Was Mary Kelly a Ripper victim?

[Garry Wroe]

To be frank, it did NOT look like a "ripper" killing.

It did to the doctors, policemen and civilians who attended the scene, Lynn. In fact no-one at the time even hinted that Kelly's killer was anyone other then Jack the Ripper. Only recently has a tiny minority begun to question the status of Kelly as a Ripper victim. And it is a tiny minority, principally because the evidence to the contrary is overwhelming.

[Wickerman]

...... and we know she didn't have a reputation for bringing clients home...and we also know that she didn't do so when Barnett lived there 8 days earlier.

Mike.
There is an interesting comment from Joe, largely overlooked, that he gave to Abberline.

I can understand Barnett attempting to 'tone it down', when he appeared at the Inquest, in front of the press, public, friends & neighbors. But three days earlier he sat with Abberline, just the two of them.
Here he told Abberline why he left Mary.

(That he lived with her)..."until last Tuesday week (30 ulto) when in consequence of not earning sufficient money to give her and her resorting to prostitution, I resolved on leaving her,.."

Joe was not so forthcoming at the Inquest, in front of all and sundry.

[Wickerman]

Really?

Kelly was 'very drunk' when she entered her room with Blotchy. It is more than possible that they consumed what remained of Blotchy's beer and then went to bed together. If Blotchy left at some point thereafter, let's say to go to work or return home to a wife or girlfriend, that would leave a drunken and chemise wearing Kelly alone and sleeping in the bed. The possibility then exists that the killer let himself into the room and attacked Kelly where she slept, which would explain the medical opinion that the throat was cut whilst Kelly lay close to the partition wall.

So there are other explanations, Jon. But then I suspect that you will reject these because of your insistence that Kelly returned to the streets after Blotchy departed the scene.

Yes Garry, I am well aware of the possibility, but then my "insistence" is not guesswork either, is it?

Let us not forget, you choose to ignore the possibility that Kelly went back out on the streets; in spite of Hutchinson claiming to see her between 2-3:00am, in spite of Mrs Kennedy claiming to see her outside the Britannia "about 3:00am", and, in spite of Sarah Lewis confirming Hutchinson's story about this couple walking up the court:
"..I also saw a man and a woman who had no hat on and were the worse for drink pass up the court."

You appear to be quite content to assume she never left her room, so long as you ignore the words of those who claim to have seen her outside.

My "insistence" is more along the lines of, 'that these witnesses should be heard, not ignored', especially when nothing has been offered to contest their observations.

[lynn cates]

Tom Arnold

Hello Garry. Thanks.

Forgetting about superintendent Arnold, perhaps?

Cheers.
LC

[c.d.]

How does this not look like a "Ripper" killing? Does it not look like the murder of Eddowes only more brutal which can easily be attributable to the killer having more time with his victim?

c.d.

[c.d.]

If Mary did not bring clients back to the room while living with Barnett, how much of that is attributable to Mary not wanting to bite the hand that feeds her? With Barnett out of the picture would the same rules apply?

c.d.

[GUT]

G'day cd

If Mary did not bring clients back to the room while living with Barnett, how much of that is attributable to Mary not wanting to bite the hand that feeds her? With Barnett out of the picture would the same rules apply?

c.d.

Especially when we read that Joe disapproved of her work.

Once he's gone, and she is even more in need of money I believe she would go for it. I also find it hard to accept that a roll n a bed in nice warm room wouldn't earn her more than a4p knee trembler in a dark alley.

Of course these are only my opinion.

[c.d.]

Hello Jon.

"the night was too cold to sleep in only a chemise"

Likely. But, we cannot say this unequivocally, as:

1. Some are warm natured. (I NEVER sleep under anything--too warm.)

2. We are NOT certain it was night when she died.

Cheers.
LC

Wouldn't the broken window have made the room fairly cold? And it was a damp night as well was it not?

c.d.

[GUT]

Wouldn't the broken window have made the room fairly cold? And it was a damp night as well was it not?

c.d.

G'day c.d.

But at one stage there had been a raging fire going it would seem.

[c.d.]

Hello GUT,

The problem is we don't know who lit the fire, Mary or her killer.

c.d.

[GUT]

G'day c.d.

Hello GUT,

The problem is we don't know who lit the fire, Mary or her killer.

c.d.

And we don't know how the killer got in, or much else really, boy we don't even know her real name, where she was born, when she was killed, did she take a punter back [but what then was botchy].

[Michael W Richards]

Mike.
There is an interesting comment from Joe, largely overlooked, that he gave to Abberline.

I can understand Barnett attempting to 'tone it down', when he appeared at the Inquest, in front of the press, public, friends & neighbors. But three days earlier he sat with Abberline, just the two of them.
Here he told Abberline why he left Mary.

(That he lived with her)..."until last Tuesday week (30 ulto) when in consequence of not earning sufficient money to give her and her resorting to prostitution, I resolved on leaving her,.."

Joe was not so forthcoming at the Inquest, in front of all and sundry.

An interesting quote Jon, and one wonders how Barnett's perceptions of Mary might have changed when they took in Maria, someone whom I suspect Mary knew from her "street" work. And with that quote we have the inference that Mary, as I suggested, wasn't bringing her "work" home..Barnett was still there at that time.

With Mary Kelly we don't have D & D charges, we don't have testimony that states the deceased drank heavily often, we don't have the telltale signs of long term alcohol abuse in her organs, in fact we only know of the one instance when Mary arrives home with Blotchy.

My point in mentioning this is that people may suggest that Mary was earning after Joe left, and even while he was still there, but we don't have enough evidence to suppose she drank it all away. So, why the arrears without so much as a token gesture, which may have been sought Friday morning? Why did Joe need to give her money each day, excluding that last day? Why did Maria shoot Mary a coin that afternoon?

Mary was arguably the most attractive of the entire Canonical Group, with youth and vitality to compliment her looks. How is it that with her ability to earn she wasn't surviving quite well from her street income? The answer is most probably that she wasn't working much. She relied on the "kindness" of men around her...like her not leaving Joe B while seeing another Joe because the first Joe was "nice" to her. Not because she had a more meaningful relationship with the man she was living with, not because she was committed to her relationship with Barnett, because he was "nice" to her.

Mary was at one point, perhaps not that cold in her memory, a woman who bathed regularly, had nice clothes to wear, and serviced a more gentlemanly crowd than the off work dockers. I suspect her bemoaning her choices in life to a friend had more to do with losing a life of a fancy call girl than it did having to resort to prostitution in general.

We can look at the scene while the victim lay there and we can see dramatic differences in what was done to her as compared with the previous Canonicals. Its also there in the PM data. But aside from the irregularities in the cuts and the actions, we have the circumstantial evidence that suggests Mary may have let her killer enter. By virtue of that cry out at 3:45, and the witnesses descriptions of its volume. No-one claimed that cry out from that court, and the only one in it who could not claim it later, was Mary.

I think its very reasonable to say that Mary was killed by someone mentally ill, I don't think its reasonable to assume that could only have been one man. Clearly....we know of several ill men at that time in that place, and we know that at least a temporary mental illness was just a few drops in your absinthe away.

Cheers Jon

[c.d.]

Hello Michael,

If Mary were killed by someone mentally ill, it is quite a coincidence that they favored a method employed by the Whitechapel Murderer.

c.d.

[lynn cates]

ripper killing

Hello CD. Thanks.

What does a ripper killing look like? Perhaps a crime which was not solved? Then there are MANY ripper killings.

Cheers.
LC

[lynn cates]

night

Hello (again) CD. Thanks.

"Wouldn't the broken window have made the room fairly cold? And it was a damp night as well was it not?"

Are we CERTAIN she died at night?

Cheers.
LC