Ripperologist 142: February 2015

[AdamNeilWood]

Coming soon: your FREE Ripperologist issue 142!

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Contents include:

“JACK” McCARTHY
PART ONE: THE LIFE OF A DORSET STREET LANDLORD
by Trevor Bond

CROSS EXAMINED: THE CASE FOR THE DEFENCE
by Dusty Miller

THE VIOLENCE OF SPRING ONIONS
by Paul Williams

THE CROPTON LANE FARM MURDERS
by Rosemary Pardoe

FROM THE ARCHIVES: HANDCUFFS
by ex-Inspector Maurice Moser, CID

FROM THE CASEBOOKS OF A MURDER HOUSE DETECTIVE:
THE MURDER HOUSE IN DENHAM
by Jan Bondeson

ROSYLN D’ONSTON: NOT QUITE A DUNCE
Nina and Howard Brown

DEAR RIP
Your letters and comments

I BEG TO REPORT: NEWS ROUNDUP

THE GENTLE AUTHOR’S SPITALFIELDS LIFE

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[Bridewell]

It would seem that I am the first to comment on this particular issue. I haven't read the others yet but wish to commend Dusty Miller for a meticulously researched and detailed presentation of the case for the defence of Charles Allen Lechmere. I thought the mention of Paul having noted that the woman felt cold was particularly apposite in light of the claim elsewhere that Lechmere had supposedly cut her throat only moments before.

Anyone new to the subject who is interested in Lechmere as a suspect should read both Fisherman's original Rip article and Miller's before rushing to judgement one way or the other.

[GUT]

It would seem that I am the first to comment on this particular issue. I haven't read the others yet but wish to commend Dusty Miller for a meticulously researched and detailed presentation of the case for the defence of Charles Allen Lechmere. I thought the mention of Paul having noted that the woman felt cold was particularly apposite in light of the claim elsewhere that Lechmere had supposedly cut her throat only moments before.

Anyone new to the subject who is interested in Lechmere as a suspect should read both Fisherman's original Rip article and Miller's before rushing to judgement one way or the other.

2nd that.

[Rosella]

I haven't received the February issue yet, though the December one arrived, thankyou. Am I being too impatient?

[Azarna]

It would seem that I am the first to comment on this particular issue. I haven't read the others yet but wish to commend Dusty Miller for a meticulously researched and detailed presentation of the case for the defence of Charles Allen Lechmere. I thought the mention of Paul having noted that the woman felt cold was particularly apposite in light of the claim elsewhere that Lechmere had supposedly cut her throat only moments before.

Anyone new to the subject who is interested in Lechmere as a suspect should read both Fisherman's original Rip article and Miller's before rushing to judgement one way or the other.

I agree, it is a very well written and logical article.

The piece on McCarthy is also particularly fascinating. Very useful to anyone interested in East End doss houses and how they worked.

[tnb]

Thanks Azarna. Glad you both enjoyed it and felt you got some info out of it. That's what makes it all worthwhile.

[GUT]

I agree, it is a very well written and logical article.

The piece on McCarthy is also particularly fascinating. Very useful to anyone interested in East End doss houses and how they worked.

Yep took a bit of absorption and I will be gong back to read a few more times, but an interesting character.

[tnb]

GUT - you can't begin to imagine the amount of diagrams on scraps of paper that it took to get my head around it. And that's after I jettisoned thw Crossinghams!

[AlanG]

Does anybody think the ripper could of been waiting around the scene and gone back once Cross and Paul had left for a bobby and cut her throat again?

[drstrange169]

Hello Alan,

Like everything "ripper", there's some evidence to support that theory and there's some evidence against it. But, I for one, think it certainly can't be ruled out yet.

Re: McCarthy, I'm looking forward to reading the next installment.

[AlanG]

Yeah my immediate thought would've been, where the killer could've waited without arrousing suspision, but yet be close enough to move in and inflict the second wound to the throat.

[Wickerman]

Does anybody think the ripper could of been waiting around the scene and gone back once Cross and Paul had left for a bobby and cut her throat again?

The killer would not know if one of the men wouldn't stay with the body while the other went for a policeman.
I think the killer just disappeared around the corner of the Board School, once he heard footsteps approaching..

[MrBarnett]

Trevor Bond's fascinating piece on McCarthy highlighted what a small world these people inhabited.

Joe Barnett supposedly born in Hairbrain Court, Blue Anchor Yard. John McCarthy's family living in nearby Kettleby Court, Blue Anchor Yard, and in 1861, just one street to the west, in Darby Street, lived Jeremiah Sullivan an Irish immigrant dock worker. At the time he was living there with his wife, Ellen and sons, Jeremiah and Daniel. His daughter Margaret would go on to marry William Crossingham. She would name one of her sons Jeremiah and according to her daughter Matilda's marriage certificate, her (Matilda's) father was also a Jeremiah Sullivan. ( Although it's possible this was a fiction designed to conceal an out of wedlock liaison with one of the Crossingham brothers.)

And in 1861, slap bang in the middle of the area, in Holloway Court, Blue Anchor Yard, were my great, great grandparents Jeremiah and Rebecca Sullivan. They in due course (naturally) would name one of their sons Jeremiah.

Their daughter Elizabeth, my great grandmother, would later move to Breezers Hill (via Bluegate Fields, Shadwell and Lavender Place, Pennington Street) where my grandmother born. All areas where there were concentrations of Irish and Irish Cockneys.


If the report below is anything to go by, a lot of unofficial subletting took place. And it would appear that the absentee landlords got off scot free while the poor tenants who tried to make a few bob by packing as many of their fellow countrymen (and probably relatives) into the properties as possible were the ones who were held to account.


The Times
Dec 13, 1858 THAMES.-- Yesterday Silvester Driscoll, an Irish Labourer of No. 6, Slater's-court, Blue Anchor-yard, Rosemary-lane, appeared before Mr. Yardley to answer an information exhibited by Mr. Richard Reason, inspector of common lodging-houses, for receiving lodgers in a room occupied by him before he had registered the same and conformed to the regulations of the statute.

Police sergeant Price, No. 15H, inspector of lodging-houses in the Whitechapel district said, the house in which the defendant lived was let out in tenaments to poor Irish people, who sublet their rooms. The tenement was in a filthy condition. About a month since the tenants of the various rooms, including the defendant, were summoned before Mr. Ingham for refusing to register and comply with the law, and were dismissed with a nominal fine and a caution. Since then one of the defendants, a woman named Farrell, and her family had been attacked with fever. He found them in a lamentable condition, and caused them to be removed to the workhouse. On the 18th of June he served the defendant's wife with a notice to register, and on the 30th of July he served the defendant himself with a notice for alterations and repairs, to lay on a proper supply of water, and to erect partitions for the separation of the sexes, which he had not done, but continued to receive lodgers. On the morning of the 28th of last month he visited the defendant's room, which was a very small one on the first floor and contained two beds; in the first bed he saw the defendant, his wife, and a girl aged 16. The second bed, which was on the floor, contained a girl named Ellen Shoa, who said she paid the defendant 6d. per week, and that sometimes others occupied the same bed. In another room, on the second floor, which was also in the occupation of Driscoll, he discovered three beds. The first, which was on a bedstead, contained a man named John Crawley, who said he paid a rent of 2s. per week; the second contained two women, named Mary Wilson and Sarah Robinson, who each paid 8d. per week; and the third, John Carroll, his wife, and infant. Carroll said that he paid no rent at all. The walls of the rooms had been limewashed since a former visit, but in other respects the tenement was in a filthy and dilapidated state, and altogether unfit for human habitation. There was a retiring place in front of the house, the contents of which had overflowed, and the effluvium arising from it was nauseous in the extreme. There had been many cases of fever in Slater's-court and its vicinity.

The defendant, in reply to the charge, said he had spoken to his landlord about the overflowing of the cesspool, and he refused to remove the soil, and siad it had been in the same state for 50 years, and must remain in its present condition. The defendant added, "My landlord won't repair the cesspool or make any alteration."

Mr. Yardley said, he did not care whether the landlord did so or not; and that, until the defendant complied with all the requirements of the law, he would make it very uncomfortable and very unprofitable for him to take any lodgers at all. Three notices had been served on the defendant, and the magistrates had also warned him. The health of the metropolis was not to be endangered by such filthy lodging-houses as the defendant's. He should inflict a fine of 40s and costs, and, if the offense were persevered in, the defendant would incur a penalty of 5l., and 40s, for every day the nuisance was continued. He asked the defendant if he could pay the fine?

Driscoll. - Not a halfpenny, Sir.

Mr. Yardley.- Have you any goods on which a distress can be levied for the amount?

Driscoll.- None at all, Sir. All I have in the world is not worth 10s.

Mr. Yardley.- Then, what a fellow you must be to take lodgers! I sentence you to one month's imprisonment.

[AlanG]

The killer would not know if one of the men wouldn't stay with the body while the other went for a policeman.
I think the killer just disappeared around the corner of the Board School, once he heard footsteps approaching..

Probably...I haven't ever been to the crime scene so dont know if there is a vantage point. But I agree if it was too dark to see a few feet in front of you, then viewing from a distance would be highly inprobable. So you would be relying on hearing.