Can't get past Maxwell

[Dickere]

Thank you, it is an interesting comment that Bond's comment is strictly speaking unclear. English is not my first language either, but I would definitely read the "distinct" as "very clear".

I understand that ecchymosis could be a sign of strangling, but Bond wrote that the "skin cuts in the front of the neck" had ecchymosis. It seems a very narrow or small area for ecchymosis to show up, if it came from strangling.

This would perhaps support the theory that the killer used a ligature - say, a red handkerchief - and cut along the lines of the mark it made?

As a native speaker, distinct means clear or obvious (to an expert). Distinctive means something that stands out, so that's the meaning here. It is distinct as in it is definitely this thing, rather than possibly some other thing(s).

[JULIO M.]

In support of the previous exposition of Varqm

In the book of Evans & Skinner: "Jack the Ripper Sourcebook", on page 367 we find that evidence given at the Inquest into the death of M.J.Kelly are kept in the Greater London Record Office.

On book page 368: "Middlesex, TO WIT. The Information of Witnesses severally taken and acknowledged on behalf of our Sovereign Lady the Queen,...", "...on the Inquisition then and there taken on View of the body of the said Mary J Kelly then and there lying dead".

We also can read on the same page the testimony of Joseph Barnett: "I have seen the body. I identified her by the ear and the eyes. I am positive it is the same woman".
Also on page 370 the testimony of John McCarthy: "...I knew the deceased as Mary Jane Kelly I have seen the body and have no doubt as to the identity."

These are official documents of testimonies given under oath, not newspaper accounts.

Another Joseph Barnet evidence: "I have lived with the deceased one year and eight months..." and "...I have lived with her at 13 room, Miller´s Court. eight months or longer..."

It seems to me that MJ Kelly who, according to some people, presumably was threatened, in great fear for her life and in continuous flight, did not escape very fast nor very far.

[Varqm]

It was/is a common sense that the witness view the body first.I think in the Coles inquest a bartender witness had to view the body first before he can continue his testimony.In Abberline's letter to his superior he acknowledged that although he believed ,at least initially,in Hutch he still has to bring Hutch to the Shoreditch mortuary to view the body,which was a bit odd.
Right off the bat there is a provision in the Coroner's Act 1887 to have the jury and coroner view the body before the inquest begins ,which they did in MJK' s case,but not the witnesses.

[Robert St Devil]

Hair and eyes. That's how the Morning Advertiser reported Joesph Barnett's identification of Mary Kelly. And some credence may be given to the report since the reporter also added the quip about Barnett kissing the Bible at the administration of the oath, which leans towards the reporter having first-hand account of the proceedings rather than having obtained his report thru second-hand statements.

Jospeh Barnett: I have seen the body of the deceased, and I identify it by the hair and eyes... [Morning Advertiser 13 Nov 1888]

Joseph Barnett: ... which are all that I can recognise; but I am positive it is the same woman [Daily Telegraph 13 Nov 1888]

Taken alongside the report in the Daily News 12 Nov 1888 by Elizabeth Phoenix who described Mary Kelly (of 3 years prior) as:

...a woman about 5ft 7in in height, and of a rather stout build, with blue eyes and a very fine head of hair, which reached nearly to her waist.

So...

It could be that, at the date & time of her murder, Mary Kelly could have been distinguished (as well as positively identified) by the features of her hair.

The Daily News of the same day also included the following:

Every portion of the deceased was fully accounted for, and at the conclusion of the [postmortem] investigation the various pieces were sewn together [by the doctors attending the mortuary] and placed in a coffin.

The Times (London) added that Jospeh Barnett identified the body of Mary Kelly because he...

...had seen the body in the mortuary [13 Nov 1888]

Which got me to thinking about the Elizabeth Stride inquest...in particular, about Elizabeth Tanner

Elizabeth Tanner:I have seen the body of the deceased [Elizabeth Stride] at St. George's Mortuary

Which led me to question(s)...

was this procedure of viewing the body a general practice of inquest witnesses? more to the point, would Caroline Maxwell have seen the body of Mary Kelly at the mortuary prior to attending the inquest?

In other words, would Caroline Maxwell been given another opportunity to reconsider the Mary Kelly in the mortuary being the same Mary Kelly that she had spoken with on Dorset street a day or two prior?

[Varqm]

I believe in the scenario Kelly was killed at around 4 am.Kelly was believed by the doctors to have been killed while lying down-Phillips,partly still drunk.Lots of blood.
The cry was the time she was surprised and killed.
This was not a client scenario .Nichols,Stride and Eddowes were killed silently,starting while standing up.

[Wickerman]

...I understand that ecchymosis could be a sign of strangling, but Bond wrote that the "skin cuts in the front of the neck" had ecchymosis. It seems a very narrow or small area for ecchymosis to show up, if it came from strangling.

This would perhaps support the theory that the killer used a ligature -

We might recall the theory of Dr Brownfield, that this killer might have used a thin cord to strangle all his victims. Then run the knife through the mark made by the cord which would produce the effect noted by Bond.

[spyglass]

Hi Richardnunweek

Do you not think this a highly brutal approach to disappearing, which could easily have been achieved without the need to murder someone?

I wouldn't suggest that Kelly was involved in someone else getting murdered, it was a lucky coincidence ( for Kelly ) that someone else just happened to be there, if not it would have been her.
kelly took this opportunity to finally disappear for good.
Im not saying this is what happened, just a possible scenario, But I have long been intrigued with a Fenian connection.

[etenguy]

The co-author of the work is my daughter. Unhappily I do not have her close all the time I need it because she was in total charge of anything related to the written material and things along the internet which for me is a stressful task.

Hi Julio

You and your daughter have done a good job and completed an interesting piece of work. It supports the questioning of traditional views of Kelly's time of death and perhaps even shifts the probability in favour of a later time of death.

[JULIO M.]

When talking about the ripper you never can discount any probability, but his "Modus Operandi" consisted primarily in avoiding what he considered (probably)unnecessary and unwanted cries of help from victims by strangulation or suffocation until fainting (or death in, maybe, the first two cases, Nichols & Chapman). Then definitively silence them by slitting her throat from ear to ear in a very aggressive manner, using the knife so fiercely it marked the intervertebral cartilage. I do not think he used ligatures (of any type or colour) in any of the crimes. He was a primitive but resolutive manual worker. I think.

[etenguy]

Hi If we take the scenario that Kelly was being hunted by someone, and she believed her days were numbered, It could have been a case of survival , what else better then to become a victim of the Ripper, , and to leave an mutilated corpse on her bed in her room , with her clothes nearby, The hunter would believe she had become the Rippers victim , and stop hunting her,. Then a lot of unexplained happenings would make sense, so who was the woman on the bed? and who butchered her in that manner.? Regards Richard,..[ If nothing else what a great movie twist in the case that would be ]

Hi Richardnunweek

Do you not think this a highly brutal approach to disappearing, which could easily have been achieved without the need to murder someone?

[Kattrup]

Hello Kattrup. Dr Bond wrote: "...The skin cuts in the front of the neck showed distinct ecchymosis…”. Ecchymosis is not exactly a bruise, but a little punctiform haemorrhage which may have different etiologies and that in this particular case I think was caused by someone making pressure over the neck. The front part of the neck. If we consider that the woman was lying in a supine position (face up) and the man above her, presumably he tried to prevent her from screaming, firstly by manual strangulation and once silenced ( but not dead, as there were visible arterial blood splashes in the right wall) by cutting the throat in his peculiar manner already showed previous and exclusively in the cases of Nicholls, Chapman and Eddowes. My level of English language does not allow me to distinguish the clear meaning of "distinct". Perhaps "very clear" or perhaps "several".Ecchymosis comes from greek and is a word that both English and Spanish have the same meaning and pronunciation but the inconvenient that either singular or plural is written and sounds the same.

Thank you, it is an interesting comment that Bond's comment is strictly speaking unclear. English is not my first language either, but I would definitely read the "distinct" as "very clear".

I understand that ecchymosis could be a sign of strangling, but Bond wrote that the "skin cuts in the front of the neck" had ecchymosis. It seems a very narrow or small area for ecchymosis to show up, if it came from strangling.

This would perhaps support the theory that the killer used a ligature - say, a red handkerchief - and cut along the lines of the mark it made?

[JULIO M.]

The co-author of the work is my daughter. Unhappily I do not have her close all the time I need it because she was in total charge of anything related to the written material and things along the internet which for me is a stressful task.

[JULIO M.]

Hello Kattrup. Dr Bond wrote: "...The skin cuts in the front of the neck showed distinct ecchymosis…”. Ecchymosis is not exactly a bruise, but a little punctiform haemorrhage which may have different etiologies and that in this particular case I think was caused by someone making pressure over the neck. The front part of the neck. If we consider that the woman was lying in a supine position (face up) and the man above her, presumably he tried to prevent her from screaming, firstly by manual strangulation and once silenced ( but not dead, as there were visible arterial blood splashes in the right wall) by cutting the throat in his peculiar manner already showed previous and exclusively in the cases of Nicholls, Chapman and Eddowes. My level of English language does not allow me to distinguish the clear meaning of "distinct". Perhaps "very clear" or perhaps "several".Ecchymosis comes from greek and is a word that both English and Spanish have the same meaning and pronunciation but the inconvenient that either singular or plural is written and sounds the same.

[Kattrup]

I AM SORRY. ENGLISH IS NOT MY MOTHER LANGUAGE AND COMPUTERS EITHER. I THINK I MISSPELLED THE DOI NUMBER. THE WHOLE WORK IS BASED ON WILLIAMS BEADLE´S BOOK BUT WITH A MEDICAL ADAPTATION WHICH SLIGHTLY MODIFIES HIS VIEW. IT TRIES TO CONFIRM THE HOUR WITH A GREAT PROBABILITY.
https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4118183

Thank you Julio and to your co-author. Quite interesting.

I wonder why you wrote that MJK probably was strangled? There does not seem to be anything in Bond's comments about it, or what do you think?

[richardnunweek]

Kelly was a woman who had a vague back story, very likely a false name and a woman who didnt want to be found.
she seems to me a Woman on the run from something.
Was she involved somehow with the Irish problems...an informer possibly ?
was she being hunted and realised she had been found ?
Did she escape someone's vengeance by the skin of her teeth and spent the rest of her life on the move?

Hi If we take the scenario that Kelly was being hunted by someone, and she believed her days were numbered, It could have been a case of survival , what else better then to become a victim of the Ripper, , and to leave an mutilated corpse on her bed in her room , with her clothes nearby, The hunter would believe she had become the Rippers victim , and stop hunting her,. Then a lot of unexplained happenings would make sense, so who was the woman on the bed? and who butchered her in that manner.? Regards Richard,..[ If nothing else what a great movie twist in the case that would be ]