Complete History of Jack the Ripper (89 page)

1
DN
1 October 1888.

2
Star
1 October 1888.

3
DN
4 October 1888;
Star
3 October 1888.

4
ELO
6 October 1888; Montagu, 15 October 1888, forwards petition of Whitechapel traders, HO 144/221/A49301C/10; traders’ petition, October 1888, MEPO 3/141, ff. 136–7; report of Supt. T. Arnold, 22 October 1888, MEPO 3/141, f. 166;
DT
19 October 1888.

5
Star
5 October 1888;
ELO
6 October 1888.

6
For this collection of grisly anecdotes,
Star
18 September 1888;
DT
18 October 1888;
DN
12 and 25 October 1888.

7
ELO
and
ELA
13 October 1888;
DT
and
DN
9 October 1888; burial register, City of London Cemetery, GL, MS. 10445/33.

8
DN
12 October 1888.

9
Report of Inspector McWilliam, 27 October 1888, HO
144/221/A49301C/8b;
The Police Gazette
, 5 October 1888;
T
and
DT
2 October 1888;
DT
and
DN
5 October 1888.

10
Harris, 30 September 1888, to Matthews, and Home Office minutes thereon, HO 144/221/A49301C/3; Lusk, 7 October 1888, to Matthews, and Home Office draft to Lusk, 12 October, HO 144/220/A49301B/7.

11
This was the estimate mooted by the press (
DN
2 October) and thereafter bandied about in Home Office correspondence. It is probably too small. How much a successful informer might have actually realized is impossible to say. A total of £1,475, however, had been offered by 2 October: Samuel Montagu (£100);
Illustrated Police News
(£100); foreman of the jury at Nichols inquest (£25); City Corporation (£500);
Financial News
(£300); Colonel Kirby (£100); Henry White, a Middlesex JP, in a letter to the
Times
, 2 October (£50); subscriptions to the Mile End Vigilance Committee reward fund, according to
DT
1 October (£300).

12
For the Mile End Committee,
DT
4 and 5 October 1888; for the Working Mens’ Committee,
DN
4, 8 and 9 October 1888, and Cullen,
Autumn of Terror
, pp. 135–6.

13
Dew,
I Caught Crippen
, pp. 124–5;
DN
8 October 1888.

14
DT
1 and 2 October 1888;
Star
1 October 1888;
ELA
6 October 1888;
PMG
10 October 1888.

15
Warren, 3 October 1888, to Chairman of Whitechapel Board of Works,
T
,
DT
and
DN
4 October.

16
Wensley,
Detective Days
(London, 1931), p. 4. Interestingly, Warren ordered trials of several varieties of boots with ‘india-rubber, waterproof or silent soles’ but constables complained that they were tiring to wear and made their feet sore (Memo on noiseless boots sent to Mr Bulling of the Central News, 6 October 1888, PRO, MEPO 1/55, ff. 321–3).

17
DT
and
DN
10 and 17 October 1888;
T
31 October 1888.

18
Star
1 October 1888;
DT
2 October 1888.

19
Police notice, 30 September 1888, MEPO 3/141, f. 184.

20
Warren, 3 October 1888, to Chairman of Whitechapel Board of Works,
T
4 October; report of Chief Inspector Swanson, 19 October 1888, on Stride murder, HO 144/221/A49301C/8a;
Star
4 October 1888.

21
Ellis, 3 October 1888, to Matthews; Warren, 4 October 1888, to Ruggles-Brise; Matthews, 5 October 1888, to Warren; all in HO 144/221/A49301C/8.

22
The officers engaged in the search recorded their findings in small notebooks, none of which, sadly, have survived. My account rests on: official notice of Warren, 17 October 1888,
DT
18 October; report of Chief Inspector Swanson, 19 October 1888, and minute of Dr Anderson, 23 October 1888, HO 144/221/A49301C/8a;
DN
13 and 19 October 1888;
Star
17 October 1888;
DT
19 October 1888.

23
T
1 and 2 October 1888; HO 144/221/A49301E/1. Edwin Brough (
T
8 October 1888) said that the dog used in the 1876 case was ‘a mongrel with little or no trace of bloodhound about it.’

24
Macnaghten,
Days of My Years
, pp. 202–3; Dew,
I Caught Crippen
, pp. 145–6; H. M. Mackusick, in
DT
19 October 1888; Edwin Brough, 5 October 1888, in
T
8 October.

25
Warren, undated, to Lindley, PRO, MEPO 1/48; Warren, 5 October 1888, to Under Sec. of State, and minute of Henry Matthews, 7 October 1888, HO 144/221/A49301E/2.

26
DN
10 October 1888.

27
T
19 October 1888; statement of Mr Taunton,
T
13 November 1888.

28
Taunton’s statement,
T
13 November 1888.

29
Warren, 23 October 1888, to Under Sec. of State, HO 144/221/A49301E/3.

30
DT
10 November 1888; for a Radical lampoon, see Howells & Skinner,
The Ripper Legacy
, p. 86; for the view that the dogs constituted a deterrent to the murderer see H. M. Mackusick in
DT
19 October 1888 and Watkin W. Williams, Sir Charles Warren’s grandson, in a letter to Tom Cullen,
Autumn of Terror
, p. 160.

31
The whole question was reviewed in two Home Office memorandums of 6 and 19 October 1888, HO 144/220/A49301B/19.

32
Matthews, 5 October 1888, to Ruggles-Brise, Bodleian Library, MS. Eng. hist. c. 723, ff. 132–7; Warren, 6 October 1888, to Matthews, and Matthews, 7 October, to Warren, HO 144/220/A49301B/9; Lushington, 17 October 1888, to Warren, HO 151/4, ff. 251–4; Warren, 17 October 1888, to Matthews, HO 144/220/A49301B/12.

33
Warren, 6 October 1888, to Matthews, HO 144/220/A49301B/9; Warren, 9 October 1888, to Under Sec. State, and Lushington, 10 October, to Matthews, HO 144/220/A49301B/8; Warren, 17 October 1888, to Matthews, HO 144/220/A49301B/12; Warren, same date, to Murdoch, PRO, MEPO 1/48.

34
PMG
8 October 1888; Anderson,
Lighter Side of My Official Life
, p. 136; draft letter of Warren, 25 October 1888, to Lushington, MEPO 3/141, ff. 158–9.

35
Swanson’s report, 19 October 1888, HO 144/221/A49301C/8a.

36
Dew,
I Caught Crippen
, p. 112; for Abberline, ‘On Duty in Plain Clothes’,
Cassell’s Saturday Journal
, Vol. X, No. 452, 28 May 1892, p. 852, and
PMG
24 March 1903.

37
Report of Inspector McWilliam, 27 October 1888, HO 144/221/A49301C/8b; Rumbelow,
Complete Jack the Ripper
(1987), p. 227.

38
Minute of Sir Charles Warren, 13 October 1888, HO 144/221/A49301D/1; Anderson’s minute, 23 October 1888, and Warren, 24 October, to Under Sec. State, HO 144/221/A49301C/8a.

39
For Texas murders,
DN
2 October 1888;
DT
6 October 1888;
Star
12 October 1888.

40
Statements of Albert Backert, 30 September and 1 October 1888,
DN
1 and 2 October.

41
DN
10 and 17 October 1888;
DT
10 October 1888;
ELA
20 October 1888.

42
Statements of James Risdon Bennett and L. Forbes Winslow, 1 October 1888,
Evening News
1 October; Edgar Sheppard, 1 October, to
T
, in
T
2 October 1888; statements of Dr Blackwell, 30 September 1888, in
DN
1 October, and Dr Brown,
Evening News
1 October 1888.

43
DT
31 October 1888.

44
Dew,
I Caught Crippen
, pp. 86, 95–6, 150.

1
Thames Magistrates’ Court register, GLRO, PS/TH/A1/11.

2
For Barnett’s accounts of Mary’s past and his life with her, see his statement to the police, 9 November 1888, copy filed with CPM; his inquest deposition, 12 November 1888, CPM; and his press statements in
DN
and
Star
10 November and
DT
12 November 1888.

All attempts to verify Barnett’s statements have been unsuccessful or unconvincing. For gallant attempts see Begg,
Jack the Ripper
, pp. 211–2; Mark Madden, ‘The Tragedy of Mary Kelly’,
Ripperana
, No. 6, October 1993, pp. 26–8. Barnett himself has been the subject of more productive research. A tall, fair-complexioned fish porter, he was thirty at the time of the murders and died of bronchitis at 106 Red Lion Street in 1926. See, Bruce Paley, ‘A New Theory on the Jack the Ripper Murders,’
True Crime Monthly
, April 1982, pp. 3–13; Mark Madden, ‘Jack the Ripper?’,
Ripperana
, No. 6, October 1993, pp. 2–6.

3
Star
12 November 1888. Mrs Carthy was probably Mrs Mary McCarthy of 1 Breezer’s Hill. She is not known to have been related to John McCarthy of Dorset Street.

4
Statement of ‘another girl’ who knew Kelly, 9 November 1888,
DN
10 November 1888.

5
Statements of Elizabeth Phoenix, 11 November 1888,
Star
12 November; Elizabeth Prater, 9 November 1888,
DN
and
Star
10 November; Caroline Maxwell, 9 November 1888,
DN
10 November.

6
Statement of Julia Venturney, 9 November 1888, to police, copy filed with CPM.

7
The identity of the prostitute cannot be established. Barnett (
DT
12 November 1888) calls her ‘Julia’ which suggests that she might have been Julia Venturney. However, by 8 November Venturney was definitely living at 1 Miller’s Court and neither in her statement to the police nor in
her inquest testimony did she give any hint of a former residence with Mary Kelly.

8
Barnett’s inquest testimony reads: ‘I identify her [Mary’s body] by the ear and the eyes.’ Both ears, however, had been partially severed by the murderer and I suspect Barnett was misheard and really testified that he had identified the body by the hair and eyes.

9
Statement of Mrs Prater, 9 November 1888,
DN
10 November.

10
My reconstruction of the finding of Mary’s body rests principally upon the statements of Thomas Bowyer and John McCarthy, 9 November 1888, to police, copies filed with CPM; depositions of Thomas Bowyer and John McCarthy, 12 November 1888, CPM, ff. 1–3; press statements of John McCarthy, 9 November 1888,
T
and
DN
10 November.

Bowyer speaks of the ‘blinds’ or ‘curtain’ at the broken window of No. 13. A report in
DT
12 November 1888, and Inspector Dew in his reminiscences, both aver that the ‘curtain’ was merely an old coat hung across the inside of the window to exclude the draught. It may have been the man’s black overcoat Maria Harvey left at No. 13 the previous evening.

11
Dew’s memories of the Kelly murder will be found in
I Caught Crippen
, pp. 86, 143–55.
DT
10 November 1888 calls Bowyer ‘a pensioned soldier’. He certainly does not look like a ‘youth’ in the sketches of him in
The Penny Illustrated Paper
17 November 1888 and on the front cover of
The Illustrated Police News
24 November 1888.

12
Depositions of Dr Phillips and Inspector Abberline, 12 November 1888, CPM, ff. 9, 11.

13
Deposition of Dr Phillips, 12 November 1888, CPM, f. 9.

14
Anderson, 25 October 1888, to Bond, extract enclosed with Anderson, 13 November 1888, to Under Sec. State, HO 144/221/A49301C/21.

15
This was one of a series of unsolved murders, contemporaneous with the Ripper crimes, in which dismembered female remains were deposited in and around the River Thames. See, Elliott O’Donnell,
Great Thames Mysteries
(London, 1930), pp. 111–36.

16
Dr Thomas Bond, ‘Notes of examination of body of woman found murdered & mutilated in Dorset Street,’ MEPO 3/3153, ff. 12–14. Although stamped 16 November 1888 by the Metropolitan Police authorities the document itself is not dated. It is, however, almost certainly the special ‘annexed report’ on Mary’s injuries referred to in Bond’s general report to Anderson of 10 November (MEPO 3/140, ff. 220–3; HO 144/221/A49301C/21). The annexed document was detached from the general report at some early date and has, until now, been presumed lost. Hitherto our understanding of the appearances in Miller’s Court has primarily rested upon erroneous press reports, especially
T
and
DN
10 November 1888, and
Illustrated Police News
17 November 1888. Neither these nor Bond’s report substantiate the remarks allegedly made by Chief Inspector Henry Moore to the American journalist R. Harding Davis in August 1889: ‘He cut the skeleton so clean of flesh that when I got here I could hardly tell whether it was a man or a woman. He hung the different parts of the body on nails and over the backs of chairs. It must have taken him an hour and a half in all.’ (
PMG
4 November 1889)

17
Star
10 November 1888.

18
T
10 November 1888. McCarthy’s account of the disposition of the various parts of Mary’s body was, understandably in the circumstances, inaccurate.

19
DN
10 November 1888.

20
T
10 November 1888.

21
Warren, 9 November 1888, to Lushington, and ‘Telephone message from Police’, 9 November 1888, HO 144/221/A49301F/1; E. S. Johnson, 9 November 1888, to Mr Wortley, HO 144/221/A49301C/8.

22
T
12 November 1888; deposition of Inspector Abberline, 12 November 1888,
T
and
DT
13 November.

23
Compare, for example, the reports in
T
and
DT
12 and 13 November 1888.

24
Bond, ‘Notes of examination of body of woman found murdered & mutilated in Dorset Street’, MEPO 3/3153, ff. 15–18.

25
Bond, 10 November 1888, to Anderson, HO 144/221/A49301C/21 and MEPO 3/140 ff. 220–3.

26
Matthews, 10 November 1888, to Lushington, HO 144/220/A49301B/15; Lushington, 10 November 1888, to Warren, enclosing draft bill, MEPO 3/3153, ff. 5–8;
T
12 November 1888.

27
Hansard’s Parliamentary Debates
, Third Series, Vol. CCCXXX, pp. 902–4; Vol. CCCXXXI, pp. 15–6.

28
Quoted by Cullen,
Autumn of Terror
, p. 186.

29
Star
and
T
10 November 1888.