|
 |
 |
|
|
|
| Author |
Message |
    
Neil K. MacMillan
Detective Sergeant
Username: Wordsmith
Post Number: 124
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, February 10, 2005 - 4:37 pm: | 
|
While reading Skinner and Evans again I began to wonder if there is a set of characteristics with the victims of Jack the ripper. What made him (Them) pick these women? Here is what I have so far.
-All of them were prostitutes even if only intermitantly.
- All except Mary Jane Kelly wre in their late thirties to late forties.
-All were given to drink.
-All of them seem to be short by todays standard approximately five feet to five feet three inches.
-All of them had dark hair with the possible exception of Mary Jane Kelly.
-All of them were English born except Elizabeth Stride.
-All of them had similar wound patterns except Stride posibly because the killer was interrupted.
-All were married at one point or still legally married.
-All of them were poor.
That's all I have right now but I will say I believe that if there is more it well could provide a clue as to the number of victims and a start to fetermining at least how Jack may have operated. I'd like to hear what everyone thinks.
Kindest regards, Neil |
Maria Giordano
Inspector
Username: Mariag
Post Number: 319
Registered: 4-2004
| | Posted on Thursday, February 10, 2005 - 5:26 pm: |
|
All of them were in the habit of going to dark, out of the way places with strange men.
Mags
|
Dan Norder
Chief Inspector
Username: Dannorder
Post Number: 520
Registered: 4-2004
| | Posted on Friday, February 11, 2005 - 2:18 pm: |
|
I'll go with what Mags said and add: All of them were in the East End of London in 1888.
(With the understanding of course that we are only referring to the canonical five, as specifics could change if there were other Ripper victims beyond the commonly accepted ones.)
Dan Norder, Editor
Ripper Notes: The International Journal for Ripper Studies
 Profile  Email  Dissertations  Website
|
Donald Souden
Inspector
Username: Supe
Post Number: 437
Registered: 10-2003
| | Posted on Friday, February 11, 2005 - 4:26 pm: |
|
Neil,
Mags and Dan are right and their points (prostitutes and in the East End) is all one needs to understand most of your remaining points of similarity.
Prostitutes (male as well as female) are often the prey of choice for serial killers for a number of reasons. They are people at the margins of society and often of no fixed abode. They are generally alcohol or drug dependent, which makes them always desperate for money and further befuddles their wits. And, their profession not usually being a spectator sport, they are willing to be led to secluded places to ply their trade.
Both the canonical victims and the possibles were all East End prostitutes in 1888 and that meant they would generally fit into all the other pigeonholes you delineated. That is, most Whitechapel prostitutes were 30-50, alcoholics, the products of failed marriages and poor (else they wouldn't have been there).
As for size and hair color, they all nestled comfortably within the respective bell curves at that time. For a variety of reasons, women and men (consider how many witness descriptions had the men only a few inches taller than the women) were much shorter than 21st C norms. And, without easy recourse to modern color rinses, most of the women would be brunettes.
The long and short of it is, they would go into dark, out of the way places with strange men and they lived in the East End of London in 1888.
Don.
"He was so bad at foreign languages he needed subtitles to watch Marcel Marceau."
|
Howard Brown
Inspector
Username: Howard
Post Number: 239
Registered: 7-2004
| | Posted on Friday, February 11, 2005 - 4:29 pm: |
|
---all had had divorces or dissolved marriages and/or relationships [ Chapman and Nichols by divorce..Stride and Eddowes at least separated,if not legally divorced...Kelly,break up with Barnett. Tabram,like Annie and Polly,went through a divorce.. ]
---
How |
Neil K. MacMillan
Detective Sergeant
Username: Wordsmith
Post Number: 125
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Friday, February 11, 2005 - 4:45 pm: |
|
You all make very salient points. What I'm trying to figure out is did Jack kill them strictly because they were Whitechapel soiled doves or is there a commonality that is being missed. Obvoiusly had they been working in a bordello, the madam or pimp would have offered some amount of protection. Hopefully I'm not confusing people (including myself)Thanks for the rapid responses by the way. Have a splendid weekend. Neil} |
Diana
Chief Inspector
Username: Diana
Post Number: 516
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Friday, February 11, 2005 - 6:56 pm: |
|
I have wondered why MJK was so different than the rest. She had been allowing another prostitute to share the room with her that week, Julia Venturney. If Jack had seen Venturney going in and out of #13 earlier in the week, he might not realize, when he attacked the shadow on the bed, that it was not her. I would dearly love to know how old Venturney was and what she looked like. |
David O'Flaherty
Chief Inspector
Username: Oberlin
Post Number: 729
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Friday, February 11, 2005 - 7:23 pm: |
|
Hi Diana,
I'm sorry I don't know the answer to your question about Julia Venturney, but the Daily News 13 Nov 1888 provides a characterization of Mary Ann Kelly's other guest, Maria Harvey:
In Maria Harvey, the woman who had been compassionately taken in by Kelly, the Court had its one amusing witness. She was the Mrs. Gamp of the day, and when she and the Coroner got at loggerheads over the question as to whether certain articles of apparel were two shirts belonging to one man or one man’s two shirts, there was general laughter at Mrs. Harvey’s decisive dogmatism of manner.
If you haven't read Dickens' Martin Chuzzlewitt, this site has a description of Mrs. Gamp. Assuming the reporter's not exaggerating, I can see why Joe said "enough already!"  If anyone has seen a fuller account of this comical dialogue between Roderick Macdonald and Maria Harvey, I'd be obliged to hear from you either here or at oflaherty@casebook.org
Cheers,
Dave
(Message edited by oberlin on February 11, 2005) |
Diana
Chief Inspector
Username: Diana
Post Number: 518
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Friday, February 11, 2005 - 7:33 pm: |
|
I may be mistaken. The "Companion" says that it was Harvey who spent the early part of the week with Mary. |
Leanne Perry
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Leanne
Post Number: 1654
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Friday, February 11, 2005 - 9:25 pm: |
|
G'day,
Mary Kelly took in Julia Venturney on or around the 27th of October ('Lloyds Newspaper' 11 November), then as soon as she left Mary immediately took in Maria Harvey on the 30th of October.
Joseph Barnett and Mary engaged in a violent row that night. Joe left saying that he'd return when Mrs Harvey had gone.
LEANNE |
Howard Brown
Inspector
Username: Howard
Post Number: 240
Registered: 7-2004
| | Posted on Saturday, February 12, 2005 - 12:18 am: |
|
Neil:
You may want to ask another Neal,that being Neal Stubbings [a.k.a. Shelden ] for some other ideas in addition to what anyone else can provide... |
mal x
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Friday, February 11, 2005 - 3:33 pm: |
|
hi
yes, that is if we accept the cononical five; my guess is that the Ripper killed most, if not all of the others too...all these victims were brief encounters, met whilst outside on the street, this is quite important..kelly is also a brief encounter too
because the torso murders probably weren't brief encounters, but long relationships that others knew about, hence the Ripper hid their identities by removing their limbs/heads...
but why remove organs from some and not others, and why were some murders street knifings only?...dont know..most odd, maybe the Ripper was highly temperamental/unstable and some victims triggered his emotions whilst others didn't.
the murders dont just reveal a sick mind (kelly) but also a temperamental personality..why stab a victim 23 or so times, they also reveal age, the Ripper was young and highly active.
i'm guessing Carrie Brown was also a ripper victim
|
Joan O'Liari
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Friday, February 11, 2005 - 7:36 pm: |
|
Hi everyone;
A few links between Elizabeth Stride and Catherine Eddowes: Both were known to do cleaning among the Jews, and both had thimbles in their possession. Both were new to the streets according to their most recent man, or did the men know how the women were making their money and turned a blind eye because they needed the money too?
IF Jack was local to the area, or very familiar with the street women, then he might notice someone "new", even Mary was supposed to have been only on the street recently due to her breakup with Barnett.
Joan
|
Diana
Chief Inspector
Username: Diana
Post Number: 520
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, February 12, 2005 - 6:24 pm: |
|
Good thinking, Joan. I hadn't thought of that one. |
mal x
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Saturday, February 12, 2005 - 11:56 am: |
|
other common characteristics....
1 women living in his immediate locality
2 all women killed in a close time scale (roughly, that is if you also include all the others too; about 4 years)
the canonical 5 are the peak, with these other lesser murders grouped either side of this `autumn of terror`.......why? no idea..only theories
|
Diana
Chief Inspector
Username: Diana
Post Number: 615
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, May 19, 2005 - 7:53 pm: |
|
Polly
Was 43 when killed.
Married William Nichols at 19.
Had five children in fifteen years.
Husband runs off with midwife when she is 32 and then returns.
She takes to drink.
She leaves home several times and comes back.
Deserted by husband at age 35 because of her drinking.
Husband gets custody of four of the children and Dad gets the other one.
Paid 5 shillings a week until husband finds out she is living by prostitution.
Sues husband for support but loses.
Hits bottom -- workhouses, infirmaries, doss houses.
Spring of her 43rd year -- job as a domestic
July of her 43rd year -- runs away having stolen from employer
I think Polly was a person to whom life happened. She did not make things happen. They happened to her. The only time we see her taking any initiative is when she sues her husband. Of course this was partly because she lived in the Victorian age. The turning point in her life was when William cheated on her. She turned to the bottle for solace and from there it was all downhill. I do not see her as a very assertive person and probably not very intimidating.
Because I do not like to read gargantuan posts, I will split this up, despite the awkwardness of five posts in a row from one person. |
Diana
Chief Inspector
Username: Diana
Post Number: 616
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, May 19, 2005 - 8:07 pm: |
|
Annie
Died at age 47.
Married at 28
Disabled son and 2 daughters (a disabled child can put a lot of stress on a marriage -- I used to be a special education teacher)
One daughter dies when Annie is 41 years old. (This also stresses a marriage)
Having taken to alcohol, Annie deserts her family at about age 41.
It is thought her husband was drinking too.
Annie loses her allowance from her husband at age 45 when he dies.
Turns to prostitution when she can't make a living as a hawker.
At some point her health declines.
Fights with another prostitute over a bar of soap.
Annie and Polly are a lot alike. Annie's turning point came with the disability of her son coupled with the death of her daughter. She also was a person to whom life happened. The only time she seemed to try to take control was when she unsuccessfully attempted a career as a hawker. She also showed some assertion when she got into the soap brawl. She probably was also unpreposessing.
|
Diana
Chief Inspector
Username: Diana
Post Number: 617
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, May 19, 2005 - 8:25 pm: |
|
Elizabeth
Died at age 45.
At age 17 begins work as a domestic in Sweden.
By 22 is into prostitution.
At 22 Elizabeth runs away to London with a sailor.
Lives with him for awhile till he learns she is seeing other men and then he throws her out.
Marries John Stride at age 26 temporarily ending her life of prostitution.
No record of any children.
Husband dies when she is 41.
Lives with Michael Kidney till she is 44 or 45.
Relationship with Kidney is not stable and she is in and out of lodging houses.
Known as an intelligent woman.
Earns money doing char work and donations from the Swedish Church.
Liz was more in control of her own life than her predecessors, and probably more assertive. While it is not an act I approve of, I feel it takes a certain amount of assertiveness to run away to a foriegn country at such a tender age. Liz had a spirit of adventure lacking in the others. She also managed to keep her marriage intact until her husband's death. She did not completely fall into prostitution after his death, turning to Kidney, charring, and the Swedish Church. I believe Liz would have been a bit more intimidating and assertive than either Polly or Annie and by all accounts she was unusually intelligent. |
Diana
Chief Inspector
Username: Diana
Post Number: 618
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, May 19, 2005 - 8:40 pm: |
|
Catharine
Died at 46.
Mother dies when Cathy is 13.
Sometime before age 21 she runs off with Conway.
She has three children with Conway.
Separates from Conway at age 38 taking one daughter with her.
It is suspected that the relationship ended because of her drinking, his violence or both.
By age 39 she has taken up with John Kelly with whom she went hop picking in Kent.
Catharine's turning point was the death of her mother. She lived a self destructive life after that. I think she was more like Annie and Polly than Liz. She was controlled by her addiction in almost every major life event. She didn't choose what happened to her. Events chose her. She did have a great sense of humor as seen in the fire engine incident and had managed to stay out of full time prostitution. I don't think she had hit bottom as much as the first two and as a result might not have seemed so easy pickings as they did. |
Diana
Chief Inspector
Username: Diana
Post Number: 619
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, May 19, 2005 - 8:55 pm: |
|
Mary
None of her biographical material can be confirmed.
Believed to have died at age 25.
Believed to have married John Davies at age 16.
Believed to have lost her husband to an explosion at age 18.
Believed to have turned to prostitution after this, having moved to London at age 21 and entered a West End brothel.
Says she visited France.
Lived with Morganstone and Fleming.
Met and lived with Barnett.
Left by Barnett on October 30.
Everything that is said about Mary is hypothetical because we can't confirm her life history. However the death of her husband in the explosion would have been her turning point. She progressed downward after this, controlled by events but not controlling them. However she was said not to be one to take any nonsense from people, so there was a certain level of assertiveness there. Certainly moreso than the other four
Facts gleaned mostly from Mammoth Book of Jack the Ripper by Maxim Jakubowski and Nathan Braund, Carroll and Graf Publishers, Inc., New York, 1999 |
Diana
Chief Inspector
Username: Diana
Post Number: 620
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, May 19, 2005 - 8:58 pm: |
|
Conclusion
Jack grew in confidence as he went along. Each success primed him to take on a more challenging victim the next time. At the beginning he would not have had the nerve to tackle Kelly. |
Diana
Chief Inspector
Username: Diana
Post Number: 622
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, May 19, 2005 - 10:15 pm: |
|
I believe he was basicly a person who had low self esteem. I believe he had been mistreated by a significant female in his life and had learned to hate all women, while fearing them at the same time. If he was brimming with confidence he would have chosen different victims.
In some perverted way, the killings and mutilations made him feel better, less powerless. With each one he grew in confidence and that was why he could finally face someone like Kelly.
It is possible that after MJK, his hatred burned itself out. What meant devastation and death for five other human beings might have been therapeutic for him. (No endorsement implied!) |
Howard Brown
Inspector
Username: Howard
Post Number: 401
Registered: 7-2004
| | Posted on Thursday, May 19, 2005 - 10:26 pm: |
|
Nice list,Diana.
Its also as likely that he had a sense of the ubermensch within him. A killer, such as JTR in his work,as well as others in subsequent murders, could have felt a sense of superiority that entitled them to wreak carnage as JTR definitely did.... Was it a mask for a real sense of inferiority...or some proto-Loeb/Leopold type? Someone who employed the contemporary Social Darwinism of the times to its extreme as sarcastically,yet prophetically described by George Bernard Shaw?
In any event,your list is NOT to be overlooked.
How
(Message edited by howard on May 19, 2005) |
Phil Hill
Chief Inspector
Username: Phil
Post Number: 565
Registered: 1-2005
| | Posted on Friday, May 20, 2005 - 6:35 am: |
|
So much of this depends on perceptions - perceptions of what constitutes a link; perception of what the murderer's motivation might have been; perceptions of who might be included in the "canonical" list.
Look at some of the pictures of Whitechapel/Spitalfields that include people and look closely at the women - they are old before their time, thinish. Hats were usually worn (Nichols had a new one) and at night, hair-colour might have been difficult to determine.
We don't know for sure that Stride or Kelly were Ripper victims (both have been ascribed to other hands) so we have only Nichols, Chapman and Eddowes really to focus on. Indeed, Kelly and Stride are among the exceptions to the links ascribed above - so does this make it less likely they were Jack's handiwork? I think it would be dangerous to draw such a conclusion on such a subjective basis.
Whay happens if Tabram, Coles and Mckenzie are included in the sample?
In my view what is important here is that Jack never seems to have left a very small area, and one in which all these women lived and "worked". If Stride were eliminated as a Ripper victim, he never even struck south of Whitechapel Road!!
These were woman on the streets at the hours he was abroad, women befuddled and tired and desperate. They were easy prey.
If we could prove, as Knight and others have sought to do, that they all knew each other. Or, as "Uncle Jack" purports, they all used the same doctor, we might have useful links.
But haircolour? Build? Age? In the absence of a starting point they tell us, IMHO, nothing.
Phil |
Glenn G. Lauritz Andersson
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Glenna
Post Number: 3447
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Friday, May 20, 2005 - 7:07 am: |
|
Diana,
Thanks indeed. Some nice compilations there, which I believe makes it easier for the overall view.
Phil,
I totally agree.
As I see it, searching for common characteristics among the victims -- as a way of getting closer to the Ripper and his motives -- is somewhat useless, since they share their backgrounds, fates and histories with the large majority of poor street prostitutes in general at the time. So trying to establish a link between them without proper evidence really leaves us with no clues whatsoever as far as the case is concerned.
In my own studies of the lives of 150 prostitutes in Scandinavia at the time, I came across personal information that to almost every penny fits those of the East End murder victims, looking at the same age group.
Nearly all of them had been married, nearly all of them had been tossed over by their husbands because of drinking (or they had become widows) and were alcoholics. Etc. etc.
So in short, except for people like Mary Kelly (who, if what she told Barnett about herself is not bunch of fairy-tales, seems to have led an exceptional life), the Ripper victims shared most of these characteristics with prostitutes in general, more or less (if we exclude younger age groups).
In my view, it only tells us that Jack the Ripper went out for easy targets and women of the same (or what he interpreted as women of the same) "profession".
And of course, as Phil says, trying to establish patterns when we are not even sure of which one we can attribute to the Ripper in the first place, is dangerous.
All the best
(Message edited by Glenna on May 20, 2005)
G. Andersson, author/crime historian
Sweden
The Swedes are the men That Will not be Blamed for Nothing
|
Jim
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Thursday, May 19, 2005 - 10:00 pm: |
|
Diana
I think your conclusions from the facts are correct. Each of the victims may have been increasingly more assertive than the previous victim. But this implies that JtR took time to observe his victims beforehand or knew them.
Also, how much different were they then the rest of the prostitutes in Whitechapel or anywhere for that matter? Was each of them just a victim of opportunity? Where they just in the wrong place at the right time or chosen for a special characteristic?
I'm not sure a chance encounter on the street would have given him a good enough look into their personalities to determine their level of assertiveness. Unless he spent the nights between victims searching for the next. Waiting and watching, maybe talking to other women until he found the right profile, coming back later to do the deed.
I believe they had something physical about them, a certain laugh, or mannerism or whatever that peaked his interest first. |
Phil Hill
Chief Inspector
Username: Phil
Post Number: 572
Registered: 1-2005
| | Posted on Friday, May 20, 2005 - 11:43 am: |
|
And what does increasingly assertive mean? If the women were drunk or ill, their personality and instincts might be dulled. Annie Chapman was supposed to have been "low" spirited on the day preceeding her death. Nichols gives the impression of a rather timid sparrow and was well in her cups.
I am doubtful indeed of such a subjective approach, which in my view will tend to give you the outcome you want, NOT an objective insight, which is what is needed.
Phil |
Maria Giordano
Inspector
Username: Mariag
Post Number: 395
Registered: 4-2004
| | Posted on Friday, May 20, 2005 - 12:00 pm: |
|
In this most frustrating case, where we have so very little data and even less data that we can trust it's so tempting to look for patterns.
After all, the human brain is hardwired to look for patterns and to seek images out of randomness (see the thread on Mary Kelly's ghost, for example).
Whether we call it Occam's Razor or KISS, we need to remember not to leap to conclusions because they are more satisfying. Any one of us could probably come up with a half dozen scenarios on the spot to explain the Whitechapel Murders.Most of them would be plausible and satisfying.
I'm a fatalist about this case--I don't think we'll ever find Jack or even agree on who was or wasn't a victim. The best I think we'll ever do is to try to understand what life for these people was REALLY like, our romantic or nostalgic imaginations aside, and to get at least close to figuring out the kind of person the killer was.
Why did Jack kill prostitutes? Because they were there. Because they were easy. Why does there have to be more?
Mags
|
Diana
Chief Inspector
Username: Diana
Post Number: 624
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, May 21, 2005 - 8:03 am: |
|
I thought victimology was a respected branch of criminology. As to having no evidence, I have based my assertions on what is known of the life history of each of these women. And as to judging the assertiveness of a person on short notice, I do it all the time. I have met people who speak rapidly and loudly and are not afraid to interrupt and stare you straight in the eye. I have also met people who speak slowly and softly and are afraid to make eye contact. I make judgments about these individuals in the first two minutes and usually I'm right. In fact women are told in rape prevention classes to walk rapidly and in a businesslike manner, to hold their heads up and look straight ahead.
Having said that, I think I have been occasionally wrong.  |
Glenn G. Lauritz Andersson
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Glenna
Post Number: 3449
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, May 21, 2005 - 9:04 am: |
|
Diana,
Victimology is a respected branch of criminology, AND an important approach in an investigation.
However, that is mostly used in order to map the victim's circuits of personal relations and whom they met last or was last seen with.
Trying compare a number of prostitutes with each other is more questionable and difficult, since their life situation is pretty much the same. The only thing we can deduce is that they were murdered because they were easy targets because they indulged in a profession that put them in a vulnerable situation plus the fact that they belong to the outcast of society.
Which is why they usually end up like victims.
However, in Stride's, Cole's and Kelly's case, I find traditional victimology and mapping of their personal relations extremely important to look into a bit extra, because of the nature of their relations with certain men in their lives and the circumstances around their murders.
Besides that, I'd say the common characteristics of women in the same situation as the Ripper victims -- drunkedness, widowers or left by their husbands (usually some sort of veneral disease history is also a common) -- are so many that it doesn't tell us much.
All the best
(Message edited by Glenna on May 21, 2005)
G. Andersson, author/crime historian
Sweden
The Swedes are the men That Will not be Blamed for Nothing
|
Diana
Chief Inspector
Username: Diana
Post Number: 625
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, May 21, 2005 - 4:50 pm: |
|
But I think there are subtle differences between these women as I have pointed out above. I have just been rereading Douglas' book and he says SKs tend to size up prospective victims for their vulnerability, and they do it as a snap judgment. I deduce from what is taught in rape prevention classes that they are less likely to prey on a woman who looks assertive and has a higher level of self esteem. He compares them to a predator sizing up a group of animals at a watering hole. Which ones look weak? Which ones would not be likely to put up a fight, etc. If he chooses the weakest of the weak he reveals that he cannot trust himself to tackle anyone stronger. If there is a gradual shift in the assertiveness of his victims then his confidence is growing. |
Gareth W
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Tuesday, May 31, 2005 - 11:08 am: |
|
Surprised nobody's picked up on one of Neil's assertions in his original posting:
"All of them were English born except Elizabeth Stride"
... neither was Mary Kelly, by all accounts. |
Sharon
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Saturday, August 27, 2005 - 4:32 pm: |
|
I'm a student doing research on Jack the Ripper and while looking through the Wikipedia archives,I noticed some curious similarities in the names of the victims. I don't know how to verify the info detailed here,could anyone please confirm this? At a glance we see that -
Mary Ann Nichols, (maiden name Mary Ann Walker, nicknamed "Polly")
Annie Chapman, (maiden name Eliza Ann Smith, nicknamed "Dark Annie")
Catherine Eddowes, (used the aliases "Kate Conway" and "Mary Ann Kelly," from the surnames of her two common-law husbands Thomas Conway and John Kelly)
Mary Jane Kelly, (called herself "Marie Jeanette Kelly" after a trip to Paris, nicknamed "Ginger")
I imagine Jack probably was looking for somebody he vaguely knew as Mary "something" ( probably Anne) Kelly that he had tracked down to that specific area of Whitechapel,who fit a certain description.As it has been mentioned before,all the women had marital problems, were casual prostitutes. He may have been prepared for a change in name and could have probably over estimated the age of the woman he was looking for.
Discounting Stride again,
two of the victims had the first name Mary Anne,
two of the victims had the last name Kelly,
three of the victims had the first name Mary at some point, and
three of the victims had the middle name Ann at some point in their lives.
Granted,these were probably common enough names in the Victorian era, but taken together with the pattern of attack, his choice of victims and the locations that he worked in, it begins to look like he was on a quest.
That would tie in with how his murders seemed to get more desperate as he progressed, and the similarity of age and occupation regarding the victims. Was Mary Jane Kelly the one that he was searching for?
}} |
Jennifer Pegg
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Jdpegg
Post Number: 2887
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Sunday, August 28, 2005 - 2:42 pm: |
|
Yes,
but Mary and Ann are very common names.
Jenni
"You know I'm not gonna diss you on the Internet
Cause my momma taught me better than that."
|
Gareth W
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Sunday, August 28, 2005 - 5:04 pm: |
|
Hello Sharon,
As Jenni has said, these were very popular names. In London alone, the 1881 Census reveals over 37,000 women named "Mary Ann(e) ____" and, in the same Census, the separate London district of Middlesex (which included Whitechapel) lists nearly 24,000 women with the same names.
Curiously "Mary Jane" was a much less popular combination in 1881, but still seems to have run into some 2,000 in London but only 243 in Middlesex. I wouldn't draw too many conclusions from this however, for the following reasons:
1. As is apparent in the cases of Nichols, Eddowes and Kelly alone it was also not uncommon then - as now - for prostitutes to use "stage names". This may have been either to mask their identity (a token gesture to protect their dignity perhaps, or to avoid subsequent arrest) or - as in the case of Kelly - to affect an "exotic" origin to make them more attractive to punters.
2. Before being hijacked by the marijuana-smoking street culture in which we now live, "Mary Jane" was a common euphemism for the female genitalia. That connection may have been sufficiently risque to discourage respectable Victorians from thus christening their daughters, amongst prostitutes it may even have been a usefully suggestive "nom de guerre".
All that aside, I honestly don't think Jack knew (or cared) about most of his victims' names until he'd heard the street gossip or read about the victims in the papers after the murders.
|
Catherine Ann
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Sunday, August 28, 2005 - 7:27 pm: |
|
I agree with this theory. This is a connection with the names. Perhaps somebody in his life had these names who gave him a hard time and he was hunting women who reminded him of her! |
Tia Padora
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Saturday, September 17, 2005 - 12:26 pm: |
|
Common characteristics?
The characteristic most common among the victims is that they were all prostitutes, whether they were full-time or part-time workers. Normally I would take stock in characteristics such has height, weight, hair color and eyes. But Jack the Ripper was all over the place in that regard and really cant see any other connection, at this point, other than the former and that being they were all prostitutes.
Diana made the mention that she could not understand why Mary Jane Kelly was so different from the rest. The only thing different between Mary Kelly and the rest of the victims was that she had a private room and they did not. This private room allowed Jack the Ripper to do everything he wished to do in one night. As I look back through all of the posts, I see the same thing over and over again. First with the mention that the victims were in the habit of going into dark out of the way places with strange men. Then you read that two had thimbles in their possession. That all the victims drank a lot. So on and so on. But what does any of this prove?
I will tell you, and I don’t mean any disrespect, but the posts that are being made here are right in line with the detectives of 1888 and that is “straw grasping”. The victims were all cut up so the detectives state that he had to have been a doctor. Only a lunatic would have committed a crime such as this so the detectives look for men that are crazy or spent time in a mental institution.
As honorable as the suggestions that have been made here are, I quite frankly do not believe that Jack the Ripper was ever known then nor will he ever be known in the future simply because the detectives then and we are now, going about this all wrong: With blinders on.
Trying to make a connection to the victims outside of the obvious and stereotyping the victims and Jack the Ripper, is pure torture in and of itself.
|
AP Wolf
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Apwolf
Post Number: 2534
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Sunday, September 18, 2005 - 2:29 am: |
|
How about that most of the victims wore some article of clothing carrying the stamp of the Lambeth Workhouse?
Now, that wasn't too much torture and stereotyping was it? |
Diana
Chief Inspector
Username: Diana
Post Number: 792
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Sunday, September 18, 2005 - 10:02 am: |
|
Wow! AP -- How do you find these things? Do you suppose he had some connection to the workhouse? |
Suzi Hanney
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Suzi
Post Number: 2963
Registered: 7-2003
| | Posted on Sunday, September 18, 2005 - 11:51 am: |
|
Hi AP
Now about these 'underneaths' from the Lambeth Workhouse!!! I reckon there were a lot of these floating about at the time!....shared... shall we say!!!!!! Mind you I think I'd have taken the labels out !....or is that modern thinking!!!!!
Suzi |
AP Wolf
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Apwolf
Post Number: 2536
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Sunday, September 18, 2005 - 1:40 pm: |
|
Not really, Diana, even though I do know a most singular chap who spent some days in the worthy institution.
I was just attempting to demonstrate that all connections in the crimes need not be spurious or even torture.
Many such available connections are there, Dorset Street and Flower & Dean Street being other classic examples; and recently I have also found useful connection in Back Church Lane.
Four murders of women in 1887 & 1888 are linked to this address.
We strive to exploit these connections in a positive and useful way. |
Julie
Detective Sergeant
Username: Judyj
Post Number: 144
Registered: 2-2005
| | Posted on Monday, September 19, 2005 - 4:13 pm: |
|
AP
I don't remember if I thanked you for the text you sent me, my apologies if not.
THANK YOU
Julie
|
AnneLawStudent
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Sunday, September 18, 2005 - 11:55 am: |
|
There does seem to be a connection in that the women couldn't hold down relationships. Which is by no means a result of East End life. He was probably looking for vulnerable women who'd give him enough of a chance for him to lead them down back alleys. They were also all mothers, except the last one, a fact that is often overlooked, though I do not see why it should be. He went for their innner organs. Perhaps his unleashed fury on Mary kelly was a result of his not finding in her a ' mother' to his extraordinary situation?
Stupidly put... ! But feasable maybe. |
Gareth W
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Sunday, September 18, 2005 - 10:40 am: |
|
Diana,
"Do you suppose he had some connection to the workhouse?"
I'd be very surprised to find many Whitechapel denizens of the victims' class in the LVP who hadn't had a connection to the Lambeth Workhouse at some time or other. Even if there had been a clear connection between killer, victims and Workhouse, my guess is that it would be a case of needles and haystacks to find it.
|
|
Use of these
message boards implies agreement and consent to our Terms of Use.
The views expressed here in no way reflect the views of the owners and
operators of Casebook: Jack the Ripper.
Our old message board content (45,000+ messages) is no longer available online, but a complete archive
is available on the Casebook At Home Edition, for 19.99 (US) plus shipping.
The "At Home" Edition works just like the real web site, but with absolutely no advertisements.
You can browse it anywhere - in the car, on the plane, on your front porch - without ever needing to hook up to
an internet connection. Click here to buy the Casebook At Home Edition.
|
|
|
|
