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Chris Scott
Inspector
Username: Chris
Post Number: 375
Registered: 4-2003
| | Posted on Sunday, August 10, 2003 - 8:23 am: |       |
Off on one of my flights of fancy when all sorts of irrelevant thoughts come to mind, I wondered last night if there was any chance there was someone still alive who was around at the time when Jack was at work.
I looked at the online Guinness Book of records and, amazingly, there is:
The oldest man (authenticated) living just misses out:
Yukichi Chuganji born March 23, 1889
but the oldest living woman, amazingly was born the year before the Whitechapel murders:
Kamato Hongo born September 16, 1887
She is presumably, the last living link with Jack's days - quite a sobering thought!
Chris |
Robert Charles Linford
Chief Inspector
Username: Robert
Post Number: 551
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Sunday, August 10, 2003 - 8:54 am: | |
Hi Chris
Yes it's a shame that more of the old folks weren't found and interviewed, before it was too late.
Robert |
Saddam
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Monday, August 11, 2003 - 1:26 am: | |
"...it's a shame that more of the old folks weren't found and interviewed, before it was too late."
This is precisely what Tom Cullen did for his book on the case, working in the 1950s-60s. He rounded up everyone living at the time of the murders in or near Whitechapel who was still alive and willing to speak, and let him speak his or her own piece. The result was a torrential downpour of exaggerations and outright lies that Cullen wisely set off in a separate section of the book, and made clear what he felt the truth value of it all was by cogent if not overt commentary. It was pretty sobering to see 80-90 year old senior citizens shamelessly jockeying for position in the "I knew Jack the Ripper" contest. What a way to end your life.
Saddam
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Deborah
Police Constable
Username: Elgyfu
Post Number: 4
Registered: 4-2004
| | Posted on Saturday, May 01, 2004 - 2:01 am: | |
That is always a problem when interviewing people about something after they have been exposed to theories and myth.
Recently there was a terrible double murder here in England, two little girls killed by their school caretaker.
Watching the news before the caretaker was known to be the murderer (but he was know to be the last person to see them alive) he was described by locals as 'decent', 'honest', 'dedicated' and 'a good man'.
After his guilt was discovered people in the area were telling the newspapers and TV that they had always thought he looked 'shifty' and that they knew he was 'up to no good'.
Hindsight has a big effect on the memory and with all that has been written about JTR, both factual and mythological, well, would anyone be an unbiased witness now anyway? |
Mark Andrew Pardoe
Inspector
Username: Picapica
Post Number: 234
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Sunday, May 02, 2004 - 3:40 pm: | |
Whatho Deborah,
You, of course, are right. People have remarkable changes in attitude when they look back.
It is interesting how only good people die. After someone's death we are told by everyone how marvellous the person was, a person with a great sense of humour, would do anything for anyone, the kindest person on earth and so on and so on.
Do the real tossers stay alive?
Cheers, Mark (a truly wonderful person who loved all humanity including Monty) |
Adam Went
Police Constable
Username: Adamw
Post Number: 8
Registered: 12-2004
| | Posted on Sunday, December 12, 2004 - 3:19 am: | |
What I don't understand about all of that is why people from that era would even want to lie about their personal experiences. What purpose would it have? It's ultimately only going to bring the Ripperology world further away from just possibly finding out who the killer really was. They're not going to get famous for it, and for anyone who knows what they're talking about, they're only going to get ridiculed for it later on.
Then, of course, there are those that know some good info but don't want to speak up. Example: Being also interested in the Titanic, it saddens me that there are only 3 living survivors from the ship now, out of 705 who survived the sinking. And out of the 3 still alive, only 1, the youngest, Millvina Dean, speaks often in public about it. And she was only 2 months old when she was on the ship! The other 2 want to distance themselves from it as much as possible!
So that is a real shame too. But, back to the Ripper case, I think we're all going to advance much further if we just focus on what witnesses said in 1888, not 70 or 80 years later. Memories fade, opinions change, etc.
Just my thoughts on that.
Cheers,
Adam. |
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