Dr. Harold Dearden's Brother Officer
Harold Dearden, author of Who Was Jack The Ripper, told a story that on 9 November 1918 during the Great War (World War 1) he was in the trenches at the Somme, when a fellow officer told him that this was the second time his birthday had been ruined. The previous occasion had been his tenth birthday party (9 November 1888) when a noisy and violent lunatic had been brought into his father's private mental asylum, disrupting the boys birthday party. The lunatic was said to be the son of one of his father's oldest friend's. As this event was supposed to have occurred on the same day as the murder of Mary Kelly, we are therefore expected to believe this lunatic was none other than Jack the Ripper. The story goes on to say that over a short time the lunatic became a smiling and gently demented companion for the boy, with a great talent for drawing. No researcher has yet identified the brother officer or probably ever will.