Four little words

[Tom_Wescott]

It's a distasteful thought, but someone emptying a chamber pot from the first floor window directly above the body could have been responsible.

LOL. That idea's so wacky it's probably the actual truth of what happened. Great suggestion, Bridewell.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Wickerman]

It'd be safe, nobody would touch it

[Robert]

That's a funny place to keep gin.

[Bridewell]

It's a distasteful thought, but someone emptying a chamber pot from the first floor window directly above the body could have been responsible.

[Tom_Wescott]

I suppose we could be back to urine from her own bladder?

C4

That or the Ripper's own urine. In fact, that's more likely than Chapman's urine unless you're suggesting he had time to play in her urine but not to dispose of his own.

Or water. But if water, we have to ask ourselves why it was over the body and why he didn't use the tap. Did he perhaps bring his own water for that purpose? Had he washed at the tap the water wouldn't have been all over Chapman.

Thanks Wick for the posts about the canvass. I too read it as the Inspector instructing Kent to do that.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Ginger]

Had she been sprinkled with gin, I'd think that someone would have remarked upon the smell, even moreso than with urine, a smell that might reasonably be expected from a mutilated body. While I never before considered the matter, it is interesting to me in light of this discussion how much interest is shown at Annie's inquest into the matter of whether she'd had any liquor to drink that night. The coroner stresses the matter in his summing-up, and opines (as did Dr. Philips) that she'd had none that night.

If she did have gin on her clothes, is it possible that the fact was being withheld by the authorities? Could that line of questioning at the inquest have been intended to establish that Annie could not have spilled gin on her dress herself, as she had none? I don't know enough about the working relationship between the police and the coroner to speculate intelligently.

I can see the obvious appeal behind the idea of Jack enticing her into the backyard with the promise of a nip from his flask, then, once the deed was done, throwing the gin contemptuously over her ("There's your gin!"), but I really don't believe it. That requires the Ripper to see her as a person, an individual, even if an individual for whom he felt scathing contempt. I just don't think he felt that much connection with his victims. As I've said, though, that's just opinion, without much to back it up.

[Wickerman]

If her skin or clothing had gotten wet, it was through some other agency than the formation of dew.

I wouldn't discount the possibility that the killer had not rinsed his hands at the tap in the yard, though I understand the police(?) claimed to have checked for blood beneath the tap.

James Kent claimed that her apron was laid, or lifted up, over her disarranged clothes. If the apron was greasy then water may have beaded on it rather than be absorbed into it?

Interestingly, then Kent claims to fetch a piece of canvass to throw over her.
"... I got a piece of canvass from the shop to throw over the body,.."

Then Insp. Chandler claimed to do the same:
"...I obtained some sacking to cover it before the arrival of the surgeon,.."

Perhaps it was Chandler who directed Kent to find something to cover the body?
Regardless, the water is now obscured & absorbed by the canvass by the time Dr Phillips arrives.

[curious4]

Bladder

I suppose we could be back to urine from her own bladder?

C4

[Wickerman]

So what of the morning dew hypothesis?

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

"I saw some water, which seemed to me as if it had been thrown at her."
Echo, 12th.

"She looked as if she had been sprinkled with water or something."
Daily News, 13th.

"You spoke of some liquid having been thrown over her. Did you notice any water or anything? -I could not tell what it was."
Morning Advertiser, 13th.

Morning Dew tends to spread itself evenly across a surface as it is the result of the difference between the temperature of a surface, and the ambient temperature of the air.
Whatever James Kent saw it does not appear to have been something evenly spread across her body.

If it was Dew, then the body must have been in-situ for some time, supporting the suggestion by Dr Phillips.
Although Kent appears to describe a liquid inconsistently spread across her (as if it had been thrown?). Does he mean in patches?

[Tom_Wescott]

If the Ripper didn't urinate on her for lack of time, surely he wouldn't waste both time and gin on her? If he did, he clearly was not an Englishman!

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

P.S. thanks for the dew info, Ginger.

[curious4]

Thanks

Hello Ginger,

Thanks. I did look up facts regarding the formation of dew, but as I usually spent my science lessons catching up on sleep, I rapidly found my attention wandering and gave up. Great to have things explained so clearly.

Although, looking up "Weather conditions in London on the nights of the Whitechapel murders", I got a slightly different weather picture.

Not dew then. Gin?

Best wishes,
C4

[Ginger]

I doubt that it could have been dew. Dew condenses on objects that are cooler than the atmosphere. The low temperature that night was around 50F, per http://www.casebook.org/victorian_london/weather.html. If the relative humidity for the day is recorded anywhere, I've yet to discover it. However, both the Friday and the Saturday are described as 'fine', 'bright' and 'clear'. To my mind, that argues for a reasonable relative humidity, perhaps around 50% to 65%, which accords well with the chart of London's aggregate historical humidity at http://weatherspark.com/averages/287...United-Kingdom. Calculating the dew point for those values (there's a handy slider-type tool at http://www.dpcalc.org/) shows that dew wouldn't have formed on Annie's body unless she reached a temperature between 39F and 32F, which just wasn't going to happen under the conditions.

If her skin or clothing had gotten wet, it was through some other agency than the formation of dew.

[Tom_Wescott]

So what of the morning dew hypothesis?

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[curious4]

Facts

Hello Tom,

Mrs Richardson testified that the pail of water left by the tap was untouched. He didn't wash his hands. At least this was the conclusion reached at the time.

I don't believe Jack urinated on any of his victims. He had had his "fun", was pressed for time in all cases, barring Mary Kelly, and (possibly) was looking forward to the hullabaloo when the bodies were found. Sorry, just don't believe he would have hung around unbuttoning his trousers/lifting his kilt just to humilate his victims even more. Time was a factor, he could have been spotted at any time.

Best wishes,
C4

[Tom_Wescott]

The difference is we can reasonably place a man with a penis and a bladder in the backyard of 29 Hanbury Street at the appropriate time who was provably not shy about expressing his opinion on womankind. So there's really no comparison between the urination scenario and your phantom rain shower. It's all speculation but even speculation should be contained and informed by facts. There was a water faucet in the backyard as well, so it could have come from that. Perhaps the Ripper washed something, maybe his hands. Maybe it WAS Chapman's own urine, though with my lack of knowledge of such things, I can't see how.

Because of the various possibilities presented by what was actually known to have been in the backyard that morning, I don't 'think' it was any one of those things, but suppose it could have been any of them.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott