New York Times
November 10, 1888
EXCITING LONDON EVENTS
"The Parnell Inquiry and Another Butchery"
by commercial cable from our own correspondent.
London, Nov.9.-- From to-day's proceedings of the Parnell Commission it
seems likely that the inquiry hereafter will go on in a cloud of sparks
knocked out by partisan conflict. The Irish members are deeply indignant at
the persistent pro-Times rulings of Justice Hannen and only less vexed with
their English lawyers, who have so tamely accepted these rulings without
protest. The mutterings against this supineness have finally grown so loud
that Sir Charles Russell was to-day impelled to try a sharp fall with Justice
Hannen. The incident was exciting at the time, but it is most interesting as
presaging a partisan struggle from this out, with a great probability of
somebody going to prison for contempt of court. The most eligible candidate
for this distinction appears at present to be William O'Brien, who this week
attacks the commission in United Ireland as a one-sided fraud.
The discovery to-day of the seventh Whitechapel murder, this time
believed to have been committed in broad daylight and involving the most
terrible wholesale mutilation it is possible to imagine, overshadows all
other topics in the London mind to-night. Bloodhounds are out, but I am
unable to learn at this hour that they have discovered anything. The
conclusion is now universal that the assassin is a periodic lunatic, who,
unless detected at once, is likely to commit a fresh series of crimes within
a few days before his frenzy passes away.
London, Nov.9.-- At 11 o'clock this morning the body of a woman cut into
pieces was discovered in a house on Dorset-street, Spitalfields. The police
are endeavoring to track the murderer with the aid of bloodhounds. The
appearence of the body was frightful, and the mutilation was even greater
than in the previous cases. The head had been severed and placed beneath one
of the arms. The ears and nose had been cut off. The body had been
disemboweled and the flesh was torn from the thighs. Some of the organs were
missing. The skin had been torn off the forehead and cheeks. One hand had
been pushed into the stomach.
The victim, like all the others, was disreputable. She was married and
her husband was a porter. They had lived together at spasmodic intervals. Her
name is believed to have been Lizzie Fisher, but to most of the habitues of
the haunts she visited she was known as Mary Jane. She had a room in the
house where she was murdered. She carried a latch key and no one knows at
what hour she entered the house last night, and probably no one saw the man
who accompanied her. Therefore it is hardly likely that he will ever be
identified. He might easily have left the house at any time between 1 and 6
o'clock this morning without attracting attention. The doctors who have
examined the body refuse to make any statement until the inquest is
held. Thre bloodhounds belonging to private citizens were taken to the place
and put on the scent of the murderer, but they were unable to keep it for any
great distance and all hope of running the assassin down with their
assistance will have to be abandoned.
The murdered woman told a companion last evening that she was without
money and would commit suicide if she did not obtain a supply. It has been
learned that a man, respectably dressed, accosted the victim and offered her
money. They went to her lodgings on the second floor of the Dorset-street
house. No noise was heard during the night and nothing was known of the
murder until the landlady went to the room early this morning to ask for her
rent. The first thing she saw on entering the room were the woman's breasts
and viscera lying on a table. Dorest-street is short and narrow and is
situated close to Mitre-square and Hanbury-street.
In the House of Commons to-day Mr. Conybeare asked the question whether,
if it was true that another woman had been murdered in London, Gen. Warren,
the Chief of the Metropolitan Police, ought not to be superseded by an
officer accustomed to investigate crime. The question was greeted by cries of
"Oh! Oh!" The Speaker called "Order! Order!" and said that notice must be
given of the question in the usual way.
Mr. Conybeare replied: "I have given private notice."
The Speaker--The notice must be made in writing.
Mr. Cunningham Graham then asked whether Gen. Warren had already
resigned, to which Mr. Smith, the Government leader, replied no.
