WHITECHAPEL AGAIN THE SCENE OF HORRIBLE BUTCHERY
The Assassin Driven from His Victim by An Approcahing Policeman Before Completing Mutilation - A Man Who Saw The Ripper
London. Feb. 13.
At 2.45 this morning a policeman on duty in Chambers street, Whitechapel, found the dead body of a young woman with her throat cut from ear to ear. The head was attached to the body by a small strip of skin. The body has been identified as a woman of the pavements known as "Carroty Nell", about 25 years.
The report of the discovery spread like an electric flash, and the place was soon thronged with hundreds of dissolute men and women. The scene of the awful affair is a dark, gloomy archway known as Swallows Gardens, which forms a passageway from Little Mint street into Chambers street - an archway frequented by railway employees and stablemen, who work in the adjoining street. Notwithstanding the fact that at the time of the murder many of these workmen must have been within hearing of a cry of distress, no alarms were heard by any person as far as the police have been able to ascertain. The general appearance of the woman and the style of her clothes, which were of fair quality and lay in an orderly fashion about ther body, indicated that in life she had belonged to the class of abandoned women. Her hair was in an untidy condition. The police believe that the woman was murdered while standing talking to her associate, and that the "Ripper" had no time whatever to inflict the peculiar mutilations which have heretofore characterized his savage butcheries. Approaching footsteps they think caused him to take flight. When the body arrived at the Whitechapel mortuary the blood was found to be still warm. As soon as the body was discovered the police immediately cleared away the blood stains in the hope of restraining the sinister curiosity of the rapidly gathering crowds. A wooden cross having, however, been carved in the near woodwork to mark the spot, large numbers of people were flocking to the dim archway. A railway man has been found who states that as he passed through Swallow Gardens this morning, just before the murder, he saw the victim standing in the archway engaged in conversation with a man who had the appearance of being a foreign seaman. The police are now scouring vessels lying in the Thames.
London, Feb. 18.
Col. Edward Bradford has at last an opportunity to prove the wisdom of Home Secretary Matthews in appointing him commissioner of Metropolitan police. His reputation for suppressing thuggism in India has a good deal to do with his selection for his present office, and it is believed that that man who brought to justice and virtually exterminated the cunning murderers of Rajpuana would not be baffled, like his predecessor, in pursuit of the Whitechapel assassin. The police and public profess to be confident that he will unearth the murderer of Carroty Nell, and public opinion is equally confident that the murderer is Jack the Ripper, who came nearer being arrested red-handed than ever before. Experts who have studied the former crimes of the Ripper say there is no dount that this latest murder must be added to the list of that wretch's enormities. Like the others this woman belonged to that unfortunate class, and like them she was not of the vilest grade in that class. Another similarity is in the location of the crime, which was committed in a place comparatively public, and yet screened from immediate observation. The unfortunate women of Whitechapel, who had got over the terror created by the murder of some time ago, are again fear stricken, and gather in groups to discuss the latest traged and wonder who will be the next victim. The location of the tragedy is near the city boundary, in the vicinity of the docks, and viler in some respects than the scenes of the Ripper's former crimes, being often resorted to by men and women who do not care to seek accommodation in lodgings. For this reason had not the officer actually stumbled over the body, the Ripper might have returned to his horrible work after the policeman had passed, and the officer's statement indicated that the murderer was waiting in the darkness with this object, when frightened into retreat by the officer's detection of the body. Constable Thompson is the most unhappy man in London tonight, as he feels he had the most noted criminal of the age within his grasp. The inquest will be held to-morrow. Meantime the police are scouring the city for suspicious characters and Sir Edward Bradford has spent all day in his office directing operations.
