Comparing with Tabrum with non Ripper victims.

[FrankO]

Tabram had one or two small cuts to her privates, at least one of which might have been a slip of the knife after a stab. 95% of her wounds were stabs to her upper body, with multiple stab-wounds in her neck and chest. Nothing remotely like the canonical Ripper murders, nor - for that matter - like many of the non-canonical WMs either.

Hi Gareth,

I'm not reacting to your post to try and convince you of another view - we've been there already - but just to show you and/or others that an example of a killer exists who attacked one victim in very similar fashion to the way Tabram was attacked and another very similar to how Kelly was 'treated'. In July of 1992 Robert Napper stabbed Rachel Nichell 49 times in the neck and torso in a park (after having raped her) and in November of 1993 he killed and mutilated Samantha Bisset in her appartment, taking away part of her womb. Of course, there are differences, as he also stabbed Samantha 70 times.

The best,
Frank

[Patrick Differ]

Hi Sam,

Not to bring Tom Wescott up again (I just can't help it, his arguments are great !) but he makes a good argument in Ripper Confidential that JTR's "rips" were not slices or incisions, but stab wounds that were opened into "rips" by moving the knife. I agree with you that the stabs targeting the neck and upper body were unusual if we consider Tabram a Ripper killing, but stabs alone don't discount this for me given the argument mentioned above, plus the fact that her skirts were lifted and her legs spread and posed to expose her genitals.

Then again, if it were, indeed, a personal blitz attack fueled by emotion and unrelated to JTR, the goal of humiliating Tabram would also be completed by these actions. So I suppose the argument could go both ways

One puzzle for me on Tabrum is how JtR found Tabrum without either engaging her or following her. It seems unlikely he would expose himself with her in the Pub. Did he see her and Pearly Poll leave with the soldiers and follow Tabrum and wait to see if she came out of George Yard? Impossible to know but its highly likely he was in the vicinity of George Yard.

Second puzzle is whether Tabrum was already dead from being stabbed in the heart by a soldier? Why use 2 knives, a dagger and a pen knife? This meant the killer would be carrying 2 knives, although its likely most men carried a pen knife. If she was dead from being stabbed in the heart then its possible she was already dead when JtR found her.

If Tabrum was the first kill then what could you compare it to? She died from hemorage and most likely a stab to the heart. Being stabbed 38 times with a pen knife tells me that she was either dead from strangulation or the stab to the heart. She would have felt pain. Tabrums murder is unusual as were the mutilations that followed. Im not sure there is any direct comparison.

Tabrums throat was not cut and neither were her carotid arteries. Yet there were 9 cuts to the neck, with a penknife. Tabrum was being probed. Thats what the locations and numbers in her case tell me. In this case I believe it was quantity and location. The neck, chest, heart, trunk, privates.

If JtR was responsible for some of the earlier hit and run attacks in February through April then waited until August to begin again then some event likely interrupted him. But he learned from Tabrum whether he stabbed her in the heart or didnt.

With the exception of Stride there is little difference in location of the probes with Nichols, Chapman, Eddowes and Kelly.

Great topic. JtR learned from Tabrum. Did he learn human v animal? Would be interesting to see the comparison include transition to human with other serial killers?

[bonestrewn]

One puzzle for me on Tabrum is how JtR found Tabrum without either engaging her or following her. It seems unlikely he would expose himself with her in the Pub. Did he see her and Pearly Poll leave with the soldiers and follow Tabrum and wait to see if she came out of George Yard? Impossible to know but its highly likely he was in the vicinity of George Yard.

Second puzzle is whether Tabrum was already dead from being stabbed in the heart by a soldier? Why use 2 knives, a dagger and a pen knife? This meant the killer would be carrying 2 knives, although its likely most men carried a pen knife. If she was dead from being stabbed in the heart then its possible she was already dead when JtR found her.

If Tabrum was the first kill then what could you compare it to? She died from hemorage and most likely a stab to the heart. Being stabbed 38 times with a pen knife tells me that she was either dead from strangulation or the stab to the heart. She would have felt pain. Tabrums murder is unusual as were the mutilations that followed. Im not sure there is any direct comparison.

Tabrums throat was not cut and neither were her carotid arteries. Yet there were 9 cuts to the neck, with a penknife. Tabrum was being probed. Thats what the locations and numbers in her case tell me. In this case I believe it was quantity and location. The neck, chest, heart, trunk, privates.

If JtR was responsible for some of the earlier hit and run attacks in February through April then waited until August to begin again then some event likely interrupted him. But he learned from Tabrum whether he stabbed her in the heart or didnt.

With the exception of Stride there is little difference in location of the probes with Nichols, Chapman, Eddowes and Kelly.

Great topic. JtR learned from Tabrum. Did he learn human v animal? Would be interesting to see the comparison include transition to human with other serial killers?

Hi Patrick,

My personal belief is that there were never any soldiers nor an outing with Pearly Poll, and that Poll was either an opportunist (seeking fame and attention, then chickening out when she was meant to actually deliver) or some kind of conspirator (if you believe there was movement to obscure the killer of Tabram, whether he's JTR or not). I feel this way because of the complete confusion and inconsistency around her story and conduct when doing line-ups with the police.

I think Martha was sleeping rough that night, whereupon JTR found and murdered her. Alfred Crow first spotted her and apparently saw nothing unusual about it, as per the inquest "he was accustomed to seeing people lying about there." This was around 3:30 AM. When John Reeves found her, she was now lying in a pool of blood with her skirts up and legs spread, around 4:45 AM. My belief is the murder took place between those times, and that JTR purposely went to a place known to have rough sleepers. A sleeping victim is good "practice."

That's just my pet theory, though. I'm interested in your idea that JTR may have also been responsible for hit and run type of attacks!

[Herlock Sholmes]

The main question that I’d like answering (and we have no way of getting a definitive answer) it’s this - could Elizabeth Mahoney and her husband have missed seeing Martha’s body lying there in the dark had it been there when they arrived home at 1.40am? Elizabeth went out again to the Chandler’s shop Thrawl Street and by the time that she arrived back it must have been around 1.50. The landing would certainly have been dark as the lights were routinely turned off at 11.00 but Alfred Crow passed just once and saw the body there at 3.30 when it would have been just as dark. If, and it’s only an ‘if’, Martha was killed after 1.50 (Mahoney) and before Crow (3.30) then we have two further questions.

If Martha went down George Yard at 11.45 (as per Mary Ann Connelly) why was she killed over 2 hours later?

Also, if the soldier that PC Barrett saw at the entrance of George Yard at 2.00 (and who had said that he was waiting for his friend who had gone with a girl) was really the soldier that had gone to Angel Alley with Mary Ann Connelly then we would have to question why he was still there? Connelly said that she and her soldier returned to that spot between 12.05 and 12.15 where they parted company after he had assaulted her. Why would he still be there 1¾ hours later still waiting for his friend? If this was a different man then we have to confront quite a coincidence. Two soldiers, on the same evening, within a three hour period, waiting for a friend who had gone with a girl up the same street. Neither of whom were ever traced.

Connelly also said that the soldier assaulted her with his walking stick. Why would a young, serving soldier have required a walking stick? If he’d needed a stick he wouldn’t have been in the army. A follow up question is why wasn’t Barrett asked if the soldier that he’d talked to had a walking stick; he certainly didn’t mention seeing one.

I’d add another point that I’ve always thought a little strange (and one that Tom points out) - we have two young soldiers, smartly dressed in their uniforms, money in their pockets, out for drinks and fun with a couple of girls. So by just 10.00 the best that they could do was Martha and Mary? A woman that looks more like someone’s slightly chubby aunt and one that is described as ‘mannish’ looking. Surely they would have had little trouble finding two younger, more attractive companions for the evening? In addition, and I’m possibly reading too much into this word, but the soldier told PC Barrett that he was “waiting for a chum who had gone with a girl' Would he really have describes a woman 15 years or so older than him as “..a girl”? I don’t know?

Yet another question for me would be - as the soldier and Martha went into George Yard for a ‘knee trembler’ why did they walk all the way to the end of the street and then up to the first floor of the George Yard building? It doesn’t seem like a particularly likely spot for prostitutes to take their clients on a regular basis (one known by Martha I mean) and could they really not have found a nook or a doorway or an entrance somewhere before getting all the way to the end of the street? As Tom mentions witnesses hearing disturbances in the area that night I’m wondering if the couple might have received some unwanted attention which caused them to get off the street? Might the soldier have been targeted and decided to run away?

It’s difficult to avoid the very serious possibility that Connelly was lying but…she came forward voluntarily and we do have the coincidence of the soldier seen by PC Barrett at 2.00. Her performance at the line-ups at the Barracks leave us with the unavoidable impression that isn’t a trustworthy witness though. But was she lying about everything?

[Sam Flynn]

I agree with Tom on many things, bonestrewn, but not on this. It's clear to me that the assault on Tabram was dramatically different from anything in the C5 or indeed the other Whitechapel Murders. Amost certainly a frenzied one-off.

[Herlock Sholmes]

That’s how i see it too Sam. An episode of rage, possibly alcohol fuelled.

[bonestrewn]

Sam and Herlock,

Completely understandable! I guess what I wonder is, from your perspectives, was it definitely a personal murder (as the intensity of the stabbing might imply)? Or was it just a different killer who happened to be active at the time?

[Paddy Goose]

Hello bonestrewn and welcome,

Since I don't think it would be changing the subject, could you please answer, at your convenience the question I asked you in post #33 of your Eddowes thread when I quoted you as saying you knew of scholarship stating most of the women in Whitechapel were prostitutes and one said 70%.

My question to you was what is the source or sources of the scholarship you know of? Because I hadn't heard that before.

Paddy

[bonestrewn]

Hello bonestrewn and welcome,

Since I don't think it would be changing the subject, could you please answer, at your convenience the question I asked you in post #33 of your Eddowes thread when I quoted you as saying you knew of scholarship stating most of the women in Whitechapel were prostitutes and one said 70%.

My question to you was what is the source or sources of the scholarship you know of? Because I hadn't heard that before.

Paddy

Hi Paddy,

My apologies for missing your previous question! To clarify, I didn't give 70% as a hard number; I said that I thought I remembered, in older scholarship, some crazy number like 70%. Due to a terrible memory, I try to always hedge my bets

I ran across that number (if indeed my memory is accurate) while researching for a short story a number of years ago, and it dealt with both "professional" and "casual" prostitution specifically in the East End, hence the large number. As I'm currently at work and Ripperologizing from my phone, I don't have the exact document on hand, for which I apologize.

That said, I was able to pull up the chapter "A Study of Victorian Prostitution and Venereal Disease" in Suffer and Be Still: Women in the Victorian Age, which has this to say:

"Trying, as did contemporaries, to measure the number of prostitutes in nineteenth-century Britain is an exercise comparable in futility with attempts by theologians to estimate the number of angels who could be accommodated on the head of a pin. Reliable estimates are impeded by the nature of the profession. Firstly, the problem of “clandestine” prostitution (emphasized by all contemporaries) is, by definition, statistically intractable. Secondly, it was widely acknowledged that the numbers of prostitutes fluctuated inversely with the state of trade and employment. Thirdly, within these longer-term fluctuations, there were also seasonal variations in the numbers of prostitutes.8 Most observers deal only with London, acknowledged to be the place to study “la prostitution anglaise. C’est la son centre naturel.”9 Occasionally estimates were made of provincial prostitution, which was found almost overwhelmingly in urban centers. Colquhoun in 1797 estimated that there were 50,000 London prostitutes.10 Talbot, Ryan and the Bishop of Oxford all place the figure at 80,000 in the late 1830’s and early 1840’s.11 Whitehorne, in 1858, opined that one sixth of unmarried women between the ages of 15 and 50 were prostitutes – an alarming figure of 83,000.12 These figures, however, are little more than guesses repeated by one writer borrowing from another as though repetition would establish credibility. As for the country as a whole, the Westminster Review on different occasions placed the numbers at 50,000 and 368,000.13 The latter figure, were it valid, would have made prostitution the fourth largest female occupational group.14"

This bears out my memory that it used to be assumed or generally agreed upon that there was an extremely high rate of prostitution in the Victorian era.

I will pop back in or shoot you a private message when I am able to locate my old research folders.

[Herlock Sholmes]

Sam and Herlock,

Completely understandable! I guess what I wonder is, from your perspectives, was it definitely a personal murder (as the intensity of the stabbing might imply)? Or was it just a different killer who happened to be active at the time?

I wouldn’t feel at all confident about assigning the word ‘definitely’ bonestrewn. I wouldn’t say that it couldn’t have been the ripper’s first attempt but, like Sam, I don’t think so. If it was a one off murder by another individual that fact still wouldn’t deter us from suggesting “well, if he could explode and do this once…”

[bonestrewn]

Makes sense! Thanks for your reply, Herlock!

[Sam Flynn]

Hi Gareth,

I'm not reacting to your post to try and convince you of another view - we've been there already - but just to show you and/or others that an example of a killer exists who attacked one victim in very similar fashion to the way Tabram was attacked and another very similar to how Kelly was 'treated'. In July of 1992 Robert Napper stabbed Rachel Nichell 49 times in the neck and torso in a park (after having raped her) and in November of 1993 he killed and mutilated Samantha Bisset in her appartment, taking away part of her womb. Of course, there are differences, as he also stabbed Samantha 70 times.

The best,
Frank

Hello Frank

There were severe and multiple stabs in both Napper cases, though. I don't see a single genuine stab-wound in any of the C5, yet Tabram was unambiguously - and, apparently, frenziedly - stabbed almost 40 times.

[Lewis C]

bingo bone
the fact that her skirt was hiked up to expose the object of tje rippers fantasy, like the others, was the final straw for me that tabram was a ripper victim.

Hi Abby,

While I'm less certain than you are, I think that more likely than not Tabram was a Ripper victim. The reason you gave is one reason, and there are others. Considering the murder location and those of the C5, Tabram's was the most centrally located of those six murder locations. It occurred three weeks before Nichols, close enough that there's no chronological reason to exclude it from the sequence. The type of victim and the time of day are similar to those of other Ripper victims. She was killed with a knife with far more damage done to her body than was necessary to kill her.

This seems to me like an awful lot of similarity. There are differences too, but I question whether any of the differences are ones that can't be explained by the fact that it was an early murder, and he was still developing his way of doing things.

[Sam Flynn]

The victim having her dress/skirt lifted up means nothing in terms of it being a Ripper murder, given that (a) Tabram was a prostitute; and (b) even though her skirt WAS lifted up, her killer inflicted next to zero injuries - i.e. stabs - to her lower body.

There are umpteen cases of prostitute murders where the victim was found with her skirts hitched up or her pants pulled down.

[Sam Flynn]

This seems to me like an awful lot of similarity. There are differences too, but I question whether any of the differences are ones that can't be explained by the fact that it was an early murder, and he was still developing his way of doing things.

37 wounds - all stabs - to her upper body, and only one or two lower down, with the actual private parts remaining unscathed, and no significant cuts whatsoever. Is that more indicative of an early murder, or of a frenzied, one-off incident perpetrated by someone other than JTR?