Elizabeth Prater

I'm going to plug for the "Yeooow miaou-der!" theory - lol

Yeap, possible that Diddles was trying to copy it's owner and opt for a duet.

Vote:
1) Kelly..........2) Prater/Diddles

[Nemo]

I'm going to plug for the "Yeooow miaou-der!" theory - lol

It comes as a mighty relief to me that Kelly was alive before she was murdered and didn't tend to use "Oh murder" as a greeting. But I'm a bit worried about this image of Prater knocking off Diddles in the sink. Is there any evidence for this - eg soapy claw marks? Maybe it was Diddles calling out "Yeooow miaou-der!" Perhaps our resident feline expert could comment? Come in Suzikins!

Love,

Caz
X

Just love the diddles bit, not too sure on the soapy bit, maybe bubbles of blood with claw marks, so up for debate then? Mind you Novemeber is close to xmas and cruxifiction is about death, so another view: Was it an early Merry Cryptmus greeting? Could we ask Mr M Boggles

[caz]

It comes as a mighty relief to me that Kelly was alive before she was murdered and didn't tend to use "Oh murder" as a greeting. But I'm a bit worried about this image of Prater knocking off Diddles in the sink. Is there any evidence for this - eg soapy claw marks? Maybe it was Diddles calling out "Yeooow miaou-der!" Perhaps our resident feline expert could comment? Come in Suzikins!

Love,

Caz
X

I think the suggestion that Kelly's door was open was coupled with a theory that a visitor had come to call and the expression of "Oh, murder" was Kelly's reaction upon greeting the person at the door or when awakened by the person entering her room.

I do not hold to this theory myself.

Hi Nemo,
No, i don't think ' O Murder ' was a greeting, probably it was a response to when given a murderous blow. I still find it hard to believe that the witness who said she was awake all night didn't hear a cry of ' O Murder ' if the cry came from outside Kelly's room, and a passer by would have alerted the police, as would have anyone except the murderer themself, highly unlikely he would have dobbed himself in. So a Cry of ' O Murder ' from a passer by would have fetched the police on Kelly's doorstep by around 7am or 8am at least.

Hi Shelley,

How you woke up in the morning would depend largely on where you actually lived in the area amongst other things. Residents would usually find their own way to gauge the time, using some local occurrence that they knew could be relied on.

Chimes from public buildings and churches was a favourite way. A lot of people still had rooster in the back garden somewhere near them (a lot of Eastenders had chickens in the back yard - even poorer households) and could use that to judge the time. Sunrise of course was another way to judge it at least at certain times in the year.

A person would generally get an inbuilt sense of what the time was anyway if they follow the same routine day after day, and would wake up at the right time automatically, without any external means of being nudged.

Someone living in Buck's Row for instance, would probably use the noise made by a passing goods train to judge the time. When I was a kid, with no clock or watch in my room, I used to get up for school by counting the trains passing over the bridge outside my bedroom window. (Same line that went passed Buck's Row)

The other way was to listen for things like a milk or dust cart passing, or policemen pounding the beat. In that sense it was a very interdepent means of getting up in the morning. For instance, someone that lived near a church would get up using the bell chimes, then go off to work. Someone else would hear them passing by and use them as a guide to get up, and so on along the line. Course, if someone had a day off sick, you were right up a certain creek.........

Bringing the post back on topic - witness testimonies can only be used as a rough guide for timing. In Mrs Prater's case, she said that Diddles disturbed her at about half-past three or a quarter to four so she was really only guessing the time and might well have been a fair bit out either way. The fact that Sarah Lewis estimated the cry of 'Oh murder' as being at just before four o clock supports the idea that Mrs Prater was a bit out in her guesstimate of the time. There was no real way for her to know what the exact time was.

Hugs

Jane

xxxxx

Hiya Janie,
That's a good detailed explaination of what times the folk went by and yes, you'd be up the creek if someone had been sick, so a late to work morning and wages garnished at the privilege of such conduct! I don't have a watch either, but being a modern gal always relied on the church clock in the front room
Yes, i would expect that quite a few minutes to almost an hour or so could be out of sink, Prater could have come around knocked diddles off at any time then dozed off again.
Good to see you on the Boards Janie, boy there is a lot of good posts with great info on them, but it would take a long time to get through them all, still it is amazing the attention to detail on these boards, some people have worked really hard at it.

[Nemo]

I think the suggestion that Kelly's door was open was coupled with a theory that a visitor had come to call and the expression of "Oh, murder" was Kelly's reaction upon greeting the person at the door or when awakened by the person entering her room.

I do not hold to this theory myself.

[Jane Coram]

Hi Shelley,

How you woke up in the morning would depend largely on where you actually lived in the area amongst other things. Residents would usually find their own way to gauge the time, using some local occurrence that they knew could be relied on.

Chimes from public buildings and churches was a favourite way. A lot of people still had rooster in the back garden somewhere near them (a lot of Eastenders had chickens in the back yard - even poorer households) and could use that to judge the time. Sunrise of course was another way to judge it at least at certain times in the year.

A person would generally get an inbuilt sense of what the time was anyway if they follow the same routine day after day, and would wake up at the right time automatically, without any external means of being nudged.

Someone living in Buck's Row for instance, would probably use the noise made by a passing goods train to judge the time. When I was a kid, with no clock or watch in my room, I used to get up for school by counting the trains passing over the bridge outside my bedroom window. (Same line that went passed Buck's Row)

The other way was to listen for things like a milk or dust cart passing, or policemen pounding the beat. In that sense it was a very interdepent means of getting up in the morning. For instance, someone that lived near a church would get up using the bell chimes, then go off to work. Someone else would hear them passing by and use them as a guide to get up, and so on along the line. Course, if someone had a day off sick, you were right up a certain creek.........

Bringing the post back on topic - witness testimonies can only be used as a rough guide for timing. In Mrs Prater's case, she said that Diddles disturbed her at about half-past three or a quarter to four so she was really only guessing the time and might well have been a fair bit out either way. The fact that Sarah Lewis estimated the cry of 'Oh murder' as being at just before four o clock supports the idea that Mrs Prater was a bit out in her guesstimate of the time. There was no real way for her to know what the exact time was.

Hugs

Jane

xxxxx

Hi Shelley

Apologies for misreading your post. Nevertheless it is a reasonable conjecture.

The cry appeared to come from the court...

It has been suggested that Kelly's door was open when the cry was made to account for the acoustics

However, the explanation could possibly be that Kelly was already dead and butchered by 3 am when some third party happened to look in the window and pretty much stifle their own cry of "Oh, murder!" before leaving...

As I said earlier, this is unlikely but certainly a possibility.

When you say she was "alive" before she was killed, do you mean "awake"?

As i have mentioned on another thread connected with this, there were three witnesses that gave statements and all were Mary Kelly's neighbours, two of them said they heard the cry of ' O Murder ' the third witness said she was awake all night and heard no cry of ' O Murder ' and given here position in the Court she would have heard a cry of ' O Murder ' if it had been another woman other than Kelly outside of Kelly's room, if the cry had come outside of Kelly's room the third witness could have heard it, because she didn't i am much more likely to believe that the cry came from inside Kelly's room by Kelly herself. In total there was 4 witnesses to Kelly: Prater, Lews, Cox and Hutchinson, however only three were women and her neighbours. Prater and Lews stated they heard the cry of Murder it was Cox that said she didn't hear any cry of ' O Murder '.

Hi Shelley

Apologies for misreading your post. Nevertheless it is a reasonable conjecture.

The cry appeared to come from the court...

It has been suggested that Kelly's door was open when the cry was made to account for the acoustics

However, the explanation could possibly be that Kelly was already dead and butchered by 3 am when some third party happened to look in the window and pretty much stifle their own cry of "Oh, murder!" before leaving...

As I said earlier, this is unlikely but certainly a possibility.

When you say she was "alive" before she was killed, do you mean "awake"?

Ah yes, her killer could have left her door ajar and perhaps knew a good timing of other peoples coming and goings around the neighbours. I would have thought that if some other woman cried out ' O Murder ' upon seeing Kelly's body, she would have screamed the place down and shouted get the police! as well. No i just meant Kelly was still alive, as on another post i mentioned that to my mind she was lying on the bed resting after having been drinking and either didn't move because of the drink or she knew her surprise visitor, or both. I mean if your still alive as well as a bit of the worse for wear for drink and someone is attacking you you could still be aware and move a bit in defense, but some good blows will weaken you, so hence the faint cry heard of murder.

[Nemo]

Hi Shelley

Apologies for misreading your post. Nevertheless it is a reasonable conjecture.

The cry appeared to come from the court...

It has been suggested that Kelly's door was open when the cry was made to account for the acoustics

However, the explanation could possibly be that Kelly was already dead and butchered by 3 am when some third party happened to look in the window and pretty much stifle their own cry of "Oh, murder!" before leaving...

As I said earlier, this is unlikely but certainly a possibility.

When you say she was "alive" before she was killed, do you mean "awake"?

Hi Shelley

That is an interesting conjecture that maybe someone else discovered the murder scene and cried "Oh, murder!" - and then saw fit not to report it or raise the cry...unlikely I think, but possible

Most timings seem to be made via routine/regular events such as "I knew it was after 4 because the lodging light was out" or "It must have been after 5 because everyone was preparing for market" etc - supposed accurate timings only seem to be had when a clock could be seen or heard in the vicinity - even most policemen had no timepiece.

Sometimes boys were employed to wake workers to ensure they were at work on time. I agree that waking up and trying to guage the time would be very sketchy indeed.

Hi Nemo,
I didn't say that someone else discovered the body of Kelly and cried ' O Murder ', above i just mentioned the possible ways that the ordinary poor folk of the east end could have told the time. On another post i actually said that i would have thought that with two witnesses who were women and neighbours of Kelly, both stated that they heard a woman's voice cry ' O Murder ' and given the fact that Mary kelly had defense wounds on her finger or thumb and the blood spattering in the room she was killed whilst still alive, it is reasonable to assume that the voice of a woman that cried out ' O murder ' would have been Kelly herself and adds weight to the fact that she was still alive when attacked by the killer, i also said in another post that ' Blotchy ' wouldn't have been the killer of Kelly to my mind, Blotchy would have left the scene long before, my opinion is that Mary Kelly is not a Ripper victim but a nasty domestic killing.

[Nemo]

Hi Shelley

That is an interesting conjecture that maybe someone else discovered the murder scene and cried "Oh, murder!" - and then saw fit not to report it or raise the cry...unlikely I think, but possible

Most timings seem to be made via routine/regular events such as "I knew it was after 4 because the lodging light was out" or "It must have been after 5 because everyone was preparing for market" etc - supposed accurate timings only seem to be had when a clock could be seen or heard in the vicinity - even most policemen had no timepiece.

Sometimes boys were employed to wake workers to ensure they were at work on time. I agree that waking up and trying to guage the time would be very sketchy indeed.

Interesting thread, Stewart.
What bothers me though are the references to specific or non-specific times.
A few years ago I invited a specialist horologist in these matters to comment on this specific theme on the boards, which he did, maintaining that it would have been highly unlikely that any of the witnesses would have possessed a time piece in 1888, or even the large lodging houses for that matter. As can be seen from many other witness statements in the case, time was always fixed from a church clock, or in some cases a brewery clock... so how could a witness, suddenly woken by a cry in the night, have fixed the time from their bed?
The horologist also maintained that, given the distance from Big Ben, all parish church clocks would have been from ten to twenty minutes out of cinque with GMT.
It is a crucial issue that many gloss over or completely ignore.

I would like to ask about how would people know what time to get up for work? Would this be perhaps either listening to a clock chiming, i don't know if Big Ben could be heard from Whitechapel, but a church or brewery clock could perhaps be heard that was nearer, i think with some clocks you would just hear the ' O ' clock sounding out, but with others the half past and quarter past, some even with 10 past an so on, also there is an old way of timing by candles. Still it could be a bit hazy as to actual time if you are woken up and go back off to sleep again.

Cry of Murder

If there was a faint cry of murder, is there any possibility that Mary Kelly could have shouted out ' Oh Murder '? As i would think that taking the view that Murder was cried out, if someone else came accross Kelly's body they would be yelling and screaming ' Murder, Murder ' or even shouting out ' Murder, Murder get the police '.