Kelly Timeline

[Doctored Whatsit]

Hi Herlock,

McCarthy's testimony at the inquest:
"For a moment I could not say anything, and I then said: "You had better fetch the police." I knew the deceased as Mary Jane Kelly, and had no doubt at all about her identity. I followed Bowyer to Commercial-street Police-station".

Apparently McCarthy sent Bowyer to the police station and then caught him up, so there was some of McCarthy's time unaccounted for.

Digressing again, we have all seen the photographs of Kelly's body and I have always found it odd that Barnett, who knew her intimately, was able to identify her by "the ear and eyes" only, whereas McCarthy "had no doubt at all about her identity".

[GBinOz]

Hi Herlock,

McCarthy's testimony at the inquest:
"For a moment I could not say anything, and I then said: "You had better fetch the police." I knew the deceased as Mary Jane Kelly, and had no doubt at all about her identity. I followed Bowyer to Commercial-street Police-station".

Apparently McCarthy sent Bowyer to the police station and then caught him up, so there was some of McCarthy's time unaccounted for.

[GBinOz]

I don't wish to digress from the thread title, but the Maxwell witness statement is perhaps the most confusing of any, when it should be the most reliable! She was, it seems, on first name terms with Kelly, actually spoke to her, can fairly accurately estimate the time because of what she was doing, and she made her statement later the same day. There is no logical reason for it to be less than very accurate. Compare it to Long and Lawende etc and it is near perfect, and yet it is deemed inevitably to be totally inaccurate while many cling to Long and Lawende as being crucially important. It is no wonder that Ripperology has its wide-open debates!!!!

Sorry, to wander off, now back to the thread ...

Absolutely agree Doc. Maxwell was interviewed, by Abberline, only hours after seeing Kelly, unlike Long who, four days after the event, suddenly remembered seeing Chapman, who she had never seen before. Abberline considered her to be of strong character and was unable to fault her story, and her story never changed, not even when she was warned by the coroner that it didn't conform to other testimony. Eventually police brushed off her testimony as her remembering an event from a previous day.

The testimony that I have difficulty in believing is that of Mary Ann Cox. She testified that Mary entered her dwelling with a "blotchy" man carrying a beer pot and that Kelly then sang to him for an hour and a quarter. Was Mr Blotchy in Kelly's room because he was a talent scout for a musical review? Neither Elizabeth Prater nor Julia Vanturney heard singing. No beer pot was found in Kelly's room and police enquiries at local pubs found that none of them had sold a "pot" of beer that night.

These are anomalies that fall into Herlock's category of unanswerables.

[C. F. Leon]

Do we know anything about Maxwell personally? Any confirmation that she really knew MJK? Maybe she was a publicity-seeking liar, or prone to fantasies, or demented? IIRC, she claimed that she had spoken to Kelly who called her by name, so if it actually happened, it wasn't a case mistaken identity.

"I see Kellys ..."

[Doctored Whatsit]

I don't wish to digress from the thread title, but the Maxwell witness statement is perhaps the most confusing of any, when it should be the most reliable! She was, it seems, on first name terms with Kelly, actually spoke to her, can fairly accurately estimate the time because of what she was doing, and she made her statement later the same day. There is no logical reason for it to be less than very accurate. Compare it to Long and Lawende etc and it is near perfect, and yet it is deemed inevitably to be totally inaccurate while many cling to Long and Lawende as being crucially important. It is no wonder that Ripperology has its wide-open debates!!!!

Sorry, to wander off, now back to the thread ...

[Herlock Sholmes]

Maxwell made her statement the same day!

Beat me to it by a few seconds Doc.

[Herlock Sholmes]

Herlock

Thank you for doing this. It certainly lays the events in a clear order. Without rehashing the synchronisation of clocks arguments it would be fair enough to at least assume the two accounts of hearing the shout of murder could be talking about the same event.
That said the morning accounts of Mary out and about have always seemed strange. We know eyewitness testimony is unreliable at the best of times and I know people say they got the days mixed up. However with an event in your area of such significance it seems unlikely you would confuse the days.
Do we know when Maxwell and Lewis where interviewed?

Hello George,

I’m unsure when Maurice Lewis was interviewed but Maxwell was certainly interviewed on the day of the murder so she wasn’t have to think back. It’s certainly one of the big mysteries. I’ll have more of a look tomorrow. When I’ve done previous timelines they always end up throwing up questions…some of which we can never get an answer for.

[Doctored Whatsit]

Herlock

Thank you for doing this. It certainly lays the events in a clear order. Without rehashing the synchronisation of clocks arguments it would be fair enough to at least assume the two accounts of hearing the shout of murder could be talking about the same event.
That said the morning accounts of Mary out and about have always seemed strange. We know eyewitness testimony is unreliable at the best of times and I know people say they got the days mixed up. However with an event in your area of such significance it seems unlikely you would confuse the days.
Do we know when Maxwell and Lewis where interviewed?

Maxwell made her statement the same day!

[Georgeb]

Herlock

Thank you for doing this. It certainly lays the events in a clear order. Without rehashing the synchronisation of clocks arguments it would be fair enough to at least assume the two accounts of hearing the shout of murder could be talking about the same event.
That said the morning accounts of Mary out and about have always seemed strange. We know eyewitness testimony is unreliable at the best of times and I know people say they got the days mixed up. However with an event in your area of such significance it seems unlikely you would confuse the days.
Do we know when Maxwell and Lewis where interviewed?

[Herlock Sholmes]

First draft



c5.00-6.00pm (October 30th) - Joseph Barnett moves out of 13 Miller’s Court (27 Dorset Street) because, according him, she had taken in a woman who was a prostitute. He calls Mary, Marie Jeanette Kelly.

Wednesday Afternoon - Thomas Bowyer sees Mary Kelly alive for the last time.

Thursday morning - Charwoman Julia Venturney of 1 Miller’s Court, sees Mary Jane Kelly for the last time.

c7.30-7.45pm (Thursday) - Fish Porter Joseph Barnett (currently living with his sister at 21, Portpool Lane, Gray’s Inn Road) sees Mary Jane Kelly for the final time. Maria Harvey of 3, New Court, Dorset Street is also there but she left before Barnett did.

c8.00 - Julia Venturney goes to bed but only dozed all night. She heard nothing unusual.

c10.00-11.00 - A Dorset Street tailor called Maurice Lewis sees Mary in the Horn Of Plenty pub drinking with ‘some women (one of whom was called Julia) and a man called Dan (who, until recently, Kelly had been living with) She left with a respectable looking man.

c11.45pm - A very drunk Mary Jane Kelly is seen by Mary Ann Cox of Room 5, Miller’s Court walking down the passage to the court in the company of a man carrying a pot of ale. Kelly said “Goodnight..” before going into her room while singing a song.

c12.00am - Cox goes back out.

c1.00 - Cox returns to her room and hears Kelly still singing.

c1.00 - Elizabeth Prater of room 20 (the one directly above Mary’s room, which she describes as ‘the shed’) returns to Miller’s Court. She has been out since 5.00pm. She stands on the corner.

c1.02 - Cox leaves her room to go out onto the street again. Kelly is still singing.

c1.20 - Elizabeth goes up to her room after calling it at McCarthy’s shop. She saw no light from Mary’s room.

c1.30 - She goes to bed after barricading the door. She quickly falls asleep.

c2.00 - George Hutchinson, Victoria Home, Commercial Street, sees Kelly near to Flower and Dean Street. She asks to borrow sixpence but Hutchinson has no money. He then sees a man approach Kelly near Thrawl Street. They passed Hutchinson and he followed them into Dorset Street. They stood at the entrance to the court for around 3 minutes then went inside. He watches the court.

c2.30 - Sarah Lewis, a laundress living at 24 Great Pearl Street, goes to Miller’s Court to visit Mrs Keyler at number 2. As she goes into Miller’s Court she sees a man opposite the lodging house who appears to be looking into the court. She sees a man with a drunk woman ‘further on.’

On her way to Miller’s Court she sees a man talking to a woman near to The Britannia. She had seen the same man in Bethnal Green Road at around 8.00 on the previous Wednesday. Lewis was with another woman and the man scared them by asking one of them to go with him into an entry.

c3.00 - George Hutchinson leaves Dorset Street.

c3.00 - Cox returns to her room and sees that the light is off in Mary’s room and all is quiet.

c3.30 - Sarah Lewis awakes after falling asleep in a chair at number 2

c3.30-3.45 - Elizabeth Prater his woken by a kitten and at that time she hears a faint cry of “oh murder” which seemed to come from within the court.

c4.00 - Sarah Lewis, at number 2, hears a loud cry of “murder” which sounded like the voice of a young woman.

c5.45 - Elizabeth is in The Ten Bells drinking rum. After a drink she goes back to her room and sleeps until 11.00.

c 5.45- Cox hears a man walk down the court.

c8.00 - Maurice Lewis says the he sees Mary leave her room and return a few moments later.

c8.00-8.30 - Caroline Maxwell of 14, Dorset Street says that she sees Mary standing at the entrance to Miller’s Court.

c8.45 - Maxwell says that she sees Kelly outside the Britannia beer shop talking to a man.

c10.00 - Maurice Lewis and his friends went to the Britannia pub where he saw Mary drinking with some people.

c10.45am (Friday) - On the order of John McCarthy, Thomas Bowyer of 37 Dorset Street, goes to Mary’s room (number 13 Miller’s Court) to collect rent plus arrears. On receiving no reply he looked through the window and saw Mary’s body on the bed.

c10.50 - Bowyer tells McCarthy what he’d found and they returned to Kelly’s room so that McCarthy could look through the window.

c10.52 - They both went to Commercial Street where McCarthy asked for Inspector Reid but it’s difficult was Inspector Walter Beck who returned with them.

c11.00 (just after) Inspector Beck is told about the murder. He sends for Doctor Phillips and closed the court.

c11.00 - Divisional Police Surgeon, George Bagster Phillips of 2, Spital Square is informed of the murder.

c11.15 - Dr Phillips arrives and looks through the window of Mary Kelly’s room as the door is locked and sees that she is beyond help. He remains at the court until around 1.30 as he sees that it’s necessary that no one enters the room.

c11.30 - Inspector Frederick George Abberline arrives at Miller’s Court and takes charge. Beck informs him that bloodhounds have been sent for.

c1.30 - Superintendent Arnold arrives and tells John McCarthy to break open the door to Kelly’s room after informing Abberline that the bloodhounds aren’t coming.

c 1.50 - Robert Anderson arrives at Miller’s Court in a cab.

c4.00 (shortly after) - A covered van arrived at Miller’s Court to collect the remains. They were placed in the shell and taken to the mortuary which adjoined Shoreditch Church. Kelly’s room was then closed, boarded up and padlocked.

c5.30pm - Sarah Lewis leaves the court after being prevented from doing so by order of the police.



The inquest takes place on Monday 12th November at Shoreditch Town Hall. The coroner is Dr Roderick MacDonald M.P. (Coroner to the north eastern district of Middlesex. Also present are: Superintendent Arnold (H division) Inspector Abberline CID and Inspector Nairn *** Also the deputy coroner Mr Hodgkinson.

Jurors - Joseph Gobly, George Buffery, E. Stevens, John Harvey, John Lloyd, Samuel Jenkins, Abraham Clements R Nettelfield, William Worf, Joseph Roberts, Lewis F Hunter, George Harry Wilson and Henry Dawkes.