Those letters

[Cogidubnus]

I'm not sure whether assumptions are being made about the origin of letters MJK was receiving...I believe McCarthy said she received letters...what did Barnett have to say? McCarthy might well have no way of knowing where the letters came from...Barnett on the other hand might...

The reason I ask the question is that at this time, many Post Offices still applied a simple "Killer" frank to the stamp, which bore no reference to a town of origin...it was simply a set of bars with a number therein (my own stamp collection, alas, contains hundreds of these - I say alas because they are worth far less than the CDS handstamps - which contain the postal town of origin and a date)...Do we know for certain these letters came from Ireland?

How unfortunate for us that this murder took place in England, and perhaps concerned postmarks from Ireland, rather than Scotland - owing to a well known murder there in 1857, (google Madeleine Smith), Scottish postmarks were modified from that time onwards...a practise which was only gradually introduced in England...

Food for thought?

Dave

[lynn cates]

scrutiny

Hello Dave. Yes, food for thought. About all we "know" is Barnett's story--and it does not hold up to scrutiny too well.

Cheers.
LC

[Limehouse]

I know I keep saying this (on various threads) but has any comment been made in any witness statements tha MJK had an accent? It is said that she had been in London a few years, but surely if she had been raised in Ireland or Wales she would have had an accent? If she was raised by Irish parents, partly in Ireland and partly in Wales she would definitely have had at least a trace of an Irish accent with perhaps some Welsh overtones. Surely her accent would have been a good clue as to her origins? In all the books I have read, I have never seen a reference to her accent. None of the women or men interviewed seem to have commented on this.

[kensei]

Limehouse, I would assume that her accent was not unusual enough for anyone to have remarked upon. Perhaps it was very close to standard Irish, as she's been portrayed in film.

On the letters, it makes me wonder- who claimed Mary's few possessions after her death? Does anyone know that? If the police gathered everything up as evidence, what would have become of it, including the letters?

[Addy]

Hi all,

I remember reading somewhere that the letters were from her mother. I do think Barnett said this because he had to read her letters to her. I've also read that they came from her brother, so I suppose there is confusion over this. (to put it mildly)

I also wonder if any letters arrived for her after her death and if so, for how long? As none of her family was present at the funeral, it could be an indication that they really didn't know that she was dead.

Greetings,

Addy

[D.B.Wagstaff]

Hi all,

I remember reading somewhere that the letters were from her mother. I do think Barnett said this because he had to read her letters to her. I've also read that they came from her brother, so I suppose there is confusion over this. (to put it mildly)

I also wonder if any letters arrived for her after her death and if so, for how long? As none of her family was present at the funeral, it could be an indication that they really didn't know that she was dead.

Greetings,

Addy

Hmmm, some indication of mother, some of brother . . . the way everything else about this case gets all convoluted, one can only wonder if it was simply "other"

Only having a jolly - wouldn't you?

[kensei]

Just had an afterthought on Mary's accent- it's been said that if she moved from Ireland to Wales when very young then the Welsh accent should have rubbed off on her somewhat. But it's her family surroundings, i.e. the people she was around most of the time, that would have the biggest influence on how she talked, not the place they moved to. Thus her growing up with a fairly standard Irish accent seems likely to me.

[DanaeChantel]

Limehouse, I would assume that her accent was not unusual enough for anyone to have remarked upon. Perhaps it was very close to standard Irish, as she's been portrayed in film.

On the letters, it makes me wonder- who claimed Mary's few possessions after her death? Does anyone know that? If the police gathered everything up as evidence, what would have become of it, including the letters?

Yes, this question was answered for me on another thread and the question was just answered tonight. Mary's belongings were gathered up and sent to her brother who was in the British army. It was said or rather implied that he did not wish any attention from his sisters death brought to him for fear of it affecting his position in the army. I found this odd, as it would not be his fault who his sister was or her demise. Perhaps the army may have frowned upon such a thing but it is hard to say.

[jason_c]

Limehouse, I would assume that her accent was not unusual enough for anyone to have remarked upon. Perhaps it was very close to standard Irish, as she's been portrayed in film.

On the letters, it makes me wonder- who claimed Mary's few possessions after her death? Does anyone know that? If the police gathered everything up as evidence, what would have become of it, including the letters?

kensei, I agree with your first sentence but come to a different conclusion. No accent was commented upon, I think therefore her accent was most likely local sounding rather than Irish or Welsh.

[Limehouse]

Just had an afterthought on Mary's accent- it's been said that if she moved from Ireland to Wales when very young then the Welsh accent should have rubbed off on her somewhat. But it's her family surroundings, i.e. the people she was around most of the time, that would have the biggest influence on how she talked, not the place they moved to. Thus her growing up with a fairly standard Irish accent seems likely to me.

I agree kensei, her accent would be mostly the same as family around her - perhaps with a slight Welsh overtone.

The information we have about Mary seems to have come from stories she told Barnett - and others. When recounting these stories, there seems to have prevailed seeds of doubt about her story's total truth. However, nobody seems to have said 'she couldn't have come from Ireland/Wales because she sounded like a Londoner. Therefore, is it wrong to assume she did have an Irish accent and people only doubted bits of her story?

[Sally]

Accent is very hard to quantify. A person who has travelled and lived in various places might have picked up vocabulary and inflection from those places, or not.

It depends on the environment, probably and how many other people in the same social group are sharing the same accent.

There is a permanent gypsy camp near my workplace, it's been there for years. It is enclosed by a wall and gates. Everybody who lives there has an Irish accent, including the children, some of whom are very young. None of those children were born in Ireland, I remember seeing some of them as babies. Their accent is entirely the product of environment. They have a closed community, which doubtless reinforces their requirement for a continuation of community traditions, including accent.

I think that it is very hard to know how a person would have spoken, even if you know something of their background. Would Barnett, for example, have spoken with an East End accent? He was one generation removed from Irish immigrants. Did a sense of his Irish roots give him a connection with Kelly, perhaps?

Kelly is cited as having spoken fluent Welsh - maybe this indicates that she had lived in Wales for a long time, and was integrated into the community there. Yet she seems not to have considered herself to be Welsh.

I wonder if accent is one of those questions to which there can be no satisfactory answer.

[Khanada]

Some people pick up accents more easily than others; it is not always affected by one's age, but can be affected by one's will.

A couple of years ago we moved halfway across the United States, from my home area in northern Appalachia to a place that is quite definitely The South. I am generally the kind of person who picks up accents rather easily, and I still do not sound like the people I am surrounded by, for the simple reason that I refuse to pick the local accent up. The only similarity I really have is that I, like the people I am surrounded by, do say "y'all" quite naturally. That's an oddity for a native of Pittsburgh, PA, where we normally say "yinz"... but I've said "y'all" naturally from childhood (thank television choices at that age). People know, the moment I speak, that I am a Yankee girl.

Mary may or may not have picked up accents from those around her -- some do, some don't. (There's an old fellow I see often around here, who's been here for decades, and the second he speaks you know immediately that he's from Boston, MA!) She may have been susceptible to picking up accents, but capable of making a conscious choice not to pick up that of the people she was surrounded by. Or not.

It would be interesting to know what she sounded like, though...

[lynn cates]

speech impediment

Hello All. If I recall properly, there was a story going about that MJK had a slight speech impediment. For a while, it was argued by some that this was a misreport of her accent.

Make of it what you will.

Cheers.
LC

[Bridewell]

However, nobody seems to have said 'she couldn't have come from Ireland/Wales because she sounded like a Londoner.

It's a fine distinction perhaps, but how do we know nobody said it? It's just not recorded anywhere that they did. I was born in Northumberland and lived there till the age of three and a half. I never picked up a Northumberland accent but, according to my late mother, I was speaking with a London accent (like my friends) within 6 weeks of arriving in Enfield. With the whole Fenian thing going on, Irish people may well have adapted fairly quickly, so as not to stand out.

Regards, Bridewell.

[Bridewell]

Echolalia

Hello All. If I recall properly, there was a story going about that MJK had a slight speech impediment. For a while, it was argued by some that this was a misreport of her accent.

Make of it what you will.

Cheers.
LC

Hi Lynn,

You're not thinking of Barnett's echolalia, are you?

Regards, Bridewell.