Evening Star (Washington, D.C.)
18 July 1889
WHITECHAPEL'S FIEND
Secrecy and Efficacy of "Jack the Ripper's" Bloody Work.
London Special to the Philadephia Times, July 17.
Thousands in this great city are quaking with fear. The murderous knife of
"Jack the Ripper" is back again and the horrible
murder yesterday morning enables him to cut another notch in the handle of
his terrible knife. The details of the crime
leave no doubt that he was the murderer of Alice Mackenzie, known to some
as Kelly. An examination of the body developed the
unusual feature that Jack had not done the work with the dull knife
heretofore used, as the slashed are clean. The clothes
were drawn over the head after the knife had been driven into the neck. A
cut four inches long, running toward the groin, had
not severed the abdominal wall. On both sides of this cut and along the
lateral line below the breast bone there were twenty
scratches.
The woman had evidently been taken unawares, as she was strongly built and
weighed 140 pounds. She could not have uttered a
cry without being heard by the police. Jack adopted his old plan, except
that in this case the right hand had been placed
over the mouth and the left hand drove the knife into the neck instead.
The murder threw Whitechapel into a condition of
fearful excitement, and Castle alley was crowded all day. People from all
quarters flocked to the scene and stories of the
crime were on every tongue. The woman was identified by John McCormick, a
porter. He said he lived with her six years. She
was forty years old and was from Peterboro. Her family lived there until a
month ago, when they lived in a furnished room in
Whitechapel. She did charing work and never got her living on the street.
ADDICTED TO DRINK
Sometimes she drank too much. He left the house at 1 o'clock yesterday
afternoon, as they had a tiff. He gave her a shilling
and advised her not to spend it in drink. He was told she returned to the
house at 10 o'clock last night and took a blind boy
named Geo. Dixon for a walk. McCormick knew no more of the woman and boy.
They went to the Cambridge music hall and there met
a man and asked him to treat them. She then went home, but left again
after, saying she was to meet a man at the Cambridge
music hall. Whether or not she met his is not known, but the blind boy has
no means to identify him except by his voice.
Nothing could more clearly indicate the cunning of the murderer than the
selection of the locality. The alley is a hundred
yards long and is dark and encumbered by a mass of wagons and barrows,
which formerly were stored in a yard in which
excavations were going on. A few feet above, at the bottom, is a network
of streets, courts and alleys. On the left side are
small factories and workshops, and on the right is a high board fence,
shutting off the back yards of a row of small houses
facing on Newcastle street.
DIFFICULT TO CAPTURE HIM.
Newcastle street runs parallel with Castle alley, and just below the scene
of the murder they are connected by a narrow
court. If approached, therefore, from Whitechapel road the murderer could
escape down Castle alley into Old Castle street,
and through this to Wentworth street and thence to Commercial street or
the lane. If approached from Old Castle street he
could escape through Castle alley court into Whitechapel road. If hemmed
in on both sides he could still escape through the
connecting court to Newcastle street, and thence to Whitechapel road or
Wentworth street.
There was further cunning and evidence of intimate knowledge of the
locality in the fact that he was just on the boundary
line of two police districts. Whitechapel road is patrolled by constables
from Leman street station, and no street constables
come from the road down the alley because that is in the district
belonging to another division. He must have known that an
officer could come toward him only from the bottom of the alley and his
intimate knowledge of the locality and the police
rules made his escape as easy as ever. When it is remembered that in all
the eight murders committed he has never once been
seen by anybody the fear of him in Whitechapel can be understood, and that
there is a superstition in some of the slums that
he is invisible does not seem surprising.
THE POLICE AT SEA.
The police are absolutely without a clue, Inspector Reid so stated this
evening. Jacobs, the only person in the vicinity of
Old Castle street, was simply on an errand, and was released directly.
Three other men were arrested on suspicion during the
early morning and forenoon, but were almost immediately released upon
establishing their identity and their whereabouts at
the hour of the murder. A search of the lodging houses, which followed
close upon the discovery, revealed nothing. Nobody had
come in or gone out within an hour who could in any way be connected with
the tragedy. The only hope was the examination of
barmen and barmaids along Whitechapel road with reference to the presence
in their places of the woman Mackenzie prior to the
murder.
There is a possibility, judging from the previous cases, that the murderer
took her into one of these and got her stupidly
drunk before attempting her death. This investigation appears to be the
only chance of finding a clue, but it does not appear
to have been made. The attempt to surround the scene with a cordon of
constables amounted to nothing, as the murderer had
passed out into Whitechapel road. Consequently the police stand as before,
not knowing which way to turn. No doubt they have
done and are doing all in their power.
DETECTIVES EMPLOYED.
Chief Commissioner Munis (sic) and Colonel Monsall were on the spot as
soon after the murder as the telegraph and horses
could bring them. All the detective strength of the metropolitan force had
been centred in Whitechapel, and the best brains
of Scotland Yard not only are but have been at work on the murderers. Up
to a month ago two constables were nightly on the
watch in the alley, it being a likely spot for the murderer to select. Up
to two weeks ago there was also a nigh watchman
stationed in the alley by a man who owned a number of barrows stored
there. The withdrawal of all these left the place free.
There is nothing more for the police
to work on at present than there was at the last murder on August 9. The
murderer is
clearly a maniac, but so cool that he makes no mistakes and leaves no
traces, and, furthermore, it is evidently without that
sense of fear which leads to detection in nine cases out of ten.
The Whitechapel Murder.
London, July 18.
At the inquest to-day over the body of the woman found murdered in
Whitechapel district yesterday morning it was found that
in addition to two deep gashes across the stomach there were fourteen
other wounds on the body, mostly skin deep.
