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Thames Torso Murders
Casebook Message Boards: General Discussion: Miscellaneous:
Thames Torso Murders
Author: David Powell
Sunday, 20 October 2002 - 01:33 pm |        | I know there has been a lot on the message boards on this subject over the past two years but R Michael Gordon's book Alias Jack the Ripper, does raise some new interesting ideas which might be worth kicking around a bit. My response to his suggestion that Severin Koslowski (alias George Chapman) was responsible for the four Thames Torso murders (in addition to being JTR)is as follows.
‘Alias Jack the Ripper’ is a stimulating survey of a whole series of murders which helpfully widens the perspective from the ‘canonical five’. R Michael Gordon makes some striking points to link Chapman/Klosowski with the Whitechapel murders. As a newcomer I do not feel qualified to comment on this aspect of the argument. But as for a link between Chapman and the four Thames Torso murders, there are some questions.
First, I agree with R Michael that the Torso murders must be considered as a series. Although disposal of bodies in the Thames was far from unusual, torso murders certainly were. In the UK newspapers of the time I can find only two other ‘torso’ deaths recorded over the previous decade. The autopsy notes on the four state that: ‘The mode of dismemberment and mutilation was in all [cases] similar, and showed very considerable skill in execution, and it is a fair presumption from the facts that, that the same man committed all four murders.’
But, second, I think he underplays the difference in methodology between ‘Torso’ and ‘Ripper’ victims. Although he quotes in the body of his book extracts from Chief Commissioner Munro’s memorandum (September 16 1889) on the Pinchin Street murder as evidence that ‘Scotland Yard could not then or now rule out the Ripper in this case’, the full report (helpfully included at Appendix 4 of Alias JTR) gives a different flavour. Munro explicitly came to the conclusion that the perpetrators were not the same. ‘There is no sign of the frenzied mutilation of the body but of deliberate & skilful dismemberment with a view to removal’. The memo listed five differences:
· Nothing to show that death was caused by cutting the throat;
· No mutilation (though there was dismemberment);
· No evisceration;
· No removal of the organs of generation; and
· Murder committed neither in the street nor in the victims home: probably therefore the lodging of the murderer.
Actually, the first of these points is almost certainly wrong. The Pinchin Street torso had as the cause of death ‘syncope’ (i.e. severe haemorrhaging), pointing at least circumstantially to the throat having been cut (but impossible to determine given the absence of the heads). The other three torsos also showed similar general bloodlessness of the tissues. Nonetheless, there is on the face of it a big difference between a killer who strikes in the open street, targeting the sexual organs and another who hides his victims body but doesn’t seem to indulge in sexual mutilation:
· Rainham. Various internal organs (lungs, heart and other thoracic viscera; most of the intestines) were never found but the uterus (interestingly, ‘that of a virgin’) remained.
· Whitehall. The lower part of the torso (and associated organs) were never found but the breasts, at least, were unmarked.
· Battersea (Elizabeth Jackson). The sexual organs were unmarked but the foetus (about seven months) had been removed after death.
· Pinchin Street. Legs and head removed but otherwise no mutilation.
There is a particularly striking difference between the murder of Mary Kelly, where JTR had ample time to have dismembered the corpse had he wished and the calm disposal in the case of all the torso murders, where the murderer used both a saw and a sharp knife to make the necessary disarticulations. Moreover, the torso murderer (unlike JTR?) had no surgical skill. Rather the limbs and bodies 'were separated in the way that a butcher or slaughterer would adopt.'
Finally, there is the question of the 5 October letter in which ‘the Ripper’ explicitly denied having had anything to do with the Whitehall murder(Though this has been dismissed as one of the innumerable hoax letters, it is not clear why someone should have thought this point worth making).
A part of R Michael’s case against Chapman/Klosowski is based on his having been at the right place at the right time, and he certainly makes a number of persuasive points. The difficulty with the torso killings is that in all cases there was a gap between the murder and the disposal of the body parts - implying that he would have needed to have stored them securely for periods of a few days to a few weeks. Not impossible, but given his particular personal circumstances often difficult. For example:
· Rainham. The ‘best guess’ for Klosowski’s immigration to London is given as March to June 1887. The torso was indeed found on May 11. But at that time it had probably already been in the water for at least a month (the autopsy , performed in July, reported that ‘several months had elapsed since the date of death’). The thigh was found on 5 June, also in the Thames but the other six portions of the body were found on 30 June/1 July in Regents Canal. They must have only very recently have been dumped there (given the volume of traffic on the canal they would have otherwise been found earlier). Would a new immigrant to London really have been able to acquire a safe location where he could have dismembered and then concealed body parts so soon after arriving in a strange country?
· Whitehall. At the time of the 1888 Whitehall torso murder (20 August or possibly a few days earlier) Klowsowski was living in George Yard building. Given the crowded nature of tenement life, it is extremely implausible that he would have been able to dismember and dispose of a body without others being aware of the fact. It is possible that he might have been able to have thrown an arm into the Thames (discovered on September 11 considerably upstream of Whitechapel, near Pimlico ). But a torso would have been a heavy and cumbersome burden - especially as he would probably have been transporting the leg (unearthed on the same site on October 16). Nor is it clear how Koslowski would have acquired the necessary detailed knowledge of the site (the police argued that only someone intimately familiar with the building works would have known about the recess where the torso was found).
· Battersea. Elizabeth Jackson was last seen in Chelsea, and the various parts of her body were found not too far from where she had last been seen (given her advanced pregnancy, she would not have been in a position to walk too far even had she wanted to). By this time, Koslowski had apparently moved to Cable Street, about ten miles away. Unless he had some hideaway in the Chelsea area, it is difficult to understand the logistics of him transporting a body back to Whitechapel, dismembering it, then returning the parts (roughly) to where Elizabeth Jackson had been living.
· Pinchin Street. Cable Street is indeed close to Pinchin Street, so the argument for Koslowski’s involvement may be a little more plausible. On the other hand, the police themselves believed the torso had been deliberately brought to Whitechapel from the West End. It is also indicative that the intriguing detail of the anonymous informant who had given a tip off two days before the body was found had spoken to a newsvendor in Charing Cross (West End not East End). Another point against Koslowski is that the murder had been committed only weeks after Lucy Baderski had moved in with him, so this would have been a highly reckless action to take.
All in all, I think there may be more plausible candidates for the torso murderer. |
Author: Christopher-Michael DiGrazia
Monday, 21 October 2002 - 08:18 am | | David -
Gordon has now written The Thames Torso Murders of Victorian London (McFarland and Co., ISBN 0-7864-1348-4), in which he makes explicit his contention that Klosowski committed the murders. He also believes that Wolf Levisohn - who testified against Chapman in 1903 - was also somehow connected to the murders, in complicity if not in actuality.
I am still reading the book preperatory to a review in the January Ripper Notes, but as Gordon's case is based heavily upon the no-longer-extant Chronicles of Crime by Dr Thomas Dutton, there seems to be ample reason for scepticism, at least from my point of view.
Still, read it for yourself and draw your own conclusions. |
Author: Christopher T George
Monday, 21 October 2002 - 10:40 am | | Hi, David:
R. Michael Gordon's book Alias Jack the Ripper is made up of a lot of supposition and circumstantial evidence as well as information that is known to be faulty. When Hargrave Adam wrote the introduction to The Trial of George Chapman in the Great British Trials Series he made the statement that Chapman (Severin Klosowski) was living in George Yard at the time of Martha Tabram's murder, August 7, 1888. But there is no evidence that he did so.
In fact, it seems apparent that Chapman did not live in that location until later. As evidenced by the entry in the Post Office Directory of 1889, material for which would have been gathered in late 1888, he appears to have been living at 126 Cable Street, St. George's-in-the-East (Sugden, p. 441) at the time of the Autumn of Terror. It would seem that Chapman did not move to the White Hart, at the junction of George Yard with Whitechapel High Street until 1890.
R. Michael Gordon thus appears satisfied to base his case against Chapman on faulty information and supposition. I think he owes his readers a higher standard of research.
Best regards
Chris George |
Author: David Powell
Monday, 21 October 2002 - 06:13 pm | | Christopher-Michael/Christopher
Thanks for both these comments and for giving me some further background on 'Alias JtR'. I didn't know a book on the Torso murders had already been published but I'll now look out for it. I've only very recently become interested in JtR having discovered a testimonial written by Dr Thomas Bond for my Great Grandfather (Charles Hebbert) suggesting he had helped him in some of the Ripper autopsies.The only material from my ancestor that survives, however, are his autopsy notes on the Torso murders. There is nothing on the Ripper murders themselves, unfortunately.
I have been extremely impressed by the standard of scholarship on this site. I certainly don't feel qualified to enter into any of the debate on who might have been the Ripper. But I have been looking at archive material on the Torso murders (alas limited, apart from press reports). I had been wondering whether any of the JtR suspects might have been implicated in this second series of murders. Since I am (conventionally enough) convinced this was a different hand, this might have enabled at least one to have been 'eliminated from inquiries'. I'd welcome views from others whether there is any possibility of this.
At present, however, my best guess is that the torso perpetrator is not anyone who has yet appeared in the frame. Two possible leads are the closeness of all the finds to water (note. Regents canal is some distance from the Thames) and that both New Scotland Yard and Pinchin Street (next to a site used for dressing stone), have a connection with construction. The canal system was used at the end of the 19th C inter alia for bringing in construction material to London. And some kind of vessel would have provided the murderer both with somewhere to dismember, and then store his victims bodies.
David |
Author: Vicki
Tuesday, 22 October 2002 - 12:48 am | | Evening,
Since these are women who were murdered, I would look into the Match Girls strike of June/July 1888. http://www.davidric.dircon.co.uk/matchgirls.html
One of the bodies was found in the foundation/basement of the new Scotland Yard building. St. Barbara is the patron of architects, foundations, AND the prevention of fire. One of her symbols is the cannon, and I think the Scotland Yard building was on or near a Cannon St.. The water connection could have something to do with fire prevention also.
Some of the Whitechapel murders had a hint of the fire theme. Liz Stride, for example, was murdered by Berner St., and Catherine Eddowes was near a coal shute.
Vicki |
Author: Wolf Vanderlinden
Tuesday, 22 October 2002 - 02:47 pm | | Hello David, Christopher Michael and C.G.,
I am now working on something not related to this topic but it does remind me of something I read in a New York paper from 1891. A small paragraph in a much larger article contains a rundown of supposed Ripper victims and states,
"With regard to the Whitechapel murders, the Pinchin street case (Sept. 10, 1889) is generally not included in the list, as it undoubtedly did not belong to the same series. Also it may be noted that murders 1 and 2 are not universally believed to have been done by the perpetrator of murders 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7, while murder 8 is by some separated from the rest also and classified as an "imitation" of the preceding atrocities."
It is interesting to note that less than three years after the murders the thinking appears to have been that only the canonical five were considered the true victims of Jack the Ripper with Smith, Tabram and the Pinchin street torso already rejected. The identity of murder 8 is not stated but it is probably Francis Coles as her murder had occurred only two months earlier.
C.G., a small point. Hargrave Adam did not state that Chapman had lived in George Yard Buildings during the time of the Tabram murder. He merely stated that Chapman had obtained, "...a situation in the (Whitechapel) High Street as a hairdresser's assistant," and that, "Chapman arrived in London some time in 1888; worked and lived in Whitechapel."
It was Wolf Levisohn who testified at the inquest of Mary Spink and Bessie Taylor that , "He first met the accused in a shop under the White Hart public-house, 89 High Street, Whitechapel, in 1888." As you have pointed out, this information is incorrect, Chapman did not work at this location until 1890. R. Michael does not state where his information for Chapman's tenancy in the George Yard Buildings comes from other than to point out the close proximity of GYB with the White Hart which is still at the West corner of Whitechapel High Street and George Yard. I point this out because R. Michael does not evan have the weight, correctly or incorrectly, of H.L. Adam to support him and I don't think that it should be given to him.
David, fascinating news about your Great Grandfather. Dr. Charles A. Hebbert assisted Dr. Thomas Bond and may have been present at the post mortem of Mary Kelly, if he was assisting Bond in 1888. Dr. Hebbert is best known for his involvement in the murder of Rose Mylett and the Pinchin Street torso murder. His report on his post mortem findings from the Pinchin case are still in existence, Ref. MEPO 3/140, ff. 141-7, and I wonder if this is what you were referring to or whether you have his original notes in your possession?
In the Mylett case Dr. Robert Anderson, the assistant commissioner, had asked Dr. Bond to examine the body as he was not satisfied that Mylett had indeed been murdered. Bond had been out of town at the time and so Hebbert opened the letter and responded himself. Anderson was apparently unhappy with this as he stated in his report to James Monro,"Mr. Bond's assistant, Mr. Hibbert (sic) , had opened my note to Mr. Bond, and (unfortunately, I think) decided to act for him in the case." This should not be seen as a slight to your Great Grand Father as Anderson seemed desperate to force the medical experts to change their view of Mylett's death from murder to death by natural causes. Already Drs. Brownfield, Harris and Mackeller, Mackeller having been sent by Anderson, had ruled that Mylett had been murdered and Anderson had desperately hoped that Dr. Bond would see it differently. Instead your Great Grandfather showed up, autopsied the body and sided with the others. Anderson was livid and hoped to finally get his wish when Dr. Bond examined the body himself. Bond supported the others but was eventually persuaded to change his mind.
Wolf. |
Author: David Powell
Tuesday, 22 October 2002 - 06:59 pm | | Wolf,
Thanks for the vignette about the Mylett case. I have been though some of the Ripper material in the PRO but missed this.
The autopsy reports were published in Vol IV and V of the Westminster Hospital Reports under the titles 'An Exercise in Forensic Medicine' and 'An Exercise in Forensic Medicine Part II'. Charles Hebbert commented in the latter that the four cases as a whole show how a skilful and determined individual can murder and dispose of four bodies without detection.
I now think this was something of a wry aside at the inability of the authorities at the time to see the four as a sequence. There were six inquests in all. Though I can find no record of the original Rainham inquest only two of the others unequivocally returned a verdict of murder. The connection between the last three did appear in some newspaper accounts of Pinchin Street but it was very much played down. And I still find the tone of Munro's Pinchin Street memo quite remarkable. In effect he was saying, yes, there is another serial killer. But it isnt JtR, so we dont need to worry!
Vicki,
Thanks for the interesting idea about a fire connection. New Scotland Yard was constructed in Cannon Row rather than Cannon Street and I think got its name from some fortifications associated with the Palace of Westminster.
David |
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