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AP Wolf
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Apwolf
Post Number: 1701
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Friday, January 07, 2005 - 7:45 pm: | 
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In September of 1875 The Times of London was to report on the 'Whitechapel Road Mystery and Murder', a case involving the murder and dramatic mutilation of a young lady.
There are elements in this case which I believe may have acted as a catalyst for the 1888 murders.
(Cue Stan, the masturbatory author with magic wand in hand as he rushes onto stage in pink tutu and exclaims: 'well what a surprise, where is me five pound note?')
'Up your asp,' Robert proclaims and starts downloading weighty files from The Times. |
Glenn L Andersson
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Glenna
Post Number: 2734
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Friday, January 07, 2005 - 8:04 pm: |
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I believe you refer to the murder of Harriet Lane, who was murdered and horribly mutilated by Henry Wainwright.
I agree, AP -- at least it shows that such murders had been performed in the same area.
All the best
G, Sweden
(Message edited by Glenna on January 07, 2005)
"Well, do you... punk?"
Dirty Harry, 1971
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Glenn L Andersson
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Glenna
Post Number: 2735
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Friday, January 07, 2005 - 8:36 pm: |
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AP,
If that's what you're thinking about, then it may not be a total Ripper-look-alike murder -- since she was battered with a hammer and then shot in the head three times -- but mr Wainwright did the remarkable thing of digging up her strongly decaying body, that he had placed in his house in Whitechapel Road -- and dismembered the corps and then turned into nice little packages of newspaper parcels.
Could very well be gruesome enough for someone like the Ripper to pick up on it -- at least it could have provided inspiration for the one(s) who was/were responsible for the Whitehall and Pinchin Street torsos.
So horrible murders that created media attention did indeed happen before the Ripper.
let's not forget that Harriet also was Wainwright's mistress and that he had a personal relationship to her.
All the best
G, Sweden
"Well, do you... punk?"
Dirty Harry, 1971
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Glenn L Andersson
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Glenna
Post Number: 2738
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Friday, January 07, 2005 - 9:13 pm: |
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If you or Robert have access to the original Times, it would be very interesting to read them. I have never seen them myself and it could be good to find a confirmation of the fact that the murder was covered to an important degree.
All the best
G, Sweden
"Well, do you... punk?"
Dirty Harry, 1971
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Sir Robert Anderson
Detective Sergeant
Username: Sirrobert
Post Number: 118
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Friday, January 07, 2005 - 11:30 pm: |
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"(Cue Stan, the masturbatory author"
Ahem, it's funny how spellcheck works sometimes...for example, masturbatory is actually spelt FELLOW, Wolfmeister.
I say that as your fan.
Sir Robert
"I only thought I knew"
SirRobertAnderson@gmail.com
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Jeffrey Bloomfied
Chief Inspector
Username: Mayerling
Post Number: 551
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, January 08, 2005 - 1:30 am: |
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Hi all,
About a year ago I wrote an article in THE RIPPEROLOGIST entitled WHAT WAINWRIGHT WROUGHT discussing the 1875 crime, and trying to show how elements in it fit into a pattern of similar crimes that occurred including possibly influencing the Ripper. The murder of Harriet Lane was called "the Whitechapel Murder" for many years, until the Ripper's activities usurped that name from the 1875 crime.
Actually Wainwright had buried the remains of Ms Lane in the floor of his warehouse in Whitechapel. When he went bankrupt, and lost the lease tothe warehouse, he dug up the remains (he had used quicklime to destroy the body, but it preserved it instead), cut it up, put it into "American Cloth" (not newspaper), and tried to transport it by cab to another warehouse where he could bury it. Unfortunately, Wainwright had to leave the packaged remains of Harriet for a few moments while he got a hansom cab. He left the packages with a former employee, who got curious about the items in the packages. The employee slightly unwrapped one package and found it had a human hand in it. When Wainwright drove off in the hanson, the employee gave chase on foot across the East End of London, finally finding a constable who was willing to stop Wainwright and ask about the packages. Wainwright tried to first bluster it out, than tried to offer a preposterous bribe. The constable opened a package, and then arrested Wainwright. Because of the chase across London, and the discovery of Harriet's remains in the street, the case was called the "Whitechapel Road Mystery."
Jeff |
Robert Charles Linford
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Robert
Post Number: 3811
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, January 08, 2005 - 1:55 am: |
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Hi all
This is a sort of summary, from Oct 18th 1875 ("Times"). I can't post all the reports, because Stephen seems to have recently reduced the permitted size of the posts, which I take it means he is trying to save bandwisth. And transcribing everything...by the time I'd finished they'd have got a man on Mars.
Robert |
Glenn L Andersson
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Glenna
Post Number: 2740
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, January 08, 2005 - 8:51 am: |
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Ah, thanks for that, Robert.
Jeffrey,
I had no idea you had written an article about Wainwright. Seems like you miss out on much when you don't subscribe.
All the best
G, Sweden
"Well, do you... punk?"
Dirty Harry, 1971
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Phil Hill
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Saturday, January 08, 2005 - 9:29 am: |
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This is fascinating stuff, guys.
I was unaware of the case, but to me it provides an additional context for the JtR murders 13 years later.
I wonder how well it was recalled in the area. It would be unlikely to be an influence on a Tumblety, Druitt, non-resident suspect; but might be for a Chapman. Kosminski might not have been arouind to remember, or had good enough skills to read about the 1875 case.
But the links to the Whitehall and Pinchin St "torso" cases might be worth looking in to.
Certainly, it shows that gruesome murders in the east End were nothing new. Most modern accounts I have read look back to the Ratcliffe Highway case, but this was more recent and closer to hand.
Thanks again to all, one learns so much from involvement with casebook.
Phil |
AP Wolf
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Apwolf
Post Number: 1702
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, January 08, 2005 - 11:06 am: |
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Thanks for the comments, folks, and thanks for posting the shorter version of events, Robert.
Blimey, there is so much coverage in The Times that I've been reading it all day and have still not reached the last article!
I thought the story worth flagging up just for the very reasons that have been given by various posters, that it showed some recent history to the art of gruesome murder in the Whitechapel Road area; and that it could have had a great deal of influence on impressionable minds.
Not for a second did I view the crime as being directly related to the later Whitechapel murderers... so not guilty there, Glenn.
My main interest actually was in the warehouses employed by the villians in this gruesome crime, as I had thought originally that they may well have belonged to the extended Mears/Flood/Cutbush clan.
This is still a possibility. Doesn't mean much, but of slight interest to myself, who at this moment in time appears obsessed by Victorian warehouses and who owned them.
Sorry Jeff, never meant to step on your toes there... if I had been aware of your efforts in this regard I would have contacted you beforehand. |
Glenn L Andersson
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Glenna
Post Number: 2743
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, January 08, 2005 - 11:20 am: |
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AP,
Don't misunderstand me; I sincerely thank you and Robert for bringing this interesting issue up in a tread of its own.
I have myself previously mentioned this case three times on the Boards (not in detail, though), mainly as a point of example (related to the murder of Mary Kelly) of that it was not impossible during the 19th century for a interpersonal mutilation murder to occurre, where the victim and the perpetrator had known each other personally.
All the best
G, Sweden
"Well, do you... punk?"
Dirty Harry, 1971
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Glenn L Andersson
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Glenna
Post Number: 2746
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, January 08, 2005 - 12:12 pm: |
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Within brackets:
Another murder involving mutliation and dismembering, which was seen as spectacular for it's time, but quite further back in time:
The gross case of James Greenacre who in 1837 killed and mutilated Hannah Brown in Edgeware Road, with whom he was supposed to marry, and dismembered her body. He was hung in Newgate 2nd of May 1837,
The Weekly Chronicle had spectacular coverings of this case, illustrated with more or less graphical engravings about the events.
Both this crime and the murder performed by Wainwright are not completely Ripper-look-alikes as said before, but rather more comparable to the Whitehall and Pinchin Street torsos, but they show that spectacular murders involving mutilation (and more spectacular than those of Emma Smith, Millwood and Tabram) had occurred in London before the murder of Nichols. Although there is a long time span between Hannah Brown's murder in 1837 and the Ripper, and 13 years between Wainwright's crimes and the Ripper's, they were widely covered.
I think at least they are worth to be noted in a crime historical context to 1888.
All the best
G, Sweden
"Well, do you... punk?"
Dirty Harry, 1971
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Jeffrey Bloomfied
Chief Inspector
Username: Mayerling
Post Number: 552
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, January 08, 2005 - 8:51 pm: |
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Hi all,
I have given some notice to an historical context of 1888 regarding other crimes. Here are some signposts I have thought significant:
1726 - Catherine Hayes - murders her husband with several accomplices (including her lover) and then cuts up his body to dispose of it. The body portions are disposed of in London, but the head is found and displayed to the multitudes on a post and later in a doctor's office. When Mr. Hayes disappearance is noticed by a close friend and a relative (and Mrs. Hayes explination is found to be unbelievable), head is finally identified as the missing man, and the murderers arrested. This case is worth noting if you believe in a Ripper Conspiracy theory, because the large number of co-conspirators helped put the noose around all their necks, when they were all arrested. Hayes was literally burned alive at her execution (the hangman dropped the noose to garrotte her due to the heat and flames, so she was literally burned alive).
1761 - Theodore Gardelle, a Swiss-born miniature portrait painter, attacked his landlady intending either to rob or rape her, and killed her to stop her screams. He began to cut up the body, in order to burn it in the fireplace, but the odor and the smoke attracted attention. He was caught with the remains of the body and arrested, tried, and executed. This killing was also in London.
1811 - The Ratcliffe Highway Murders that were the subject of Thomas de Quincy's noted essay, ON MURDER CONSIDERED AS ONE OF THE FINE ARTS. This crime was actually a series of slaughters of whole households in the East End that were probably motivated by greed (the houses were robbed afterwards). The horror and fear it spread in the metropolis of London were comperable to that of the Ripper seventy seven years later. The perpetrator was most likely a seaman named John Williams, who died while in police custody (presumably a suicide), but the most notable recent study of the case, THE MAUL AND THE PEAR TREE by P. D. James and T. A. Critchley has suggested that Williams may have been another victim of the actual killer.
1827-28 - The West Port Murders in Edinburgh, Scotland, which were not mutilations, but led to total mutilations. This is the case of William Burke and William Hare, who sufficated a series of transients and local unfortunates to sell the bodies to the anatomy school of Dr. Robert Knox.
Hare would turn state's evidence, enabling the trial and conviction of Burke (whose name is now a synonym for sufficate). The killings had a world-wide notice, and again a type of fear of sudden death and disappearance spread (even, according to Edmund Pearson, to New York City). A subsequent "burking" murder case in London (in 1831) led to the execution of three co-murderers of the victim, and helped spread the fear even more.
1837 - The Greenacre case mentioned by Glenn above. Greenacre, a small merchant, thought he was engaged to a rich lady named Hannah Brown. On Christmas Eve, when both had been drinking, Greenacre discovered Hannah had thought he had money. In an argument that followed he clubbed her to death. With the aid of his mistress, Sarah Gale, he cut up the body of Hannah, and began transporting portions around London. [An apocryphal anecdote has him carrying Hannah's head wrapped up in cloth, and boarding a horse drawn bus. When the conductor went around asking people for their money for tickets, the latter said something like "Five pence a head", supposedly making Greenacre faint!] The portions were dumped, but kept floating back into view. The head turned up in a canal lock. Eventually the head and the body were identified as Hannah, and Greenacre was arrested with Sarah the night before they were to head for America.
Greenacre was tried and convicted and hanged. Gale was transported as a convicted accomplice to Australia. For many years melons sold at Greengrocers in London were called "Greenacres", especially if they fell off stalls and roled on the ground.
1842 - Daniel Good - murderered his common-law wife (Jane Jones), and cut-up and intended to bury her body in a stable (Good was a coachman) in Roehampton. Good was an idiot - in the middle of his planning to get rid of the body of his victim, he went out and was seen shoplifting a shirt. A constable and the merchant followed Good to the stable, and came across the remains of the victim when Good acted peculiarly. But Good managed to lock them into the stable and fled. For nearly a month he was sited repeatedly by the public, but the police kept missing him. Finally he was caught. Eventually he was tried, convicted, and hanged. The inept mishandling of the search for Good led to the creation of a detective squad at Scotland Yard.
1851 - Norwich mutilation "mystery" - bits and pieces of a human body were found around the town of Norwich by various members of the public. A medical "expert" identified these as the remains of an elderly man. In 1869 William Sheward, a seventy year old man, confessed to the police that he murdered his wife (while drunk) after an argument. Although he subsequently took back the confession, he was tried, found guilty, and hanged. Leaving the real mystery: why did the police medical expert say the remains in 1851 were those of an elderly man?
1856 - Trial and execution of Dr. William Palmer, who is usually considered having the record for a male serial murderer (about a dozen murders) for insurance money or to avoid paying debts. However these killings are poisonings.
1857 - The Waterloo Bridge Mystery. The remains of a chopped up body of a man were found in a large carpetbag on an abutment of Waterloo Bridge. It was identified as a bag that was brought through the turnstyle of the bridge by an elderly lady the previous night. Despite intense efforts, the identity of the man was never determined, and the reason for his murder (the remains showed he was stabbed) was never ascertained. Several theories have been advanced, including one by Sir Robert Anderson in his book THE LIGHTER SIDE OF MY OFFICIAL LIFE.
1866 - The Cannon Street Murder Mystery: A housekeeper named Sarah Milsom was found beaten to death at the foot of a staircase in the shop she was working in at night. There was an arrest and trial, but the defense was able to produce over 20 witnesses who gave the defendant (a relative of the victim) an airtight alibi.
1870 - A tramp going around with the name of John Jones or Owens kills a blacksmith named Emmanuel Marshall and his mother, wife, sister, and three children in Denham. It is the largest mass murder in England up to that date.
1872 - Murder of Mrs. Squires and her daughter in their shop/home in Hoxton. The killer, a young man, was seen by many fleeing the shop, but he was never identified and the case was never solved.
1873 - Mary Ann Cotton hanged in the West Auckland Poisoning Case (she is considered to have the record as a serial killer in Victorian England).
1874 - 1875 - The Wainwright Case. Due to financial reverses Henry Wainwright murdered his mistress Harriet Lane, shooting her and burying her body in quicklime in the floor of his warehouse in Whitechapel. But he has to lose his leasehold when he declares bankruptcy. He digs up the body, cuts it up, and tries to transport it across the East End to another warehouse that his brother Thomas (an accomplice) works at. But Alfred Stokes, an employee, unravels one of the packages and finds that it contains human remains. Stokes chases Wainwright's hansom cab across the East End, finally flagging a police officer. The latter uncovers the remains of Harriet Lane and arrests Henry. He and Thomas are tried for murder, Henry getting sentenced to death and Thomas a prison sentence as an accessory before and after the fact.
1876 - Henri Pineaux, a.k.a. Comte Henri de Tourville is extradited back to the Austrian Tyrol to stand trial for the murder of his second wife, Ms Madeleine Miller. De Tourville was responsible for killing his first wife and her mother, a traveller named William Cotton whom he was working for, and trying to kill his infant son (to collect the estate his first wife left for the boy). He was found guilty of the murder of the second wife, and ended up slaving his life away in an Austrian salt mine (he died in there in 1890 - in London he had a small fortune in a bank from his numerous murders).
1877 - The De Goncourt - Benson Swindle: Henry Benson swindles the Countess De Goncourt out of a large sum in a scam dealing with racing tips. It turned out that several high ranking police officials were taking bribes from Henry Benson, and Benson was a witness against four of them. Three detectives (Chief Inspectors Meiklejohn and Druscovitch, and Inspector Palmer) were found guilty, and sentenced to prison. Druscovitch appears to have also been bribed by De Tourville the murderer (see 1876) and said that an early homicide was an accident not a killing. Benson committed suicide in the New York City prison, The Tombs, in 1888, when about to be extradited to Mexico for a trial.
1878 - A foreign sailor named Joseph Garcia kills the William Watkins family at Llangibby (near Usk), Wales, in a robbery-mass murder. He cut their throats. He was eventually executed for this. Besides being another large mass murder (see 1870), I bring this up because it makes me recall the theory of Mr. Edward K. Larkins, of Her Majesty's Customs, regarding two Portuguese sailors on cattleboats. Where, after all, did Mr. Larkins get his peculiar theory from?
1878 - 79. First Burton Crescent Mystery: Ms Rachel Samuels, a woman who lived alone, is murdered in her home at Burton Crescent. A servant named Mary Donovan is arrested in January 1879, but released. Case never solved.
March 1879 - The Richmond Mystery: Mrs. Rachel Thomas is killed by her servant Kate Webster in Mrs. Thomas' home in Richmond. Her body is cut up and parts of it dumped in the Thames. Kate Webster also boils parts of the body, and may even have sold some of the "drippings" to neighbors. Webster sells Ms Thomas's property under the dead woman's name, but the crime is revealed. Webster is tried, found guilty, and executed.
1879 - Euston Square Murder Mystery - Ms Mathilda Hacker had been living in a house in Euston Square up to 1877, but suddenly disappeared. Remains of Ms Samuels were found in the building two years later, leading to the trial of Hannah Dobbs, a servant at the house. Dobbs was acquitted, but in the course of the trial testimony by Mr. Severein Bastendorf (the brother of the building's owner) was shown to be perjured. Bastendorf got seven years for perjury. The death of Ms Samuels was never solved.
1880 - Harley Street Mystery. The remains of a woman were found on the premises of a Mr. Henriques. Her identity was never settled, and the cause of death was not quite settled either, although criminal abortion was suggested.
1881 - The Chatham Mystery: Lt. Roper is found shot to death at the Chatham barracks. Despite in depth investigation and a large reward the case was never solved. It briefly reappeared as nearly solved in the confession (later repudiated) of Percy Lefroy Mapleton in November 1881 (when he was awaiting execution for murdering Frederick Isaac Gold that same year).
1884 - Second Burton Crescent Murder - Mary Ann Yates, a prostitute, was found strangled in her room at Burton Crescent. Although a German ship's doctor was arrested, he was released for lack of evidence.
1883 - 1884 - The Liverpool Insurance Murders: Margaret Higgins and her sister - in - law, Margaret Flannagan, poison at least five people in their immediate families (they may have killed others, and there may have been others involved) for insurance money. This case would have been the major serial killing case of the 1880s if the Ripper Murders had not come along four years later.
1887 - Murder of newspaper reported Archibald M'Neill in Boulogne, France. It generated a great deal of attention from December 1887 to February 1888, and despite heavy suspicions against a local man seen with M'Neill the night he died, it was never solved.
1888 - Regent's Park Murder: This case, terribly ignored by most criminal historians, would have been the murder of the year if the Ripper killings had not taken place. A man named Joseph Rumbold was attacked by a gang of eight youths led by one George Gallesly. One of the others was a youth named Francis Cole (apparently a male). It turned out that the murder was symptomatic of gang warfare in London's East End. It turned out Rumbold was the wrong target. Gallesly was the only one found guilty, but though sentenced to death the sentence was reduced due to his age. Interesting to compare this case with the trial of Richard and George Davies for the murder of their father in 1889. The father had a reputation of being a violent bully, but Richard Davies was sentenced to death and was hanged because he was old enough to be hanged. Home Secretary Matthews received great criticism for not recommending reducing the sentence to life imprisonment.
1888 - Whitechapel Murders.
The signposts either are for large scales killings, serial killings, mutilation killings, or unsolved killings. One has to keep in mind the reputation of Scotland Yard in the 19th Century was not so high as it became in the 20th Century. The number of prominent unsolved crimes, many in the East End, were noted and pushed into the face of the police to show they were incompetents.
Best wishes,
Jeff |
Glenn L Andersson
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Glenna
Post Number: 2749
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, January 08, 2005 - 11:03 pm: |
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Jeff,
Thanks for that. Indeed astonishing. Most of those I have never heard of before. Where on Earth do you get this stuff?
Thanks again. A marvellous summary.
I also notice, that serial murder was not altogether a new thing brought on by the Ripper, after all. Go figure.
All the best
G, Sweden
"Well, do you... punk?"
Dirty Harry, 1971
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Jeffrey Bloomfied
Chief Inspector
Username: Mayerling
Post Number: 553
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Sunday, January 09, 2005 - 10:57 am: |
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Hi Glenn,
It has taken quite a time for me to make the signposts chronology up. I'd say about twenty years. Many of the unsolved crimes are mentioned in my copy of HAYDN'S DICTIONARY OF DATES (1893 edition). Some, like the killing of Mary Ann Yates, bear some real attention, because that was only four years before Whitechapel and the victim was a prostitute. It is not an exact fit: she was strangled with a tightly wrapped cloth around her throat - not the Ripper's modus operandi. But she was killed in her room (like Mary Kelly) and the police investigation got botched. In fact, the investigations in all the unsolved cases (and in parts of the De Tourville and De Goncourt cases) were botched - sometimes intentionally (remember the crooked Detectives in De Tourville and De Goncourt cases).
Some other cases were forgotten while I put down the main ones. In 1872 Harriet Buswell (HAYDN'S DICTIONARY OF DATES refers to her "euphemistically" as a "gay woman", was murdered, and the killer never was caught. The 1881 - 82 St. Luke's Mystery (the probable death of a German born baker, Urban Napoleon Stanger) was not settled well (although one of the suspected murderers did get a prison sentence for forgery). One could also add the 1888 Scotland Yard Mystery (like the 1880 Harley Street Mystery) where the remains of a dead woman were found in a vault underneath the newly built buildings of Scotland Yard. There are some cases I would put in but others might not:
the 1882 Dalton Murder, where P.C. Cole was shot by a burglar, and one of the latter's tools was dropped near the constable's body. The tool had the letters, "R" "O" "C" "K" on it. Two years later, closer examination showed there had been an "O" and "R" before those letters, and they spelled out the name of the murderer, Thomas Henry Orrock. Orrock was tried on this evidence, the testimony of several felons he had bragged to, and some early ballistic evidence. He was found guilty and hanged. I would include that for several reasons.
1) It shows the level of police competence again.
It took two years to catch Orrock, despite the letters on his chistle. And when they realized who it was, it turned out Orrock had hidden himself by going into prison on a lesser crime!
2) There is a strange thing about the "R" "O" "C" "K" / "Orrock" clue, a fictional clue in Conan Doyle's first Sherlock Holmes story A STUDY IN SCARLET, and Whitechapel. I discussed it in the book WHO WAS JACK THE RIPPER? Briefly, A STUDY IN SCARLET is set in the early 1880s (in the English first half of the novel), and Conan Doyle threw in a great deal of bits and pieces concerning life in England in that period into the story.
a) The name of one of the victims of the killer in the novel is Joseph Stangerson. It has been suggested that the odd second name was based on the above mentioned Urban Napoleon Stanger of the St. Luke's Mystery from 1881 - 82.
b) There is a reference to Watson learning of Holmes' love of music, because of his getting tired of hearing Holmes play his violin, causing Watson to claim it was causing "trials upon my patience". Although this may be pushing things, one Sherlockian scholar suggests that this phrase suggests Holmes was playing the popular Gilbert and Sullivan music from 1875 (TRIAL BY JURY) to 1881 (PATIENCE).
c) The novel is definitely set in the early 1880s in that Watson is invalided out of the army (fighting in Afghanistan) when he was wounded in the leg at the battle of Maiwand (1880).
d) There is a reference to Thomas Carlyle in the novel, when Watson mentions him and Holmes asks who is is. Thomas Carlyle died in March 1881.
e) Finally, at one point Holmes, Watson, and Inspectors Gregson and Lestrage, examine a clue of a word written on a wall near a dead body (of the first victim, Mr. Enoch Drebber). The word is "R" "A" "C" "H" "E". Lestrade thinks the word, written in blood, is the letters of the name of a woman at the back of the murder, whom he calls "Rachel". She is latter refered to as "Miss Rachel". Holmes points out the word is German for "Revenge". You will note the closeness in similarity to the ORROCK/"R" "O" "C" "K" clue this is. A friend of Conan Doyle's, Arthur Lambton, wrote in a book ECHOS OF CAUSE CELEBRES that Doyle told him he was basing the Rachel clue on the Orrock clue. But A STUDY IN SCARLET appeared in BEETON'S CHRISTMAS ANNUAL of December 1887. I suggested that it might not be impossible that the Ripper read the novel, studied the clue (which is illustrated in the magazine) and used it in the infamous Goulston street graffito.
But let us face facts Glenn...this (like so much else) is such a big stretch! [To add to the Rache/Rachel significance in dating the time of A STUDY IN SCARLET, a prominent criminal named "Madame Rachel" Leverson died in prison in 1880. However, to be fair, Samuel Rosenberg, in his study of the Holmes' stories as symbolic tales (NAKED IS THE BEST DISGUISE), he suggests that the references to Rachel refer to the famous French tragedian of the 1850s, also called Madame Rachel!]
Anyway, the full signpost chronology is a partial work in progress. One just has to remember that whoever was (or were) Jack the Ripper lived in that period of time up to November 1888, and had a mindset going up to 1888. All references in his/her/their mind(s) go up to the events of that month.
Best wishes,
Jeff |
Robert J. McLaughlin
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Sunday, January 09, 2005 - 3:13 am: |
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Hi Jeff,
Would you happen to know the exact address of where the Cannon Street murder mystery occured? Thanks.
Robert
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R.J. Palmer
Chief Inspector
Username: Rjpalmer
Post Number: 521
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Sunday, January 09, 2005 - 1:22 pm: |
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Jeff---There's also, of course, the Lipski and 'Potzdamer' cases in the East End in the months prior to the beginning of the Whitechapel murders.
One that's always puzzled me is a crime mentioned in passing by William Fishman. He mysteriously writes about a Jewish woman found dead with 'shocking injuries' in a tunnel near Aldgate just prior to the beginning of the Whitechapel Murders. This is certainly not a garbled version of Emma Smith. (see East End 1888) But I've never seen any other reference to this.....it remains a mystery to what the heck he is referring. Cheers, RP |
Robert Clack
Inspector
Username: Rclack
Post Number: 408
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Sunday, January 09, 2005 - 3:08 pm: |
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Hi Robert
'The Times' gave the address as 2, Cannon Street. The back entrance was in Budge Row, the premises were owned by Messrs. Bevington.
I have to admit the number sounds odd as Budge Row ran of the North side of Cannon Street about half way along opposite Cannon Street Station.
All the best
Rob |
Jeffrey Bloomfied
Chief Inspector
Username: Mayerling
Post Number: 554
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Sunday, January 09, 2005 - 6:02 pm: |
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Hi all,
R.J., you are right in that I left out Lipski. I am not well aware of the Potzdamer Case. But I left out others I would have to put in. For example, in 1880 I would have to put down the Daniel Stott Poisoning Case. The which? That was the poisoning murder that Dr. Thomas Neill Cream was convicted of, and sentenced to life imprisonment in Joliet Prison (so that he was supposedly in jail when the Ripper was operating). I also am taking it for a given that the cut off murder is Mary Kelly's. What of the Pinchin Street Mystery? Or Rose Mylett? Or Frances Coles (who, after all, has a name that is very similar to the young punk in that Regent's Park Murder in 1888)? There are other examples of police bungling or partial bungling: the 1882 trial of Esther Pay for the murder of her daughter Georgina Moore for instance. Or the two years of searching for Charles Peace, after he killed Arthur Dyson in 1876 (and the subsequent discovery that Peace killed a Police Constable, but a Mr. William Habron was serving a life sentence for this killing). I could expand to include the death dates of various Ripper candidates (Druitt's death in December 1888, for instance). Or political incidents (like Bloody Sunday in November 1887). So it goes.
I wish somebody did a solid book length study of the murder of Mrs. Milsom at Cannon Street. It is a weird case.
All the best,
Jeff |
Howard Brown
Inspector
Username: Howard
Post Number: 191
Registered: 7-2004
| | Posted on Sunday, January 09, 2005 - 7:03 pm: |
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Nice list,J.B. !!
Your great list doesn't have the 1881 disappearance of a Jewish baker from Kreuznach,Germany,who settled on 136 Lever Street,not far from Pentonville Prison named Urban Stanger ...although a man named Strumm,Mrs.Stanger's lover and a fellow baker,was imprisoned for 10 years for forging a check from Mrs. Stanger,it was believed that Mrs.Stanger used Strumm to dispose of the cuckolded husband's body and when Strumm was nailed for trying to cash/forge a check from the by then missing Mr.Stanger,she clammed up and he got 10 years....despite Strumm protesting her involvement,which, of course she denied,taking her late husband's bank account and her cheating heart and Mrs. Strumm [!] back to the Fatherland and leaving Strumm to face the music all alone...it was widely rumored that the late Mr.Stanger was sliced and diced up into filler for meat pies...but business didn't suffer from the rumor...just the sale of meat pies.
So while someone did recieve some time in jail for the forgery, no one was ever arrested for Stanger's disappearance...he never reappeared again either in Germany or London.
This Millsom woman was a housemaid that hopped up and went downstairs when the doorbell at her place of employ rang...and never came back up....
Apparently,she saw a moneylender for some money to pass off to a guy named George Terry who had been living in the poorhouse. A friend of Terry's named Smith was charged with the murder,but released 'cause he had a good enough alibi....
The poor woman had her head bashed in....and of course,it went unsolved.
(Message edited by howard on January 09, 2005) |
Dan Norder
Inspector
Username: Dannorder
Post Number: 468
Registered: 4-2004
| | Posted on Monday, January 10, 2005 - 3:40 am: |
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Hi Jeff,
"Some, like the killing of Mary Ann Yates, bear some real attention,"
I was wondering if I could ask you to email me on this one. I have info on a similar-sounding case (and could conceivably be the same one if reports were sufficiently muddled) but the name of the victim is completely different and the date doesn't quite match. I would like to compare notes.
Dan Norder, Editor
Ripper Notes: The International Journal for Ripper Studies
 Profile  Email  Dissertations  Website
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Jeffrey Bloomfied
Chief Inspector
Username: Mayerling
Post Number: 555
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, January 10, 2005 - 10:18 pm: |
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Hi Dan,
Contact me at my e-mail address. I can't seem to get you through this website for some reason.
I made some errors, one of which was that it was the Harriet Buswell killing in December 1872 was where the suspect was a German ship's chaplain, not a German doctor. It was not the Mary Ann Yates case 12 years later.
Best wishes,
Jeff |
Dan Norder
Inspector
Username: Dannorder
Post Number: 474
Registered: 4-2004
| | Posted on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 11:18 am: |
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Hi Jeff,
I don't have your email address as far as I know, and your profile doesn't list it. I tried sending you a private message, but sometimes those don't seem to go through. If you didn't get it, you should be able to email me through dan@norder.com or the alternate address in my signature.
Dan Norder, Editor
Ripper Notes: The International Journal for Ripper Studies
Profile Email Dissertations Website
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Ian Barrett
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Monday, August 08, 2005 - 12:38 pm: |
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Hi,
I have just moved into a house on Tredegar Square in East London, and someone told me that it is the house where Henry Wainwright lived (no. 40) The Times reports mention that he had a wife and children on Tred Sq but don't mention the house number. Does anyone have any information on this?
Many thanks in advance,
Ian. |
Robert Charles Linford
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Robert
Post Number: 4742
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Monday, August 08, 2005 - 4:15 pm: |
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Hi Ian and welcome to the Boards.
The 1871 census does indeed list a Henry Wainwright, 32, living at No.40 Tredegar Sq with wife Elizabeth, two sons, two daughters and two servants. His occupation is brushmaker employing 103 men, women and boys.
Robert |
AP Wolf
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Apwolf
Post Number: 2364
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, August 08, 2005 - 5:09 pm: |
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Sounds like Henry made a clean sweep of things then Robert.
Grand to see you. |
AP Wolf
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Apwolf
Post Number: 2986
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, December 20, 2005 - 4:19 pm: |
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A good likeness of dear Henry to follow, plus his murder weapons and other bits and bobs. |
Robert Charles Linford
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Robert
Post Number: 5413
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, December 20, 2005 - 4:33 pm: |
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Here we go, then.
Robert |
Jeffrey Bloomfied
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Mayerling
Post Number: 1019
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, December 20, 2005 - 10:15 pm: |
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Hi Robert,
Nice photos and illustrations - and Wainwright shares his page with his contemporary fellow killer Charles Peace.
Jeff |
Robert Charles Linford
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Robert
Post Number: 5414
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, December 21, 2005 - 4:42 am: |
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Thanks Jeff. AP found those.
Peace looks particularly unprepossessing!
Robert |
Stanley D. Reid
Chief Inspector
Username: Sreid
Post Number: 702
Registered: 4-2005
| | Posted on Wednesday, December 21, 2005 - 6:46 pm: |
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Hello all,
Did Peace suffer from acromegaly? His picture seems to indicate the syndrome. Perhaps the condition affected his mind.
Stan |
Howard Brown
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Howard
Post Number: 1256
Registered: 7-2004
| | Posted on Wednesday, December 21, 2005 - 8:11 pm: |
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Stan:
It could be. Peace sure looks like he had it.
Maybe he had the accompanying tumor-like symptoms to his brain... |
Jeffrey Bloomfied
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Mayerling
Post Number: 1022
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, December 22, 2005 - 11:24 am: |
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Hi Howard,
If you look for an old biography on Peace called KING OF THE JAGS, the author (I'll have to look up the name) included other earlier prison photos of Peace, and he did look somewhat less grubby in them. I should remind you that Peace was able to successfully pass himself off as Mr. Thompson of Peckham (a high income area) for two years before he was arrested.
Best wishes,
Jeff |
Howard Brown
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Howard
Post Number: 1257
Registered: 7-2004
| | Posted on Thursday, December 22, 2005 - 6:45 pm: |
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J.B.
Just re-reading your earlier 2005 chronology and you did mention the Stanger case from 1881...sorry. I overlooked it. Thanks for posting that great list.
I have a photo from one of the newspapers from Sheffield,England of Charles Peace which in full frontal pose does not show any sign of acromegaly.
Have a good holiday,J.B. |
Howard Brown
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Howard
Post Number: 1259
Registered: 7-2004
| | Posted on Thursday, December 22, 2005 - 9:58 pm: |
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Also in re-reading this thread, I notice Glenn Andersson mentions:
"I have myself previously mentioned this case three times on the Boards (not in detail, though), mainly as a point of example (related to the murder of Mary Kelly) of that it was not impossible during the 19th century for a interpersonal mutilation murder to occur, where the victim and the perpetrator had known each other personally..."
No offense, but a dismemberment is different than a evisceration in some ways....
These dismemberments that J.B. has generously listed do not indicate the removal of organs at all. They are really different types of murders.
I'm sure many of us agree with the sentiment that these previous atrocities could have been inspirational to JTR. No doubt that this was possible.
However,as we know, the Ripper took organs and did not dismember his victims.
The dismemberments were acts based on the need to hide the bodies. The WM victims were left on display or at least,out in the open.
The dismemberments were acts based on afterthoughts. The WM crimes with an apparent indifference to whatever resulted from their being or perhaps,a desire that they be as shocking as they were.
While it is possible that the victims knew their assailant, there is a world of difference between the WM and the list that J.B. posted in that the WM were not only out in the open...but that these dismemberment murders contain an element of "tidying up" that the Ripper murders do not. |
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