, and they dismissed the single account that made such supposition possible."

Perrymason

No witnesses place her in bed either.

In our modern day 9 to 5 working world we regulary go to bed late evening. We cannot compare the modern middle class forum contributors working lives with that of todays street prostitute junkies. Likewise alchoholic prostitutes of the late Victorian era.

We have many accounts of that period where drunken prostitutes worked the early morning hours. Annie Chapman was almost certainly not working those early daylight hours to obtain money for a bed.

Considering the job of market porters etc and the lack of Government welfare, Victorian Whitechapel was as much a 24/7 culture as todays.


btw, reading the above infuriates me as to McDonalds inquest questions. Simply asking wether Kelly was a regular those morning hours could have saved modern Ripperology much wasted anguish.

[Ben]

Hi Jason,

We have many accounts of that period where drunken prostitutes worked the early morning hours. Annie Chapman was almost certainly not working those wee small hours that night to obtain money for a bed.

Not wishing to ge embroiled in yet another relentless and entrenched "Did she go out again?" debate, but Chapman's situation isn't readily comparable to that of Kelly. Chapman needed to be out soliciting in the wee hours in order to get off the streets, as did any other prostitute inhabitant of common lodging houses. There wasn't quite the same immedate necessity in Kelly's case as she had the security of a bed for that evening, even if she hadn't procured a single client.

Cheers,
Ben

[jason_c]

Hi Jason,



Not wishing to ge embroiled in yet another relentless and entrenched "Did she go out again?" debate, but Chapman's situation isn't readily comparable to that of Kelly. Chapman needed to be out soliciting in the wee hours in order to get off the streets, as did any other prostitute inhabitant of common lodging houses. There wasn't quite the same immedate necessity in Kelly's case as she had the security of a bed for that evening, even if she hadn't procured a single client.

Cheers,
Ben

Ben, apologies, i'd slightly edited my initial post before you quoted me.

Off the streets? Since when did we know a prostitute for the taste of drink found the need to get off the streets before she had acquired more to drink?

[Ben]

Annie Chapman was almost certainly not working those early daylight hours to obtain money for a bed.

No worries, Jason, and no apology necessary, although I'm more confused now. How do you know Chapman was not soliciting for bed-money?

[jason_c]

No worries, Jason, and no apology necessary, although I'm more confused now. How do you know Chapman was not soliciting for bed-money?

I dont know for sure.

If lodging house didnt allow customers to sleep during the day we can assume she wasnt soliciting for a bed. If lodging houses did allow for Chapman to be bedded for its early morning opening hours then the jury is out. Alchoholic or drug dependants do not keep money in there pockets for hours without spending it on whatever gives them almost instant satisfaction.

[Ben]

Hi Jason,

She was told she couldn't sleep at Crossingham's because she didn't have enough money for a bed. She then left Crossingham's in order to gain money to procure a bed there. She probably encountered her killer in so doing,

[The Good Michael]

I am not trying to convince anyone of anything. The witnesses testified, the details of the night are based on their accounts. Its there, you see it or you dont.

Or, "It may or may not be there. I see it there."

Anyway, as I said, Im not selling anything,...I dont have a myth I need to perpetuate to keep me in sheckles. So I dont need the hassle for just offering some ideas.

It isn't hassle for the offering of ideas. It is hassle for using words such as 'evidence', 'probable', and 'most likely' when it would be more appropriate to say, "I am of the opinion," or "I believe." The way you broach your arguments can only cause backlash. If you continue in that vein, be prepared for it. It happens to all of us when we argue of a certainty when none can exist. Either bear up without whining and sulking, or change your tone. I have been guilty of the same thing, and have learned from it.

Mike

[Sam Flynn]

Hi Ben,

She was told she couldn't sleep at Crossingham's because she didn't have enough money for a bed. She then left Crossingham's in order to gain money to procure a bed there.

...which was pretty pointless at twenty past five in the morning, long after Chapman's motivation of a "bed for the night" had become purely academic. Perhaps Annie was looking for breakfast-money, rather than bed-money, by then. Perhaps she needed a few pennies to buy a shot of rum.

The point being, there were more reasons for soliciting than simply wanting to have a roof over one's head.

[anna]

Hi all,I think she did know her attacker.I don't think she could have been paraletic,as she manages to fold her clothes,otherwise she would have just laid down on the bed fully clothed,or at least just dropped her clothes in a bundle on the chair.Unless of course,that just what she did,and Jack folded them in an "over and job done"act. (Like when you retire,you fold your clothes,well, Mary's "retired",so he folds her clothes for her).