Undocumented Migrant in Whitechapel, 1888. The DNA evidence is 137 years old. I would like to know how the evidence was kept uncontaminated, since there have been hundreds of court cases where DNA Contamination was enough to provide reasonable doubt. I personally like the one Identified in the Michael Caine Movie on the Whitechapel Murders.
Most of what’s been written on the subject is, um, felgercarb to borrow a term from the original BSG.
Kosminski only shows up in the ‘memorandum’ by Commissioner Sir Melville MacNaughten, along with two other “suspects”, Seweryn Kłosowski (aka George Chapman when they hanged him for marrying and then poisoning three women for inheritances a decade and a half later) and “Michael Ostrog”, another supposed “barber-surgeon”.
The problem is that only Klosowski/Chapman’s existence can be verified- because he was hanged.
George Dew stated that nobody ever heard of the other two before or after MacNaughten’s “memo”. And at the time (fall 1888) MacNaughten wasn’t even in London; he wouldn’t become Commissioner until the following spring.
They had a description of the “Ripper”, from two different witnesses to the leadup to two murders, Annie Chapman and Elizabeth Stride. And they were consistent; male, 5’10”, heavyish, fair-haired, mustache, wearing a deerstalker cap (?) and a frock coat. Witnesses described him as a “toff”- “shabby-genteel” was their term.
His MO and “signature” showed knowledge of anatomy. That was common a century later (to say nothing of today after two decades’ worth of CSI on TV), but in 1888 it would only be found in the medical profession.
Most likely (here’s where I SWAG) he was the son of a “noble house”, probably second or third (not the one who would come into the title). He had been a medical student, but had dropped it, most likely because dear old Dad said it wasn’t a “respectable” pursuit for a gentleman. (At that time, that was the CW among the upper classes.)
He frequented the gambling houses and music halls along Whitechapel High Street and Whitechapel Road (same thoroughfare with different names at opposite ends), just like a lot of “toffs”. And that’s one reason he wasn’t caught; while the police were beating the bushes in the East End, he simply got in his coach and told his driver to take him home- to the West End.
No, he wasn’t any of the “favorite” upper class suspects. He certainly wasn’t Herman Mudgett aka H.H. Holmes; all through August to October 1888, he was busy building his “Murder Castle” in Chicago IL.
Walter Sickert, the artist, was in Nice, France from June to October working on three commissioned paintings. He didn’t have time to go prowling about London.
And the Duke of Clarence was in the public eye pretty much all the time.
My best estimate is that the UNSUB was a habitue’ of the gambling houses and music halls, like a lot of other “toffs”. He likely was a “plunger” at cards (he obviously liked living dangerously), but never for such stakes as would hurt him. He also almost certainly had a reputation for being “rough with the drabs”.
The thing is that the other “favorite suspects”, like the Duke, probably knew him. Odds are, they played cards with him once or twice a week.
They just had no idea that he was “Jack the Ripper” after hours.
As an investigator back then, I’d have used that description, made the rounds of the various gaming clubs and music halls, and asked the gents in the one and the ladies in the other, “Do you know a fellow like that?”
In fact, I’d have asked H.R.H. the Duke of Clarence first.
After all, he was the gentleman who “knew everybody“.
3 Comments
Oh, I am so not going there.
clear ether
eon
Undocumented Migrant in Whitechapel, 1888. The DNA evidence is 137 years old. I would like to know how the evidence was kept uncontaminated, since there have been hundreds of court cases where DNA Contamination was enough to provide reasonable doubt. I personally like the one Identified in the Michael Caine Movie on the Whitechapel Murders.
Most of what’s been written on the subject is, um, felgercarb to borrow a term from the original BSG.
Kosminski only shows up in the ‘memorandum’ by Commissioner Sir Melville MacNaughten, along with two other “suspects”, Seweryn Kłosowski (aka George Chapman when they hanged him for marrying and then poisoning three women for inheritances a decade and a half later) and “Michael Ostrog”, another supposed “barber-surgeon”.
The problem is that only Klosowski/Chapman’s existence can be verified- because he was hanged.
George Dew stated that nobody ever heard of the other two before or after MacNaughten’s “memo”. And at the time (fall 1888) MacNaughten wasn’t even in London; he wouldn’t become Commissioner until the following spring.
They had a description of the “Ripper”, from two different witnesses to the leadup to two murders, Annie Chapman and Elizabeth Stride. And they were consistent; male, 5’10”, heavyish, fair-haired, mustache, wearing a deerstalker cap (?) and a frock coat. Witnesses described him as a “toff”- “shabby-genteel” was their term.
His MO and “signature” showed knowledge of anatomy. That was common a century later (to say nothing of today after two decades’ worth of CSI on TV), but in 1888 it would only be found in the medical profession.
Most likely (here’s where I SWAG) he was the son of a “noble house”, probably second or third (not the one who would come into the title). He had been a medical student, but had dropped it, most likely because dear old Dad said it wasn’t a “respectable” pursuit for a gentleman. (At that time, that was the CW among the upper classes.)
He frequented the gambling houses and music halls along Whitechapel High Street and Whitechapel Road (same thoroughfare with different names at opposite ends), just like a lot of “toffs”. And that’s one reason he wasn’t caught; while the police were beating the bushes in the East End, he simply got in his coach and told his driver to take him home- to the West End.
No, he wasn’t any of the “favorite” upper class suspects. He certainly wasn’t Herman Mudgett aka H.H. Holmes; all through August to October 1888, he was busy building his “Murder Castle” in Chicago IL.
Walter Sickert, the artist, was in Nice, France from June to October working on three commissioned paintings. He didn’t have time to go prowling about London.
And the Duke of Clarence was in the public eye pretty much all the time.
My best estimate is that the UNSUB was a habitue’ of the gambling houses and music halls, like a lot of other “toffs”. He likely was a “plunger” at cards (he obviously liked living dangerously), but never for such stakes as would hurt him. He also almost certainly had a reputation for being “rough with the drabs”.
The thing is that the other “favorite suspects”, like the Duke, probably knew him. Odds are, they played cards with him once or twice a week.
They just had no idea that he was “Jack the Ripper” after hours.
As an investigator back then, I’d have used that description, made the rounds of the various gaming clubs and music halls, and asked the gents in the one and the ladies in the other, “Do you know a fellow like that?”
In fact, I’d have asked H.R.H. the Duke of Clarence first.
After all, he was the gentleman who “knew everybody“.
clear ether
eon