Author: Wolf
Wednesday, 11 August 1999 - 03:52 pm |        |
I am afraid, Dr. Villon, that if you're looking for the Ripper among the medical lists, you will have to disregard Tumblety for the simple fact that Tumblety was not a doctor. He was a quack, a charlatan, a snake oil salesman, or as he described himself, an "electric physician."
Here is what a boyhood friend, Edward Heywood, said of him and his claim to being a doctor: "The only training he ever had for the medical profession was a little drug store at the back of the Arcade, which was kept by a 'Doctor' Lispenard, who carried on a medical business of a disreputable kind."
Tumblety had much the same character as Dr. Neil Cream, it seems, only Cream actually had a medical degree, but the boastfull flamboyance seems the same.
So if you are looking for a killer with medical, surgical, or anatomical knowledge, Tumblety must be forgotten.
Wolf. |
Author: Bob Hinton
Thursday, 12 August 1999 - 12:03 am | |
Dear Alan,
Thank you for your reply. I've just realised I'm on totally the wrong board here, so will be replying in full on the Tumblety board.
all the best
Bob |
Author: Diana Comer
Thursday, 12 August 1999 - 05:45 am | |
| I assume that the statement regarding "Dr" Lispenard is euphemistic of an abortionist. While such a person would not know all of anatomy he would certainly have to be able to find a uterus. |
Author: Wolf
Thursday, 12 August 1999 - 01:21 pm | |
You probably assume wrong, Diana. The fact that 'Dr' Lispenard ran his 'practice' from a drug store and the fact that Tumblety's only 'medical skill' was to make alcohal or narcotic based patent medicine, there was probably no surgical or anatomical knowledge involved. You are confusing disreputable with illegal.
Wolf. |
Author: Rotter
Thursday, 12 August 1999 - 01:50 pm | |
I'm not so sure about that. Abortion at the end of the 19th century was driven underground but the atmosphere was very different when Tumbley was getting his "training" in Rochester.
Remember also the Philomene Dumas affair which involved an abortion.
I quote from the entry on "abortion" in "The Reader's Companion to American History":
As married women moved to lower their fertility rates after 1830, abortion became a widespread practice in the United States. Abortionists advertised in the daily press and pharmaceutical firms competed in a lucrative market of purported abortifacients. Women spoke to each other and to their doctors in straightforward terms about their abortions.
When physicians estimated American abortion rates in the 1860s and 1870s, they used figures strikingly close to those of the 1960s and 1970s: approximately one abortion for every four live births. |
Author: D. Radka
Thursday, 12 August 1999 - 06:41 pm | |
Maybe Tumblety was reliving his "medical training" as an abortionist in getting the uteri from the victims. Maybe he was so morally appalled at the abortionist work he did he flipped out totally and felt compelled to attone for it by repeating it, somehow. Could he have thought that by removing the uterus, he would be destroying the ability of the woman to become pregnant while working as a prostitute, and then need an abortion? He'd be sort of an abortionist in reverse- a GOOD proactive abortionist who removes the uterus to prevent abortion, as opposed to a BAD reactive abortionist who actually performs abortions. He'd also be supplanting his old boss and trainer if he did this, i.e., the boss wouldn't be able to get work since the women couldn't get pregnant. Tumblety would also be showing himself as a fully-adequate abortionist by removing the uteri--every bit as good as his old boss, and one notch better to boot.
Just a thought.
David |
Author: Wolf
Thursday, 12 August 1999 - 11:37 pm | |
There seems to be a general misunderstanding about what constituted medical skill in the middle to late 19th century. Surgery consisted mainly of amputation or treatment of the outside of the body. If Tumblety was an abortionist, and I believe there is no proof of this, abortion would consist of possable herbal remedies to induce abortion or the old coat hanger method.
In the 1850's when Tumblety was supposed to be 'training' as a doctor such everyday operations such as an appendectomy had not been successfully acomplished. Medicine was a rather crude profession and anatomy classes were designed to explain to the student where everything was and how it worked, it was not designed to teach students how to repare internal damage or disease.
Any talk on Tumblety having any anotomical or surgical knowledge is based on pure supposition not backed up by the scant facts that we know.
Wolf. |
Author: Rotter
Friday, 13 August 1999 - 01:14 am | |
| The accusation was that Tumblety secured an abortifacient for Philomene Dumas. As Stewart Evans explains Tumblety was part of a movement that disdained surgery and cured ailments only by herbs and patent medicines. Of course this conveniently removed the need for medical training. This doesn't mean that he couldn't have been present at dissections or studied anatomy in some way, but claims are purely speculative. Of course there is the claim of a uterus collection but I assume these could have been purchased from some kind of medical supply establishment. |
Author: Villon
Friday, 13 August 1999 - 02:53 am | |
Hello all,
I don't think there is any reason to assume a quack abortionist would have been any better able to locate the uterus than any layman. Most of these types would have been locating the uterus per vaginum or not at all. Internal anatomy would have been outside their remit.
I think the principal method of 'surgical abortion' in this country involved syphoning a solution of carbolic or soft soap into the uterus p/v. This was very risky, involving the possibility of embolism and sudden death.
Anatomical knowledge among the medically qualified would have been pretty sound. Operations were risky, with high mortality rates.Yet they were performed. Hysterectomy was an acknowledged surgical procedure. But it was in the dissection room, not the operating theatre that our Jack would have learned his skills. IF Dr. T. received med. training he would have been well able to locate a human uterus. If he was just a quack herbalist, then of course he wouldn't.
But my first guess is still some nameless drop-out or otherwise failed med. student from the London Hospital.
regards to all
Mike |
Author: Wolf
Friday, 13 August 1999 - 11:10 am | |
Thanks Dr. Villon for clearing some of that up. As I said, Tumblety had no anatomical or surgical experience.
Rotter, "Tumblety was part of a movement that disdained surgery and cured ailments only by herbs and patent medicines" ?? Tumblety was part of a movement to scam his way through life. He sold a pimple cream and other alcohal and narcotic based patent medicines to a gullable public. If someone died while under his 'care', he slipped out the back and moved on to the next city. That's what 'quacks' do, they arn't misunderstood herbalists trying to help mankind.
Wolf. |
Author: Rotter
Friday, 13 August 1999 - 02:28 pm | |
| Tumblety was not part of any legitimate, organized movement, he was one of a flock of quacks that flourished in Victorian times. If you want the whole story "The Golden Age of Quackery"(by Stewart H.Holbrook,1959) is a good place to start. Some of these people really believed this stuff, although Tumblety probably didn't. Talk to people today who practice homeopathy (a current quackery) or who makes money as a psychic. They are often quite sincere. |
Author: Alan
Friday, 13 August 1999 - 03:09 pm | |
| Tumblety must have had some sort of anatomical knowledge as they practised hysterectomy at the Lispenard Hospital where he gained his 'M.D.' Also he had a large anatomical collection which included a dozen wombs from 'all classes of women,' so he would certainly know what they were like. |
Author: D. Radka
Friday, 13 August 1999 - 06:12 pm | |
History, history.
Technical, technical.
Where is your dynamical, your thought?
David |
Author: Rotter
Friday, 13 August 1999 - 06:47 pm | |
I don't know about a Lispenard's Hospital, this is all I have ever found about a Dr.Lispenard in Rochester(Library of Congress catalog entry for this book):
Lispenard, William C.
Dr. W. C. Lispenard's practical private medical guide ... Rochester, Pub.for the author, 1854. 224 p. 16 cm.
LC CALL NUMBER: RC881 .L77
SUBJECTS:
Generative organs--Diseases.
Venereal diseases.
LCCN: ca 11-1892
I think the subjects listed are interesting in light of the abortion question. But it is a leap to go from having specimens in a jar to having the surgical knowledge to remove them. |
Author: Wolf
Friday, 13 August 1999 - 11:56 pm | |
Alan, Tumblety didn't have an M.D. degree, he just called himself 'doctor' in order to sell his nostrums. This is from R. Sommers book, The Patent Medicine Men, "By prefixing the title 'doctor' to their names, they attempted to inspire public confidence in their nostrums, however misplaced." This fits Tumblety to a Tee.
Wolf. |
Author: Alan
Saturday, 14 August 1999 - 04:31 pm | |
| Tumblety did have an M.D. and he attempted to become a surgeon in the Union Army, the question was whether or not it was genuine. He obtained it in Lispenard's Hospital in Rochester where they carried out operations on women. |
Author: Rotter
Sunday, 15 August 1999 - 12:31 am | |
| Is there any evidence for this other than his own claims? |
Author: Alan
Sunday, 15 August 1999 - 06:22 am | |
| Yes. |
Author: Rotter
Sunday, 15 August 1999 - 11:44 am | |
| What would the evidence be? |
Author: Alan
Sunday, 15 August 1999 - 12:18 pm | |
| Do your own research you lazy thing. |
