The Bank Holiday Murders by Tom Wescott (2014)

[Barnaby]

OK well I'm not sure if "breaking the door down" caused damage to the door or not. Either way, it simply doesn't seem like "good business" to me for these things to be happening on one's property.

[Garza]

Hi Tom, decided to end my long hiatus of this to congratulate you on your first book. Once I heard about your book, I purchased it right away as I have always been impressed for your propensity for logical deduction in your research. Needless to say I finished it in two days. You can expect me to write a glowing review on Amazon.co.uk .

Not for the first time you have changed my outlook on the murderers and have given them another dimension! Cheers!

Gary

[curious]

Hi all,

I don't know anything more about Pearly Poll than what's in the book. Would like to though and I think more research could be done.

I don't see how the murders could have been lessons to anyone. These women were not prize prostitutes for anyone.

McCarthy had no choice but to axe his own door down because the alternative was to admit he had the only known key to a locked room inside which was a murdered woman.

Emma Smith's killers most likely left her for dead, though that's impossible to know for sure. As mentioned, Horsnell also survived her wounds for a time. Also, because no autopsy was performed on Horsnell, we do not know if she was violated as was Smith. It's a true injustice that the coroner's inquest was allowed to return an 'open' verdict because there was no doubt that her injuries - whatever they were - were intentionally inflicted and caused her death and therefore she was murdered. It's equally sad that the press did not care any more than did the police and coroner and only one newspaper carried any mention of the incident.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

Morning, Tom,
From what I read in the book, you seem to believe that the landlords were involved in a cover-up to protect the murderer. Right?

Can you think of any possible reason for that?

I'm trying to find some reason, just any reason, but so far, despite all my musings, nothing really adds up. Yet.

Thx,
curious

[lynn cates]

going too far

Hello Velma.

"He was an uncontrollable "employee" who was removed. Not sure that makes sense."

It does--regarding a perpetrator of violent deaths as sustained by Horsnell and Smith--possibly Tabram. Not sure how it covers the cases of Nichols and Chapman. Why would an over eager hired thug disembowel someone and remove her uterus?

Cheers.
LC

[lynn cates]

orders

Hello (again) Velma.

"you seem to believe that the landlords were involved in a cover-up to protect the murderer. Can you think of any possible reason for that?"

If you'll permit me. Suppose he were acting on their orders but were a bit too rough?

Cheers.
LC

[curious]

Hello Velma.

"He was an uncontrollable "employee" who was removed. Not sure that makes sense."

It does--regarding a perpetrator of violent deaths as sustained by Horsnell and Smith--possibly Tabram. Not sure how it covers the cases of Nichols and Chapman. Why would an over eager hired thug disembowel someone and remove her uterus?

Cheers.
LC

Hi, Lynn,

Exactly, if the landlords are involved someway, there must be a reason. That reason is most likely money (Tom pointed out these men made fortunes from pennies).

For some reason an employee (enforcer or muscle) was to discipline people. Figuring out some reasonable reasons why should be a priority here.

However, the enforcer was basically a mad man (perhaps without realizing it himself at the beginning) and loved the violence so much that it kept escalating.

One of the mysteries of this series is why the murders appeared to end with MJK -- perhaps the landlords quietly took care of their "problem" — for he would have indeed have become a problem at that time.

Velma

[curious]

Hello (again) Velma.

"you seem to believe that the landlords were involved in a cover-up to protect the murderer. Can you think of any possible reason for that?"

If you'll permit me. Suppose he were acting on their orders but were a bit too rough?

Cheers.
LC

Hi, Lynn,
My thoughts exactly. But that's the tip of the iceberg. If the landlords gave orders for someone to be "roughed up" there must be a reason. What possible reasons could there be?

V

[Tom_Wescott]

Hi Tom, decided to end my long hiatus of this to congratulate you on your first book. Once I heard about your book, I purchased it right away as I have always been impressed for your propensity for logical deduction in your research. Needless to say I finished it in two days. You can expect me to write a glowing review on Amazon.co.uk .

Not for the first time you have changed my outlook on the murderers and have given them another dimension! Cheers!

Gary

Hey Garza, thanks a million! That means a lot coming from you. And I'm sorely lacking UK reviews for some reason so your support is much appreciated. Feel free to chime in with any questions or comments on the material.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Tom_Wescott]

Morning, Tom,
From what I read in the book, you seem to believe that the landlords were involved in a cover-up to protect the murderer. Right?

Can you think of any possible reason for that?

I'm trying to find some reason, just any reason, but so far, despite all my musings, nothing really adds up. Yet.

Thx,
curious

Hi Curious. I'm sure there are a number of reasons, but I don't pretend to know THE reason. Here are a few though:

1) One of them was the murderer (i.e. McCarthy)
2) Someone in their circle was the murderer (i.e. A relative or one or more of the boxers).
3) They were acting as an agency for some other force (Fenians, for instance, though I'm personally not a Fenian theorist).
4) They were themselves behind the murders for some reason we can only guess at.

But based on my research some of these landlords did a play a part. The most suspicious are McCarthy, Satchell, and Crossingham.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Ginger]

I have a hard time believing in the murders as an effort to shut up potential snitches. They're way too dramatic and showy for that. If you want to do away with someone who knows your secret, then you don't want to attract attention to the fact that she was done away with. Ideally she should disappear, or meet with a innocent-looking accident. That couldn't have been that hard to engineer in that time and place, especially considering that most of the victims were known by all and sundry to drink heavily. If Mary Kelly'd been found at the foot of the stairs with a broken neck while reeking of gin, no one would think much of it.

Instead, we're left with a murderer who at the least doesn't care that his crimes attract attention, or quite probably enjoys the panic and outrage he causes. If he's trying to suppress information, he's embraced a novel and exceptionally bold strategem for doing so.

I think it's more likely that Jack was out of Crossingham and McCarthy's control from the start, yet someone known to them, and someone whom they felt compelled to protect. The two reasons that come right to mind for me are that perhaps he was a close relative, a son or nephew whom they initially thought they could bring under control; or perhaps they shared some sort of guilty secret that could send them all to prison, if not the gallows, were Jack to be arrested and talk.

At any event, when he killed Mary Kelly right in McCarthy's own building, I think he became far too dangerous to them to leave alive, regardless of the relationship. There's the interesting circumstance too that the police greatly diminished their patrols, and gave other indications that they were no longer concerned about the Ripper quite soon after Kelly's murder. I think it's by no means out of the question that the police were quietly informed that the Ripper was now out of the picture. Under the circumstances, I doubt they'd be inclined to look too closely into the matter, so long as they were sure that he was gone.

[lynn cates]

sooner

Hello Velma. Thanks.

"One of the mysteries of this series is why the murders appeared to end with MJK -- perhaps the landlords quietly took care of their "problem" — for he would have indeed have become a problem at that time."

Sooner than that, I should think.

Cheers.
LC

[lynn cates]

insubordination

Hello (again) Velma.

"If the landlords gave orders for someone to be "roughed up" there must be a reason. What possible reasons could there be?"

Actually, Tom has given some good ones in his book. Of course, ANY act of insubordination would be subject to punishment.

Cheers.
LC

[lynn cates]

pay it no mind

Hello Ginger.

"If Mary Kelly'd been found at the foot of the stairs with a broken neck while reeking of gin, no one would think much of it."

Indeed. And if Kate were found disemboweled after two others were similarly served . . . ?

Cheers.
LC

[Barnaby]

Who, if anyone, in the organized crime world of the day, did the landlords answer to? Could the directive come from them? Otherwise I just see little motive for the landlords to bring this unnecessary trouble to their doorstep.

[curious]

Hi Curious. I'm sure there are a number of reasons, but I don't pretend to know THE reason. Here are a few though:

1) One of them was the murderer (i.e. McCarthy)
2) Someone in their circle was the murderer (i.e. A relative or one or more of the boxers).
3) They were acting as an agency for some other force (Fenians, for instance, though I'm personally not a Fenian theorist).
4) They were themselves behind the murders for some reason we can only guess at.

But based on my research some of these landlords did a play a part. The most suspicious are McCarthy, Satchell, and Crossingham.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

Morning, Tom,
Thanks. Perhaps you covered all this in the book -- my memory does not remember as much as it once did, and I've loaned my copy of the book to my son.

1. While McCarthy does seem suspicious, since all the landlords lived long lives and prospered, I can't see them as the murderer, who, to my way of thinking, was completely over the edge after Kelly.

2. Someone in their circle seems more possible to me. Since someone appears to have been able to coerce Mary Ann Connelly into her act (and she appears to have moved just before Tabram's murder, indicating it was premeditated and perhaps indicating that Connelly had not intention of being involved) perhaps it was someone of her family. She did have a brother or two, wonder if one could have been one of the boxers? or even worked for one of the landlords. Connelly was sick so much, I wonder how she managed to keep a roof over her head.

3.Fenians had not occurred to me but I had considered it was someone with enough clout or coin to make it worth the landlords' while to cover up the murders. Fenians would work and there does seem to be a strong Irish thread running through the murders. If Pearly Poll was the Mary Ann Connelly I believe her to be, her parents were born in Ireland. I'm wondering if just money would have been enough. Would the landlords have continued to remain quiet toward the end of the series just for money? or once they started the cover-up they could not then expose it and their actions?

4. I wonder if they were actually behind the murders -- as murders. There doesn't seem to be a reason for them to kill the women who died. I tend to think that if the murders started with them, they were not supposed to be murders (but then Martha Tabram looks premeditated) but a "here's what happens to people who go against us, who don't cooperate, who don't pay up, who don't . . . ."

If for some reason the landlords were behind it, then obviously Pearly Poll knew way too much. It's interesting how much they would have had to trust her. Why would a sickly woman who stayed in the infirmary as much as she was out and doesn't seem to have had any means of support have so much trust from the landlords? Why would she have been allowed to live? And apparently she was because I found her in the 1891 census -- a sick inmate at a workhouse. (IF I have the right Mary Ann Connelly.)

She must have had a huge stake in protecting the murderer to have done what she did and then to have retained the trust of the landlords . . .

Why Pearly Poll? Think I may try to run down her brothers . . . when I find a few minutes.

Gotta get ready for work. Have a great day everyone.

curious