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** This is an archived, static copy of the Casebook messages boards dating from 1998 to 2003. These threads cannot be replied to here. If you want to participate in our current forums please go to https://forum.casebook.org **
The City Police Suspect
Casebook Message Boards: Ripper Suspects: General Discussion :
The City Police Suspect
Author: Scott Nelson
Sunday, 12 March 2000 - 12:52 am |        | City P.C. Robert Sager was quoted as saying "We had good reason to suspect a man who worked in Butcher's Row, Aldgate..." In the excellent new book by Messrs. Connell and Evans, "The Man Who Hunted Jack the Ripper" there is an interesting chapter on the City Police Suspect, essentially a newspaper account in 1906 about the murders by ex-City Police Inspector Harry Cox. The question I would like to advance is: Can the reminiscences of Sager and Cox be reconciled into a coherent account of a suspect watched by the City Police Force? We know where the suspect under survelliance by the city police worked, south of Aldgate High Street, between Mansell St. and the Minories, possibly as far south as the Thames. (Thank you again for the info Guy, Viper and Stewart). It seems to me that his occupation would have been either: 1) a common hawker of cheap goods, 2) a butcher, 3) a hairdresser, 3) a tailor 4) a shoe-maker or 5) a dock-worker (common laborer). As this area is described as dominantly jewish and inference from the description of Cox is that the suspect was jewish, could there be hint of reasonable suspicion on a local man? What was he doing ducking into a Leman Street shop, and why did he eventually retreat to St. Georges-in-the-East (Stepney), where apparently his residence was?
Am I reading too much into this? |
Author: Jim DiPalma
Tuesday, 14 March 2000 - 12:32 pm | | Hi All,
Scott, I also found the story from Inspector Cox most intriguing, but mostly for the fascinating glimpse it provided into the some of the measures taken by the police to capture the Ripper, i.e., the workings of the day-to-day surveillance operations. It also emphasized the lack of consensus among the police as to the Ripper's identity, not just among senior police officials but the men on the ground as well. I'm not sure what sort of case can be made from it, though.
In addition to the points you've listed, the Cox story provided a physical description, 5'6" tall with short, dark, curly hair, and the fact that he had occasionally been confined to an asylum at Surrey. It is indeed unfortunate that Cox declined to identify the suspect by name - even if the records at Surrey still exist, without a name, and with only the scant information we have, I should think he would be difficult if not impossible to trace.
I should also think that many of the officers involved in that sort of surveillance would have thought their target a likely suspect, as Cox clearly did.
FWIW,
Jim |
Author: The Viper
Wednesday, 04 July 2001 - 10:39 am | | The question of the butchery trade has arisen here and on the David Cohen discussion topic. Where were the slaughterhouses licensed to produce meat for human consumption at the time? Well, according to the Whitechapel Board of Works District Annual Report (1889) there were ten of them as follows:-
One each in Cable Street; Mile End New Town; Norton Folgate and Whitechapel Road. Six in Whitechapel High Street - located mainly on the southern side.
Regards, V. |
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