Patricia Cornwell - Walter Sickert - BOOK 2

[Elamarna]

I am reading the evidence the way I see it, and I am accordingly reasoning that anybody who was not old enough in 1873 to be the likely killer of the 1873 torso victim, is not likely to be the Ripper either, since I am pretty certain that they were one and the same man.
I am not telling people that the gospel we should live by is accepting this. I am saying that not haveing been of age in 1873 is a very serious flaw in my book, whenever choosing a Ripper suspect.

Christer,

Firstly thanks for explaining on the other thread, your reasoning for 147 Cable Street, which as I suspected is not based any palpable evidence, just your reasoning that if Lechmere were the killer it is an obvious place.
Which is a fair conclusion once one takes that approach.


I have also been following the exchange between you and Paul, and I see the problems that I and some others have with your theory on the two killers being the same is still unresolved.

This falls into two broad areas

While there are some similarities between some of the Torso and Ripper killings, these are not compelling for some who have a background in medical/natural science.

We have discussed that before, flaps, cuts etc, and I see no need to rehash that again, particularly on a thread which has apparently moved far from its original topic, and would move even further.

The other more important issue, therefore, given we are unlikely to agree on the first point at present, is your repeated pointers to 1873.

You have stated I believe that the 1873 case includes pointers, that are, obvious to you, with regards to links to 1888 and to the possible reason for both sets of murders.

The problem with the above is that you are not at present prepared to say what these observations are. Indeed on the other forum, you even said you were sorry that you would/could not reveal them yet.

While I fully respect that view, it does make the acceptance of your view on this particular issue impossible to accept at present, or even to meaningfully discuss.


If I am wrong on any that, it is my misunderstanding and I apologize


And let me be clear, I do not rule out the possibility that the two sets of murders were committed by the same hand, to do so would be unreasonable; however I see it as no more than that, a possibility!

I patiently await the release of this new information.


Steve

[Fisherman]

PaulB: I don't make any demands 'about a historically correct approach to Ripperology'. There are widely accepted 'rules' about conducting history and they should be followed. They are not my 'rules'. I do not demand that they be followed. I don't know where you got that nonsense from.

Well, mainly from criticism you have directed at me over time. If I am wrong about it, so much the better.

You can accept that the 1873 and the 1888 murders were committed by the same person. You can accept anything you like. I simply think it is unfair - and in my view unprofessional - to discount as a valid suspect someone who could not have committed the 1873 crime and therefore does not fit your criteria. Obviously you will disagree. That's up to you.

I think you may be overreacting somewhat. Patrica Cornwell has all the means it takes to push her suspect, and she does so in an emphatic manner. What I think about it will not have any measurable impact at all. Furthermore, I am not telling anybody to follow my example. Nor would people do so if I did.
I am reading the evidence the way I see it, and I am accordingly reasoning that anybody who was not old enough in 1873 to be the likely killer of the 1873 torso victim, is not likely to be the Ripper either, since I am pretty certain that they were one and the same man.
I am not telling people that the gospel we should live by is accepting this. I am saying that not haveing been of age in 1873 is a very serious flaw in my book, whenever choosing a Ripper suspect.
And that can only be "unfair" if I rob somebody of his or her right to disagree. I really donīt think I do, Paul.

Nobody, certainly not me, has suggested that there should be no discussion of a common identity.

And I have never said that you did, have I? So I fail to see why you defend yourself on the point.

I haven't said that your belief that the 1873 and 1888 murders weren't comitted by the same person.

Misphrased, I take it - but I think I see what you mean.

I would hope that I would give that suggestion the same very careful attention as I give to other theories, including Patricia's, whose books I have at least read. But the validity of your theory isn't and never has been in question, it's simply whether or not you are right to dismiss another person's theory because it doesn't fit conclusions you have reached that may be persuasive in themselves but have not been proved and are not, as far as I am aware, generally accepted.

These are public discussion boards, Paul. To me, that means that they are a place where suggestions may be put forward for discussion. I happen to think that the Ripper killed the 1873 torso victim, and that impacts my thinking. As I said before, if I am wrong, I will accept everything that follows with such a thing. What I do not accept as readily is any idea that I need to prove my suggestion decisively before I am allowed to let it govern how I do my Ripperology. And I do it by grading down suspects who were too young to have killed in 1873. Not by dismissing them, but by grading them down.
Iīm sure that there is room for both my suspect and thinking and Cornwells ditto. Just as I have misgivings about her suspect, Iīm sure she may have misgivings about my suspect too. And I consider that perfectly fair.

[PaulB]

PaulB: 'Pre-judging' has nothing whatsoever to do with Topping. It is about having a pre-conceived and unproven idea and making judgements based on it, which is what you are doing when you dismiss as valid suspects anyone who cannot have committed the 1873 murder. It really doesn't matter how good a case you can make for believing that the 1873 murder was committed by Jack the Ripper, it could still be wrong. Stranger things have happened! Walter Sickert does not fit your personal criteria and you are therefore pre-judging Patricia's argument because of it. I don't think that's fair or right, but I'm happy to let folk make up their on minds about that.

You may have missed the point I was making about Toppy, but as I said - it really does not matter.
I am aware that I do not adjust to your demands about a historically correct approach to Ripperology. You really should not take that too seriously, though - there is no set of rules to which we must all adjust out here. We are quite free to form our own ideas and make our own conclusions, and that is the exact prerogative I am using.
Thatīs not to say that you donīt have a point - just as you say, no matter how good a case I can make for an inclusion of the 1873 torso case, I can nevertheless be wrong. Stranger things have indeed happened. Thatīs all very true!
I am nevertheless convinced that I am on the right track here, since I have had it confirmed by many separate details, all of them working in combination with the scenario I have in mind. And since it is a scenario that is quite unusual and odd, the fact that the separate elements all support it, is not very likely to be coincidental. So I am quite happy to work from the presumption that I am correct, and quite prepared to admit that I am wrong if anything surfaces to prove it.

I don't have an opiion on the torso/Ripper connection. I'll look into it more closely, but to makea pre-judgement of my own I'd say that I think it is unlikely that Jack the Ripper committed murders significantly earlier than 1888. I could be wrong though. And I probably am.

Nicely put, Paul, if I may say so! And on the surface of things, very logical - the notion that the Ripper would have killed long before 1888 does need something special to work. It is only because I have noticed such a special matter that I entertain the idea, a matter that is perhaps more clearly expressed in the 1873 victim than any other victim.

But one can accept a probable connection without touching on the 1873 and 1874 deeds! There are so many similarities of such great rarity involved in the series that I think it defies logic not to work from the assumption of one killer only for both series. Cuts from sternum to pubes, abdominal walls cut away in large flaps, rings taken from the victims, colon sections gone lost, inner organs taken out, uteri extracted...
We would be complete idiots not to discuss a common identity; at least thatīs my contention.

I don't make any demands 'about a historically correct approach to Ripperology'. There are widely accepted 'rules' about conducting history and they should be followed. They are not my 'rules'. I do not demand that they be followed. I don't know where you got that nonsense from.

You can accept that the 1873 and the 1888 murders were committed by the same person. You can accept anything you like. I simply think it is unfair - and in my view unprofessional - to discount as a valid suspect someone who could not have committed the 1873 crime and therefore does not fit your criteria. Obviously you will disagree. That's up to you.

Nobody, certainly not me, has suggested that there should be no discussion of a common identity. I haven't said that your belief that the 1873 and 1888 murders weren't comitted by the same person. I would hope that I would give that suggestion the same very careful attention as I give to other theories, including Patricia's, whose books I have at least read. But the validity of your theory isn't and never has been in question, it's simply whether or not you are right to dismiss another person's theory because it doesn't fit conclusions you have reached that may be persuasive in themselves but have not been proved and are not, as far as I am aware, generally accepted.

[Fisherman]

PaulB: 'Pre-judging' has nothing whatsoever to do with Topping. It is about having a pre-conceived and unproven idea and making judgements based on it, which is what you are doing when you dismiss as valid suspects anyone who cannot have committed the 1873 murder. It really doesn't matter how good a case you can make for believing that the 1873 murder was committed by Jack the Ripper, it could still be wrong. Stranger things have happened! Walter Sickert does not fit your personal criteria and you are therefore pre-judging Patricia's argument because of it. I don't think that's fair or right, but I'm happy to let folk make up their on minds about that.

You may have missed the point I was making about Toppy, but as I said - it really does not matter.
I am aware that I do not adjust to your demands about a historically correct approach to Ripperology. You really should not take that too seriously, though - there is no set of rules to which we must all adjust out here. We are quite free to form our own ideas and make our own conclusions, and that is the exact prerogative I am using.
Thatīs not to say that you donīt have a point - just as you say, no matter how good a case I can make for an inclusion of the 1873 torso case, I can nevertheless be wrong. Stranger things have indeed happened. Thatīs all very true!
I am nevertheless convinced that I am on the right track here, since I have had it confirmed by many separate details, all of them working in combination with the scenario I have in mind. And since it is a scenario that is quite unusual and odd, the fact that the separate elements all support it, is not very likely to be coincidental. So I am quite happy to work from the presumption that I am correct, and quite prepared to admit that I am wrong if anything surfaces to prove it.

I don't have an opiion on the torso/Ripper connection. I'll look into it more closely, but to makea pre-judgement of my own I'd say that I think it is unlikely that Jack the Ripper committed murders significantly earlier than 1888. I could be wrong though. And I probably am.

Nicely put, Paul, if I may say so! And on the surface of things, very logical - the notion that the Ripper would have killed long before 1888 does need something special to work. It is only because I have noticed such a special matter that I entertain the idea, a matter that is perhaps more clearly expressed in the 1873 victim than any other victim.

But one can accept a probable connection without touching on the 1873 and 1874 deeds! There are so many similarities of such great rarity involved in the series that I think it defies logic not to work from the assumption of one killer only for both series. Cuts from sternum to pubes, abdominal walls cut away in large flaps, rings taken from the victims, colon sections gone lost, inner organs taken out, uteri extracted...
We would be complete idiots not to discuss a common identity; at least thatīs my contention.

[PaulB]

Pre-judging? Yes, I suppose some would say that - mainly the ones who say that they see no similarity whatsoever between Toppys handwriting and that of the Dorset Street witness. Forensic handwriting specialist Frank Leander would not say anything such, however...

Be that as it may, the more interesting matter is that of comparing the 1873 victim to the Ripper murders. In that case, the similarity I am talking about is one that is glaring enough - and one that is not often seen in murder cases. It is quite, quite rare, which is why I am saying that we are dealing with the same killer in all probability.
There is not just the one similarity, of course. But the one I am referring to means that if they were NOT the same killer, then something extremely odd was going on.

Out of interest, where do you stand on the topic of the Ripper and the Torso man possibly being the same man, Paul? And why? That is if I may ask?

'Pre-judging' has nothing whatsoever to do with Topping. It is about having a pre-conceived and unproven idea and making judgements based on it, which is what you are doing when you dismiss as valid suspects anyone who cannot have committed the 1873 murder. It really doesn't matter how good a case you can make for believing that the 1873 murder was committed by Jack the Ripper, it could still be wrong. Stranger things have happened! Walter Sickert does not fit your personal criteria and you are therefore pre-judging Patricia's argument because of it. I don't think that's fair or right, but I'm happy to let folk make up their on minds about that.

I don't have an opiion on the torso/Ripper connection. I'll look into it more closely, but to makea pre-judgement of my own I'd say that I think it is unlikely that Jack the Ripper committed murders significantly earlier than 1888. I could be wrong though. And I probably am.

[Fisherman]

Thanks Fish
so this is a letter that she found his dna on the envelope and or the paper matched the kind he used?

I believe this is one of three letters coming from that 24-paper stack that also involved regular Sickert letters.
Whether it was also involved in the DNA business, I canīt say.

I never read Cornwells first book, but I may read the second.

[Abby Normal]

This old aquaintance:

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-TjiToWwEttQ/Uebu7bLsgII/AAAAAAAAY10/wjFXW-zrqns/s1600/letters+4.jpg

is supposedly one of them, Abby! Seems artistic enough...

Thanks Fish
so this is a letter that she found his dna on the envelope and or the paper matched the kind he used?

[Fisherman]

You see similarities between a murder committed in 1873 and the murders committed in 1888. If you are correct then Walter Sickert is very, very unlikely to have been Jack the Ripper. But you don't know that the 1873 and 1888 murders were committed by the same person. You can do what you like, of course, but I wouldn't exclude any candidate for the Ripper on the assumption that my unproven theory was correct, no matter how persuasive the evidence might appear to be.

I have no idea what you are talking about regarding Huchinson, but you would seem to be pre-judging again.

Pre-judging? Yes, I suppose some would say that - mainly the ones who say that they see no similarity whatsoever between Toppys handwriting and that of the Dorset Street witness. Forensic handwriting specialist Frank Leander would not say anything such, however...

Be that as it may, the more interesting matter is that of comparing the 1873 victim to the Ripper murders. In that case, the similarity I am talking about is one that is glaring enough - and one that is not often seen in murder cases. It is quite, quite rare, which is why I am saying that we are dealing with the same killer in all probability.
There is not just the one similarity, of course. But the one I am referring to means that if they were NOT the same killer, then something extremely odd was going on.

Out of interest, where do you stand on the topic of the Ripper and the Torso man possibly being the same man, Paul? And why? That is if I may ask?

[PaulB]

PaulB: Perfectly valid observations, although one can't dismiss a candidate for the Ripper because of a personal belief that the Ripper committed a murder in 1873.

Actually, one can. Whether others agree is an entirely different matter...

After all, that personal belief could be wrong.

Yes, it could. But there are elements involved in the 1873 murder that are very, very rare and I think I know the exact inspiration for these elements. Interestingly, other rare elements, fitting the exact same inspiration ground are repeated in the Ripper cases. So thatīs why, Paul.
Without going in on the overall explanation, Iīm happy to mention one matter that should be considered:
Charles Hebbert says that Mary Kellys eyelids were removed. And when the 1873 torso "mask" was found, it had the eyelids attached.
So both these victims seemingly had their eyelids cut from their faces. In one case, where there was more time and privacy, the whole of the face was cut away from the skullbone,eyelids included, and in the other, more time pressed deed, the face was slashed into mince-meat - but the eyes seem to have been more or less spared, and if Hebbert is correct, the eyelids were cut away. That is not the picture we normaly have of the cutting of the face of Kelly, which is generally described as a frenzied act.
But frenzied killers do not take the time to cut the eyelids away, while at the same time avoiding to damage the eyes; a quite delicate thing to do.

As for Sickert writing letters, I don't think it can be so easily dismissed, but shows that Sickert's apparently life-long interest in the Ripper murders began in 1888. Maybe that was because he saw themurders as theatrical, as you suggest, or maybe there was a deeper reason, as Patricia senses.

I am not dismissing the notion that Sickert could have written the Ripper letters that Cornwell speak of, on the contrary - it looks as if he very likely did. But that does not per se make him anything more sinister than a letter-writer with a morbid interest in the Riper deeds. And they were thirteen a dozen back in the day.
I am - personally - saying that Sickert makes for a very unlikely Ripper, for reasons tied to the 1873 murder, and I fully accept that people may ask for more evidence that I am giving away.

What does seem to be overlooked is not whether or not Walter Sickert was Jack the Ripper, but whether he was the originated the Royal Conspiracy theory, arguably the most influential Riper theory ever, and the implications if he did. Having met and talked with Joseph Sickert many times and being interested in the history of the Jack the Ripper, not simply the question of who Jack the Ripper was, I am intrigued by the possibility that Walter created that story in whole or in part.

That is another matter, of course, and an interesting one. Letīs just say that once we enter these domains, much of whatever viability a suspect has starts to wear off rather quickly. Which need not be a good thing - for the longest, the same thing happened to Topping Hutchinson on account of the same connotations, but in the end, it seems that Reg was on the money - at least to my eyes.
So lightning struck in an unexpected place in that case. But how likely is it to do so again...? Hopefully, time will show.

You see similarities between a murder committed in 1873 and the murders committed in 1888. If you are correct then Walter Sickert is very, very unlikely to have been Jack the Ripper. But you don't know that the 1873 and 1888 murders were committed by the same person. You can do what you like, of course, but I wouldn't exclude any candidate for the Ripper on the assumption that my unproven theory was correct, no matter how persuasive the evidence might appear to be.

I have no idea what you are talking about regarding Huchinson, but you would seem to be pre-judging again.

[Fisherman]

Can anyone please tell what specific letters she is claiming sickert wrote.

ive asked the question numerable times and no one seems to know the definite answer. surely Cornwell has said what specific letters he wrote No?

Ive got letters from hell so if anyone knows what specific letter(s) shes claiming he wrote I can look them up.

thanks in advance!

This old aquaintance:

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-TjiToWwEttQ/Uebu7bLsgII/AAAAAAAAY10/wjFXW-zrqns/s1600/letters+4.jpg

is supposedly one of them, Abby! Seems artistic enough...

[Abby Normal]

Can anyone please tell what specific letters she is claiming sickert wrote.

ive asked the question numerable times and no one seems to know the definite answer. surely Cornwell has said what specific letters he wrote No?

Ive got letters from hell so if anyone knows what specific letter(s) shes claiming he wrote I can look them up.

thanks in advance!

[miss marple]

Artists are creative.Painters are obsessed with painting doing it, teaching it,writing about it. The fullfillment of art is complete. Serial killers are a. different species.
Do get to the point,Sickert was a very rounded and entertaining man with many interests, a good writer on art and a broad knowledge of many subjects. He was above all interested in humanity, ordinary life, he found working class women more interesting to paint than duchesses, as did most of the french impressionists and Degas, the master of painting life as lived.
He was interested in crime, as would anyone be who is fascinated by human behavour, his favourites being the Tichbourne Claiment and Jack the Ripper.
I did post his Jack the Ripper suspect story years ago.Its time to repeat it.
Osbert Sitwell a friend of his, tells the story in his introduction to Sickert's writings.
To paraphrase: Some years after the murders Sickert took a room in a London suburb. An old couple looked after the house and sometime the old woman told him his room had been occupied by Jack the Ripper. She told him his predecessor had been a veterinary student, after a month or too, the delicate consumptive young man took to sometimes staying out all night. They would hear him come in about 6 in the morning then he would go out to buy the first edition of the paper, he would also burn a suit in the fire when he had been out all night. His consumption got worse and his mother took him back to Bournmouth where he died three months later. Sickert wrote his name in the margin of a book which he gave to William Rotherstein,the book later got lost in the war.
I think Sickert probably embellished this, because it made a great after dinner story and Sickert was a great raconteur. The ripper was great copy.Everyone from all classes was were fascinated by the murders, References crop up everywhere. If Sickert had not mentioned the murders that would have been weird and unusual, as everything else interested him.

Miss Marple

[Henry Flower]

I've changed my mind on these things. I used - as many evidently do - to get irate at researchers 'wasting' time and resources on research that I thought misguided. Now I think it's mostly all good. She might not demonstrate that WS was JtR, but to have someone with her resources establishing (if she does) the identity of the writer of some of the letters, well, that's not to be sniffed at even if we don't all follow her where that leads. That's already more than some researchers will ever achieve.

And there's a lot of sniffy generalisation on this thread: yes, there were "thousands of letters". So what? Some have potentially more value than others, it all depends which letters she identifies as being Sickert's, and what exactly those letters tell us.

I admire her tenacity. She made millions from writing entertaining and successful novels, and she's funding Ripper research out of her own pocket. She may not nail Sickert (a painter I loved long before he got tangled up in the JtR nonsense) but why be sniffy about her trying?

Finally - we need Dave/Cogidubnus on this thread. He had real knowledge and expertise on matters postal. To paraphrase Alan Partridge:

Dave! ... Dave! ... DAVE!? .. Dave! Dave! ... Dave! Dave!.. It's no use he can't hear me.

[Fisherman]

PaulB: Perfectly valid observations, although one can't dismiss a candidate for the Ripper because of a personal belief that the Ripper committed a murder in 1873.

Actually, one can. Whether others agree is an entirely different matter...

After all, that personal belief could be wrong.

Yes, it could. But there are elements involved in the 1873 murder that are very, very rare and I think I know the exact inspiration for these elements. Interestingly, other rare elements, fitting the exact same inspiration ground are repeated in the Ripper cases. So thatīs why, Paul.
Without going in on the overall explanation, Iīm happy to mention one matter that should be considered:
Charles Hebbert says that Mary Kellys eyelids were removed. And when the 1873 torso "mask" was found, it had the eyelids attached.
So both these victims seemingly had their eyelids cut from their faces. In one case, where there was more time and privacy, the whole of the face was cut away from the skullbone,eyelids included, and in the other, more time pressed deed, the face was slashed into mince-meat - but the eyes seem to have been more or less spared, and if Hebbert is correct, the eyelids were cut away. That is not the picture we normaly have of the cutting of the face of Kelly, which is generally described as a frenzied act.
But frenzied killers do not take the time to cut the eyelids away, while at the same time avoiding to damage the eyes; a quite delicate thing to do.

As for Sickert writing letters, I don't think it can be so easily dismissed, but shows that Sickert's apparently life-long interest in the Ripper murders began in 1888. Maybe that was because he saw themurders as theatrical, as you suggest, or maybe there was a deeper reason, as Patricia senses.

I am not dismissing the notion that Sickert could have written the Ripper letters that Cornwell speak of, on the contrary - it looks as if he very likely did. But that does not per se make him anything more sinister than a letter-writer with a morbid interest in the Riper deeds. And they were thirteen a dozen back in the day.
I am - personally - saying that Sickert makes for a very unlikely Ripper, for reasons tied to the 1873 murder, and I fully accept that people may ask for more evidence that I am giving away.

What does seem to be overlooked is not whether or not Walter Sickert was Jack the Ripper, but whether he was the originated the Royal Conspiracy theory, arguably the most influential Riper theory ever, and the implications if he did. Having met and talked with Joseph Sickert many times and being interested in the history of the Jack the Ripper, not simply the question of who Jack the Ripper was, I am intrigued by the possibility that Walter created that story in whole or in part.

That is another matter, of course, and an interesting one. Letīs just say that once we enter these domains, much of whatever viability a suspect has starts to wear off rather quickly. Which need not be a good thing - for the longest, the same thing happened to Topping Hutchinson on account of the same connotations, but in the end, it seems that Reg was on the money - at least to my eyes.
So lightning struck in an unexpected place in that case. But how likely is it to do so again...? Hopefully, time will show.

[PaulB]

I can only echo what has already been said - if we have a man who is obsessed with the Ripper saga, then we also have a man who is not unlikely to try his hand at writing Ripper letters. It was a very widespread hobby at the time, and the ones most likely to take it up would have been the ones truly fascinated with the case.
What has not been said is that Sickert was born in 1860, which would have made him 13 at the time the Ripper/Torso killer murdered the 1873 torso victim. I have little doubt that this victim had the same originator as did the Ripper series. So it is a litmus paper I always use when personally judging who is a likely contender for the combined role.
My own feeling is that what drew Sickerts interest is how these murders were very theatrical deeds.

Perfectly valid observations, although one can't dismiss a candidate for the Ripper because of a personal belief that the Ripper committed a murder in 1873. After all, that personal belief could be wrong. As for Sickert writing letters, I don't think it can be so easily dismissed, but shows that Sickert's apparently life-long interest in the Ripper murders began in 1888. Maybe that was because he saw themurders as theatrical, as you suggest, or maybe there was a deeper reason, as Patricia senses.

What does seem to be overlooked is not whether or not Walter Sickert was Jack the Ripper, but whether he was the originated the Royal Conspiracy theory, arguably the most influential Riper theory ever, and the implications if he did. Having met and talked with Joseph Sickert many times and being interested in the history of the Jack the Ripper, not simply the question of who Jack the Ripper was, I am intrigued by the possibility that Walter created that story in whole or in part.