Probibility of Martha Tabram Being a JtR Victim

[Michael W Richards]

Interesting you should suggest this. Not too long ago I read that only Sergeants, and higher ranks, were allowed to take their bayonet out with them on the town. Lower ranks had to turn them in before leaving Barracks.
Hard to find confirmation of details like this but, if true, it might be consistent with your thinking.
Also, all ranks were issued with a military-style penknife. No mention of having to turn those in.

Hi Jon,

I have not read that any soldier, high ranking, active vs inactive or retired, was allowed to wear their Sword or Bayonet on any night they might choose to, but I have read that Bayonets and Short Swords could legally be worn on Bank Holidays....by any military man, retired or active. As a matter of fact bayonets could be purchased locally as well.

The fact that Martha has a bayonet type wound, a single one, indicates to me that we are likely looking at a case of 2 soldiers, as has been speculated, and that one soldier stabbed her with the bayonet with the intention of finally killing the woman. After all she had been through with the pen knife, almost a blessing really.

The nature of the attack seems frenzied, and it also is apparently about stabbing...not slicing, severing or cutting. That coupled with 2 weapons being used pretty well eliminates Jack for me.

Cheers Jon

[GUT]

G'Day all

IF JtR did both killings on the night of the double, he used [had] two different knifes, why not on the night of Tabram.

If he started with the smaller knife [described as a pocket knife] and found it wasn't good enough he might have pulled out the larger one, or started with the larger one but found it unwieldy for the frenzied attack and moved to the smaller.

[Michael W Richards]

G'Day all

IF JtR did both killings on the night of the double, he used [had] two different knifes, why not on the night of Tabram.

If he started with the smaller knife [described as a pocket knife] and found it wasn't good enough he might have pulled out the larger one, or started with the larger one but found it unwieldy for the frenzied attack and moved to the smaller.

Its the 38 tries with the pen knife that cramps that theory GUT, if he had a larger knife on him, why not end the incessant stabbing quickly....have you ever tried emulating the motion of pinning someone to a wall and stabbing up and down the torso 38 times? Sadly...I have. Its tiring. Even adrenaline wears thin.

I see this scenario....she cheats the man, or he thinks he has been cheated, or worse, mocked...and he, likely in the drink, reacts angrily and with malice stabbing...but neglecting to stab effectively. She was alive throughout the attack..all the wounds bled. If the killer intended to kill....why not kill? Why waste time making survivable wounds....eventually the victim would succumb from the number of them, yes, but what about her making sounds while he is still flailing away?

A second man, likely waiting for his mate...just like the soldier seen by the copper that night, comes looking for his pal...sees the mess he's created, and with a single stab, ends the possibility of her surviving the attack, and gets his mate out of there lickety split. Soldiers have a bond that most of us will never understand, and I believe one could do such a thing to save his military mate.


Cheers

[Cogidubnus]

Thinking about it...

History records that there were thousands of complete and partially intact ex-military bayonets available for sale in local markets and black-markets. However, until the relatively recent introduction of the sword bayonet, wouldn't most of these have been of the older and discarded distinctively triangular cross-section "spike" variety?

If so, presumably this tilts the odds of Tabram's killer blow away from an older, more cheaply available bayonet...towards either a less generally available, more modern, sword-bayonet, or a larger non military blade....Not forgetting that commonly available pocket knives or clasp knives could easily have a four or five inch blade which, used with sufficient force, could also penetrate the sternum...

All of which assumes, of course, that Dr Killeen really knew his stuff about knife wound evidence, which bearing in mind the alleged paucity of serious knife offences in the 1880s, can surely by no means be certain...

All the best

Dave

[GUT]

G'Day Dave

History records that there were thousands of complete and partially intact ex-military bayonets available for sale in local markets and black-markets.

For a few d.

[GUT]

Dave

... wouldn't most of these have been of the older and discarded distinctively triangular cross-section "spike" variety?

Not so sure about this, things get onto the second hand market pretty quick today, especially things you haven't paid for, and from what I've read, if anything, it happened even faster in LVP because of, in some areas, desperation for money.

[Ginger]

I think Tabrum was JtR's first vic. I don't think you find that kind of rage -- the kind that stabs 39 times -- without real hatred and madness.

I've always wondered if it was maybe panic and desperation rather than rage. If perhaps the murderer expected her to gasp and fall down dead after the first stab, like a victim in a penny dreadful, and she didn't... Or perhaps if she appeared to be dead, and then, when he began to cut her belly, she started to struggle...

[Cogidubnus]

Pearly Poll

Not so sure about this, things get onto the second hand market pretty quick today, especially things you haven't paid for, and from what I've read, if anything, it happened even faster in LVP because of, in some areas, desperation for money.

You could well be right GUT...I'm merely addressing the fixation we seem to have with a bayonet for this particular killing...a fixation which seems to me to derive only from the testimony that a couple of hours earlier Tabram went down a side-turning with a soldier...

Unless we accept that an East-End prostitute would've really spent that long satisfying her fourpennyworth, then it seems likely to me that there is really no more reason to suspect a bayonet than any other type of available blade....a far richer variety than we could imagine today...

I've always wondered if it was maybe panic and desperation rather than rage. If perhaps the murderer expected her to gasp and fall down dead after the first stab, like a victim in a penny dreadful, and she didn't... Or perhaps if she appeared to be dead, and then, when he began to cut her belly, she started to struggle...

Hi Ginger

I must admit to wondering about this too...If Tabram was an early, relatively amateurish episode, could the killer have taken on board these shortcomings/experiences, in choosing a superior weapon for the subsequent killings?

All the best

Dave

[GUT]

G'Day Ginger

Or perhaps if she appeared to be dead, and then, when he began to cut her belly, she started to struggle

Certainly a conceivable scenario.

[Ginger]

Hi Ginger

I must admit to wondering about this too...If Tabram was an early, relatively amateurish episode, could the killer have taken on board these shortcomings/experiences, in choosing a superior weapon for the subsequent killings?

All the best

Dave

Hullo Dave.

That's where my speculation runs on this as well. If, between Tabram and Nichols, he improved his technique that markedly, I'd have to expect him to be an intelligent man, and literate as well. Even in the East End, I'd assume awkward questions might be asked if one went about inquiring as to the best way to kill someone quickly and without a struggle. That leaves him with books as a resource. He knew how to find the information he wanted without raising suspicions, and he was intelligent and disciplined enough to apply it correctly. A bookish introvert might well approach the first murder (Tabram) not realizing that killing someone in reality was going to be much more difficult than in his fantasies.

That's all speculation, of course, but it pretty well outlines what sort of person I think he was.

[Cogidubnus]

Hi Ginger

I'm not convinced of the literacy (no evidence) but the native intelligence to analyse/learn I have no problem with whatsoever

All the best

Dave

[Wickerman]

Hi Jon,

I have not read that any soldier, high ranking, active vs inactive or retired, was allowed to wear their Sword or Bayonet on any night they might choose to,...

Hi Michael.

It's unfortunate that you had not asked me for the reference when I wrote that back in June last year.

[Wickerman]

All of which assumes, of course, that Dr Killeen really knew his stuff about knife wound evidence, which bearing in mind the alleged paucity of serious knife offences in the 1880s, can surely by no means be certain...

Hi Dave.

Can you elaborate on what experience you think is necessary to distinguish between a deep wound and a shallow wound?
Or the shape left in tissue by a single-sided small blade (pen-knife?) as opposed to the silhouette of a larger dagger thrust through bone?



Dr Timothy Killeen.
Licenciate of the Royal College of Surgeons, Ireland, 1885.
Licenciate of the Kings and Queens College of Physicians, Ireland, 1886.

Dr. Killeen was competent enough to conduct an autopsy, he was ordered to do this by the Coroner. It is the responsibility of the Coroner to know which medical practitioners within his parish, or those available to him, which have proven abilities that he can rely on to conduct an autopsy for his Inquest.

That said, I am interested in what difficulties you see in a surgeon accurately describing two different stab wounds.

[Tom_Wescott]

Hi all,

Dr. Killeen would not have been the only doctor to see the wounds. There's no question that two blades were used. The only debate was whether or not it was a sword or dagger that inflicted the heart wound. Bayonet was even ruled out, though not by Killeen, who would not likely have had bayonet wound experience. It was a juryman and not Killeen who suggested a bayonet in the first place, and that was only because of all the soldier talk going on at the time. Soldiers were ruled out before the end of August.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Digalittledeeperwatson]

Alles klar, eh kommissar?

If "JTR" was responsible for Tabram, it seems almost clear that the motivations for her murder and the following murders are different. Uncontrolled rage vs a methodical approach. If something of the sort was the case, a pragmatism, for a quick description, emerged. Using extremes of the spectrum to illustrate the disparity.