The Legend Of Mary Jane Kelly

[mpriestnall]

In my view, this is a case of not seeing the wood for the trees.

I know my ash from elder you know!

I was just saying there was more than 6 brothers to contact or could have come forward to say they were connected to MJK. Wives, girlfriends and their family but the authorities and the press failed to do so. Maybe that's because the 6 brothers in London were an invention by JB?

Maybe he was telling a story. One he was put up to tell by the Macdonald et al?

[mpriestnall]

No, the testimony has been edited, that's all.

Your almost certainly correct. Fair enough.

[Wickerman]

From JB's inquest testimony:
"There were six brothers living in London, and one was in the army. One of them was named Henry. I never saw the brothers to my knowledge".

There is no documentary evidence to show her London relatives were traced. It's a reasonable assumption that at least some, if not all, of the brothers would have wives and maybe children. So we are talking more than 6 close relatives of Kelly. 10-15 relatives maybe. And no evidence of any being traced.

Really?

In my view, this is a case of not seeing the wood for the trees.

[Wickerman]

JB gave two statements that seem to be non-sequiturs because he seems to be giving answers not to the questions being asked.

1. "[Coroner] Did you drink together ? - No, sir. She was quite sober."

2. [Coroner] Did she express fear of any particular individual ? - No, sir. Our own quarrels were very soon over.

Did JB mess up his lines?

No, the testimony has been edited, that's all.

[Wickerman]

Part of Joseph Barnett's testimony at the inquest:
"I have seen the body, and I identify it by the ear and eyes, which are all that I can recognise".

https://photos.casebook.org/displayi...372&fullsize=1

I don't understand why JB couldn't use the remaining parts of MJK arms and legs to contribute to his identification of Kelly. Surely her limbs were as distinctive and recognisable to JB as her ear and eyes, after 1 year and 8 months of knowing Kelly?

What gives?

Martyn.
What gives is, the body is well wrapped for viewing by the jury.
This was Nichols.

After the autopsy the body is wrapped with only the head visible.

You know before an inquest begins the jury are required to view the body.
All Barnett was doing was confirming he had seen the body.

I know we read that Barnett was brought to Millers Court and, we are told, he peeped through the window. Well, so did McCarthy and he could not see much in that dark room, so likely neither could anyone else. The police did not let Barnett into the room as far as we know, and why would they just look at the photograph. The body would have to be cleaned up for a formal identification.

There's another issue too. The Inquest version suggests Barnett could only recognise her by her "ear and eyes". Yet Dr Bond wrote that her ears had been cut off (partly removed).
Her most recognisible feature was her hair, her nickname being "Ginger".
The Morning Advertiser, Echo & Scotsman are a few of the papers that heard it correct - hair & eyes.

[mpriestnall]

JB gave two statements that seem to be non-sequiturs because he seems to be giving answers not to the questions being asked.

1. "[Coroner] Did you drink together ? - No, sir. She was quite sober."

2. [Coroner] Did she express fear of any particular individual ? - No, sir. Our own quarrels were very soon over.

Did JB mess up his lines?

And why didn't the coroner seek to clarify JB's answers? This is a murder inquest after all.

[mpriestnall]

From JB's inquest testimony:

"[Coroner] Was there any one else there on the Thursday evening ? - Yes, a woman who lives in the court. She left first, and I followed shortly afterwards.
[Coroner] Have you had conversation with deceased about her parents ? - Yes, frequently. She said she was born in Limerick, and went when very young to Wales. She did not say how long she lived there, but that she came to London about four years ago. Her father's name was John Kelly, a "gaffer" or foreman in an iron works in Carnarvonshire, or Carmarthen. She said she had one sister, who was respectable, who travelled from market place to market place. This sister was very fond of her. There were six brothers living in London, and one was in the army. One of them was named Henry. I never saw the brothers to my knowledge. She said she was married when very young in Wales to a collier. I think the name was Davis or Davies. She said she had lived with him until he was killed in an explosion, but I cannot say how many years since that was. Her age was, I believe, 16 when she married. After her husband's death deceased went to Cardiff to a cousin.
[Coroner] Did she live there long ? - Yes, she was in an infirmary there for eight or nine months. She was following a bad life with her cousin, who, as I reckon, and as I often told her, was the cause of her downfall.
[Coroner] After she left Cardiff did she come direct to London ? - Yes. She was in a gay house in the West-end, but in what part she did not say. A gentleman came there to her and asked her if she would like to go to France."

The coroner asks JB about MJK movements on Thursday evening. Then he abruptly jumps to a question about JB's conversations with MJK about her parents. Was this just a way of opening the door for JB to lay a false trail about MJK's irish/welsh origins? There then follows details about MJK's father and supposed husband. and then the coroner asks the question: "After she left Cardiff did she come direct to London? The use of the "direct" is interesting. Clearly the coroner already knows the answer to this question and is putting this question to JB to make it clear there were no intervening steps on her journey from Cardiff to London, thus disallowing opportunities of investigations for the police and the press.

Notable by there absence are what one would think would be highly relevant questions about the reasons for MJK moving to London. Surely the questions of who or what brought Kelly to London could be relevant to her murder but the coroner failed to ask these questions, thus closing down furthur obvious lines of inquiries for the police and press.

Did the coroner gloss over these lines of inquiries because on investigation by the police and press it would have been quickly been established that MJK made no such journey from Wales to London, because she was in fact London born and bred?

[mpriestnall]

JB gave two statements that seem to be non-sequiturs because he seems to be giving answers not to the questions being asked.

1. "[Coroner] Did you drink together ? - No, sir. She was quite sober."

2. [Coroner] Did she express fear of any particular individual ? - No, sir. Our own quarrels were very soon over.

Did JB mess up his lines?

[mpriestnall]

From JB's inquest testimony:
"There were six brothers living in London, and one was in the army. One of them was named Henry. I never saw the brothers to my knowledge".

There is no documentary evidence to show her London relatives were traced. It's a reasonable assumption that at least some, if not all, of the brothers would have wives and maybe children. So we are talking more than 6 close relatives of Kelly. 10-15 relatives maybe. And no evidence of any being traced.

Really?

[mpriestnall]

Part of Joseph Barnett's testimony at the inquest:
"I have seen the body, and I identify it by the ear and eyes, which are all that I can recognise".

https://photos.casebook.org/displayi...372&fullsize=1

I don't understand why JB couldn't use the remaining parts of MJK arms and legs to contribute to his identification of Kelly. Surely her limbs were as distinctive and recognisable to JB as her ear and eyes, after 1 year and 8 months of knowing Kelly?

What gives?

[Debra A]

It might be worth a second look, though I do recall Deb's commenting on the Rees case several years ago, that it didn't lead anywhere, I just can't recall why.

I'm having trouble recalling myself
Basically, the story is about Abbi Kelly, daughter of a marine store dealer in Llanelly who was said to have worked for Dr Hopkins' and his daughter, Mary Jane Rees, an abortionist. Abbi worked for Hopkins as a servant at some point. Rees claimed to have seen her in London after she left home and that is how the rumour that she may be the murdered girl started, as far as I remember. However, Abbi Kelly had married someone named Muir and emigrated to the US, rather than she went to London and so the story seemed to end there because she is on the US census and passenger lists as Abbi Muir after 1888. She also had a sister named Julia. Paul Begg researched the story originally, many year ago.

[mpriestnall]

Coroner's Act 1887 can be found here btw.

[Scott Nelson]

By the way, have these issues stopped? (anybody know?), my last is No.166 from Mar. 2020.

That's the last one I got as well. I guess it's just going to to be intermittent now.

[JeffHamm]

A few thoughts on the above:
1) Sweeney is also a common Irish surname. Mr Rees may have known her as Sweeney or mistook the commonness of the surname. The indication he said he knew her father would suggest as being unlikely
2) But it did unearth a peculiar find. A Mary (albeit listed as being on the young side) in 1871 and 1881as suggesting she would have been just 17 in 1888
3) What I found strange was the father was called John. There was an incident involving iron. He also had two sons, one called Henry and another called John
4) Weirdly Mary drops off the census in 1891 but John senior acquires a new wife "Magaret" who is just 22

In the end all just odd coincidences once again and no viable leads.

HI erobitha,

Hmmm, by 1891 he also seems to have "lost" a daughter born in 1871 who was named Mary (either Mary R in 1871, or Mary T in 1881), but now has a daughter named Polly of no middle initial, who was also born in 1871 (and cannot be the daughter of his new wife, who was only 2 at the time of Polly's birth). And of course, Polly Nichols was really Mary Ann Nichols, so it looks like Mary ? Sweeney is not Mary Jane Kelly of Dorset Street but coincidently end up going by names that can be somewhat associated with the first and last victim of the JtR series (I'm assuming, of course, that the Polly Sweeney in 1891 is the same person as the previous Mary ? Sweeney's).

Now, I suppose, she could be the Mary J that Mr. Ree's knew (outside chance here, as Mr. Rees does claim familiarity with his MJK's father, so I would presume wouldn't mistake Sweeney for Kelly), and she may have returned to her father's household after leaving London (where Mr. Ree's claims to have seen her), perhaps getting spooked when her namesake was murdered in 1888. I suppose we could spin a tale that given the association of the name "Sweeney" with "Sweeney Todd", we could suggest that Mr. Ree's "Mary" used the common name "Kelly" to avoid that association once she left her father's household, and Mr. Rees would know of her preference and used that when talking with the reporters. It would also fit with her changing her name upon the hypothesized return, to get away from the association with the JtR victim, but sort of falls down given she's going under the name "Polly", which is still associated with JtR via Nichols. So, unless Polly is some sort of common alternative name given to Mary's, that becomes a bit of a sticking point in my over active imagination.

Anyway, my free running associations aside, the important point really is that I think there's a good case for suggesting Mary R, Mary T, and Polly Sweeney are all the same person, ego, not the victim found in Dorset Street.

- Jeff

[mpriestnall]

[QUOTE=Al Bundy's Eyes;n761979]

Hi,
The Coroner's Act can be found online, for a look at how it was or was not put into practice I'd recommend a read of David Barrats article found here: https://www.orsam.co.uk/thebiginquiry.htm

He's specifically referring to the Stride inquest, but there's lots of useful info there.

Thanks Al. Appreciate the info

I have a couple of observations to make about Barnett's testimony, regarding items included and not included. Looking at the other inquests for comparison might be useful for looking at the Kelly inquest.