Morris Lewis and the reporting of his story

[Elamarna]

Hi Abby
There is a third fairly obvious option. In that Maxwell and Lewis were correct and also the TOD is between 3 and 6 as most suspect it is.
Only leaves one conclusion if you believe both.its a conclusion I came to many years ago

Dear Packers,

yes most will agree on the TOD. (not all as we know).

And as you say, it about do you believe Maxwell and Lewis, you do, others do not.

unfortunately like so much in the case, it is unresolvable unless new evidence comes to light.

regards

Steve

[John G]

Hi John
Is it not rather odd that every witness is unreliable if they've seen something of importance?

There was something that could have been done at the time but clearly was not done.
Elizabeth Long. Witness. Taken to view a body
Mathew Packer. Witness. Taken to view 2 bodies
All manner of witnesses. Taken to view Catherine Eddowes

Caroline Maxwell. A witness of utmost importance. Taken to the cleaners with Lewis being slated as unreliable for probably the same reason.

It is a reasonable assumption that the body was impossible to view. Leaving Barnett and McCarthy's identification as a sham

Ah yes, the old romancer Matthew Packer, the man who sold rabbits to Jack the Ripper's cousin and who blatantly lied about not being spoken to by the police.

[John G]

Where does this come from out of interest John?

Hi David,

Begg, P, Jack the Ripper: The Facts, 2004, p286.

[David Orsam]

Hi Abby,

Here are my responses:

However, I still find it hard to Beleive there was enough time for Mary to pick up her killer at the bar walk back to her room (restart the fire? Burn clothes,Have it burn back down) be killed and mutilated and the killer to have escape without being seen by the time her body was discovered. Not sure if all this is physically even possible.

If Kelly met her killer shortly after 9am then I personally can't see any problem in those things being done in one and a half hours. A few of the things you mention are very quick indeed. Walking back to room from Britannia: 2 minutes? Starting fire: 1 minute? Being killed: 10 seconds? Escape: 1 minute?

After 10am makes it tight but we would, I think, need an expert opinion before ruling it out.

Also, I can't help but think that the doctors and all the police, detectives and abberline, who undoubtedly must have been very experienced in finding blood evidence at crime scenes, would know by experience and intuition from looking at the body and blood, how dry it was, what the stains looked like, that they all instinctively pretty much felt that the murder had happened several hours earlier, ie., in the middle of the night and not that it was very fresh, being just several minutes old. Perhaps this was discussed amongst themselves and just not written down?

I don't think that what you are suggesting is actually possible.

Also, we do have evidence of the murder taking place much earlier in the middle of the night, the corroborated heard screams of murder, heard by two witnesses around four in the morning, one of which said it sounded like that of a young woman and that it was very near.

Interesting that you say "screams". I'll come back to that.

It's tempting to rely on the cry of "murder" for the time of death but Prater said in her statement that she didn't take much notice of it because "I frequently hear such cries from the back of the lodging-house where the windows look into Millers Court". At the inquest she confirmed: "It was nothing uncommon to hear cries of murder so I took no notice".

That being so - her clear evidence - how can we possibly rely on such a thing for the time of death?

There are some odd things about the evidence relating to this anyway.

Prater, living almost above Kelly's room, said in her evidence: "the voice was in a faint voice". According to the Daily Telegraph report she said it was a "suppressed cry".

Sarah Lewis, however, in 2 Millers Court, said, according to the Telegraph: "I heard a female's voice shouting 'Murder' loudly".

Odd, no?

Then what about Prater's statement of 9 November. In that she said:

"I heard screams of murder about two or three times in a female voice".

But at the inquest, when asked if she heard the cry of murder a second time, she said "no" according to the Telegraph.

One single scream. So why did she originally say she had heard two or three screams? What do we make of that?

And then what about Mary Ann Cox who came into her room at 3am and then didn't go to sleep for the rest of the night. She said "I should have heard any cry of murder I heard nothing".

Are you seeing any discrepancies here?

Added to that we have the doctors TOD which any way you look at it is much earlier than a post nine am murder.

But the doctor came to his conclusion based mainly on digestion of food in the stomach about which it was not medically possible for him to produce a reliable estimate of the time of death. Nor on rigor or rigidity for that matter. The police might as well have brought a psychic in for his or her opinion. Such an estimate would have been just as scientifically worthless as the doctor's.

[David Orsam]

Begg, P, Jack the Ripper: The Facts, 2004, p286.

But where does he get it from?

[John G]

Hi John,

I can't help thinking you are unnecessarily complicating matters.

I've dealt with the Horn of Plenty sighting in another post. As for the Britannia sighting, in the LWN report Lewis says that he couldn't say who Kelly was with. I have already said that the fact that only Lewis saw Kelly in the Britannia is a factor to be taken into consideration when assessing his reliability but, for the reasons I have given, I really don't find it "strange". It would only be strange if we had evidence from someone who was in the Britannia that morning who confirmed that they knew Kelly and that they would have seen her if she had been in there.

You can't ignore the fact that Lewis said to a reporter that he saw Kelly in the Britannia that morning and Mrs Maxwell said on oath that she saw her outside the Britannia that morning.

We are certainly not talking about a "major local conspiracy". Why do you say that? There is no conspiracy required here at all.

There might have been a rumour circulated that Kelly was drinking in the Britannia that morning but unless it was published somewhere we wouldn't know about it. Were all rumours in this case published?

What you call "the fundamental problem" (or one of them), being the lack of surviving police reports, isn't actually a problem in respect of the points I am making. It's a problem for our understanding. We simply don't know anything about the police view on Lewis, if they had one.

As for the fact that Lewis didn't appear at the inquest, I have said that is a factor to take into consideration, but we don't know why he didn't appear. Mention of Schwartz is irrelevant in my view but, in that case, the police seem to have believed him (per Swanson's report) yet he still, apparently, wasn't called.

Finally, we are the mercy of newspaper reporters here and it is inevitable that they would have made mistakes. We have to make judgments as best we can about what was said. Sometimes we simply can't sort the wheat from the chaff. I know it's tempting to want to come to definitive conclusions but sometimes we can't do it.

The only thing I can really do is turn the question around: Where is the evidence that Kelly was murdered before 9am? I'm saying there really isn't any.

Hello David

Firstly, if Paul Begg is correct about the Britannia landlady stating that it had been quiet on the morning of the Lewis "sighting", and that she was therefore certain that Kelly hadn't been there, then I think Lewis' evidence is pretty much blown out of the water.

I would say that, as witnesses go, George Hutchinson has to be regarded as more reliable than Lewis, because at least his evidence was properly scrutinized, and we know Abberline believed him, at least initially (not that I'm saying Hutchinson is necessarily a reliable witness.)

In stark contrast, all we have from Lewis is a series of conflicting press reports, which suggests to me that he may have been inventing the story as he went along.

Regarding the Britannia sightings. Maxwell claimed to have seen Kelly outside the pub as 9:00am, whereas in one of Lewis' accounts he sees her inside the pub after 10:00am. Therefore the accounts don't really correspond at all. However, of even greatest importance is the fact that Lewis is reported as having gone to the Britannia, where he allegedly saw Kelly, after playing a game of pitch and toss. However, in an earlier version, he refers to the game but doesn't mention going to the pub. It's therefore possible that his Britannia story was thrown into the mix after he became aware of other accounts, i.e. Maxwell's.

I am fortified in this conclusion by the reference he also makes to seeing Kelly return with some milk. Now, of course, Maxwell also mentions going to the milk shop, so I wonder if he has once again incorporated elements of Maxwell's statement into his own account, but got the facts confused, i.e. because he was relying on rumours of what Maxwell was supposed to have said.

The reason I refer to a "conspiracy" is that both Maxwell and Lewis mention seeing Kelly long after she was presumed to be dead. Moreover, in versions of Lewis' accounts it is at least intimated that he saw her with Barnett which, if true, would surely elevate him to the status of main suspect. Therefore, I consider it virtually inconceivable that no other witness would have reported these later sightings-Particularly as Lewis Mentions seeing her with other people- unless they were part of a cover up, probably involving Barnett.

Finally, is there any evidence that Kelly was killed before 9:00am? No, there isn't. In fact, I will go further, considering that Barnett claimed to have identified the victim from her eyes and ears, I would have to agree with Packers that it is doubtful she was even effectively identified.

[John G]

But where does he get it from?

Ah, I thought you would ask that! Unfortunately, he doesn't give a reference, he simply refers to the fact that there were enquiries made by the police at the Britannia and other pubs, and no evidence could be found of Kellie being served with beer on the morning of her death. He then adds, "Indeed the landlady of the Britannia said that the pub hadn't been busy that morning and she was therefore certain that Kelly hadn't been there." (Begg, 2004, p286).

[packers stem]

Hi John

Ah yes, the old romancer Matthew Packer, the man who sold rabbits to Jack the Ripper's cousin and who blatantly lied about not being spoken to by the police.

Is there a suggestion that Packer did not make a mortuary visit? Irrespective of rabbits....
The importance of my post surrounds why Maxwell was not taken to view the body if Abberline was in any doubt at all about her identification
Same goes for Maurice Lewis

[David Orsam]

Ah, I thought you would ask that! Unfortunately, he doesn't give a reference, he simply refers to the fact that there were enquiries made by the police at the Britannia and other pubs, and no evidence could be found of Kellie being served with beer on the morning of her death. He then adds, "Indeed the landlady of the Britannia said that the pub hadn't been busy that morning and she was therefore certain that Kelly hadn't been there." (Begg, 2004, p286).

That's not very good. Without coming over all "Pierre", how are supposed to accept that without some kind of source reference?

[David Orsam]

Regarding the Britannia sightings. Maxwell claimed to have seen Kelly outside the pub as 9:00am, whereas in one of Lewis' accounts he sees her inside the pub after 10:00am. Therefore the accounts don't really correspond at all. However, of even greatest importance is the fact that Lewis is reported as having gone to the Britannia, where he allegedly saw Kelly, after playing a game of pitch and toss. However, in an earlier version, he refers to the game but doesn't mention going to the pub. It's therefore possible that his Britannia story was thrown into the mix after he became aware of other accounts, i.e. Maxwell's.

I am fortified in this conclusion by the reference he also makes to seeing Kelly return with some milk. Now, of course, Maxwell also mentions going to the milk shop, so I wonder if he has once again incorporated elements of Maxwell's statement into his own account, but got the facts confused, i.e. because he was relying on rumours of what Maxwell was supposed to have said.

Hi John,

I've already dealt with the 9am v 10am point. The early reports said Lewis was playing pitch and toss at 9am. Why can't Lewis or the LWN reporter have got confused about timings later that evening or the next day?

You say that Lewis refers to seeing Kelly return with some milk. Actually he never said that. He told a P.A. reporter that the woman then believed to have been murdered returned with some milk. The suggestion in my OP was that, at the time this newspaper report was written, the identity of the murdered woman was unconfirmed and Lewis was thinking of someone else.

[David Orsam]

The reason I refer to a "conspiracy" is that both Maxwell and Lewis mention seeing Kelly long after she was presumed to be dead.

What does it matter when she was "presumed" to be dead? Yes, there was a conspiracy of some sort if they saw Kelly after the woman in 13 Millers Court was, in fact, dead but that's the thing we haven't established.

Moreover, in versions of Lewis' accounts it is at least intimated that he saw her with Barnett which, if true, would surely elevate him to the status of main suspect. Therefore, I consider it virtually inconceivable that no other witness would have reported these later sightings-Particularly as Lewis Mentions seeing her with other people- unless they were part of a cover up, probably involving Barnett.

Well John, answer me the question. Where was Kelly between 8pm and 11.45pm on the night of her death. You don't find it "inconceivable" that no-one saw her anywhere?

[John G]

That's not very good. Without coming over all "Pierre", how are supposed to accept that without some kind of source reference?

Hello David,

Yes, it's a bit remiss of Paul, especially when one considers his deserved status in the Ripperology community, and the statement he makes is clearly of some importance. Maybe you could drop him an email and request clarification- I would do it myself, but I don't have his address, as were obviously not acquainted!

[David Orsam]

Finally, is there any evidence that Kelly was killed before 9:00am? No, there isn't.

Right thank you, so now we are down to the nitty gritty.

Number of witnesses at inquest testifying that Kelly was killed before 9:00am: NONE

Number of witnesses at inquest testifying that Kelly was alive at 9:00am: ONE

It's 1-0 to alive!

[John G]

Right thank you, so now we are down to the nitty gritty.

Number of witnesses at inquest testifying that Kelly was killed before 9:00am: NONE

Number of witnesses at inquest testifying that Kelly was alive at 9:00am: ONE

It's 1-0 to alive!

Well, I'm assuming that the only witness who could effectively testify to Kelly being killed before 9:00am would be her killer, but unfortunately he didn't make an appearance at the inquest either...mind you, on second thoughts, maybe he did!

So, you're obviously correct, although I would conclude 1-0 to the possibly unreliable witness!

[packers stem]

Hello David,

Yes, it's a bit remiss of Paul, especially when one considers his deserved status in the Ripperology community, and the statement he makes is clearly of some importance. Maybe you could drop him an email and request clarification- I would do it myself, but I don't have his address, as were obviously not acquainted!

As far as I'm aware there is no surviving official report from the landlady .
We have Maurice lewis' name ,it's abundantly clear that he knew who Kelly was with the mentioning of Dan .
The landlady ,as she remains unidentified ,could just as easily be a barmaid and holds about the same weight as the unidentified young woman ,who's name was known ,who also saw Kelly between 8.30 and 8.45 according to the times on the 12th .Had the reporter been a little more inquisitive we could well have had 3 independent sightings