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A Ripperologist Article
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This article originally appeared in Ripperologist No. 81, July 2007. Ripperologist is the most respected Ripper periodical on the market and has garnered our highest recommendation for serious students of the case. For more information, view our Ripperologist page. Our thanks to the editor of Ripperologist for permission to reprint this article.
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Mrs. Kuer’s Lodger
by Gavin Bromley
Introduction
Berner Street achieved notoriety as the scene of one of the Whitechapel Murders in 1888, the
murder of Elizabeth Stride occurring on the night of the supposed ‘double event’ (30th September
1888); a notoriety that would in time result in its name being changed to Henriques Street. The
next street to the east in the parish of St. George’s-In-The-East is Batty Street, which runs parallel
with Berner Street from Commercial Road as far as Fairclough Street, unlike its neighbouring
street, which then carries on as far as Ellen Street. Batty Street itself had achieved some notoriety
in the previous year, 1887, as the scene of the murder of Miriam Angel at No. 16, a murder that
led to the conviction and execution of Israel Lobulsk, known better as Israel Lipski. Its proximity
to Berner Street and the fact that ‘Lipski’ was allegedly shouted as a racial taunt to a Jewish
witness of events linked to the murder of Elizabeth Stride, have been the main reasons for Batty
Street being linked to the Whitechapel Murders.
However, events on the night of the double event at No. 22, Batty
Street, just three doors south of No. 16, perhaps provide a more direct
link to the murders.
The story of the Batty Street lodger was brought to our attention in The
Lodger, by Stewart P. Evans and Paul Gainey. (1) Essentially the story was that
at some point in the early hours of 30th September 1888, the landlady at
No. 22 was disturbed by one of her lodgers returning home. The lodger
then mysteriously disappeared, leaving behind a bloodstained shirt. The
police were involved and seemingly the story was satisfactorily explained.
However, Evans and Gainey asked if there might have been more to the
story and tried to see a link with the suspect, Francis Tumblety, who had
been forgotten about from the time of the murders.
They gave a possible route that the killer may have taken to get back to
Batty Street from Mitre Square, the scene of the second murder that night
(that of Catherine Eddowes) if the murderer had gone via Goulston Street
to deposit the piece of apron he had taken from the victim. (2)
Evans and Gainey suggested that the Batty Street lodger story may have
been linked with other newspaper reports. They quoted a report from The
Globe of Wednesday 10th October, 1888, which told of a member of the
CID travelling to Liverpool in order to trace the movements of a man who
had been in a West End hotel. He had been in the habit of ‘slumming’ and
had suddenly disappeared leaving a small bill unpaid. He left a black bag
with various contents and had not returned. An advertisement seemingly
appeared in The Times giving the man’s name and informing him that the
bag would be sold if he didn’t claim it.
Some of the contents of the bag
were said to be in the possession of
the police who were investigating the
matter. Certain documents, wearing
apparel, cheque books, obscene
prints and letters were said to form
the foundation of the inquiry. The
suggestion had been made that the man
had landed in Liverpool from America
and the East Anglian Daily Times of
Thursday 11th October mentioned the
police were watching the port and
railway stations in that city.
The Batty Street lodger story broke
in several newspapers on Tuesday 16th
October 1888. As we will see shortly,
when we look at the reports in depth,
reference is made to police investigating
the lodger’s previous movements.
Evans and Gainey link this to the story
in the Globe because of the reference
to the man’s previous movements and
because they speculate that the police
would have discovered the Liverpool
connection from belongings the lodger
left at Batty Street.
As we will see, another story of a
man leaving bloodstained clothes at a
laundry in Gray’s Inn Road may have
been the source of an attempt by the
police to kill the Batty Street lodger
story in order to avoid alerting the
man they were seeking.
The authors refer to a report in the
Daily News of Tuesday 9th October
titled ‘Remarkable Story’. This tells
of an American arrested at 1am the
previous morning (Monday 8th) whose
conduct and demeanour was said to
be suspicious. John Lardy and a friend
had followed the man after seeing him
approach two women thought to be prostitutes. They followed him from London Hospital to Aldgate at the corner of
Duke Street. By then the man seemed to be aware that he was being followed and doubled back to go down Leman
Street to Royal Mint Street and across King Street. The latter was a narrow road so the men ran round to the other
side to catch sight of him there. When they arrived they heard a door shut and suspected he had gone into a house.
He emerged 25 minutes later in different clothes. Lardy described him as being about 5-11 or 6-0 feet tall and said he
had what appeared to be a false moustache.
The report is linked to one in the Manchester Evening News 18th October that said a man aged 35 had been
arrested. He had been somewhat confused lately and was detained pending further inquiries. The description of this
American certainly fits that of Tumblety and the authors link the various reports to this investigation into Tumblety’s
movements.
It is often hard to find the truth behind a story. Details get added, misconstrued, garbled and mixed up with other
stories. But on the face of it, essentially a lodger at 22 Batty Street had departed on the morning following the double
event after disturbing the landlady and left behind a bloodstained shirt. He appeared to be a foreigner and hadn’t
been seen since. But what details could we rely on and what was the truth behind the story? Were these other stories
necessarily linked with the incident at Batty Street? For example, the reference to the man at the West End hotel and the connection made by Evans and Gainey to the story of the port in Liverpool being watched would more likely have been made from the contents of the bag left at the London hotel rather than any evidence found in Batty Street. The authors make some very reasonable deductions and rightly deserve credit for first discussing this story in detail, but let’s strip away some of the extraneous details to see what the basic facts of the story are and to build a picture of the possible events.
The Batty Street Lodger
The first reports of the Batty Street lodger story appeared on Tuesday, 16th October, 1888. It was reported in a number of newspapers. I am using the Evening News as the main source as it contained more details than other papers. Where details not covered in the Evening News appeared in other newspapers they will be noted. The only source we have for the name of the landlady is the Illustrated Police News of 27th October, 1888, which gave it as Mrs. Kuer.(3) No other newspaper identified her.
On Sunday the police were watching with great anxiety a house at the East-end which is strongly suspected to have been the actual lodging, or a house made use of, by some one connected with the East-end murders.
From various statements made by the neighbours in the district, the landlady had a lodger, who since the Sunday morning of the murder has been missing. It appears according to the statements made by the landlady to her neighbours(4), her lodger returned home early on the Sunday morning, and she was disturbed by his moving about. She got up herself very early, and noticed her lodger had changed some of his clothes. He told her he was going away for a little time, and he asked her to wash the shirt which he had taken off and get it ready for him by the time he came back. As he had been in the habit of going away now and then she did not think much at the time, and soon afterwards he went out.
THE WRISTBANDS AND SLEEVES SATURATED WITH BLOOD.
On looking at his shirt she was astonished to find the wristbands and part of the sleeves completely saturated with wet blood. The appearance struck her as very strange, and then when she heard of the murders a horrible suspicion seemed to flash into her mind. Acting on the advice of some of her neighbours, she gave information to the police, and showed them the shirt and the state it was in. They then took possession of it, and obtained from her a full description of her missing lodger. During the last fortnight she has been under the impression that he would return, and was sanguine that he would probably come back on Saturday or Sunday night, or perhaps, on Monday. The general opinion, however, among the neighbours is that he has left her for good.
A VISIT TO THE HOUSE
On finding out the house and visiting it the reporter found it tenanted by a stout, middle-aged German woman, who speaks very bad English, and who was not inclined to give much information further than the fact that her lodger had not returned yet, and she could not say where he had gone or when he would be back. The neighbours state that ever since the information has been given, two detectives and two policemen have been in the house. The house itself has rather a dingy and uninviting appearance. The curtains are kept partly together, and the shutters partly up. It is approached by a court, and as there are alleys running through from one street to the other adjacent, there are different ways of approach and exit. It is believed that in the information obtained as to his former movements and general appearance, together with the fact that numbers of people have seen the same man, the police have in their possession a series of most important clues, and that his ultimate capture is only a question of time.(5)
This tells us that on Sunday, 14th October, the police were watching the address concerned, which at this point was not identified in the reports. All sources say that the statements came from the neighbours, but the Evening News explicitly mentions that the details were obtained from statements made by the landlady to her neighbours (even its sister paper, the Daily News does not state this despite an otherwise virtually identical report). This can be inferred from the other reports, but this does indicate the landlady had given much of the details to her neighbours. So while the neighbours could have made their own observations and deductions we know some of the details at least came from the landlady herself. Though, of course, what was passed on to the reporter(s) may not necessarily have been what the landlady had told her neighbour(s).(6)
The neighbours were said to come from the ‘district’. This could just be a figure of speech, but it may indicate that these were not immediate neighbours as ‘district’ suggests a wider area than just the immediate houses. This may indicate that the reporter’s source of the story was a few generations from that originally told by the landlady.
There is also the fact from the above account that a reporter apparently spoke directly to the landlady, but she was not giving much information. She was described as a stout, middle-aged woman from Germany who did not speak English very well. That fact needs to be borne in mind when assessing the details. There is a lot of scope here for misinterpretation of what the landlady said (to her neighbours and to the reporter) and also for the landlady misinterpreting questions asked of her.
The details obtained from the neighbours are that the landlady was disturbed in the early hours by her lodger returning home and moving about. She got up herself very early and noticed he had changed some of his clothes. There is little scope for ambiguity with this detail—someone came home in the early hours and disturbed her. The explanations given later for the incident do not account for this detail.
A slightly different account is given in other newspapers regarding when the landlady herself got up.
This man was said to have returned to his lodging at an early hour on the Sunday morning on which the Berner-street and Mitre-square murders were committed. His landlady was disturbed by his movements, and she noticed next morning that he had changed his clothes.(7)
Whereas the report in the Evening News can be interpreted as the landlady getting up when the lodger returned or not long afterwards (‘her lodger returned home early on the Sunday morning, and she was disturbed by his moving about’ and ‘she got up herself very early’) the Telegraph states that it was next morning that she noticed he had changed his clothes (suggesting it was later on in the morning—i.e. daylight hours). Another interpretation of the way it was reported in the Evening News is that it could be that when she herself got up it was maybe a couple of hours after the lodger returned but was still very early (for example about 5 o’clock). No indication is given of exactly when the lodger returned, just that it was in the early hours. We have no way of knowing when this was in relation to the time of the murders of Stride and Eddowes. It is not clear from the Evening News account if she got up when he returned. However, it is stated that it was ‘next morning’ that she noticed the lodger had changed his clothes.
The fact that the lodger was said to have changed his clothes is a difficult one to interpret. She must have seen him on at least two separate occasions to know he had changed his clothes. Presumably Saturday evening would be the last time she saw him before noticing the change. Then she may have seen him as he returned home and disturbed her, or not long after this. Or she could have seen him later in the morning when she herself got up. However, at this later time, what would be odd about a person changing their clothes from those they were seen in the previous evening? People do tend to change their clothes the following day. If the observation was made at this time, it may be that he tended not to change his clothes very often. Nonetheless, he would change them occasionally even if it wasn’t every day, assuming he had more than one set of clothes. So why would Mrs. Kuer think it noteworthy if he had changed his clothes in the morning from those worn the previous evening? It may have been because his clothes had already been moved out (if the lodger had arranged to move out that weekend anyway, which is a possibility as we will see) or because he was seen wearing clothes that did not belong to him. In the latter case the landlady may not have had to see him on two separate occasions to deduce he had changed his clothes.
With these snippets of information the inference is clear that the person concerned was a lodger and not just someone who had left clothes to be washed, which was claimed later.
We are also informed that he told her he was going away for a while and asked her to clean his shirt ready for when he returned. The man was said to occasionally leave for a while so this was not regarded as unusual by the landlady. These details may have been misinterpreted for reasons we will come to later.
The man left soon afterwards and had been missing since ‘the Sunday morning of the murder’. In the section where
the landlady was spoken to directly, she confirmed that he had not yet returned and she did not know when he would
do so. In the section where the information seemingly came from the neighbour, the landlady was said to have been
confident that he would have returned on Saturday or Sunday night, or possibly on Monday. Now this would appear
to mean from Saturday the 13th to Monday the 15th. As we will see later, there may be an explanation for why the
landlady was said to have expected he would return on a particular day. Nothing was said in the original report that
when he left he gave a specific day for his return, though maybe she was used to him leaving for about a fortnight at
a time. The neighbours were said to believe that he would never come back.
The landlady later discovered the shirt was bloodstained on the cuffs and sleeves. The reference to it being saturated
with blood was possibly an exaggeration by the neighbours or the reporter. When she then heard of the murders, this
aroused her suspicions and her neighbours advised her to call the police, which she had, and since then the police (two
detectives and two uniformed policemen) had been waiting at the house around the clock (presumably in shifts). That
she had told her neighbours would explain them being the source for the story.
The report then gives a brief description of the location of the house in relation to nearby passages (‘It is approached
by a court, and as there are alleys running through from one street to the other adjacent, there are different ways of
approach and exit’). The address was given in subsequent reports and this is an accurate description of the approach
to the house. 22 Batty Street can be easily reached from Berner Street by going along Hampshire Court, where it is
situated at the end directly on the left of the passageway. Virtually directly opposite the house on the other side of
Batty Street is another court (Queen Court) leading to Christian Street. So, as the report stated, there were various
ways to reach 22 Batty Street directly.
The final section presents a confi-
dent view of the predicted outcome
of the enquiry: ‘It is believed that
in the information obtained as to
his former movements and general
appearance, together with the fact
that numbers of people have seen the
same man, the police have in their
possession a series of most important
clues, and that his ultimate capture
is only a question of time.’ Reference
to his former movements and general
appearance would probably come from
the landlady and may have covered
his former address and his movements
at the time of the other murders.
Interestingly ‘numbers of people’ had
seen the same man. In the Daily
News this was expanded to say that
‘numbers of people have seen the same
man about the neighbourhood’ (my
emphasis). As we will see, the police
were not providing any information
about this story so this detail would
appear to come from the neighbours,
or possibly was the result of the reporter asking people in the neighbourhood if they’d seen a certain man and giving
a rough description as provided by the landlady or her neighbour. Such a method would be unlikely to yield useful
information, as people would want to be seen to have important information. It is possible, however, that this was
correct information, in which case a possible implication is that the lodger had been seen in the area since so was
possibly still around.
However, the confidence expressed in the Evening News is contradicted in reports by, amongst other newspapers, the Daily Telegraph, the Manchester Guardian and the Irish Times.
Suspicion flashed across her mind, and the police were informed. Inquiry was instituted, with the result that the incidents mentioned are said to have been “satisfactorily accounted for.(8)”
The report that an important clue had been obtained through the discovery of a bloodstained shirt left by a suspected character in an East End lodginghouse had no better foundation than an incident which was satisfactorily explained over a week ago.(9)
These reports suggest that the matter had already been investigated and a satisfactory explanation had been given over a week before. This may point at the weekend before (i.e. Saturday the 6th / Sunday the 7th) that being just over a week before the story became known on Monday the 15th.
So at this point the Daily News and Evening News were reporting that here was an important lead while the Telegraph, Manchester Guardian and Irish Times were reporting that the incident had already been satisfactorily explained. The account in the latter newspapers may represent early access to information that would come to light in the next couple of days.
On the following day the story was expanded.
THE EAST-END MURDERS.
THE BATTY-STREET CLUE.
THE BLOOD-STAINED SHIRT.
The startling story published yesterday with reference to the finding of a blood-stained shirt and the disappearance of a man from a lodging-house in the East-end proves upon investigation to be of some importance. On Monday afternoon the truth of the statement was given an unqualified denial by the detective officers immediately after its publication and this presumably because they were anxious to avoid a premature disclosure of facts of which they had been for some time cognisant. From the very morning of the murders, the police, it is stated, have had in their possession a shirt saturated with blood. Though they say nothing they are evidently convinced that it was left in a house in Batty-street by the assassin after he had finished his work. Having regard to the position of this particular house, its close proximity to the yard in Berner-street, where the crime was committed, and to the many intricate passages and alleys adjacent, the police theory has, in all probability, a basis of fact. An examination of the surroundings leads to the conclusion that probably in the whole of Whitechapel there is no quarter in which a criminal would be more likely to evade police detection, or observation of any kind, than he would be in this particular one. At the inquest on Mrs. Stride one of the witnesses deposed to having seen a man and a woman standing at the junction of Fairclough and Berner-streets early on the morning of the murder. Assuming that the man now sought was the murderer, he would have gained instant access to the house in Batty-street by rapidly crossing over from the yard and traversing a passage, the entrance of which is almost immediately opposite to the spot where the victim was subsequently discovered. The statement has been made that the landlady of the lodging-house, 22, Batty-street—the house in which the shirt was left - was at an early hour disturbed by the movements of the lodger who changed some of his apparel and went away; first, however, instructing her to wash the cast-off shirt by the time he returned. But in relation to this latter theory, the question is how far the result of the inquiries made yesterday is affected by a recent arrest. Although, for reasons known to themselves, the police during Saturday, Sunday, and Monday answered negatively all questions as to whether any person had been arrested or was then in their charge, there is no doubt that a man was taken into custody on suspicion of being the missing lodger from 22, Batty-street, and that he was afterwards set at liberty.(10)
The Irish Times added:
There is no doubt that a man was taken into custody on suspicion of being the missing lodger from 22 Batty street, and that he was afterwards set at liberty. The German lodginghouse-keeper could clear up the point as to the existence of any other lodger absent from the house under the suspicious circumstances referred to, but she is not accessible, and, it is easy to understand that the police should endeavour to prevent her making an statement. From inquiries in various directions this afternoon a further development is very likely to take place.
First of all we have a reference to the fact that the police were denying the story on Monday afternoon (15th). This was expanded later in the story to include Saturday (13th) and Sunday (14th). This would suggest that none of the information relating to the story came from, or was confirmed by, a police source. The assumption was that the police were keen to keep the story under wraps to avoid jeopardising any operation in progress. Of course it could be that there were denials because the matter had already been resolved.
If the press had enough information to ask the police questions on Saturday it appears odd that there was no mention of the story in the press on Monday. We’ll examine the timing of when the story broke later.
This report also tells us that the police had been aware of the incident for some time—in fact from the very morning of the murders when the landlady told them of the incident and handed over the shirt. There is a reiteration of some of the details given the previous day, but we are now told the address of the house—22 Batty Street.
The latter part of the report is interesting. We are told that ‘in relation to this latter theory, the question is how far the result of the inquiries made yesterday is affected by a recent arrest’. This is the first mention of an arrest relating to the incident, though it may tie in with the report in the Telegraph on the previous day that the matter had already been explained satisfactorily. Though the police had denied it, the reporter was certain that someone had been arrested on suspicion of being the missing lodger and that he had been released. If the report in the Irish Times (16 October) is correct regarding the matter being satisfactorily accounted for over a week before, then it may point to an arrest on the weekend of October 6-7. Of course, there is also the point that this arrest may involve some confusion with the incident at Gray’s Inn Road, which we will look at in more detail later.
Interestingly, there seems to have been a turnaround in the two press camps in their reports of the 17th. On the 16th the Daily News and Evening News had been optimistic in reporting that the man’s capture was imminent, while the Telegraph, Manchester Guardian and Irish Times were reporting that the matter had already been satisfactorily accounted for. On the 17th the Daily and Evening News were reporting that a man had already been arrested and released while the other camp were now reporting that ‘from inquiries in various directions this afternoon a further development is very likely to take place’. That there was information at all, let alone optimism, regarding further developments is odd if the police were being reticent regarding the matter. That is unless there was another source for this information – such as the landlady, though she was likewise said to be unforthcoming, or possibly the neighbours. Also there is the possibility of confusion with other leads being followed up by the police where perhaps the police were expressing some optimism, but the press had associated their optimism with the wrong story.
Also of interest in the Irish Times is that it was felt the landlady had been made inaccessible and this, it was said, was because the police wanted to ‘avoid a premature disclosure of the facts’. This would reinforce the point made in the Evening News on the 16th that the landlady was ‘not inclined to give much information’.
Another point of interest in the Irish Times (also reported in the Morning Advertiser, 17th October) is that ‘the German lodginghouse-keeper could clear up the point as to the existence of any other lodger absent from the house under the suspicious circumstances referred to’. Why the reference to ‘any other’ lodger being absent or missing? Could it be that someone had been arrested and released, but attention was now being turned to someone else? It could just be a misleading or clumsy expression, but reference to ‘any other lodger’ being absent is interesting. This suggests there was already one man absent and this man was accounted for; but there was now interest in another man. The Irish Times carried the same report as the Daily News about the arrest and release of the man, so is this an indication that someone else was now being sought?
On the 18th the story seemingly was explained by reference to the man being a laundry customer of Mrs. Kuer’s. However more questions are raised. The landlady was interviewed on the 17th and this was reported in the Evening News on the 18th.
INTERVIEW WITH THE LANDLADY IN BATTY STREET.
A Press representative had an interview, yesterday, with the landlady of the house, 22, Batty-street, Whitechapel, which place was alleged to be the resort of the owner of the blood-stained shirt. The lodging-house is kept by a German woman, the wife of a seaman. She denied that the man for whom the police were searching was one of her lodgers, and asserted that he simply had his washing done at the house. He was a ladies tailor, working for a West-end house, and did not reside in the Leman-street district. She explained the presence of blood on the shirt by saying that it was owing to an accident that occurred to a man (other than the one taken into custody) who was living on the premises, and that the police would have known nothing of it but for her having indiscreetly shown it to a neighbour. The woman denies that the detectives are still in possession of her house.(11)
The landlady, here described as being the wife of a seaman, now said that the man being sought was not a lodger, but someone who had his washing done at her house. Further reports would refer to her as a laundress. The man was said to be a ladies tailor and did not live in the area. She referred to someone being taken into custody but, importantly, said that this man was not the one responsible for getting the blood on the shirt. This was caused by ‘an accident that occurred to a man who lived on the premises’. The story died after the reports on this day and was not followed up in the press. But this information from the landlady opens up many questions. The whole incident is seemingly dismissed—the shirt was brought in by someone to be cleaned, someone in the house got blood on it accidentally, and the police had now left the house. Everything is explained. Well not quite.
An ambiguity in the report is that the man responsible for getting blood on the shirt was someone ‘other than the one taken into custody’ but it doesn’t actually equate the man taken into custody with the laundry customer. It is implied, but not explicitly stated. However, this point is clarified by the further details that appeared in the Daily News of the same date:
With regard to the statements current as to finding a blood-stained shirt at a lodging-house in Whitechapel, it appears the story is founded on some matters which occurred more than a fortnight ago. A man, apparently a foreigner, visited the house of a German laundress, at 22, Batty-street, and left four shirts, tied in a bundle, to be washed. The bundle was not opened at the time, but when the shirts were afterwards taken out one was found considerably blood-stained. The woman communicated with the police, who placed the house under observation, detectives at the same time being lodged there to arrest the man should he return. This he did last Saturday, and was taken to the Leman-street Police-station, where he was questioned, and within an hour or two released, his statement being proved correct.(12)
Additional information given by the Daily News is that the man was foreign and had brought in a bundle of four shirts to be washed, one of which was found to be bloodstained. The police were informed and waited for his return, which he did ‘last Saturday’ (apparently the 13th). He was taken to Leman Street Police Station for questioning and was then released, the police being satisfied with his statement. This seems to contradict Mrs. Kuer’s initial answers to reporters published on October 16 when she just asserted that the man had not returned yet.
Also, in these later reports the landlady said that the police were not ‘still in possession of the house’, which implies that they had been.
Regarding the story at this point that the man was a customer rather than a lodger, if police were said to have been looking into his former movements (from the reports on the 16th) this would be unlikely to apply to a customer on whom they would not have much information. However, in the case of a lodger, there may have been information that the landlady or other lodgers could give from details he had given them while he lived there, as well as items left at the house by the man.
However, the most important detail here is that the landlady said that the customer who brought the clothes was not responsible for getting the blood on the shirt. This raises the question as to why the customer was arrested. If he was not responsible for getting the blood on the shirt, why would he be arrested?
So the story about the customer, even if true, is irrelevant in that it was someone ‘living on the premises’ who was responsible for getting blood on the shirt. That the man ‘was living on the premises’ may imply he was no longer living there, possibly supporting the theory that there was still a missing lodger. The point is that this statement is supposed to be cooling the story by explaining that the bloodstains were not due to some missing lodger still being searched for by police, but the report implies that the person responsible for getting blood on the shirt no longer lived there. Again this could be an example of sloppy expression and the person referred to by Mrs. Kuer was still living there.
Perhaps tellingly, the landlady was reported as indicating to the journalist that ‘the police would have known nothing of it but for her having indiscreetly shown it to a neighbour’. This implies that the landlady was not pleased that the police had been informed and blamed her own indiscretion in showing the shirt to a neighbour. Could the landlady have had an initial suspicion and shown her neighbour the shirt, but later regretted this as she had dismissed her own suspicions and felt obliged or coerced into informing the police due to pressure from her neighbour? Could this account for the seemingly uncooperative nature of the landlady with the press? This may be an indication that Mrs. Kuer did not willingly aid the police’s investigation.
But when did Mrs. Kuer find out that it was one of her householders who had got blood on the shirt? Was it before the arrest of the customer? Or only afterwards? Was it as a result of the police inquiry into the customer’s statement after they arrested him that this information emerged? Could the arrested man’s insistence that there was no blood on the shirt when he gave to the landlady have led to further questions at Mrs. Kuer’s house? Moreover, did the police even know about this information given by the landlady to the press? Also, does this account for the references in the reports of the previous day to ‘any other lodger absent from the house under the suspicious circumstances referred to’? Had attention turned to someone else? Or had the police been given a satisfactory explanation for the blood being on the shirt from the person living at the house who was responsible for it getting there?
This person couldn’t have been Mrs. Kuer herself (and who was then trying to cover up this fact), else why would she show the shirt to a neighbour and express her suspicions in the first place.
Also to consider is the fact that this report does not account for the original story about a lodger disturbing the landlady in the early hours. A customer is not going to leave his shirts in the early hours. Nor does it account for the fact that the landlady noticed the man had changed his clothes.
While the Daily News and Evening News seemed to believe the incident was now explained, the Irish Times continued in the other direction, though expressing some doubt in the public’s faith in the optimism seemingly shown by the police.
The “bloody shirt,” having long figured as a standard of American party warfare, is likely to appear in this community as a flag of justice. For it is declared that the police are in possession of a most important clue to the Whitechapel assassin. This clue is a shirt saturated with blood, and supposed from circumstances needless to narrate to have been worn by the murderer when he killed his two latest victims. Great importance, it seems, is attached by the experts of the Criminal Investigation Department to this ensanguined garment, and the resources of the institution are at present directed to the discovery of the wearer. It must be said that the public do not share the great expectations of the authorities.(13)
Reference to the shirt being worn by the killer could just be straightforward, but saying ‘worn by’ and ‘wearer’ as opposed to ‘owned by’ and ‘owner’ may be an important distinction. If this was a deliberately subtle distinction, is this another indication that the inquiry had shifted from the man who left the shirts to the man who got blood on them?
One other very interesting item is to be found in the Evening News of 18 October, 1888—a letter from one of the lodgers at 22 Batty Street. This was written on the 17th.
A LETTER FROM 22, BATTY STREET.
We have received the following letter:
SIR - Referring to your issue No. [2227], I beg of you to publish a contradictory statement respecting the Whitechapel murder; in fact, your reporter has been wrongly informed, or else it his own suggestion.
The police are not in the house, nor has the woman had a lodger who is now missing, but a stranger brought the shirts, and when he fetched them, he was detained by the police, and after inquiries discharged. As regards our house, it is not as your report describes it, for it is a most respectable house and in good general condition; although it is certainly not Windsor Castle. There are only two lodgers, one a drayman, name of Joseph, who works for the Norwegian Lager Beer Company, and the other a baker, name of Carl Noun, who has been at work in Margate, and only returned on the 6th of this month after the season was over. I trust you will publish these statements as I put it to you, in fact it may injure the poor woman in her business. - Respectfully.
C. NOUN (a lodger in the house).
22, Batty-street, Commercial-road, E., October 17.(14)
This letter gives us some important information. From it we know there were two lodgers at 22 Batty Street—Joseph, a drayman for the Norwegian Lager Beer Company, and Carl Noun (the letter writer), a baker. Noun was keen to put the record straight and despite starting diplomatically, suggests that the reporter may have made the story up. Here Noun largely tells the same story as Mrs. Kuer. He states the police were not in the house (though, unlike with the landlady’s statement, we can’t infer from his letter that the police had at some point been in the house) nor was there a missing lodger. He reiterates the story that someone brought the shirts to the house and the police arrested him on his return, though he was later released. As an incidental point Noun also rebuts the statement in the Evening News of the 16th that the ‘house was dingy and uninviting’. He also states the reason for writing the letter is that he believed the story may adversely affect the landlady’s business (presumably as a laundress). This may be why the landlady gave the interview. Her original tactic to be evasive was unfortunately not working, so she gave an interview and Noun, to help out, wrote a letter to the press.
Noun referred to the customer as a ‘stranger’. This may imply that the man was not a regular customer of Mrs. Kuer’s or it could be that the man was just a stranger to Noun.
However, one detail in Noun’s letter is important. This is that he tells us he had been away (at work in Margate) and only returned on 6th October. This was a week after the incident. Noun would not be in a position to know first-hand what happened in the house on 30th September. He may have been in the house for the arrest of the customer on the latter’s return, but he would not be able to refute the stories in the press from first-hand knowledge.
A few possibilities present themselves here. Firstly, there was the denial that there was a missing lodger. However, if Noun was away for the season, could the landlady have brought in someone else to use the room while Noun was away? Presumably Noun would have to pay a retainer to keep the room until he returned. Could the landlady have sought to make more money by letting the room in Noun’s absence, on the understanding with the new lodger that they must find somewhere else to live prior to Noun returning on 6th October (if she knew that would be his date of return)? Maybe this was done without Noun’s knowledge and, to keep this from him, she came up with a story about a customer leaving some shirts to be cleaned, rather than a temporary lodger leaving them. The reference to the person who got blood on the shirt who ‘was living there’ may also indicate someone having moved in while Noun was away and that the person concerned no longer lived there.
Could the story about the missing lodger leaving for a while every now and then also be a reference to Noun? Maybe the scenario was that the landlady told her neighbour about the lodger leaving the shirt and explained how she let the room while Noun was away and that Noun would often go away for a time, but the neighbour thought this detail was about the missing lodger. This also raises the possibility that the reports mentioning ‘any other lodger absent from the house under the circumstances referred to’ may have been a result of Noun’s return. Noun was a lodger at the house who would have been absent at the time of the incident and knowledge of his circumstances may have been behind this reference to ‘any other lodger’.
Also, reference is made to an arrest in several reports. The Daily News (Wednesday, 18 October) refers to this being ‘last Saturday’. Strictly speaking this would refer to Saturday the 13th. However, use of ‘next’ and ‘last’ when referring to a day of the week can be ambiguous in terms of which week the statement is referring to and earlier reports in the Irish Times (Tuesday, 16 October) referred to the matter being resolved over a week before (i.e. before Tuesday the 9th), which may mean the arrest actually occurred on Saturday, 6 October. This was the day that Carl Noun said he returned to Batty Street. Could it be that Carl Noun was the man detained by the police? If they were in the house, probably even waiting in his room, it could be they believed this was the missing lodger when he returned if he vaguely fitted the landlady’s description and she was not in the house at the time of the arrest to explain their mistake.
A combination of these facts could account for different aspects of the story. It could be that there actually was a customer who left some shirts on Saturday the 29th of September (or possibly earlier). From the landlady’s account someone living at 22 Batty Street got blood onto one of these shirts. This must have been on Saturday night or Sunday morning (29/30) as the bloodstained shirt was said to be in the possession of the police from the morning of the murders. From the landlady’s explanation of events to her neighbour who persuaded her to inform the police, certain details could have been confused. The landlady would possibly have explained about the lodger disturbing her and her later discovery of the bloodstained shirt which had been brought in by a customer who asked her to have it ready for when he came back on a specified day. She may also have explained that the lodger was living there while Carl Noun, one of her regular lodgers, was away. Due to language problems or a process of ‘Chinese whispers’ the story became that it was the lodger who asked for the shirt to be cleaned (when this was actually the customer) and who was in the habit of going away for a while (when this was, in fact, Noun).
Gray’s Inn Road Laundry story
As already mentioned, Evans and Gainey suggest that the story given by Mrs. Kuer about a laundry customer leaving
shirts may have been suggested to her by the police based on an incident that had happened the previous week at the
Clothing Repairing Company in Gray’s Inn Road, Holborn, which was actually part of a chain of shops. The idea is that
in order to kill the story a statement was given to the press relating a story based on this earlier separate incident,
with the additional hope that the stories would then be confused. Alternatively, it may be that elements of this story
simply got mixed up by the press with the Batty Street lodger story in their early reports of the latter. It has also been
suggested that the Batty Street lodger story was just a result of details being confused from the Gray’s Inn Road story
and other stories.
The reports about the Gray’s Inn Road incident first appeared on Tuesday, the 9th of October.
THE EAST-END MURDERS.
The Central News states that the Metropolitan Police last night made an arrest which was thought to be of
importance. The arrest was made through the instrumentality of the manager of a clothes repairing company
in Gray’s Inn-road. Last Wednesday afternoon a man called at the shop between twelve and two o’clock in the
afternoon with two garments—an overcoat and a pair of trousers to be cleaned. They were both blood-stained.
The coat was especially smeared near one of the pockets, and there were large spots of blood on various parts
of the trousers. The manager was away at the time, and his wife took charge of the garments. The man said
he would call for them on Friday or Saturday. The wife naturally called her husband’s attention to the blood
stains on his return, and he communicated with the metropolitan police, who, having examined the clothes,
took them to Scotland-yard. Since then, two detectives have been secreted on the premises awaiting the
stranger’s return. Friday and Saturday passed by without his calling, but last evening he stepped into the shop
a few minutes before closing time. Detective-sergeant George Godley and a companion seized him without
much ceremony, and he was taken straight to Leman-street Police-station. Meanwhile the prisoner accounted
for the presence of the blood marks by the assertion that he had cut his hand. It is stated, however, that his
explanation was not altogether consistent, as in an unguarded moment he spoke of having cut himself last
Saturday, and then suddenly recollecting himself stated that he had also cut his hand previously. The prisoner
further stated that he had had the garments by him in his lodgings for two or three weeks, but he refused to
give his address. A later communication from the Central News says :- The man was liberated after the police
had satisfied themselves of his innocence. The apparent inconsistency of his explanation was doubtless due to
his embarrassment.(15)
The Irish Times of the same date
added the detail that the suspect was
“a middle-aged man of good physique
and respectably dressed”.
Extra details were given in the Star
the same day:
The detectives seized him,
and took him to Leman-street
Police-station. He stated that
while employed as a waiter at
the Alexandra Park he had broken
some glass and cut one of his hands
rather severely. Inquiries made at
his residence and at the Palace
corroborated his story, and as
there were no further grounds for
detaining him he was discharged.(16)
The reference to ‘Alexandra Park’ appears to be a mistake as the report later refers to ‘the Palace’ and the man’s place of employment was given as the Alexandra Palace in the St. James Gazette on the same date.
The City Press, on the following day, added the detail that “inquiries are being made of his antecedents”.
So seemingly on Wednesday, 3 October, the man left the clothes at the shop and returned on Monday the 8th (17) when he was detained by police. The police would naturally be looking into the antecedents of any suspect—so this fact cannot be used as evidence that the stories are necessarily linked.
Firstly, this is obviously a separate incident to that in Batty Street. It is not the case that the reports of the Batty Street incident were merely misreports of the incident in Gray’s Inn Road. That the address was very specifically given, Mrs. Kuer was spoken to and there was a letter from one of the lodgers, all tell us that there was actually a separate incident concerning bloodstained clothing at Batty Street and this was not merely the result of the press getting details wrong about the customer at Gray’s Inn Road.
There are certainly parallels between the two stories. Both involved a customer leaving clothes with bloodstains on them (a bundle of four shirts, one of which was bloodstained at Batty Street; an overcoat and trousers, both of which were bloodstained, at Gray’s Inn Road). Both involved the police waiting on the premises for the man to return (two detectives at Gray’s Inn Road; two detectives and two policemen at Batty Street) and both involved the customer returning, being taken for questioning and then being released.
Early reports of the Batty Street incident (for example, by the Daily Telegraph and the Irish Times) on the 16th of October made reference to the story being satisfactorily explained more than a week before. This timeline would fit in with the Gray’s Inn Road arrest. However, the return of the customer was said to be on a Saturday in the case of the Batty Street customer, whereas it was a Monday in the case of the Gray’s Inn Road customer. If this explanation of the Batty Street incident being satisfactorily explained over a week before was the start of the confusion between the two stories, those papers reporting the explanation must have had some information not available to the other papers (such as the Daily and Evening News) because it wasn’t until Mrs. Kuer was interviewed on the 17th that the customer aspect of the Batty Street story was given and reported in those papers on the 18th, at which point the two stories shared a lot in common. It could be that since Mrs. Kuer had been interviewed on about the 15th (as referred to in the Evening News on the 16th) she had given the detail about the customer to one reporter and not another. So the Irish Times could have reported details on the 16th relating the information Mrs. Kuer subsequently gave to the Evening News which was reported on the 18th. Of course this story could have been a falsehood inspired by events at Gray’s Inn Road given by the police or the landlady to deflect the attention of the press. However, it may be that there was a genuine incident of a customer of Mrs. Kuer’s, on returning to 22 Batty Street to pick up his shirts, being taken in for questioning by police sometime between 6th and 8th October.
To explain the ‘satisfactory account’, it seems unlikely the Irish Times (among others) on the 16th had confused the Batty Street incident with that in Gray’s Inn Road as the customer aspect of the story had not yet been explicitly reported; the man was still referred to as a lodger. If this detail was a result of an early deliberate confusion by police, they had to react immediately to press interest with this tactic.
While Mrs. Kuer may have been instructed by the police to tell the ‘customer’ story, Noun’s letter seems genuinely to have been out of concern for Mrs. Kuer and to give the real story (as he saw it) to refute the details of the initial report in the Evening News even down to disagreeing with the comment about the condition of the house.
So while it is possible that the Gray’s Inn Road story was used as the inspiration for a cover story at Batty Street (either instigated by the police or by Mrs. Kuer and aided by Noun who wrote a letter accordingly to the press to further get the denial story across), it is clear that the Batty Street lodger story related to a separate incident.
Mrs. Kuer’s reluctance
The press reported that Mrs. Kuer was not being very co-operative. This uncooperative attitude may also have been shown by her to the police. Certainly her statement that the police would not have known about the incident had she herself not ‘indiscreetly’ shown the shirt to a neighbour indicates that she was not pleased that the police were involved. This reluctance to get the police involved may have been due to her own judgment about the man concerned. Certainly, there was reason for her to have suspicions in the first place else she would not have spoken with her neighbour. She may then, on reflection, have changed her mind and decided that her lodger (or customer) could not have been involved in the murders. It may be that her assessment that the man was innocent was correct, but it seems a common reaction from some people who know serial killers that they had no idea or would not have believed it of them.
However, there may have been a further reason for her reluctance to aid the police. The murder of Miriam Angel and
execution of Israel Lipski had happened just over a year before (28th June and 22nd August 1887 respectively). The
murder had occurred just three doors away from Mrs. Kuer’s house. The case had been widely reported and following
the trial, before the execution, there was a widespread belief that an innocent man would be hanged. This was due
to a campaign by his solicitor, John Hayward, who produced a pamphlet detailing evidence that he believed proved
Lipski’s innocence. This argument was taken up by some Jewish newspapers and the Pall Mall Gazette. Petitions were
signed, mostly by the Jewish community, and by MPs to at least get Lipski’s sentence commuted. Questions also were
asked in the House of Commons regarding the case. This would, initially at least, have helped some people to question
the verdict and the sentence.
We do not know when Mrs. Kuer moved to 22 Batty Street, but it’s possible that she was there at the time of the
murder of Miriam Angel. Both victim and accused were tenants of Philip and Leah Lipski at No. 16. Indeed, it appears
the accused had taken their name Lipski as his own (Lobulsk being his real name). They were certainly supportive of
their lodger and believed he was innocent, seeing the condemned man several times in prison and a few days prior to
his execution when he again asserted his innocence.
Though Israel Lipski confessed to the murder on the eve of his execution, and
though this was reported in most papers at face value, certain elements
of the press (Jewish radical newspapers especially) viewed this
confession with some scepticism at best. The Home Secretary
had been criticised in the period between the trial and the
execution and the confession was seen as vindication for his
position by most newspapers. However, it may be that some
people still believed in his innocence and if Israel Lipski was
still professing his innocence just a few days before his
execution to Philip and Leah Lipski, it could be that they,
in particular, still believed he was innocent even after
reports of the confession.(18) They had known him for
two years and had spoken to him directly in prison, so
they perhaps would not be swayed from their first-hand
experience of the man by the newspaper reports and
by the confession that may have been viewed merely
as expedient for all concerned rather than a genuine
admission of guilt.
If Mrs. Kuer was living at 22 Batty Street at the time
or if the Lipskis were still living in Batty Street when Mrs.
Kuer moved in possibly at some point in 1888, it could be
that she knew the details of the murder and the opinions
of the Lipskis. It may be that Mrs. Kuer knew them to talk to
and almost certainly would have been aware of the case even
if she hadn’t lived in Batty Street at the time of the murder.
If she felt her story might lead to the execution of a man she
believed to be probably innocent, she might well have wanted to
play down the events to the authorities.
Other events that may have played on Mrs. Kuer’s mind were various
attacks by the husband of Miriam Angel on Leah Lipski just prior to and after
the execution. On the Saturday before Lipski’s execution, Isaac Angel went to
the house with his two brothers. Mrs. Lipski was knocked over and kicked in
the stomach, being told that ‘I will not rest till I have killed you...I will do for you as you have done for my wife’. On
the day of Lipski’s execution, Angel returned to No. 16 with his siblings and damaged the door and windows, and also
kicked Mrs. Lipski. The following day Angel returned with a mob and threatened to kill her. (19)
Again, even if she was not living there at the time, Mrs. Kuer may have heard of these events and the feelings in the
area may have left an impression on her. This may also have made her want to avoid a repeat of such incidents at her
own house. Given that feelings regarding the Whitechapel murders were running high in the area, if there were reports
in the press that the murderer may have lived at her house such attacks may have seemed a very real possibility.
Initially she tried to play down the matter without giving too many details. She may have hoped that giving few details would stifle interest in the story. Obviously this was futile, so she was then forced to give more details to try to explicitly state that the matter had been satisfactorily explained. Either the matter had actually been resolved or the police were actually still looking for the man. Even if the matter had been resolved, it could be that Mrs. Kuer feared attacks because of the ambiguous reports in the press and so she gave out more details to try to stop the interest from the press.
That she did not mention the arrest the first time she was spoken to—when the reporter said she was being evasive—could be that she thought just not saying a lot would be better in order to cause interest in the story to cool down. However, as that didn’t work and there were further reports on the 17th (including the addition of the address), she may then have chosen to give more details, while indicating (whether true or not) that the matter had been resolved.
It could be that a combination of these factors may have caused her not only to be uncooperative with the press but also with the police. Fearing how the situation might develop, she may have feared if the police did catch the man and he was convicted of the crimes then she would have a mob outside the house where he had lived. She may also have dismissed the idea in her own mind that the man could be the murderer, but felt that the evidence of the shirt with other evidence, may have been used to ‘force through’ a conviction, which is what some still may have felt had happened to Israel Lipski.
At this point it may be worth listing the options of what had happened and why she was responding in such a way:
• She had not told the police that a member of the household had got blood on the shirt. The police had waited
for the customer to return and on doing so he was arrested and released having given a satisfactory account.
This ended the matter for the police but Mrs. Kuer felt guilty about her deceit, or did not want to let prospective
customers know they might be arrested like the luckless customer who had been.
• She had not given the press or the police the full details as she did not want her house to be the target of
attacks from those incensed by the murders.
• She had not given the press or the police the full details as she did not believe the man responsible for getting
blood on the shirt was guilty of any murders.
• The police had arrested the customer, then it had come to light about the lodger getting blood on the shirt
and they turned their attention to him. So Mrs. Kuer’s statements were true and given in good faith, albeit not
wanting too many details to be given and wanting to play down the matter, though if the latter was her intent
she was not doing a good job.
• There was no customer, and the man being searched for all along by police was the missing lodger.
• There was no missing lodger; it was the customer that the police sought. Mrs. Kuer and/or the reporter
mistook reference to the customer to be reference to the lodger.
If she was keen to play the story down this could have backed up by one of her lodgers writing to a newspaper. Now there are a few reasons why Mrs. Kuer would have been keen for this to happen:
1) Nothing had happened that didn’t have an innocent explanation and the story she gave was the truth.
2) The story she gave was essentially the truth but played down the details that still indicated some suspicious
activity by a lodger – she wanted to avoid harm to her business or she wanted to avoid attacks on her
property. Less likely, the police told her to do this, but if they wanted to cover it up they’d have perhaps wanted
more deviance from truth.
3) The story she gave was not the truth (and was based on the Gray’s Inn Road story) in order to try to kill the story
as she felt her home might be attacked or her business would suffer.
4) The story she gave was not the truth in order to try and keep the fact from Carl Noun that she had let out his
room in his absence.
5) The police told her to tell the story that was not the truth in order to try to kill the story as they did not want
to alert the culprit.
Timing of the story
The story did not appear in the press until October 16, indicating that it was only known by the press on the 15th. If the police were in possession of the shirt since the day of the murder, and Mrs. Kuer had been advised by neighbours to contact the police, then the story of the lodger returning with a bloodstained shirt would appear to have been known by some neighbours from 30th September.
Given the tendency for people to pass on their stories to the press and for the press to print anything as soon as
they had the information, it seems strange that it was just over a fortnight after the incident that the press got wind
of the story. Of course, regarding the reference to ‘neighbours’ in the report any use of the plural does not give us an
accurate impression of the numbers involved. If there had been just reference to a neighbour advising her to contact
the police you know just one neighbour was involved. However since it was said to be ‘neighbours’ who advised her and
who informed the press this could be just two people or could be many more. Possibly one or two discreet neighbours
were shown the shirt by Mrs. Kuer when she had her initial uneasiness about it. In her press interview in the Evening
News, Mrs. Kuer referred to having indiscreetly shown a neighbour.
At some point in the following fortnight perhaps the story was passed on by one of these neighbours to someone else,
and may at some point have come to the ears of someone who then told the press. As stated earlier, the neighbours
were said to come from the ‘district’ and so may indicate that they were not immediate neighbours. It could be that
the presence of the police at the house may have roused the curiosity of someone who learnt some of the details for
the reason the police were on the premises and told the story to the press.
Certainly, the details were not well known in the neighbourhood, else it would not have taken so long to appear
in the press. Stories such as suspicious-looking strangers in public houses or men being seen with blood on them very
quickly found their way into the newspapers, so a story such as this would not have been passed up by reporters hungry
for details.
It may be that the arrest, if it occurred on (or about) Saturday, October 13, may have been the reason why the
story first broke. However, the arrest was not a confidently asserted detail of the original story so the arrest, even if
it occurred, is unlikely to be the reason the story first broke.
In terms of the reasons for the deviance from the original story as relayed by neighbours, there are a number of
reasons:
1) The story was passed on by the neighbours as it had been told to them by Mrs. Kuer with one or two minor details
being incorrect. Mrs. Kuer then told a different story to the press for one of the reasons noted above.
2) The story, as told by Mrs. Kuer, was interpreted wrongly in some details by the neighbours.
3) The story as told by Mrs. Kuer went through a process of Chinese whispers with the result that some details were
wrong by the time they reached the press.
Also bear in mind that when the story first broke on the 16th some of the reports stated that the incident had been
satisfactorily accounted for, some stating this had been a week before, which may allude to the Gray’s Inn Road story or
may be in reference to actual events at Batty Street. The police denials at that time could be for the same reasons.
That the police were said to be on the premises at all times and that this was the information as given in the reports that appeared on the 16th would suggest that as late as the 15th the police were still on the premises. The three options here are:
• The neighbour giving the story to the press was giving week-old information and the police were no longer on
the premises
• The police were still on the premises waiting for the customer (or the lodger) and had been since the 30th of
September.
• The police were still on the premises, but were now waiting for the lodger, having turned their attention to him
from the customer when they found out who was responsible for getting blood on the shirt.
That it took over two weeks to reach the attention of the press suggests very few people knew about the events at 22 Batty Street.
Other stories
In discussions on the forums of the Batty Street lodger it is clear that there is some confusion caused by elements from other stories reported that might not have been connected to Batty Street.
The report in the Daily News (18th October) regarding the Batty Street lodger was sandwiched between two other stories, but they all ran consecutively leaving the impression that there may have been a link in some of the details. This indeed has been commented on in the Batty Street Lodger thread on Casebook.org(20). This is how the report appears (the section directly regarding the Batty Street lodger has already been quoted above so it is indicated where it appears in context).
From more than one source the police authorities have, it is said, received information tending to show that the East-end murderer is a foreigner who was known as having lived within a radius of a few hundred yards from the scene of the Berner-street tragedy. The very place where he lodges is asserted to be within official cognizance. If the man be the real culprit, he lived some time ago with a woman, by whom he has been accused. Her statements are, it is stated, now being inquired into. In the meantime the suspected assassin is “shadowed.” Incriminating evidence of a certain character has already been obtained, and, should implicit credence be placed upon the story of the woman already referred to, whose name will not transpire under any circumstances until after his guilt is prima facie established, a confession of the crimes may, it is said, be looked for at any moment. The accused is himself aware, it is believed, of the suspicions entertained against him. With regard to the statements current as to finding a blood-stained shirt at a lodging-house in Whitechapel, it appears the story is founded on some matters which occurred more than a fortnight ago.
[Story then continues as detailed above. Then the report goes straight into the following account:]
Some strange statements have been made with reference to a foreigner, residing in the Leman-street district, who has already been in custody on suspicion of being concerned in the murders, and who was released after an exhaustive inquiry. It has been reported to the authorities that this man has again been seen flourishing a knife, and acting in a suspicious manner in the neighbourhood. The police are keeping him under surveillance at present, as there are some doubts as to his state of mind. It should be mentioned, however, that while the man was previously in custody a doctor declined to pronounce him insane. The additional police and detectives are still on night duty over the greater portion of the eastern police district.(21)
The first story is from the top of the report to the part where it says ‘the accused is himself aware, it is believed, of the accusations against him’. This has been linked to the Batty Street lodger story because reference is made to a suspect who was a foreigner living within a radius of a few hundred yards of Dutfield’s Yard, Berner Street, the scene of Elizabeth Stride’s murder, and also because it states that the place where the suspect lodged was being watched by the police. This story also has the additional detail that the suspect lived some time ago with a woman who had now made accusations against him. It has been suggested that this could have been a reference to the landlady at 22 Batty Street.
However, the report refers to where the man ‘lodges’ as opposed to where he ‘lodged’. It may be that again this is not something upon which we should put too much significance, but if it is a significant use of tense then it suggests that the man was still living there and that the report also states that the suspect was being ‘shadowed’, which implies he was being followed, would support the fact that he still lived there, rather than being missing from his lodgings. In the case of the Batty Street story, the suspect had either still to be traced or had been arrested and released. Of course it could be he had left his lodgings (in Batty Street) that the police had initially been watching awaiting his return and they had now traced him to another address. Of course in the latter case it could be that a watch was subsequently kept on him.
While the details could be said not to conflict with what we know of the Batty Street lodger, the report is clearly differentiated from the Batty Street lodger story as the latter is introduced by saying ‘With regard to the statements current as to finding a blood-stained shirt at a lodging-house in Whitechapel’, which implies the report is now talking about something else.
A similar link is made to the third story, which is clearly about another suspect. This refers to someone who had already been arrested on suspicion of being involved with the crimes and who had been released after an ‘exhaustive enquiry’. Again, the man was a foreigner and was living in the Leman Street district. There are also comments about his state of mind and the fact that a doctor had refused to pronounce him insane when previously in custody. The identity of this person is made clear in a report in the Star on 17 October:
A German named Ludwig, residing in the Leman-street district, who has already been in custody on suspicion of being concerned in the murders, and who was released after an exhaustive inquiry—it has been reported that this man has again been seen flourishing a knife and acting in a suspicious manner. The police are keeping him under surveillance at present, as there are some doubts as to the state of his mind. While the man was previously in custody a doctor declined to pronounce him insane. The additional police and detectives are still on night duty over the greater portion of the eastern police district.
So it’s our old friend Charles Ludwig up to his old tricks! He had been arrested on September 19 for ‘threatening behaviour with a knife’. This behaviour had led to a belief that he might be the Whitechapel murderer, but he was exonerated of the murders as he was on remand on the night of the double event. Actually, there are more parallels between this story about Ludwig and the first one regarding the suspect accused by a woman with whom he had lived than there are between the first story and the Batty Street incident. Ludwig also was reported to be kept under surveillance, was a foreigner and lived in the Leman Street district, which would be within a few hundred yards of Dutfield’s Yard. Such a description of distance in relation to 22 Batty Street, although true, seems a little excessive. Mrs. Kuer’s house was about 75 yards from Dutfield’s Yard and so more accurately could be said to be within just one hundred yards of the site of Elizabeth Stride’s murder.
Of course, one aspect of the first story—that the police were expecting a possible confession—could not relate to Ludwig as he had been proved to be innocent of the murders, being in custody on the night that Stride and Eddowes were killed.
Evans and Gainey raise some valid arguments to relate the Batty Street story to Tumblety, and some comments on Casebook forums and JTRForums suggest that the idea that the Batty Street lodger was an American is taking hold.(22) Certainly, the report of the man leaving a West End hotel suggests some links to an American and there were stories in the press relating to suspects with black bags and to mysterious Americans, so there may be some link between some of these stories. Already mentioned is the report in which a mysterious American was followed by John Lardy and another man. Another example is given on the Monday (1st October) after the double event:
THE ARREST.
Shortly before midnight a man whose name has not yet transpired was arrested in the Borough on suspicion of being the perpetrator of the murders in the East-end. Yesterday morning a tall dark man wearing an American hat entered a lodging-house in Union-street, known as Albert-chambers. He stayed throughout the day, and his peculiar manner rivetted [sic] the attention of his fellow-lodgers. He displayed great willingness to converse with them, and certain observations he made regarding the topic of the day aroused their suspicions. Last night this mysterious individual attracted the notice of the deputy keeper of the lodging-house, whose suspicions became so strong that he sent for a policeman. On the arrival of the officer the stranger was questioned as to his recent wanderings, but he could give no intelligible account of them, though he said he had spent the previous night on Blackfriars Bridge. He was conveyed to Stone’s End Police-station, Blackman-street, Borough. (23)
Someone in the house provided extra details to the Echo:
He [the lodger] entered very vigorously into the details as supplied by the Sunday papers, and expressed an opinion that the police would never capture the murderer, who would remain at large until he gave himself up.
“Oh,” said he, “he’s a lot too ‘cute for these London detectives.”
The “deputy’s” attention was attracted to this mysterious individual by the singular amount of excitement he displayed while discoursing upon the subject. There were about twelve men in the room- a long, scrupulously clean, though somewhat scantily furnished, apartment. Each one seemed afraid of the individual, and ultimately the police were summoned, and the luckless American was marched off in custody as a “suspect.” (24)
Further explanation was given about what happened after his arrest.
DISCHARGED BY THE POLICE.
He told the police he spent the previous night on Blackfriars-bridge, and appeared unable to account for his previous movements. Accordingly, he was conveyed to Stones-end Police-station, in Blackman-street, Borough.
“But he came back this morning,” said my informant.
“Came back?” I essayed in surprise.
“Yes,” was his cynical reply, “and he’s in bed now.”
My informant went on to say that the police, after conveying him to the station, at once instituted inquiries, but could find nothing whatever against the man, who they accordingly allowed to leave. I then called at the police-station in Blackman-street, but from the officer there could get no information. He so stolidly obeyed the “orders” he said he had received, that he refused to answer—”Yes” or “No”—whether the man had gone or not, and even to say whether he had really been in custody.(25)
The account in the Daily News referred to him giving an unintelligible account of his movements, which may imply that he gave a ‘confused’ or rambling account. However the report in the Echo simply said that he was unable to account for his movements. Also note that the police were not giving out details of the arrest so the Batty Street lodger was certainly not unique in respect of the police seemingly being evasive and nothing should especially be read into it. It may be that the police were holding their cards close to their chest, but it could simply be that the matter had been satisfactorily explained.
There were other reports of Americans being suspected or arrested.
THE EAST END MURDERS.
REPORTED CAPTURE OF “JACK THE RIPPER.”
Telegraphing this afternoon the Central News says:- The American who was arrested last night on suspicion of being concerned in the Whitechapel murder was released at ten o’clock this morning, inquiries having shown that his account of himself was entirely satisfactory. At the present moment there is no one in custody. The rumour of the actual murderer being caught has created intense excitement in London, but it is entirely unfounded.
All persons arrested today on suspicion of being concerned in the Whitechapel murders have been released on giving satisfactory explanations, and none is now in custody.(26)
Also, the following was reported by a Polish newspaper:
The perpetrator of the abominable crimes in London, of whom we wrote several days since, was at last arrested. He’s name is Fitz Gerald, he comes from America and has confessed his guilt. The killer performed his work with anatomical accuracy, a skill in which, the London physicians say, he has an unusual ability. He shall not escape strict punishment.(27)
While the details of the latter report especially should be treated with some scepticism, it shows that the idea of the killer being an American and alluding to medical or anatomical skill was a widespread idea. There appear to have been several suspects on whom the police were following leads at the time. Some of the seemingly different stories may have related to the same suspect, but there is no firm evidence for this, and some of the details appear to indicate that the reports were about different suspects. Another report of a man and a black bag was given on the 19th:
AN IMPORTANT CLUE.
The Press Association says:- Much importance is attached by the police to the arrest made at King-street Police-station, Whitehall. On Tuesday morning a man entered the above named station about nine o’clock, and complained of having lost a black bag. While the officials were taking note of his case, he commenced talking about the Whitechapel murders, and offered to cut off the sergeant’s head, and other rambling nonsense. It will be remembered that several people have testified to seeing a man with a black bag in the region of the murders, and who has not since been traced. The fact was at once remembered by the police, and the man was further questioned. In answer to an enquiry as to his business, he said he studied for some years for the medical profession, but gave it up for engineering, and that he had been stopping for some nights in coffee-houses. His manner then became so strange that Dr Bond, divisional surgeon, was sent for to examine the man. The doctor subsequently gave it as his opinion that the man was a very dangerous lunatic of homicidal tendency, and, as his appearance somewhat tallied with that published of the man who was seen with the murdered woman, he was removed to Bow-street, but before being taken thither, photos of his person were taken. He was also asked to write his name, and it is stated that the writing is somewhat similar to that of the letters received by the police and others. He gave his age as 67, but it is said he looks fully 20 years younger. The police are endeavouring to trace his antecedents and movements for the past few weeks.(28)
Elements of these reports may account for the details of those stories where the police were looking for unnamed suspects. This would include the Batty Street lodger story, for example, where the report that the suspect was a foreigner may have derived from other reports—though this was only in reference to the customer rather than the missing lodger.
What I have attempted to show here is that there were many stories of suspects living in the area, including those of Americans and while it cannot be discounted that some of these stories may relate to the same individual caution must be exercised when linking the different accounts. Similarities exist between the different stories, but there are also enough details in most cases to suggest that they relate to different suspects and different incidents. In the previous section we looked at reports that clearly related to the incident at 22 Batty Street, and these are the only stories we can rely on that definitely relate to the events at that address. Of course, some of those details may be wrong for the reasons already discussed. However, some of these other stories provide better potential links with Tumblety than the Batty Street lodger story.
There is nothing in the reports (that clearly refer to the incident at 22 Batty Street) to suggest that the wanted man was an American. Some reports relating the customer story given by Mrs. Kuer refer to a foreigner and refer to the man being a tailor. An American would most likely have been referred to as an American rather than as a foreigner. However, since Mrs. Kuer was herself from another country she may have referred to an American as a foreigner, just knowing that the man did not have an English accent. Still, while there is nothing in the reports to refute that the man was an American, there is nothing to suggest that, in fact, he was.
The confusion between different stories by the press may be the reason for certain generalised statements made in respect to one story that actually may have been true for another story. For example the statement in the press in relation to the Batty Street lodger story that the man’s ‘ultimate capture’ was only a matter of time may have stemmed from police confidence in relation to another lead.
The story of the mysterious American followed by John Lardy may tie in with other reports mentioned of Americans, but there is nothing to suggest that this report and the report of the black bag found at the West End hotel are linked, or are linked to the story of the lodger in Batty Street.
Assessment of Landlady story from 1908
Stewart Evans located an article by the journalist George R. Sims in the Yarmouth Independent of 25th February 1911. The article was headed ‘ADVENTURES OF A JOURNALIST’, part VIII ‘ON THE TRACK’ – ‘The Unsolved Mysteries of Crime’. The first case
referred to was that of the Whitechapel Murders, in which appeared the following:
Three years ago, when the discussion as to Jack’s identity cropped up again in the Press, I wrote on the subject. Soon afterwards a lady called upon me late one night. She came to tell me that the Whitechapel fiend had lodged in her house. On the night of the double murder he came in at two in the morning. The next day her husband, going into the lodger’s room after he had left it, saw a black bag, and on opening it discovered a long knife, and two bloodstained cuffs. The lodger was a medical man, an American. The next day he paid his rent, took his luggage and left. Then the police were communicated with but nothing more was heard of the American doctor with the suspicious black bag.
“But,” said my lady visitor, “I have seen him again this week. He is now in practice in the North West of London.”
She gave his name and address and the names of two people who were prepared to come forward and identify him as the lodger with the black bag, the knife, and the incriminating cuffs. The next day I took the information, for what it might be worth, to the proper quarters. But the doctor was not disturbed in his practice. There was ample proof that the real author of the horrors had committed suicide in the last stage of his maniacal frenzy.”
The incident in question occurred on the night of the ‘double event’ and so comparisons with the Batty Street lodger story are understandable. Evans points out that although the Batty Street landlady was German and spoke poor English, twenty years later her English would likely have improved greatly. His argument is perfectly valid, but it appears from some posts on Casebook.org forums, that some believe that the woman who spoke to Sims in 1908 was definitely German. However this is not stated in the article and is not asserted by Evans. All that he was trying to do was explain how the German landlady who spoke poor English in 1888, if she were the same woman, could be understood (and quoted in English) by Sims in 1908 without any reference to poor English or requiring an interpreter (though either could be unreported details of his conversation).
While it is certainly a point of connection that this incident was on the night of the ‘double event’, there are a number of stories from people reported in the ensuing years of suspicious lodgers at their house. Walter Sickert apparently told the story of his landlady telling him that the room in which he lodged (claimed to have been in Mornington Crescent) had been used previously by the Whitechapel murderer. The newspaper supplement in the St. Arnaud’s Mercury in 1890 (29), also gave a story told by a landlady of how she suspected one of her lodgers to be the murderer. There are certainly a few of these stories and so it is not necessarily the case that the landlady who spoke to Sims in 1908 was the landlady at 22 Batty Street. That is, of course, not to say that they be the same woman, just that they were not necessarily the same. It could be that a black bag and a knife were also found at Batty Street but these details never made it into the press reports. However, the black bag is one of those features of the legend that had been lodged in people’s minds from the time of the murders.
Batty Street Lodger summary
Though, it appears a satisfactory explanation was given in later reports, there are elements of the story that suggest the matter cannot be so easily dismissed.
Certainly there was blood discovered on the shirt as this is confirmed by Mrs. Kuer herself in her interview to give a satisfactory explanation of the incident. She also certainly had an initial suspicion about the circumstances as she informed the police. Also to consider is that Mrs. Kuer was spoken to as early as the 15th (for the report to be published on the 16th) where her claims that she did not know when her lodger would return contradicted the claims she made in her interview published on the 18th.
Elements of the story
A lodger returned in the early hours and disturbed the landlady
This element is derived only from the early reports as told by the neighbours. This may have been invented or may
have arisen as a result of Chinese whispers. Nonetheless, there is no easy explanation of how this was derived from
the facts that emerged later. The story of a customer leaving shirts would not explain why the landlady was disturbed
in the early hours.
A lodger who was in the habit of leaving from time to time
Again, this element is derived only from the early reports as told by the neighbours. This may be the result of Chinese
whispers from Mrs. Kuer telling her neighbour about Carl Noun who would return on the 6th, but was construed as
referring to the missing lodger.
Bloodstained shirt left
Initially, this was said to have been left by the lodger. Later, Noun and Mrs. Kuer said this was left by a customer as
part of a ‘bundle’ of four shirts. However, Mrs. Kuer qualified this by saying that though the customer left the shirts, it
was someone in the house who got the blood on it. This early report that the lodger had asked the landlady to clean it
ready for his return could have been misinterpreted from Mrs. Kuer explaining that a lodger got blood on a shirt that
had been left by a customer to be cleaned ready for the customer’s return.
The arrest
This was told by both Mrs. Kuer and Carl Noun. It
also appeared in early reports of the story, though
whether the source for this was Mrs. Kuer is not
known, but from the way it was reported it does not
appear to be Mrs. Kuer who was the source for those
early reports. The person arrested may possibly
have been Carl Noun who returned on the 6th. If the
missing lodger had used Noun’s room in his absence
then the police would possibly have been waiting in
this room and arrested Noun by mistake. If it was
the customer who was arrested on his return, why
would he be taken in for questioning if he was not
the one who got blood on the shirt?
Description
The description of the customer as a ladies tailor
working in the West end who did not live in the
Leman Street district—and possibly a foreigner—
could be a genuine description of the lodger if the
story of a customer was in fact a lie.
While it may be that the bloodstained shirt
was satisfactorily explained and the police knew
all the details of the circumstances, there are
certain details that suggest this was not resolved
satisfactorily. Firstly, that Mrs. Kuer was awoken by
a lodger returning in the early hours. The later story
that a customer left the shirt does not explain this
part of the story. That Mrs. Kuer said it was someone
in the house that got blood on the shirt suggests
there may be something in the original story. Also, if
the customer didn’t get blood on the shirt, why was
he taken by the police for questioning (Mrs. Kuer
makes it clear that the man taken into custody was
not the one who got blood on the shirt)?
Of course, it may be that the explanation of someone in the house (not necessarily another lodger, it may have been a member of Mrs. Kuer’s family if she had family living in the house) innocently getting blood on the shirt was the reason the matter was closed. But at what point would this have been known? If it was prior to the police taking up their vigil then surely they would have been told by an albeit embarrassed Mrs. Kuer and they would not have awaited the customer/lodger’s return. The same would surely apply if this fact was discovered by Kuer prior to the arrest of the customer (or Noun). Another possibility is that it was after the customer was arrested that this fact came out as a result of further police enquiries based on the customer’s denial of getting blood on the shirt.
Another person to consider is Joseph the drayman. If Noun’s statement in his letter that he did not return until 6th October is accepted, and if there was no other lodger using his room in his absence, then it’s possible that Joseph was responsible for getting blood on the shirt. The only names we have for people living at 22 Batty Street at that time are Mrs. Kuer, Carl Noun (who, it appears, was actually absent on the night concerned) and Joseph (who, from the implication in Noun’s letter, was still living at the house on 17th October and did not leave the house on or immediately after 30th September).
Somehow Mrs. Kuer realised the lodger was responsible for getting blood on the shirt. Initially suspicious, particularly after finding out about the murders the previous night, she showed the shirt to a neighbour who advised her to contact the police. Mrs. Kuer did so, but had second thoughts about her suspicions, not believing her lodger could possibly be responsible for such crimes and believed the reason for the blood was a totally innocent one. However, the police were now involved, or she was coerced into contacting the police by her neighbour.
Did Kuer tell the police about the lodger being responsible for the blood or did she just tell them about the man who left
the shirts? If she had not told the police about the lodger being responsible but let slip to the press about this, this would seem a silly thing for her to do. It does seem from other snippets that the man taken into custody was the customer (Kuer and Noun are both sources for this), and certainly not the man responsible for getting blood on the shirt (Kuer).
However, if it was a customer who genuinely roused suspici