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AP Wolf
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Apwolf
Post Number: 2784
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, November 07, 2005 - 11:42 am: | 
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When the Whitechapel Murderer picked out Eddowes as a victim he may well have been signing his own death warrant, for it does appear that Eddowes was suffering from what was then called ‘Bright’s Disease’.
Not many realise that ‘Bright’s Disease’ was considered fatal during the LVP; and famously one US President in this period - Chester Arthur - died within six years of the symptoms first appearing. Prior to the disease he had been a healthy and vigorous personality, much given to fine wine and good food, but in the last six years of his life he became a shuffling wreck of a man without even the will to get out of bed in the morning; and eventually died suddenly from massive internal bleeding.
Today we call ‘Bright’s Disease’ Nephritis, and we know that the effect on the kidneys is of a secondary nature, being inspired originally by a Streptoccal infection elsewhere in the body, very often on the skin.
These Streptoccal infections can be highly contagious, but usually only in intimate body contact situations, and a person in such intimate contact will develop symptoms within three days of contact.
I don’t think there can be any argument that the Whitechapel Murderer’s contact with Eddowes was of an awfully powerful intimate nature.
In fact it is really quite difficult to imagine how the murderer would have escaped infection.
So, all we need to do now is find out which of our many suspects died of ‘Bright’s Disease’, and that could very well be our man.
That’s Maybrick out for a start.
I wonder what eventually killed young Thomas?
Did uncle Charles have it?
And that’s why he shot himself? |
Robert Charles Linford
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Robert
Post Number: 5244
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Monday, November 07, 2005 - 1:02 pm: |
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AP, to be fair, Maybrick wasn't given much of a chance to die of it.
Robert |
Richard Brian Nunweek
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Richardn
Post Number: 1517
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, November 07, 2005 - 1:04 pm: |
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Hi AP,
That being the case then her bloke Kelly would have not survived long would he? by intimate contact are you suggesting sexual intimacy as being very dicey.
Regards Richard. |
AP Wolf
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Apwolf
Post Number: 2785
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, November 07, 2005 - 1:27 pm: |
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True, Robert.
I should be kinder to these Dairy folk, nursing this poor old serial killer who just happens to be the only serial killer in the entire history of the world who got himself killed by another killer.
Actually this Bright’s Disease idea is quite productive and instructive.
I found a hoot of a case from November of 1892 where some medical folk botch an abortion on some poor lady, kill her and her foetus, sling the remains in a coffin and sign her death certificate with cause of death as Bright’s Disease.
But they reckoned without the formidable Dr Thomas Bond - by then holding a very powerful position at the Westminster Hospital as a ‘forensic’ doctor - who has the whole lot dug up and after his post mortem examination declares to the court that there was absolutely no signs of Bright’s Disease in the poor lady but that he felt the presence of a foetus in the coffin with the dead woman to be of a highly suspicious nature.
That is a corker.
Re uncle Charles and the single shot to the head.
There was an army Colonel by the name of Prince who after suffering from chronic Bright’s Disease for six weeks shot himself in the head in August of 1892.
Richard
Sorry, I should have been more specific.
The streptococci I talk of here are not normally sexually transmitted diseases - although one supposes that some of the 150 ‘A’ strains could be - but specifically through contact with mucous and open wounds.
Poor Eddowes certainly had plenty of those, and one imagines that the type of intimate contact the killer employed in slaughtering Eddowes would have infected him with the ‘strep’.
By ‘intimate’ I mean very close contact. |
Sir Robert Anderson
Chief Inspector
Username: Sirrobert
Post Number: 609
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, November 07, 2005 - 1:35 pm: |
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"True, Robert.
I should be kinder to these Dairy folk"
Moo .
Sir Robert
'Tempus Omnia Revelat'
SirRobertAnderson@gmail.com
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Howard Brown
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Howard
Post Number: 1102
Registered: 7-2004
| | Posted on Monday, November 07, 2005 - 1:50 pm: |
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Nice play on words,A.P. The future is "Bright"..
...Bright's Disease [ named for English physician Richard Bright, 1789-1858 ] is actually another name for glomerulonephritis. Its easier to say Bright's Disease.
Anyway,A.P.....In reading about this disease, I saw the reference to streptococci and how this Bright's can result from an infection. In other words,one, non-renal in origin, infection can lead into a person getting Bright's. Bright's is the leading cause of renal failure in the US of A and Europe.
However, I didn't see where this glomerulonephritis was mentioned as being contagious. In other words, despite one separate infection leading into Bright's...I didn't see where it could then become infectious to another party after it attacked the kidney of the infected party. Did you see one, A.P. ? Thank ye kindly ! |
Baron von Zipper
Inspector
Username: Baron
Post Number: 233
Registered: 9-2005
| | Posted on Monday, November 07, 2005 - 2:07 pm: |
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Bright's disease is not contagious.
Mike
"La madre degli idioti è sempre incinta"
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AP Wolf
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Apwolf
Post Number: 2787
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, November 07, 2005 - 2:09 pm: |
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You Groucho Marxed me here, How.
The Strep is contagious, not Bright's, and it follows that if you pick up the Strep from someone who has developed Bright's from a specific strain of Strep then it is very likely that you yourself will get Bright's.
I have an Aboriginal survey for that.
Somewhere. |
Spiro
Sergeant
Username: Auspirograph
Post Number: 20
Registered: 9-2005
| | Posted on Monday, November 07, 2005 - 2:48 pm: |
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Great work AP,interesting comments...
Don't most of us learn something new at the end of the day, brandy on hand, smoking the peace pipe looking for missing women's organs.
In becoming infected by any of his victims, the killer then was likely hospitalised for a period in one of London's fine establishments?
The statements by City Commissioner Smith on the Lusk Kidney may provide further support for your suggestion though they appear discredited at times. Dr Sutton's report has still not been found but Smith's comments, he admits, were based on his notes at the time of the inquiry he headed into the murder of Eddowes.
Don't know what all this means but it sounded good.
Spiro |
Baron von Zipper
Inspector
Username: Baron
Post Number: 235
Registered: 9-2005
| | Posted on Monday, November 07, 2005 - 3:09 pm: |
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I don't believe that one is likely to get inflamed kidneys from streptococci from someone else. It may happen, but typically it would be the symptoms one sees in strep throat, which runs its coures in a week or so. I don't know if Bright's disease is stretococci specific, but I'm no immunologist. If it is not strep specific, then Jacky would have the same chance as anyone else in developing Bright's from strep. It doesn't seem very logical to me to follow this sort of course, but again, I'm no doctor, so what do I know?
Cheers
Mike
"La madre degli idioti è sempre incinta"
|
AP Wolf
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Apwolf
Post Number: 2788
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, November 07, 2005 - 4:23 pm: |
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My dear Baron von Zippo
Strep throat is not Strep nasty kidney Bright's.
Remember we have 150 Streps here.
The Strep we talk of here is associated with very poor living conditions where folk are pushed into conditions that facilitate infection.
The Strep throat you talk of is across the board, and is just as likely to infect a well-to-do family as any other.
Latest research seems to give the Strep that leads to secondary Bright's disease as being 'familial' in nature.
In other words, very intimate.
You need to do certain things to get it.
Like kiss 'em, or kill 'em. |
AP Wolf
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Apwolf
Post Number: 2789
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, November 07, 2005 - 4:53 pm: |
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Thanks Spiro
I don't think the folk suffering from this infection easily placed themselves under the care of the medics. I have reports from the LVP which shows that the folk did not trust the hospitals in this regard. I'll find them.
Meanwhile, here is the latest on a group of people who may be equated with the people of the LVP in social and other terms when it comes to Strep infection and Bright's disease:
'It has been contentious whether PSGN is a relatively benign disease, as traditionally thought, or whether, as suggested 25 years ago, it may lead to progressive renal disease and eventually end-stage renal failure.6 The reported study of albuminuria and haematuria — the harbingers of progressive renal disease — in a remote Aboriginal community suggests that the latter is correct. The study found that people with a history of PSGN in childhood had a risk of overt albuminuria more than six times that in the control group. In fact, the data show that a quarter of cases of overt albuminuria in this population may be attributable to PSGN in childhood. This is alarming, particularly as the Aboriginal population has an incidence of end-stage renal failure 10 times greater than that of the non-Aboriginal population of Australia.1,7,8 It is even more distressing when we realise that streptococcal disease should theoretically be preventable.'
PSNG is the Strep I talk about. |
Stanley D. Reid
Chief Inspector
Username: Sreid
Post Number: 538
Registered: 4-2005
| | Posted on Monday, November 07, 2005 - 4:59 pm: |
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Hi all,
It must not be very contagious, otherwise all the doctors, coroners, policemen, personel associated with any of those and anyone who came in contact with the Lusk kidney or any other of Eddowes' parts would have gotten it.
Stan |
AP Wolf
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Apwolf
Post Number: 2790
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, November 07, 2005 - 5:16 pm: |
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Stan
you and others still have not got it, have you?
It requires living tissue to pass from a wound to a wound, or from mouth to mouth, or from open wound to mouth, or eye, or nose etc.
I can't imagine any of the doctors or others involved with the death of Eddowes doing any of this, but I would suggest that the Whitechapel Murderer would have to do this to kill Eddowes. |
Stanley D. Reid
Chief Inspector
Username: Sreid
Post Number: 539
Registered: 4-2005
| | Posted on Monday, November 07, 2005 - 5:37 pm: |
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Hi AP,
Some of our cells live on as long a four days after our clinical death and the bacteria beyond that. I'd think it would quite likely that some of that group wound have had a wound or a sore or that wouldn't have brushed their hand to any of the areas you mention. For that matter, there's not much more reason to think that Jack would have had all that much greater contact. He could have cut himself or splashed blood on his face but there's no proof of that. No more proof, that is, than doctor couldn't have done the same.
Stan |
Natalie Severn
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Severn
Post Number: 2576
Registered: 11-2003
| | Posted on Monday, November 07, 2005 - 5:53 pm: |
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.....and Annie had TB which was also highly infectious-so maybe search the suspects for that too!
Natalie |
David O'Flaherty
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Oberlin
Post Number: 1112
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, November 07, 2005 - 6:44 pm: |
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Hi A.P., Stan, and Natalie
The topic of infectious corpses is addressed in Ian Burney's book Bodies of Evidence: Medicine and Politics of the English Inquest 1830-1926}. This was a concern that surgeons and inquest juries had in the 19th century and was one of several reasons why the view of the body was eventually dispensed with. Burney cites instances in the early 20th century of jurors petitioning the Home Office for compensation that they had been been exposed to infectious diseases while viewing bodies. Burney also reproduces an ad for the De Richter Body Preserving Apparatus. One of the selling points appealed directly to coroners and their juries:
At present the practice of viewing the body is liable to be not only a particularly trying discipline, but in some cases a very dangerous one. Emanations from decomposing corpses are not only revolting to the senses; they are often exceedingly dangerous to health. A cadaver which is subjected to the influence of this apparatus, no matter how far in decompositon it may originally have been, becomes entirely odourless and perfectly aseptic. Putrefaction is not only arrested; it is absolutely and finally abolished. The process does not in any way interfere with the detection of mineral poisons in medico-legal cases.
Burney also reproduces floorplans for a coroner's court that the London County Council proposed to build in 1893--there are two mortuaries, one for infectious corpses, one for non-infectious. Very swank.
I also pulled some debate out of Hansard 1836 that features Thomas Wakley (founder of the Lancet, M.P., and future West Middlesex coroner) advocating to the Commons a higher rate of pay for medical witnesses. His grounds were that not only did the opening of bodies present a danger of contracting cutaneous diseases, but that they had to pay higher insurance rates as a result.
Dave |
Spiro
Sergeant
Username: Auspirograph
Post Number: 21
Registered: 9-2005
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 2:31 am: |
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AP,
Yes, of course though I meant the killer not the victims. The hospital system was quite different then to the medical pleasures we enjoy today. Although antibiotic resistant Strep is creeping back.
Your Aboriginal report is intriguing. Although I'm not sure when this report was issued, I imagine it would be relatively modern as I live in Australia and reasonably familiar with the Aboriginal people and the history of the effects of British colonisation on their culture.
What is interesting is that these people, comparable to the poor of the LVP, had no such health problems before what we now term here as an invasion.
British convicts and European ways changed the culture of the Aboriginal people making them even today the most vulnerable group to infectious disease as your report confirms.
What brought on this onset of previously unknown disease for these people was the weakening of the immune system by alcohol as was also the case for the East End poor.
Dave,
Thanks for that report it says it all really. However did you find it, well done.
Natalie,
I agree completely. The other victims were also unfortunately disease prone that could easily have infected Jack through mutilation as hygiene was an evolving thought at the time.
If Jack had medical knowledge, would he have taken precautions not only of blood splatter but also of cross-infection?
Regards
Spiro
(Message edited by auspirograph on November 08, 2005) |
AP Wolf
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Apwolf
Post Number: 2792
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 1:01 pm: |
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Thanks so much, Dave, additional fuel for the fire always welcome. Much appreciated.
Spiro
The report on PSGN among indigenous Australians was published in the ‘Australian Health Review’ in 2001 under the title ‘How Bright is their future’ - sorry, I nicked that for the title of this thread - and its subtitle ‘Streptoccocal skin infection may have a major role in the epidemic pf chronic renal disease amongst indigenous Australians.’
I do plan to quote some more out of this important study, but can send you the whole article if you so wish.
Interesting thoughts from the pair of you.
Thank you. |
AP Wolf
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Apwolf
Post Number: 2793
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 1:04 pm: |
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Yes Natalie
an interesting concept is it not?
That by committing murder Jack may well have been killing himself. |
Stephen P. Ryder
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 3317
Registered: 10-1997
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 1:11 pm: |
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Excellent thread, this! I should point out that this idea (or a variant thereof) was widely discussed several years back on the old boards. You should be able to find it on the Casebook DVD/CD-Rom under a search for "Blood Poisoning".
The idea in that case was that the killer did not take Eddowes' apron to wash his hands, but rather stem the flow of blood from a self-inflicted knife wound sustained during the frenzied attack. As there was fecal matter found on the apron (apparently from the killer slicing through the lower bowels) it was suggested that the killer may have contracted blood poisoning via the open wound in his hand, thus rendering him ill in October and possibly explaining the "October lull."
Stephen P. Ryder, Exec. Editor
Casebook: Jack the Ripper
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Robert Charles Linford
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Robert
Post Number: 5250
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 2:15 pm: |
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Certainly the disease was no respecter of persons. It attacked President Andrew Johnson, an American minister to Russia, a Conservative MP and, ironically, Sir Thomas Nelson, Crawford's predecessor as City Solicitor.
Robert |
Stephen P. Ryder
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 3318
Registered: 10-1997
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 2:59 pm: |
|
In case anyone is interested I've uploaded the relevant discussion from 1999 entitled "Did the Ripper Contract Blood Poisoning?" at this location:
http://casebook.org/temp/bp/704.html
Be sure to start at the beginning on the July 15th archive thread and work your way down.
(Message edited by admin on November 08, 2005)
Stephen P. Ryder, Exec. Editor
Casebook: Jack the Ripper
|
Sir Robert Anderson
Chief Inspector
Username: Sirrobert
Post Number: 613
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 3:07 pm: |
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"In case anyone is interested I've uploaded the relevant discussion from 1999 entitled "Did the Ripper Contract Blood Poisoning?"
Thanks ever so much !
Sir Robert
'Tempus Omnia Revelat'
SirRobertAnderson@gmail.com
|
Natalie Severn
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Severn
Post Number: 2580
Registered: 11-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 3:29 pm: |
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The information from this thread is so valuable-thanks Dave,for that medical report-if the ripper
did have medical knowledge he seems to have been careless of himself regarding the catching of disease.Maybe he was terminally ill himself and therefore, by this time,indifferent to being infected!
AP,Spiro,
If you do post some more on this AP I would also be very interested.
A similar thing apparently happened with regard to Native Americans- venereal disease and TB are believed to have been unknown until Columbus arrived with his sailors!
Natalie |
Robert Charles Linford
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Robert
Post Number: 5251
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 3:51 pm: |
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Natalie, I thought that we killed them with measles and they killed us with syphilis. 
Robert |
AP Wolf
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Apwolf
Post Number: 2794
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 4:01 pm: |
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Thank you, Stephen.
It is very interesting indeed, and still much misunderstood.
In 1878 New York City was able to record 1,155 deaths from Bright’s disease, and I would imagine that by 1888 this had easily doubled, taking into account the squalid conditions that recently arrived immigrants lived in.
This applied equally to Whitechapel; and by my reckoning a man who went out and murdered and mutilated the very class of people who would have been the major carriers of PSGN in the LVP - prostitutes - would have been infected with the PSGN strain that ultimately - in as short a period as six years - results in sudden death from massive internal bleeding, known to us then as Bright’s disease.
I have not been standing still here, and have since discovered that suicide was common amongst folk in the LVP suffering the chronic end-stage symptoms of Bright’s when they became confused, delirious and often suffered under the delusion that they were being persecuted or threatened by certain elements of society.
But hey, I ain’t saying a word about uncle Charles.
Apart from that the six year itch from a scratch to Bright’s sits almost perfectly.
And a few weeks by the seaside was considered to be most effective for the sufferers of Bright's. |
Richard Brian Nunweek
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Richardn
Post Number: 1520
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 4:23 pm: |
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Hi,
One of the most intelligent discussions i have witnessed on the boards in many years, any person that indulged in such hidious mutalations of the human body without due care and attention would have indeed been at terrible risk to fatal infections.
The Lull in October may have infact been the result of the killer becoming unwell , and it is therefore not beyond the realms of impossibility that this possible infection led to his demise, leaving it the possibility that Kelly was indeed a copycat [ which incidently fits in with my own feelings].
We may be entirely of track, but Eddowes appears to have been the last of the Rippers type of victim ie Age, location [ that being a outside venue]
The way forward is therefore to try and present a list of local inhabitants that died during the month of October and there cause of death.
But that seems a impossible task?.
Great threads this.
Regards Richard. |
AP Wolf
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Apwolf
Post Number: 2795
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 4:24 pm: |
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Robert,
didn't a Czar die from it as well?
Anyways to be historically correct as regards the native Americans, they fired arrows at us and we threw whisky bottles at them.
The whisky won.
Despite it being an old-fashioned concept, Bright's is absolutely linked to an over-indulgence in alcohol, but I think society has grown up enough now to realise that this has nothing to with drinking alcohol but rather the things we do after drinking that alcohol. |
David O'Flaherty
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Oberlin
Post Number: 1114
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 4:24 pm: |
|
Thanks A.P., Spiro, and Natalie. I'm glad you found that of interest--a note of caution though, that's not a medical report I referenced, but rather an advertisement trying to sell something, a body-preserving apparatus. As far as jurors claiming that they had caught something from viewing corpses, I've no idea whether their complaints were justified, only that they complained.
But the debate I referenced from the House of Commons touches on some of the dangers involved in opening up bodies (without really getting too specific). I'm using some of this for an article about coroners, but since John, Robert, and I have a surplus of material, I don't guess it will hurt to post it here, if some of you are interested and Stephen doesn't mind the lengthiness. This has nothing to do with hunting Jack the Ripper, but since the postmortem plays such a huge role in our understanding of the Ripper's crimes, maybe this little bit of the procedure's history will be helpful. The debate is in reference to the Medical Witness Act of 1836, sponsored by Thomas Wakley, coroner, editor, surgeon, and reformer (in the 1830s and 1840s, Wakley was trying to make the postmortem a routine feature of the inquest)--previously coroners had not had the power to compel surgeons to perform postmortems or testify at inquests; in fact, prior to Wakley, postmortems appear to have been conducted sparingly. Wakley is responsible for a gradual increase of the procedure throughout the 19th century and on into the 20th. A.P. has mentioned a terrific case of Dr. Bond presenting postmortem evidence that a woman had died of a botched abortion--this is what Wakley was all about. In advocating that the postmortem should be a routine feature of the inquest, he would have been an influence on all the later "Ripper" coroners--Baxter, Macdonald, Langham, and Diplock.
So, in 1835, now that the power to compel surgeons was to be given to coroners, Members debated how much to pay them. Note Wakley's joke about legal coroners at the end--whether coroners should be legally or medically qualified was a big debate in the 19th century.
Hansard, 29 July 1835, Commons, Col. 1227-1231:
COUNTY CORONERS.] The House went into Committee on the Bill for regulating County Coroners.
On the Clause providing that fees should be paid to the medical men who were called upon to give evidence before a Coroner’s Jury,
Mr. C. Barclay moved an Amendment, to the effect that the fee to be given should in no case be less than £1. or more than £2.
Mr. O’Connell said, that this part of the Bill would open the door to the widest jobbing. The Amendment might as well propose at once that the fee should be always £2.; it might be regarded as certain, that no Coroner would give his cousin less than £2. Is this the sort of practice that made people want the job of coroner? He hoped that the House would reject the Clause altogether.
Mr. Cripps said, that the Amendment was not his, and that he objected to it entirely.
The Attorney-General also objected to it, and said, that the Clause was not of his framing.
An Hon. Member said, that at present no remuneration was allowed to medical gentlemen for the performance of the duty in question—which was one of much danger; many surgeons had lost their lives by dissecting exhumed bodies, and yet medical men were by this Bill liable to be called before a Coroner’s Jury at any time. Ought they not then to be remunerated? The remuneration might be accorded by the Jury, and thus all jobbing, so far as the Coroner was concerned, would be avoided.
Mr. O’Connell: Such an amendment would only lead to greater jobbing; for the Coroner would in that case have to summon such a Jury as he thought would readily grant to the surgeon (in all probability his cousin, or some other near relation) as large a sum as could possibly be granted.
An Hon. Member said, that the Coroner had nothing to do with the summoning of the Jury—it was the constable who summoned it.
Mr. Warburton considered that £2 was but small remuneration for a respectable surgeon, when it was necessary to open a body.
Mr. Wakley hoped that this Bill, which was a subject of great consequence, and which affected the interests of all classes of persons, would be allowed to proceed. He could not help expressing his sorrow that a proposition for giving but inadequate remuneration to those without whose testimony a Coroner’s inquest would be a mere farce, should be received at his side of the House in the tone and temper with which it had been met. The hostility which the hon. and learned Member for Dublin had displayed to the proposition really surprised him, because his hon. and learned Friend must be aware that there was an Irish Act called one of the Grand Jury Acts, which empowered the Coroner to give the surgeon four guineas. But his hon. and learned Friend was apprehensive that if the surgeon who attended inquests was fairly paid for his services that jobbing would ensue. He knew not in what manner these inquests were held in Ireland; but from the mode in which they were conducted in this country, he felt perfectly convinced that no jobbing whatever would take place under them. He considered the fee of £2 too small a remuneration for the performance of so exceedingly disagreeable and painful a duty. It was most dangerous to life; and the Insurance Offices required a higher premium to be paid on effecting an insurance on the life of a surgeon on account of this circumstance; and some offices, in consequence of their having to perform such a duty, refused to insure the life of the person liable to it at all. In many instances the surgeon had to examine cutaneous (of, relating to, or affecting the skin) diseases, of which there was some danger of contagion, and he had frequently to examine the whole of the organs of the human body, and even after this examination it was not a very uncommon occurrence that he was at a loss to account for the cause of death. When such were the means obliged to be taken by a surgeon to acquire information as to the cause of death, it was quite impossible that any other person connected with the inquest could know anything of the matter considered as a medical subject. He objected to the Amendment which had been proposed, not because it directed that too high a sum should be paid to the surgeon, but because he considered it too small. He was of opinion that the surgeon ought to receive instead of £1, £3, and in no case less than £3. If he were paid £10, it would not, in some cases, be extravagant. He knew a post mortem examination to last eight hours, and even then the inquiry was not considered satisfactory. Would any man say, that a respectable surgeon in extensive practice would be overpaid, if on such an occasion he received £3? The House should bear in mind that, whenever any proposition for the payment of Barristers was made, it was acceded to without the slightest hesitation. Thus Barristers were, for instance, sent on Commissions of Inquiry throughout the country, traveled in their coaches-and-four, enjoying the scenery and prospects which the country displayed, and received their traveling expenses besides five guineas a day. But if the surgeon traveled twenty miles to an inquest he was not allowed a farthing. It had been said, that the Coroner generally called in his cousin, who was a surgeon. The Coroner had not the power to do so; for the medical man who was known to possess most skill in the district in which the occurrence which gave rise to the inquest took place, was generally called in. If the House bestowed the slightest calm consideration on the subject, they could not, he thought, refuse to give to the medical man, who had so onerous and painful a duty to fulfil, a fair and just compensation.
Captain Pechell thought that the hon. Member for Finsbury’s proposition of substituting £3 for £1 would be a great improvement. But there was such a circumstance as the case of an inquest having sat on the body where the party turned out afterwards not to have been dead. A person had been supposed to have been drowned, an inquest sat on the body, and the verdict was “Found drowned.” The exertions of the Humane Society restored that supposed lifeless body to animation again, and life continued for twenty-fours [hours] afterwards. What would the hon. Member for Finsbury proposed that the surgeon who had attended should have in such a case as that?
Dr. Bowring: No post mortem examination could take place until after death.
Mr. Wakley: Oh, yes, there can; I know an instance in which there were three inquests held on the body of a woman in the London Hospital. The Coroner was an attorney; and I am informed that, after holding the first inquest, on proceeding to hold the second, the woman was discovered eating oysters.
Mr. O’Connell: Talk of Irish jobbing after that! At this side of the Channel it appeared that a person might die three times. Surely no Irish lawyer could boast of getting such a fee, and all for nothing. With the high opinion entertained by his Friend, Mr. Wakley, of the services of a medical man, he did not think any one would employ him on an inquest. He was present at 200 trials where medical men were examined, and paid for their attendance; and his opinion was, that they were not overpaid for their services, as they talked a great deal of sinciput and occiput, and extravasations, but they gave, after all, no more information than the Jury could arrive at without their learned aid; in most cases every one could tell the cause of death.
Cheers,
Dave |
Natalie Severn
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Severn
Post Number: 2581
Registered: 11-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 4:42 pm: |
|
Thanks again Dave-a lot of useful info here.So they were well aware of the dangers!
When and where will your article be presented?
AP,sounds far fetched but they say truth is often stranger than fiction.How old was Uncle Charles in 1888? |
AP Wolf
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Apwolf
Post Number: 2796
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 4:46 pm: |
|
Dave
I have to tell you that your post was the funniest thing I ever read in my life.
I mean that honestly.
I laughed out loud about the woman who was declared dead and then was found eating oysters!
That is such a peach.
I really can't wait to see what you chaps have been working on.
I'm glad to see that others were usefully employed in 'jobbing' during that difficult period.
Richard
thanks for your kind words.
Nothing is impossible. |
AP Wolf
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Apwolf
Post Number: 2797
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 4:52 pm: |
|
Old enough to know better, Natalie.
You'll have to ask Robert.
My brain fuses when it comes to simple adding up and logic, I can handle complicated but not easy.
Perhaps I got Bright's?
Must get myself to Hove, then. |
Robert Charles Linford
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Robert
Post Number: 5253
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 5:06 pm: |
|
AP, Alexander III had nephritis - headaches, insomnia, weakness in the legs...
Natalie, Uncle Charles would have been 43-4 in 1888.
Robert |
David O'Flaherty
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Oberlin
Post Number: 1115
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 5:09 pm: |
|
Hi Natalie,
Thanks very much for your interest. Ripperologist, I believe; we're not sure when as we're still writing it (hope to be done very soon). We're hoping our effort will complement Adam Wood's Wynne Baxter article--in addition to the overall look at the system, we've done a lot of work on Thomas Diplock, Samuel Langham, and Roderick Macdonald (including a look at his handling of the Mary Kelly inquest), and a couple of other points of interest.
Hi A.P.,
I'm not surprised you're tickled by Thomas Wakley--he was quite a quick witted fellow, always in the middle of a battle. This is the fellow who referred to the Society of Apothecaries as "the old hags of Rhubarb Hall". He reminds me of you actually, and that is a compliment (hopefully I have not just exposed you to a backlash of abuse, but why wait for your obituary, eh). We spend some quality time with him in our article, since he's responsible for so much of what the 19th century coronial system was.
Dave |
Sir Robert Anderson
Chief Inspector
Username: Sirrobert
Post Number: 615
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 6:15 pm: |
|
Reading over this thread, as well as the 1999 one Stephen was kind enough to repost, has got me thinking on a tangent vis a vis septicaemia and Bright's. The Pinchon torso killer, the Black Dahlia murderer, and the Cleveland Torso dude all washed their victims post mortem.
Now I'm wondering if it had something to do with fear of infection...You cut someone into pieces, there's got to be fecal matter all over the place.
Sir Robert
'Tempus Omnia Revelat'
SirRobertAnderson@gmail.com
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Stanley D. Reid
Chief Inspector
Username: Sreid
Post Number: 544
Registered: 4-2005
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 6:28 pm: |
|
Hi Robert,
The Snow Killer aka The Babysitter was a washer as well. Trace evidence removal is the assumed reason but it could have been a lot of things including some fetish of some sort.
Stan |
Baron von Zipper
Inspector
Username: Baron
Post Number: 237
Registered: 9-2005
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 6:45 pm: |
|
Sorry, I don't see this strep infection transfer happening and causing Bright's. It happens in vulnerable newborns through the birth canal, but it is very rare, though oftn deadly. I suppose it is enjoyable for some to delve into this, and for that enjoyment I'll begrudge no one. We'll see what happens, I suppose.
Cheers
Mike
"La madre degli idioti è sempre incinta"
|
Stanley D. Reid
Chief Inspector
Username: Sreid
Post Number: 545
Registered: 4-2005
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 6:59 pm: |
|
P.S.
Regarding the Cleveland Torso Killer, most of the victims were too decomposed (or found in water) to be able to tell about washing. Some may well have been washed and "the tattooed man" certainly was. Hygiene is one of several possible reasons.
Stan |
Jeffrey Bloomfied
Chief Inspector
Username: Mayerling
Post Number: 943
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 7:16 pm: |
|
Hi all,
About 1990 I asked my then doctor his opinion of the following situation. Suppose somebody commits a murder, and decides to eat part of an organ he extracts from the victim. And it turns out that the kidney is diseased - would the individual get very, deathly sick and possibly be hospitalized for a month? My doctor (even after I explained why I was considering this odd idea). He said it was too improbable to consider seriously.
Now I am wondering if it should have been pursued. I felt that the Ripper took the kidney out of Stride, did not realize she was ill, and ate half (a letter supposedly sent by him said he ate half). Then he got very ill, and almost died. While in the hospital his position was like that of Charles Bravo in 1876, who only insisted on saying he drank one item, and was being hounded by Sir William Gull about what poison he took. Here though, the Ripper could not say more than he ate some bad meat (how could he say I ate half a human kidney, without being arrested). He barely pulls through, but he is furious because he has been very sick for weeks, and when he leaves the hospital that first week in November he wants a victim soon - to treat all the way this time. The result (I felt) was Miller's Court.
If anyone wanted to pursue this - see if hospital records for London and nearby cities for late 1888 (if they still exist) show any male who suffered from a mysterious case of food poisoning that October.
Best wishes,
Jeff |
Stanley D. Reid
Chief Inspector
Username: Sreid
Post Number: 546
Registered: 4-2005
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 7:54 pm: |
|
Hi Jeff,
The letter claimed that he fried the organ before he ate it, which should have killed any bacteria but perhaps he didn't fry it long enough. Also, if it was a poison producing germ like Botulism, cooking wouldn't make much difference.
Probably the most famous case of disease transmission through human cannabalism is the tribes in New Guinea who caught Kuru when they ate their deceased relatives. Cooking wouldn't have helped there because it takes about 2000 degrees to "kill" the prion that causes it.
Best wishes,
Stan |
Howard Brown
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Howard
Post Number: 1107
Registered: 7-2004
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 8:36 pm: |
|
Peeps:
Basically what A.P. has postulated is that during the evisceration of Mrs. Eddowes, the possibility presented is that the Ripper recieved the streptoccoci that created the Bright's Disease in Mrs. Eddowes.
May I ask.... What is the duration of time that the infection from streptococci that caused the Bright's Disease stay in contagion stage?
In other words, after Kate caught the Bright's...wouldn't that streptococci have "done its deed" ? Wouldn't the streptococci disappear or become benign ?
The reason I ask is because most of us have had infections or blood poison. I had lead poison which affected my entire body for 5 weeks when I was 19. Testicles the size of tangerines....and physically, the worst 5 weeks I ever had.
This streptococci,while perhaps not as powerful as lead poison,may have "settled" in one area,as infections often do. We've all somehow got an infection that affected a specific organ or body part without affecting another...Know what I mean? |
Sir Robert Anderson
Chief Inspector
Username: Sirrobert
Post Number: 616
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 11:44 pm: |
|
"Testicles the size of tangerines"
Thank you for sharing.
That 1999 thread was about the possibility of contracting septicaemia (blood poisoning), which strikes me as a even more likely possibility.
It is a very very intriguing line of thought, whether it be Bright's or septicaemia or whatever nasty stuff was lurking in these poor womens' bodies. They must have been walking cauldrons of disease.
Soup's up.
Sir Robert
'Tempus Omnia Revelat'
SirRobertAnderson@gmail.com
|
Christopher T George
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Chrisg
Post Number: 1673
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, November 09, 2005 - 1:29 am: |
|
Hi All
As Stephen noted above, the topic of Jack getting an infection during the Eddowes murder or during, say, the Kelly murder if he got a nick on his hand, was discussed on the old boards. Thanks for uploading the discussion, Spry! What we discussed was not the idea of the killer getting Bright's Disease it was the killer contracting septicemia (blood poisoning) and then dying. That seems to be a more likely scenario than contracting Bright's Disease which I agree is apparently not transmissible.
AP, your Aboriginal report merely says Aborigines with a history of childhood renal (kidney) disease are more likely to have overt albuminuria later in life than Aborigines who do not have such signs of renal disease in early life. Not really pertinent to the discussion or to the case you are trying to make.
Chris
Christopher T. George
North American Editor
Ripperologist
http://www.ripperologist.info
http://christophertgeorge.blogspot.com/
|
AP Wolf
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Apwolf
Post Number: 2798
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, November 09, 2005 - 5:11 am: |
|
Chris
Funny how we read things differently isn't it?
I thought the Aboriginal report said that there was a clear link between children who had PSGN skin infection and then later developed 'Bright's Disease' and died from the consequences.
The thrust of the report is that these deaths could have been prevented by dealing with the original PSGN skin infection, or preventing it.
Of course I am fully aware that Bright's Disease is not contagious, and in fact never claimed it was. However I am aware that PSGN is highly contagious, particulary amongst populations whose social and economic needs are not being met by society, hence their living space becames squashed and the infection quickly becomes an epidemic... read Whitechapel here, or the Aboriginal population of Australia.
For my money someone who meddled with the internal organs of a PSGN victim is far more likely to obtain that Strep than septicemia.
The mechanics of infection are quite different, septicemia requiring the happenstance of the killer injuring himself in some form or manner, whilst PSGN requires only some form or manner of close physical contact between victim and attacker.
It does seem obvious to me that a person who develops Bright's from a PSGN infection is highly likely to pass on that PSGN infection to others who then go on to develop Brights.
Otherwise there would not be an epidemic of the
infection in the closely knit Aboriginal population of Australia, and this report would not have been written. |
Matt Will
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Monday, November 07, 2005 - 11:18 pm: |
|
If the From hell letter is truly genuine, then can we suppose that Jack ate the half of kidney as he said? Would that infect him? |
Brenda
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 08, 2005 - 8:11 pm: |
|
Hi all.
I just wanted to add that my mother died from kidney disease. Back in the day, of course, there was no dialysis to help those with failing kidneys, therefore people sickened quickly and died. As the blood stream of a victim of kidney failure begins to slowly become more toxic, their mind begins to slip. I've often wondered if some of Kate Eddowes' behavior could be attributed to "toxicity".
-"acting like a fire engine"
-Stating that she knew who the Ripper was.
-So very intoxicated she couldn't state her own name...though it was highly improbable she could afford that much booze.
-Boldly calling the policeman at the station "old c*ck".....that's hilarious!
-her seemingly pointless (?) wandering into Mitre Square...off the path one would have expected her to have taken.
Just a thought. |
AP Wolf
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Apwolf
Post Number: 2799
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, November 09, 2005 - 1:07 pm: |
|
How
An excellent point.
Here and now, I think you to be right, that the working life of such Strep attacks to be limited to about three working days, but - and this is a massive but - this is only because of the modern medical measures that are used to control it.
Take away the modern medical measures used and you rapidly find yourself in no-man’s-land, with the report on the Aboriginal population perhaps being your best guide, simply because in their case modern medical measures were not used to effectively control the spread of Strep throughout the individual and tribe as a whole.
My impression is that a Strep attack that was left untreated would eventually runs its course without causing too much short term damage, but that the Strep would remain in the host body in a more benign state - perhaps for the lifetime of the person - but in a state where it would readily infect another person who enjoyed unusual contact with the infected person.
It is only by the use of very modern medicines that we have been able to strip the body of total contamination.
I’m not suggesting that Eddowes herself would have been infected with the Strep at the time of her death, but I am strongly suggesting that she would have still been carrying that Strep which could easily infect another person who was too familiar with her parts.
Obviously during the LVP there was no way a person could be ’cured’. |
Spiro
Sergeant
Username: Auspirograph
Post Number: 22
Registered: 9-2005
| | Posted on Wednesday, November 09, 2005 - 1:41 pm: |
|
AP,
Yes sure. I'd be interested in reading the full report on the Australian Aboriginals when you have time. Thank you for sharing it. Your choice to reinvent what now appears to be an ongoing debate on a disease-laden Jack from Stephen's inclusion of past and informative musings is welcomed. But your attempt to specify again an alternative diagnosis of the infective cause for Catherine's Kidney as the culprit certainly merits attention whatever the preference of suspect.
Chris G,
Hi and good to meet you. Thanks for many fine reads over time and I take your point of the need to exercise caution in regards comparison of cultural sources to the Whitechapel crimes. It's not as if the Aboriginal people had an alcohol resistant gene as the Irish do.
Hi Brenda,
Interesting points on toxicity to ponder. Drats, so now it may be that Eddowes was driven to distraction and I thought it was just her wicked sense of humour.
Sir Robert,
Yes this is an intriguing line to follow. "Walking cauldrons of disease" is such an apt description for the conditions of these people.
How,
Appreciate you having the "balls", fruity as they come, to share some cutting perceptions. How come you know so much of disease...haven't developed a nasty rash have you. Then again, the Victorians saw disease in another way altogether compared to our expectations and I also look forward to Dave et al's Rip article and "the old hags of Rhubarb Hall"
Spiro |
AP Wolf
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Apwolf
Post Number: 2801
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, November 09, 2005 - 3:39 pm: |
|
Thanks Spiro
as the report is not long, I'll post it here so others get access as well.
'How bright is their future?
Post-streptococcal glomerulonephritis in Indigenous communities in Australia
Streptococcal skin infection may have a major role in the epidemic of chronic renal disease among Indigenous Australians.
MJA 2001; 174: 489-490
In 1836, Richard Bright, from Guy's Hospital, London, described the clinical entity of acute glomerulonephritis, later known as Bright's disease. However, it was not until 1907 that streptococci were suggested as a cause of acute glomerulonephritis. At that time, post-streptococcal glomerulonephritis (PSGN) was rife throughout the world, as it remains today in some developing countries. With increasing living standards, Australia has a very low overall incidence of streptococcal infection, but, in contrast, our Indigenous communities have one of the highest incidences in the world, and corresponding high incidences of PSGN and rheumatic heart disease.1-4
In this issue of the Journal, White and colleagues highlight anew the problem of the health of our Indigenous communities and provide some ominous insight into the long-term sequelae of PSGN.5
It has been contentious whether PSGN is a relatively benign disease, as traditionally thought, or whether, as suggested 25 years ago, it may lead to progressive renal disease and eventually end-stage renal failure.6 The reported study of albuminuria and haematuria — the harbingers of progressive renal disease — in a remote Aboriginal community suggests that the latter is correct. The study found that people with a history of PSGN in childhood had a risk of overt albuminuria more than six times that in the control group. In fact, the data show that a quarter of cases of overt albuminuria in this population may be attributable to PSGN in childhood. This is alarming, particularly as the Aboriginal population has an incidence of end-stage renal failure 10 times greater than that of the non-Aboriginal population of Australia.1,7,8 It is even more distressing when we realise that streptococcal disease should theoretically be preventable.
Proteinuria is increasingly recognised as the best overall indicator of progressive renal disease, whatever the cause. It would thus be very important to follow the study population, preferably over many more years, to determine whether renal damage does indeed progress and lead to end-stage renal failure. Other aspects of epidemic and endemic post-streptococcal infection could also be explored. It has been suggested that, because of the high rate of nephritis in families, a familial trait may be involved, increasing susceptibility to the disease.9 This may have some relevance to the PSGN epidemics in this population.
There is no simple treatment for PSGN, and preventing streptococcal infection remains the most important control strategy.10 Penicillin is beneficial in preventing spread of infection during epidemics.2 No vaccine is as yet available. As concluded by White and colleagues, prevention of streptococcal infection through improved economic and living conditions, and particularly control of skin infections, is possible and should reduce the incidence of renal involvement.
However, the real tragedy highlighted by this study is that, despite the passage of up to 20 years since these children were infected with streptococci, nothing much has changed to lower the rates of infection among Aboriginal children. Indeed, a very recent report demonstrated that skin infections still occur in up to 70% of Aboriginal children, with the major pathogens being group A streptococci.4
It is imperative that such important results are heeded. Not until fundamental changes take place in the social, economic and living conditions of our Indigenous communities will this streptococcal disease be eliminated, as it has been in all other areas of Australia.
We have a bipartisan Federal Government committed to improving the health of Indigenous Australians and an office for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health in the Commonwealth Department of Health and Aged Care, which is providing a comprehensive funding strategy for Indigenous health issues. The head of the Northern Territory Peak Aboriginal Health Organisation, Pat Andersen, is on record as describing the Primary Health Care Access Programme, now under way, as the most exciting event in Aboriginal affairs since the 1967 referendum. Furthermore, recent studies have shown that Aboriginal people can participate enthusiastically and effectively in chronic disease management, with improvement in their renal disease.11
Thus, the challenge at this time of reconciliation is to restore social equity and health to Indigenous Australians.12 It is to be hoped that this will eliminate post-streptococcal disease in Aboriginal communities. The future should be bright.
Robert C Atkins
Professor of Medicine and Director of Nephrology
Monash Medical Centre, Melbourne, VIC' |
|
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