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Leanne Perry
Sergeant
Username: Leanne
Post Number: 18
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, February 24, 2003 - 5:12 pm: |       |
G'day,
This letter to me, was an obvious hoax, probably from the person who hoaxed the 'From Hell' communication. It contains the same Irish flavour as the 'From Hell' letter.
'O have you seen the devle with his mikerscope and scalpul a lookin at a kidney with a slide cocked up', sounds like a student at the 'ospitle'!
LEANNE PERRY.
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Leanne Perry
Sergeant
Username: Leanne
Post Number: 37
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Friday, March 07, 2003 - 3:49 pm: | |
G'day,
Another letter was recieved on the 8th of October by Charles Warren, 3 weeks before the Openshaw letter was received:
'Dear Boss
Although you have not yet succeeded in catching me I presume you 'live in ope'
I have not yet settled my account with whores & mean to do the dozen I origionally stated-
Yours with love
Jack the Ripper
Look at the words 'live in ope'. This appears to be from the same student who penned the 'Openshaw letter', because of the obvious fake-Irish sounding words 'hopperate' and 'ospitle'!
The strange man who spoke to shop assistant Emily Marsh, the day before Lusk received the kidney, appeared to have an Irish accent!
LEANNE PERRY
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Steve Laughery
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Monday, January 26, 2004 - 9:15 pm: | |
Leanne
Hi!
I always enjoy reading your observations!}
I agree, the Openshaw letter seems to have been written in a fake, or "stage" accent. But, as an American, it has always looked/sounded to me more like someone trying to write the way he thought a Cockney would sound, not an Irishman.
Where I come from, if you want to immitate a poor Londoner, the first thing you do is transplant your "H"'s; if a word begins with an h, drop it. If it should begin with a vowel, stick an h in front of it. The next thing you do is toss in a few random "bloody"s, "bloomin'"s or "blimey"s.
"I was goin to hopperate agin close to your ospitle" and "dror mi nife along of er bloomin throte" sounds to me like what a foreigner (an American?) would write if he wanted the reader to think he was a local East Ender. (A literate Cockney would know that "Hospital" was spelled with an H, even if he pronounced it "'ospital")
Steve} |
Caroline Anne Morris
Chief Inspector
Username: Caz
Post Number: 682
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, January 28, 2004 - 8:08 am: | |
Hi Steve,
It’s exactly what ‘enry ‘iggins remarked upon when listening to poor flargirl Eliza Doolittle, in Bernard Shaw’s Pygmalion, reciting:
“In ‘ereford, ‘ertford and ‘ampshire, ‘urricanes ‘ardly hhhhever ‘appen.”
Love,
Caz
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Steve Laughery
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Saturday, January 31, 2004 - 9:57 pm: | |
Caz,
"Zactly!" (as Eliza's Kansas contemporary, Dorothy Gale, would say). Actually, just to show you how totally Nor'west American I am, "flargirl" took me a good 10 seconds ("Flargirl?! I thought Eliza Doolittle was a flowergir} ... oh. Wait. I get it.")
Evans' and Skinner's "Letters From Hell" mentions the Cornish folktale the Openshaw letter's postscript seems to be drawn from ("Here's to the devil, with his wooden pick and shovel ... "). I wonder how well-known that bit }was. Was it used as a toast? Is it part of a poem? Was it meant as something that Dr. Openshaw would get? Was it thrown in as something everyone would get?
Steve |
MF
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Saturday, February 14, 2004 - 11:59 pm: | |
Openshaw, Exhibit A for Patricia Corwell's Sickert case, is highly derivative, posted almost a month after Saucy Jack and two weeks after From Hell was received.
The letter fails in content as in language which you pointed out. Although it's not a blatant failure.
The faker was doing PRETTY GOOD until he got to the poem. Sophomoric humour. Not up to Ripper standards.
Offering the info that you were thwarted by the police for the SECOND time is woeful and piteable. NO self-respecting Ripper would admit to that.
And did the Openshaw writer carry out his threat to operate near the hospital? Miller's Court is on the other side of Whitechapel from London Hospital and Kelly was 10 days after. Not 'soon', compared to Dear Boss, not 'near', compared to Buck's Row, and especially if you're posting from London.
Nice try though. ha ha
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Andrew Gable
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Saturday, May 22, 2004 - 11:34 pm: | |
Interesting, I recall finding in a book a folk-verse from, I think, Cornwall that had the exact same rhythm and everything as the verse at the bottom of this letter. Though its content was different, something about the devil with a pick and shovel working in the mines. |
Dan Norder
Detective Sergeant
Username: Dannorder
Post Number: 112
Registered: 4-2004
| | Posted on Sunday, May 23, 2004 - 1:51 am: | |
Hi Andrew,
The folktale is called Duffy and the Devil, and it was quite well known at the time. It's a variant of the now more famous tale of Rumplestiltskin. In 19th century Cornwall, kids would go door to door at Christmastime and perform the story as a skit. It was published in London in 1871 by Robert Hunt in the book Popular Romances of the West of England, which was popular world-wide.
Dan Norder, editor, Ripper Notes |
MF
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Wednesday, June 30, 2004 - 12:06 am: | |
Two drawn lines, two hit notes, or two spoken words are never exactly the same, but a written word is the same no matter how you inscribe it.
If so, would not a visual, a musical or a performing artist then be more apt to copy or borrow material like Duffy and the Devil?
Sickert was an actor and a painter. He was Victorian England's greatest artist. But when it came to letters, he was just a Duffer to the real Devil.
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