Regarding the Thames Torso Murders, etc..

[Ausgirl]

Just wondering where the best place to discuss the Torso Murders might be? I have searched for relevant threads, but there doesn't seem to be any that are currently being posted in. Sorry in advance if it's eye-wateringly obvious and I've managed to miss it.

I find it very interesting that there were these neatly dismembered bodies turning up, mostly unidentified, during the span of the Ripper murders and beyond.

If there isn't a recently updated thread, would it be best to resurrect an old one or start afresh?

[Ausgirl]

Actually. Never mind. Most of what I had to say has been pretty much said already. There's some really good posts on the torso murders here.

I was just getting a bit obsessive about all those murders possibly (and I actually think 'probably' at this point) being done by the same hand, as well as this fellow actually leaving a fair sized chunk of victim in the foundations of the new police building.

Which, I think, soundly trumps mailing a bit of kidney to the president of the local Neighbourhood Watch. It's just an incredibly overt F-U to the police, isn't it? No need for nyah-nyah letters, lads - here, have a torso.

Anyway, on the off chance that I end up with anything to say that hasn't been already, I'll probably just resurrect an existing thread. Cheers.

edit add: I was just this evening watching a doco on Ed Kemper, being a killer who both mutilated and dismembered his victims (and kept the heads, and was also a bit of a necrophile, lots of analogies), and therefore maybe of a similar frame of mind as either Jack or torso man, and there was a mention that most mutilators of this kind also have an obsession with the police (which has of course been well documented in other cases, also). Police groupies, was a term chucked about. And here we have the Ripper and his taunts, and torso man leaving a body part in the most aggravating place possible.

It was a vast shock to the local police to discover that Ed was the Co-Ed Butcher, because he hung about with them in their favourite after-hours bar and drank with them, the whole time the murders were ongoing.

And it made me wonder if there were any such 'groupies' making a friendly nuisance of themselves around the police station at the time of both sets of murders. Not there's likely an answer, but I did wonder it.

[Rob Clack]

Hi Ausgirl,

Looking at the mutilations between the Torso victims and the Whitechapel victims, specifically the Macnaughton Five. I think they were done by two different people. The Torso mutilations look more skilled (the removal of the arms showed some skill in the Whitehall victim) where the Ripper victims seemed more crude and rushed. There are some very good reports on the Torso victims describing the injuries. Also the Ripper victims seem to me more put on display (except Kelly) where the Torso victims were more hidden from view. Just my opinion.


Rob

[Ausgirl]

Thank you, Rob - but I didn't mean to at all imply that I thought the Ripper and torso man were the same person. Sorry if I wasn't clear there, I meant only that I think it's very likely most if not all the torso murders were done by one person.

I do think there's some very interesting parallels, as well as differences, in the two sets of crimes. The police taunting, the gruesome trophy-keeping, etc.

And I do think the heads (or at least, skulls) were trophies, a la Kemper. Some of the bodies (I forget how many) were dismembered quite a short time after death - thus, were not medical cadavers used in a nasty jape, and so there's somewhat of a deficit of good reasons for anyone chopping up a pile of young women and parcelling their body parts for far and wide distribution.

It's not like their clothing was hidden, or that tattoo which was found on one of the victims. And an abortionist trying to hide botched abortion bodies from the police likely wouldn't be planting a torso in the foundations of the shiny new HQ. So I don't think the dismemberment and facial flaying, etc, had a lot to with avoiding victim ID, really. Extended post-mortem tinkering with the bodies is, then, probably another behaviour in common.

edit add: Less logical than a thought to follow - perhaps the torso killer really enjoyed the process of the police making a gruesome puzzle out of the body parts. The parcel chucked into the Shelley estate might then be a kind of grim and silent acknowledgement. But then perhaps the timing is off.

[Rob Clack]

Sorry my error.

Doctor Hebbert thought the four Torso victims were all done by the same person. I'm not sure he would have kept the heads myself. Possibly he was more careful in disposing them and the size of them would make it easier. Interestingly the head of Kate Websters victim from the 1870s turned up in the past few years is someones back garden.
A few years ago I was trying to make a list of dismembered victims in London during the Victorian period and there was quite a few.

Rob

[Ausgirl]

Rob, the size issue - there was bits of lung tissue and scraps of face disposed of, quite small pieces compared to a relatively bulky head. Why toss those, especially the face, and not the skulls? Seems more likely they were kept, to me.

I also think the killer wasn't actually trying at all to hide the body parts. Quite the opposite, really, aside from an early one that had been covered in quicklime, quite out of character with leaving one at a future police station, or in the Shelley estate.. Either a different killer there, or one who evolved into enjoying the process of 'discovery' as well as the murders themselves. Maybe.

I'm not sure the woman whose head showed up in (David Attenborough's?) garden was part of this series. There -were- other dismemberments, but how many of them were so neatly disarticulated, or cut up with fine sawblades, etc, as opposed to roughly hacked in bits with an axe for quick disposal? A comprehensive list of dismembered corpses and possible tools used for each (if known) would be awesome though.

edit add: Though... the torso in the foundations wasn't really easily spotted. It -could- have been the killer's equivalent of lifting his leg on the site..

[Rob Clack]

Yes its possible the heads were kept as trophys. I just think they were more disposed of to hinder identification. As you mention some of the less bulky stuff was found.
Perhaps I should have been a bit clearer when I say that the Ripper victims were left on display out in the open and would be found fairl quickly. Where as the torso victims were more hidden and would not neccesarily be found right away. With the exception of the Pinchin Street torso which was probably found within a half hour of being dumped.
I do agree that that there was a reason why the Whitehall victim was dumped where she was and by someone with some knowledge of the site.

And yes I think this series began with Rainham and ended with Pinchin Street.

Rob

[sdreid]

Yes, it's possible that the heads were kept as trophies or just disposed of more carefully; most likely to prevent identification. If the latter then it worked except in the case of Jackson.

I also tend to agree that the murders were of the same hand and were Rainham - Pinchin as I think Mac inferred as well. The murders seemed to become more bizarre as they progressed. Perhaps this was because the killer got up the nerve to go a little farther each time or maybe he wished to gain some more attention going up against the Ripper for press coverage.

[Roy Corduroy]

Your recent Ripperologist magazine article on this subject was very informative, Rob, thank you.

I do agree that that there was a reason why the Whitehall victim was dumped where she was and by someone with some knowledge of the site.

Did you have a particular reason in mind?

Thanks again,

Roy

[Damaso Marte]

I wonder if the torso killer had a grudge against Jack the Ripper for the rest of his life, for stealing his thunder and getting far more attention.

[Ausgirl]

Not to be contentious - but I must contend! That as the killer wasn't worried about all those other ID points (clothing, face, tattoo), and that he cut off and discarded the -face- of one (which was whole enough for the police to attempt construction), avoidance of victim ID as a motive for not leaving the heads about doesn't make much sense to me. It would have been all but impossible to ID a faceless head in Victorian times, I should think.

But then, I must also allow for mad persons doing mad things for reasons which defy all logic.

Good point, re torso man possibly becoming miffed that JtR stole his thunder.. Torso was actually by far the more skilled of the two, after all.. I do think having victims with faces, and also a clear 'hunting ground' and such might've been a factor in JtR being the 'star' at the time. Personally, I think torso man is hella more creepy, wins the scary factor hands down. But I have the advantage of being very far in time and space from JtR's knife. =P

I'm actually looking for references to evidence to suggest whether rape occurred in the torso victims, either before or after death.

It would be too, too strange to have -two- in the same area at the same time who were both mutilators and did not physically rape their victims. JtR shows classic piquerism-in-lieu-of-functioning-penis behaviours (with some necrophilia thrown in).

But what about torso man? I haven't seen enough to suggest a clear line of motive, yet.

Also of note is that a couple of the victims didn't have the hands of working women.. if they were of a higher class, why weren't they missed? Was the smooth skin of those hands occurring for some other reason, ie, the body being waterlogged for a time, or some sort of post-mortem treatment to soften the skin? Otherwise, what sort of women in Victorian England didn't have to work, and had smooth hands, yet wouldn't be missed at all?

As an aside, I feel terribly sorry for the police of the era, JtR and torso man combined, and not a conviction in sight...

Bleh, sorry.. I do go on. It's all just really fascinating.

[Phil H]

As well as the JtR murders and the Torso killer was there not also a series of unexplained disappearrances in the East End in or around 1888? I used to have an article on them, but cannot now put my hand on it.

So quite a bit going on.

Phil

[Debra A]

One interesting points of similarity between the mutilations performed on Annie Chapman, Mary Jane Kelly and Elizabeth Jackson is that the killer deliberately removed flaps of skin from their abdomens.

[Debra A]

Hi Ausgirl,

Looking at the mutilations between the Torso victims and the Whitechapel victims, specifically the Macnaughton Five. I think they were done by two different people. The Torso mutilations look more skilled (the removal of the arms showed some skill in the Whitehall victim) where the Ripper victims seemed more crude and rushed. There are some very good reports on the Torso victims describing the injuries. Also the Ripper victims seem to me more put on display (except Kelly) where the Torso victims were more hidden from view. Just my opinion.


Rob

Hi Rob,
Hebbert and Bond thought the precise disarticulated of the joints in the four cases, Rainham, Whitehall, Pinchin and Jackson showed only the skill of a hunter or slaughterer didn't they? While some were convinced (and still are) that JTR showed the skill of a surgeon in his mutilations many felt it was someone accustomed to animal slaughter or butchering, so perhaps not too different skill wise?
It's difficult to compare as the specific hunting/slaughtering skill of the torso killer was seen in the limb removal and disarticulated of joints and none of the Macnaghten five had limbs removed.
When comparing wounds on both sets of victims I do personally think there is some similarity-long incisions from ribs to pubes, removal of some organs,abdominal skin flap creation and removal. Comparing Mary Jane Kelly's wounds to Elizabeth Jackson's - they are chillingly similar, as I've mentioned many times before.

[Ausgirl]

Rob, I'd love to read your article, btw. Where could I find a copy? I'd also really like to find that info on the disappearances you mentioned, Phil.

Torso man seems to me a lot more finicky than JtR, with his neatly string-tied parcels and saw-cuts. That alone seems a pretty wide disparity in MO, and hard to reconcile with the rougher nature of JtR's crimes - with Mary Kelly, he could take his time .. and he was anything but neat about it. Not impossible, but in my mind so far, also not quite likely that he could swing back and forth like that.

(It well could have been 'torso-men', plural, if the report of the man who saw somebody leaping the fence at Whitehall, in the company of two others with a barrow, had anything to do with it. I bet they were just pinching stuff, was my first thought, but there's always the possibility there was more than one person.)

I was reading the other day about killers who stake defined territories, as opposed to those who travel more freely. The range of area for the torso crimes was much larger, even given that the river helped a few bits travel, than Jack's teeny patch to which he seemed pretty dedicated.

The similarities are there, though, and not at all insignificant.

Oho! And wasn't there mention of several men bearing mysterious parcels in the Ripper murders? Kidding. (mostly)

edit add: I've been reading good reviews of M.J.Trow's book. Putting it on the must-have list. Are there any others that give comprehensive detail of the crimes, that anyone'd recommend?