A PoinT To Ponder

[belinda]

Much debate is gone into about the identity of our Mary Jane but she recieved letters from her family it is said. Now this is interesting. The letters must have been addressed to Mary Jane Kelly so either her family knew her assumed name or Mary Jane Kelly was indeed her real name.

This raises for me anyway some interesting questions especially regarding no family coming forward

You may now throw things-gently

[Addy]

Hi,

You are right, she did receive letters. However she also moved about a bit, so her family knew where to reach her. Perhaps she received her mail on some fixed adress while living somewhere else?

It is also interesting that Barrett said he had to read the paper to her. So either she knew only Welsh or she couldn't read at all. And if she couldn't read, she also couldn't write so how could she let her family know where she was living?

Greetings,

Addy

[Bridewell]

A Very Good Point

I think that's brilliant. Why had no-one ever picked up on this before (or have they)? Her family must also have known where she lived in order for them to reach her. I think it unlikely that Mary herself would have thrown personal
correspondence of this kind away, so what happened to it? Thrown onto the blazing fire by her killer perhaps?

[belinda]

I've wondered if she had poor eye sight or something. Hence Joe reading to her. Is it absolutely certain that she could not write?
Maybe she had a contact in London who traveled back and forth passing on details to her family?
It's a very interesting point you raise about what she did with the letters. Some people aren't sentimental maybe she did throw them away after she read them or maybe she kept them under the floorboards a popular old place for hiding things?

Where did those letters go?

[Sally]

We know she received letters, but what we don't know is to whom those letters were addressed - so it doesn't necessarily mean that Mary Kelly was her real name. It does inidicate that her family knew how to contact her. If the name we know her by was a pseudonym, it may explain why nobody from her pre-London past came forward following her death.

As to her being illiterate or not - I don't see how it's possible to tell. Barnett reading the papers to her doesn't necessarily indicate that she herself couldn't read.

[belinda]

I read that her landlord passed on the mail that's how he knew she got the letters. So if he was passing on the mail it must have been addressed to Mary Jane Kelly

As mentioned she moved around so presumably the letters would have been addressed to where ever she was staying under the name she was using.

I doubt she would have had the money to hire a post office box or something similar

If her family knew how to contact her they had to know details of where she was. So that means they deliberately did not come foward.

[lynn cates]

points

Hello Belinda.

"Much debate is gone into about the identity of our Mary Jane but she recieved letters from her family it is said."

You have made a good qualification here--"it is said." Letters look like, well, letters. If she said they were from family, who would investigate further, and why?

"The letters must have been addressed to Mary Jane Kelly . . ."

Quite likely.

" . . . so either her family knew her assumed name or Mary Jane Kelly was indeed her real name."

Another possibility. WHOMEVER wrote the letters was privy to that name and used it accordingly.

"This raises for me anyway some interesting questions especially regarding no family coming forward."

I think those questions should be raised, but perhaps irrespective of the existence of any letters.

Cheers.
LC

[belinda]

They should. She was getting letters from somebody.Somebody knew where she was.
It's hard to believe that whoever knew where she was would not realise she was the Millers Court victim.

Shame may have kept them from coming foward. It seems sad from the modern perspective that the family would "disown" her for this reason but at that time it would have been a very difficult thing for the family especially if they were "respectable ".

[claire]

McCarthy said they were from her mother, but it's unlikely he'd have a certain means to know that. Frankly, they could have come from anyone--whether he assumed they were from her mother (or from 'home') or she told him they were, it's equally possible they came from someone else entirely. And if someone was writing to her, they would have to assume she could read their letters, or include only fairly innocuous things that another person would read to her. As far as I recollect (and I may be wrong), Barnett simply said he read the newspapers to her--not that he had to because she couldn't.

Oh, the frustration of not having a time machine to lay sticky hands on that correspondence, or even the envelope it came in.

[Hatchett]

Hi,

The Postal Service was much more accurate and relaible in those days than sadly it is now. Her correspondence would have been quickly re directed.

No one would write to a person who cannot read. If it was her Mother who was writing, and Mcarthy would only have known that because Mary told him, then her Mother must certainly have been able to read and write, which would allow you to assume that Mary could do the same.

The probable explanation is that although Mary could read she probably couldnt read very well, and so found the small print in the papers arduous and so got Joe to read them out to her.

Like you say, just a thought.

Best wishes as always.

[Wickerman]

Did you ever consider that maybe no-one else could read the letters, because of that they were thrown away?

Another girl states that she knew the deceased two years ago. She was then living at Cooley's (sic) lodging house in Thrall street, Spitalfields. She walked the streets, and while living there met Barnett. She went to live with him in Dorset street. Kelly was a Welsh woman, and could speak Welsh fluently.
Daily News, Nov. 10, 1888

Regards, Jon S.

[Chava]

Whoever those letters were from we can't assume they were from her family. Could be anyone. Old lovers, people she owed money to, old friends...

[richardnunweek]

Hi,
Receiving letters from her mother, proberly meant 'brother', according to Fiona Kendal Lane, her great grandmother[ McCarthys wife] parcelled up Marys belongings and forwarded them to her rather embarrased brother, who was in the army, who was worried about his career prospects.
The very fact that the police knew , and Barnett, the regiment her brother was in , and the barracks, suggest very clearly that there was correspondence from him either still in room 13, or that information came from Barnett himself, or Mrs Harvey etc,
As no Parents were [ at least visable] present at her funeral, which included her brother[ shame on him..] one could make the obvious suggestion that they disowned her, and considered her as ''bringing shame on the family''.
All very sad.
Regards Richard.

[Phil Carter]

Hello Richard,

Yes, it is all very sad indeed. As you know, I am one that also has the same opinion about Fiona Kendall Lane as you have.
The question I am left with is IF this lady was disowned, for what reason?
Was it familiar, or political?
Had it been familiar, the police really didn't have a reason to keep the whole business quiet. I just have this odd feeling that it may have been for political reasons, without knowing of course. Just a niggling feeling.

best wishes

Phil

[Rubyretro]

A few points :
-I believe that Fiona Kendall said that 'Kelly' wasn't Mary's real name, but rather a name that she took from a man she had been living with. This will probably be verified when Fiona publishes her book. I wonder if Barnett ever used the name Kelly as an alias ? At any rate, the letters may not have been addressed to 'Kelly' at all.

-Mary was described somewhere as being a good scholar, and I think that she could probably read. Maybe reading aloud was simply entertainment (reading 'together' in effect) ? Maybe her eyesight was failing, or simply she was able to listen whilst sewing or doing something else ?

-more interesting is the fact that her mother (if it was her mother's letters), could write. If Mary was educated and her mother literate, maybe she came from a better family than we imagine.

-It could be that Mary's mother would write to her not knowing that her daughter was a drunken prostitute; Afterall, if I were living the same life as Mary and my mother was far away, I might write that I was doing well, had a little respectable job and my own room, so as to avoid upsetting her. It could be that Mary's brother knew the truth, having visited her, but kept her secret from the rest of the family -until her death.

-It is possible that the family did not come to the funeral because it was difficult and expensive to leave jobs/travel and stay in London -particularly if they had babies or animals to care for. They might have feared being asked to contribute to the burial costs, or not want their real name to appear in the papers or have to explain to friends and neighbours -particularly if the whole thing was a shock to them.

-I would expect that she used the letters to light the fire.