Woodford Times (Essex)
Friday, 13 February 1891

"Jack the Ripper" Again!
ANOTHER WOMAN MURDERED IN WHITECHAPEL THIS MORNING.

Horror thrilled the community of Whitechapel early this morning. About two hours after midnight a report got into circulation that another woman had been murdered and horribly mutilated, and that "Jack the Ripper" had reappeared in the East End. When, however, a representative of the Press called at Leman-street Police-station, the officer in charge assured him that the facts were not quite so ghastly as rumour had represented them to be, that in fact there had been murder, but no mutilation beyond a dreadful gash in the throat. The victim, says the Central News, is a woman who has the appearance of being about 25 years of age; her name and history are as yet unknown to the police. Between one and half-past one o'clock a police constable discovered her lying in a pool of blood under an archway in Chamber Street. At first the officer thought he had merely a drunken woman to deal with, but on turning the light of his lantern upon the body he was horrified to behold a bloody corpse. The victim's throat presented a large incised wound; so deep, indeed, was the cut that the head was well-nigh decapitated. The woman was lying upon her back in such a manner as to suggest that she had been murdered under the archway. Her hair was dishevelled, as though she had been engaged in a struggle. The murder could not have been committed very long before the constable made the discovery, for the victim's blood was still warm. The policeman had the body removed as promptly and quietly as possible to the nearest mortuary. The officer says he passed the spot 15 minutes previously, and there was then no one there. The scene of the murder is only about a stone's throw from Leman Street Police Station. The deceased who was about 25 years of age, was known to the local police as an unfortunate who was in the habit of frequenting the locality, and had been seen about Leman Street early in the evening. At present there is no clue to the murderer.