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The Enduring Mystery of Jack the Ripper — Transcript

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0:25In the late 19th century, the city of London was the largest in the world.
0:30A sprawling metropolis and a melting pot for trade, finance, and people.
0:36But in the autumn of 1888, an horrific story emerged from the capital's East End.
0:42A story so dreadful, it sent shockwaves around the world.
0:47One after another, destitute women of the East End fell victim to a vicious killer known as Jack the Ripper.
0:54Despite an extensive manhunt and a few close calls,
0:58the Ripper was never caught.
1:00Instead, the murders came to an abrupt end and left behind one of the greatest mysteries
1:06in the annals of crime.
1:22In the East End of London, there's a district known as Whitechapel.
1:27In the late 19th century, Whitechapel was known for its overcrowded slums,
1:31where many of the capital's poor and unemployed had taken refuge.
1:36Day and night, an army of policemen would constantly patrol this labyrinthine network
1:41of dim-lit streets, courts, and alleys.
1:45One such place was a narrow passage known as George Yard.
1:51Near the north entrance of this passage was a residential complex known as George Yard Buildings.
1:57It was the morning of August 7, 1888,
2:00when an upstairs tenant named John Reeves headed out for work.
2:05Upon reaching the first-floor landing, Reeves encountered the body of a woman
2:09lying upon her back in a pool of blood.
2:14Horrified by the sight, he stumbled down to the street below in search for help.
2:20Constable Thomas Barrett was the first officer on the scene.
2:24He was soon joined by Dr. Timothy Killeen, who conducted a brief examination.
2:29The woman had been stabbed 39 times.
2:32Primarily in the chest and abdomen.
2:35Dr. Killeen estimated that she had been dead for "about three hours".
2:39Thus placing the time of death at approximately 02:30 in the morning.
2:45The woman had likely been attacked where she was found
2:48as no blood was found beyond the staircase landing.
2:51But this was strange as none of the tenants in this crowded building
2:54had heard a single cry for help or a disturbance of any kind.
2:59One exception was Amy Hewitt, a tenant who claimed to have heard a lone cry of "Murder!".
3:05But this was early in the evening of August 6,
3:08and the scream had emanated from outside the complex.
3:12Hewitt further explained:
3:13"The district round here is rather rough, and cries of murder are of frequent, if not nightly, occurrence."
3:21The victim was eventually identified as 39-year-old Martha Tabram.
3:26Tabram was a mother of two and had separated from her husband many years prior.
3:31Her last known address was 19 George Street,
3:34a common lodging-house less than 300 meters from the site of her death.
3:39Tabram had made a living through prostitution,
3:42and one of her associates was a woman named Mary Ann Connelly.
3:46Connelly testified that, on the evening of August 6,
3:49she and Tabram had been out drinking with two soldiers.
3:52Then, shortly before midnight, the party of four had separated.
3:56Connelly took her client into Angel Alley
3:59while Tabram guided hers into neighboring George Yard.
4:03It was the last time she saw Tabram alive.
4:09Barely two hours later, Constable Barrett had spoken to a soldier
4:13loitering near the north entrance of George Yard.
4:16The soldier had told Barrett that he was:
4:18"waiting for his mate who had gone away with a girl".
4:22Half an hour later, Tabram is presumed to have died.
4:28Both Connelly and Barrett were called upon to identify the soldiers.
4:32But all those accused could provide an alibi.
4:35One had been at home with his wife, another at an army base,
4:38and yet another in a completely different part of the city.
4:41This was enough for Inspector Edmund Reid, the lead investigator on the case,
4:46to abandon this line of inquiry.
4:48"[Connelly] and [Barrett] having both picked out the wrong men
4:51they could not be trusted again as their evidence would be worthless."
4:56Even if a soldier had been responsible, no one could deduce a motive.
5:00The people of Whitechapel might have been accustomed to crime and violence,
5:04but the sheer brutality of this attack was as frighting as it was confounding.
5:10"The crime [is] one of the most brutal that [have] occurred for some years."
5:14"For a poor defenseless woman to be outraged and stabbed in such a manner [is] almost beyond belief."
5:20These were the concluding remarks delivered at the final inquest held on August 23.
5:26Only a week later, things would go from bad to worse.
5:45On the morning of August 31,
5:47a man named Robert Paul left his home on Foster Street and headed for work.
5:54After making a right turn into Buck's Row, he spotted a man standing in the road.
6:00The man turned around to face him and said:
6:03"Come and look over here. There is a woman lying on the pavement."
6:06The stranger was named Charles Cross, and he, too, had been on his way to work
6:11when he first caught sight of the woman.
6:15The two men now cautiously approached.
6:17The woman's hands were cold to the touch, and Cross believed she was dead.
6:22Paul, however, thought he could sense faint breathing.
6:25But, instead of seeking immediate help,
6:27Cross and Paul were more concerned about being late for work.
6:31As such, they quickly resumed their morning commute,
6:34hoping to notify a policeman along the way.
6:38Fortunately, Constable John Neil was just around the corner.
6:42Niel was equipped with a lantern and found the woman lying on her back with a deep cut across the throat.
6:48The wound was still bleeding, and parts of her body were still warm.
6:54He was soon joined by Constable John Thain, who was sent at once to fetch a nearby doctor.
7:00Upon his arrival shortly after four o'clock, Dr. Rees Llewellyn estimated that:
7:06"she had not been dead more than half an hour".
7:09In other words, Cross and Paul had likely found the woman mere minutes after she was killed.
7:16Furthermore, three officers had patrolled the vicinity just a few minutes prior.
7:21Constable Niel had last inspected Buck's Row at approximately 03:15.
7:26So too had Sergeant Henry Kirby.
7:28Whereas Constable Thain had merely passed the end of the street.
7:32None of whom had seen nor heard anything amiss.
7:36Upon the body's removal to the mortuary, a shocking discovery was made.
7:41Apart from two incisions in the throat, the woman had also been "disembowelled".
7:47No organs had been removed, but Dr. Llewellyn found:
7:50"several incisions running across the abdomen".
7:53He also believed that the killer possessed:
7:56"some rough anatomical knowledge, for he seemed to have attacked all the vital parts".
8:03The victim was quickly identified.
8:05Her name was Mary Ann Nichols, and she had turned 43 just five days before the murder.
8:12Nichols had at least six children
8:14and her last known address was a common lodging-house at 56 Flower & Dean Street.
8:22On the night of her death, Nichols had been turned away from a lodging house on Thrawl Street
8:26as she lacked the funds to pay for a bed.
8:29Seeking to raise the money through prostitution, Nichols had then ventured down Osborn Street
8:34before meeting her friend Ellen Holland.
8:37The two of them shared a brief exchange, but Nichols was visibly drunk.
8:42When they parted ways around half-past two, Holland saw Nichols staggering eastward
8:46along Whitechapel Road.
8:48Barely an hour later, she was found dead.
8:54Apart from the body itself, the killer had left nothing in their wake.
8:58No blood trail, no murder weapon, no witnesses.
9:02Inspector Joseph Helson, the lead investigator on the case, stated that:
9:07"not an atom of evidence can be obtained to connect any person with the crime".
9:13While the Nichols case ground to a screeching halt,
9:15its similarities with the Martha Tabram case had not gone unnoticed.
9:20In both cases, the attack had been needlessly ferocious, and there was no discernible motive.
9:26Both victims were prostitutes of roughly the same age and moved in the same circles.
9:32The only meaningful difference was their injuries.
9:35Tabram had been repeatedly stabbed, whereas Nichols had suffered multiple slash wounds.
9:41Differences aside, the prevailing assumption was that the same deranged individual
9:46had committed both murders.
9:48A conviction that would only grow stronger in the days that followed.
10:21As the Sun was rising on September 8, a man named John Richardson was on his way to work.
10:28At a quarter to five, he made a quick stop at 29 Hanbury Street.
10:35He went through the entrance and out the back door by way of a cramped hallway.
10:44Richardson then sat down on the backyard steps before grabbing a knife...
10:48...to trim a vexing piece of leather from his boot.
10:51Once satisfied, he left the building and shut the front door behind him.
10:56About an hour later, a third-floor tenant of the same address, John Davis,
11:01plodded downstairs and into the hallway.
11:03The front door was now wide open, but the one in the back was closed.
11:08When Davis went to open it, he found the bloodied remains of a woman
11:12lying on her back just below the steps.
11:16Inspector Joseph Chandler was the first officer on the scene.
11:20After a brief inspection, he sent at once for a medic.
11:24Dr. George Phillips arrived at half-past six and found the woman "terribly mutilated".
11:30The throat had been "dissevered deeply", whereas the abdomen had been "entirely laid open".
11:36The intestines had been:
11:38"lifted out of the body and placed by the shoulder of the corpse".
11:42The body was then conveyed to the mortuary while Inspector Chandler and Dr. Phillips
11:47conducted a sweep of the backyard.
11:49Most of what they found belonged to the tenants of the building.
11:52But just below the resting place of the woman's feet,
11:55they found a small piece of cloth and two combs.
11:58The items had likely belonged to the victim,
12:01but it seemed to Dr. Phillips that they had been deliberately positioned and arranged by the killer.
12:10The post-mortem revealed that two brass rings had been forcefully removed from the victim's left hand.
12:17These rings were nowhere to be found.
12:20Portions of the victim's abdomen had also gone missing, including the womb.
12:26Dr. Phillips believed that:
12:28"the mode in which these portions were extracted showed some anatomical knowledge".
12:32This point was greatly expanded upon at a subsequent inquest.
12:36"The injuries had been made by someone who had considerable anatomical skill and knowledge."
12:42"There were no meaningless cuts."
12:44"For instance, no mere slaughterer of animals could have carried out these operations."
12:49"It must have been someone accustomed to the post-mortem room."
12:53The victim was quickly identified as Annie Chapman.
12:57Chapman's date of birth is a bit uncertain but she was roughly 47 at the time of her death.
13:03She had at least seven children, but was, tragically, only survived by two.
13:08Her last known address was a common lodging-house at 35 Dorset Street.
13:15On the night of her death, Chapman had been denied accommodations
13:18as she lacked the funds to pay for a bed.
13:21She was escorted off the premises by the night watchman,
13:24who then saw her vanish into a nearby alleyway.
13:28What happened to Chapman over the next few hours, nobody knows.
13:32Her whereabouts during this time is a complete mystery.
13:35But unlike the two previous cases,
13:38a witness in the Chapman case might have caught a glimpse of the killer.
13:43At half-past five on the morning of September 8,
13:46a woman named Elizabeth Long spotted a man and a woman conversing outside 29 Hanbury Street.
13:52Long was positive that the woman she'd seen was Annie Chapman.
13:57But the man had stood with his back towards Long, so she never saw his face.
14:01Long did, however, manage to overhear a fragment of their conversation.
14:05The man had posed the question: "Will you?"
14:08To which the woman responded: "Yes."
14:14Now, a lasting point of contention in the Chapman case is the time of death.
14:19According to Dr. Phillips, when he arrived at 06:30, Chapman had been dead for:
14:24"at least two hours".
14:26That would place her death at around half-past four.
14:30But according to Long, she saw Chapman alive a full hour later.
14:36Then there's the testimony of John Richardson.
14:39Richardson was the son of one of the tenants in the building.
14:42At a quarter to five, he made a routine checkup on the door to the basement,
14:46which had previously suffered a break-in.
14:48When he found it secure, he sat down on the backyard steps
14:51to trim a piece of leather from his boot.
14:54Even though he sat mere centimeters from the murder site, Richardson did not see a body.
15:00He was adamant on this point.
15:01"I could not have failed to notice the deceased if she had been there."
15:06To muddle the timeline even further, there's the testimony of Albert Cadosch.
15:11About twenty minutes past five, Cadosch had gone through the backyard of 27 Hanbury Street
15:16when he heard voices coming from nearby.
15:19They were barely audible, however, and Cadosch had only made out the word "No!"
15:24A few minutes later, he heard something falling against the wooden fence dividing the two yards.
15:30There's no one way to untangle this web of contradictions,
15:35but Dr. Phillips did concede the possibility that he'd miscalculated.
15:40That "the coldness of the morning and the great loss of blood" had skewed his opinion,
15:46which was largely based on the warmth of the body.
15:49So, presuming that Dr. Phillips did miscalculate
15:52and the recollections of Long and Cadosch were off by a few minutes,
15:56that would place Chapman's death at around 05:30 in the morning.
16:04By this point, the dim light of dawn would have provided the tenants of 29 Hanbury Street
16:09an unobstructed view of the murder site.
16:12Some of whom had even slept with their windows open.
16:15In spite of this, the killer managed to evade detection
16:18and even made time to arrange the victims possessions.
16:28As the tally of victims gradually mounted, the public grew increasingly anxious.
16:33They were not only frightened by the murders but
16:36frustrated with the police and their perceived incompetence.
16:39Even across the pond were the efforts of the police fiercely criticized.
16:44"The London police and detective force is probably the stupidest in the world."
16:50What these mocking quotes and illustrations failed to capture
16:54where the overwhelming odds stacked in favor of the perpetrator.
16:58The police were up against someone who seemingly struck without motive.
17:02Someone who left no murder weapon and few witnesses.
17:05On top of that, the East End was severely overcrowded while the police were understaffed.
17:11As one newspaper put it:
17:13"A man in the East End of London is a grain of sand."
17:17"As invisible, and almost as much beyond identification amid the masses."
17:23At no point would this become more apparent than during the events of September 30.
17:41On September 29, a routine Saturday meeting was held at a Socialist club on Berner Street.
17:47When the meeting came to a close around midnight, all but a few members returned home.
17:52Those who remained proceeded to drink and socialize.
17:56Half an hour into September 30, Joseph Lave stepped outside to get some fresh air.
18:02Lave used the side entrance leading into Dutfield's Yard and lingered for about ten minutes.
18:08Moments after Lave had gone back inside, Morris Eagle accessed the building via the same entrance.
18:14He, too, was a member of the club and had just returned after escorting a woman home.
18:19Neither of them noticed anything unusual.
18:22Twenty minutes later, the sound of a horse and carriage could be heard trotting down Berner Street.
18:27The driver was Louis Diemschutz, the steward of the clubhouse.
18:32When Diemschutz drove into Dutfield's Yard, his pony abruptly veered to the left.
18:37When he looked down to his right, he thought he could discern something in the darkness.
18:41Diemschutz stepped down from his barrow and, after lighting a match,
18:44could see a woman lying on her side against the wall.
18:49Without even knowing if she was "drunk or dead",
18:52Diemschutz rushed into the club to check on his wife.
18:55When he found her safe and sound, he alerted the other members,
18:58and a small crowd soon gathered outside.
19:01They could now see that the woman's throat had been "fearfully cut".
19:05And that "a stream of blood [was] trickling down the yard".
19:13Eagle, Diemschutz, and a few others promptly dispersed to find a policeman.
19:18While a growing crowd of bystanders waited for authorities to arrive,
19:22there was no sign of the perpetrator.
19:27But across the city, less than a kilometer to the west,
19:30an even more ghoulish discovery was about to be made.
19:35At half-past one of the same morning,
19:38Constable Edward Watkins patrolled an open space known as Mitre Square.
19:44Watkins's beat would take him through the square about once every 13 minutes,
19:48and, on this occasion, it was deserted.
19:51But in the time it took Watkins to complete another rotation,
19:54Mitre Square was turned into a crime scene.
20:01"I next came in at 01:44."
20:03"I turned to the right."
20:04"I saw the body of a woman lying there on her back."
20:08"I saw her throat was cut and her bowels protruding."
20:12"The stomach was ripped up."
20:14"She was lying in a pool of blood."
20:21Dr. George Sequeira and Dr. Frederick Brown soon converged upon the scene.
20:25They found terrible injuries inflicted upon the woman's face, throat, and abdomen.
20:31The intestines had been "drawn out to a large extent and placed over the right shoulder".
20:36Among the many lacerations to the face, Dr. Brown noted that:
20:40"the lobe and auricle of the right ear was cut obliquely through".
20:45Based on their expert opinions coupled with the testimony of Watkins,
20:49the woman had died within minutes of her body being found.
20:58Back in Berner Street,
20:59Dr. Frederick Blackwell and Dr. George Phillips had reached the same conclusion.
21:04The woman in Dutfield's Yard had died within minutes of her body being found.
21:09But, unlike previous victims, she had only suffered injuries to the throat.
21:13There were no abdominal mutilations or anything else by which to connect the attack to the others.
21:23But the murder in Dutfield's Yard and the one in Mitre Square
21:27were separated by less than 1 kilometer and some 45 minutes.
21:32This allowed for a chilling possibility.
21:35It was suspected then, as it continues to be today,
21:38that, when Diemschutz came clattering through the gateway, he unwittingly interrupted the murder.
21:44The killer may even have become trapped inside Dutfield's Yard
21:47because the gate on Berner Street was the only point of entry.
21:51Perhaps they saw an opportunity to escape when Diemschutz then rushed inside the club.
21:57From there, it would have taken them less than 15 minutes to reach Mitre Square.
22:01Plenty of time to hunt for another victim.
22:05But it must be emphasized that this is pure speculation.
22:08There is no evidence to suggest the two murders were even connected.
22:16The woman in Dutfield's Yard was identified as 44-year-old Elizabeth Stride.
22:21Stride was a Swedish immigrant who'd lived in London for over two decades.
22:26Following the death of her husband, she had made a living through prostitution.
22:30Her last known address was a common lodging-house at 32 Flower & Dean Street.
22:37On the night of her death, Stride had been seen by quite an abundance of witnesses.
22:42First, she was seen in the company of a "respectably dressed man" around eleven o'clock.
22:47About a quarter to midnight, Stride was seen talking to a man who was "decently dressed"
22:53and had the appearance of a clerk.
22:56Then, only a few minutes before the murder,
22:58Stride was seen in the company of a man by Constable William Smith.
23:02The man was carrying a small parcel wrapped in newspaper and was of "respectable appearance".
23:09It's unclear whether these descriptions are of the same person
23:13or if Stride accosted multiple clients as the night progressed.
23:18There were other witnesses, some less credible than others,
23:22but the one that really stood out from the rest was Israel Schwartz.
23:27About a quarter to one, Schwartz had been walking down Berner Street.
23:31As he came up on Dutfield's Yard,
23:33he witnessed a man throwing a woman to the ground in front of the entrance.
23:38The woman had "screamed three times but not very loudly".
23:43Schwartz would later identify this woman as Elizabeth Stride.
23:48Schwartz did not try to intervene but opted instead to simply cross the street.
23:52That's when he spied a second man on the opposite side who was lighting a pipe.
23:58The man who attacked the woman then appeared to address this second man
24:01by shouting the name "Lipski!"
24:05The pipe-smoker then proceeded to follow Schwartz before eventually breaking away.
24:13When taken at face value, this story appears to suggest that the killer had an accomplice.
24:18An accomplice by the name of Lipski.
24:21This was indeed the interpretation of some government officials.
24:25But Inspector Frederick Abberline, one of the lead investigators on the case,
24:29had a very different interpretation.
24:32You see, the name Lipski had gained notoriety in 1887
24:36when a Jewish man by the name of Isreal Lipski was convicted of murder.
24:40Owing to the publicity of that case, the surname Lipski had become an antisemitic slur.
24:46Abberline, therefore, deduced that the man who shouted "Lipski!" was directing an insult at Schwartz,
24:52who was described as having a "strong Jewish appearance".
24:56The man with the pipe, meanwhile, may have been an innocent passer-by
25:00who became frightened along with Schwartz.
25:03Whether Abberline's interpretation is correct, it's doubtful we'll ever truly know.
25:08Nevertheless, Schwartz's account is compelling as he conceivably witnessed the moment
25:14when Elizabeth Stride was attacked.
25:18Back in Mitre Square, a large crowd of spectators had descended upon the scene.
25:23All driven by their morbid curiosity to get a glimpse of the body.
25:28The post-mortem revealed that the killer had extracted a few organs,
25:32including the womb and left kidney.
25:35According to Dr. Brown, this extraction required "a good deal of knowledge",
25:40which he likened to that of a butcher.
25:43By contrast, Dr. Sequeira did not find any signs of "great anatomical skill".
25:50The woman in Mitre Square was identified as 46-year-old Catherine Eddowes.
25:55Eddowes had at least five children but, after escaping her abusive husband,
25:59she had become estranged from her family.
26:01Her last known address was a common lodging-house at 55 Flower & Dean Street.
26:09On the night of her death, Eddowes had been out drinking.
26:12She got so drunk that, around half-past eight,
26:14she was found lying on the sidewalk in Aldgate High Street surrounded by a crowd.
26:20The commotion attracted a few officers, who then escorted Eddowes to a nearby police station.
26:27There she remained locked in a cell until one o'clock in the morning.
26:37After being released from jail, Eddowes was likely spotted in the company of a man
26:41in the vicinity of Mitre Square.
26:46Only one of the three witnesses, Joseph Lawende, had paid close attention to the couple.
26:52The man had the appearance of a sailor and wore a "reddish handkerchief" round his neck.
26:59While Lawende did identify the woman as Catherine Eddowes, he never saw her face.
27:04Nevertheless, this sighting was only made some 10 minutes
27:07before Eddowes's body was discovered by Constable Wakins.
27:12What's so incredibly tragic about the Eddowes case is how narrowly the killer escaped justice.
27:18First of all, the only private residence in Mitre Square
27:21was occupied by a policeman and his family.
27:24They had slept right next to an upper floor window overlooking the murder site.
27:30Second of all, a night watchman and retired policeman
27:33had been cleaning a warehouse within earshot of the murder site.
27:37He would routinely hear the footsteps of patrolling officers
27:41yet heard nothing at the time of the murder.
27:44Finally, Constable James Harvey had glanced into Mitre Square
27:48at roughly twenty minutes to two.
27:50That's right in between the sighting by Lawende and the body's discovery.
27:55Harvey should have had an unobstructed view of the murder site,
27:59yet he failed to notice anything suspicious.
28:03Was it too dark?
28:05Was the killer standing just a few meters away cloaked in shadow?
28:10Did one or more witnesses get the time wrong?
28:15While the killer did ultimately escape, they did not do so without leaving a trace.
28:20Shortly before three o'clock, a bloodstained piece of cloth
28:24was found near the entrance to a building a few blocks to the northeast.
28:28It proved to be a ripped portion of the apron worn by Eddowes.
28:32The patch had evidently been torn off and then discarded by the killer upon their escape.
28:39Now, on the wall above this patch of apron, someone had written a message.
28:44"The Juwes are the men that will not be blamed for nothing."
28:49To this day, both the meaning and the author of this message remain in doubt.
28:55Was it written by the killer?
28:57Was it an attempt to cast suspicion upon or even away from the Jewish community?
29:02Was it completely unrelated to the murder?
29:10Similar questions would soon be raised by a few letters.
29:13Letters that had supposedly been written and posted by the killer.
29:27Three days before the murders of Elizabeth Stride and Catherine Eddowes,
29:30the Central News Agency of London received a letter in the post.
29:34The author of which claimed responsibility for the recent murders
29:37and to be planning for the "next job".
29:41Then, in the aftermath of the two killings, the same agency received a blood-smeared postcard.
29:47It contained details about the atrocities, which the author described as a "double event".
29:53On the off chance that the letters were genuine, the police decided to make them public.
29:58The hope was that someone would recognize the handwriting.
30:01Unfortunately, no one ever did.
30:04Instead, it merely served to advertise the name with which the letters had been signed.
30:12Opinions on the letter's authenticity were divided back then and continue to be today.
30:18Most notably, the Dear Boss Letter had promised to "clip the lady's ears off" and send them to the police.
30:24The police never received such a package, and neither of the two victims had had their ears removed.
30:31But you may recall that the right earlobe of Eddowes had been "cut obliquely through".
30:36Was this a botched attempt by the killer to keep their promise?
30:40Or was it merely one of numerous lacerations with no connection to the letter?
30:46The contents of the letters notwithstanding,
30:49modern linguistic analysis does suggest that they were penned by the same hand.
30:53So, hoaxes or not, the authors were likely one and the same.
30:59However, the handwriting bore "no resemblance at all"
31:03to the message written above the torn patch of apron.
31:07Now, the publication of the letters inspired an onslaught of copycats.
31:11Agencies all over London were soon inundated with correspondence imitating the other two.
31:17But at least one of them might have been genuine.
31:20Not because of the contents of the letter but rather the contents of a box
31:25with which it was delivered.
31:27On October 16, a man named George Lusk received a small package in the post.
31:32Lusk was the chairman of the Whitechapel Vigilance Committee.
31:36A small group of local tradesmen who sought to identify the killer.
31:40The package consisted of a letter and a cardboard box containing half a kidney.
31:48The doctors who examined the kidney all agreed that it was human.
31:52But whether it was the same left kidney removed from the body of Eddowes could not be determined.
31:58It could, for instance, have been an elaborate hoax by a medical student
32:01or someone with access to human organs.
32:04The author of the accompanying letter, meanwhile, insisted that the kidney did belong to the victim
32:09and that they had fried and eaten the other half.
32:13A popular theory at the time, and one that still is today,
32:17was that some of the letters had been fabricated by the press.
32:21According to Chief Inspector John Littlechild, the letters were "a smart piece of journalistic work".
32:27Assistant Commissioner Robert Anderson dismissed the letters as:
32:31"the creation of an enterprising London journalist".
32:34Meanwhile, Chief Constable Melville Macnaghten thought he could discern the:
32:38"stained forefinger of the journalist".
32:41There are a few candidates for who this journalist might have been
32:45but there is no solid evidence against any one of them.
32:49Whether it was a hoax by an enterprising journalist or the genuine prose of the Ripper,
32:54the letters did nonetheless receive widespread attention.
32:58They commanded space in virtually every newspaper
33:01and dominated much of the public discourse throughout October.
33:05A month which passed without a single atrocity bearing the signature marks of Jack the Ripper.
33:11Perhaps it was finally over?
33:15"It is pretty certain that the monster has become frightened."
33:18"And has suspended his horrible work for the present, if not for good."
33:40On the morning of November 9,
33:42a merchant and property owner named John McCarthy was going through his bookkeeping.
33:47McCarthy was the landlord of Miller's Court,
33:49and the tenants of Room 13 had fallen behind on their rent.
33:54McCarthy sent at once for his assistant, Thomas Bowyer,
33:57to collect the money at a quarter to eleven.
34:08After knocking twice without response, Bowyer went around the corner to peer through a window.
34:13But his view was obstructed by a coat or curtain,
34:16so Bowyer had to reach through a broken window pane to pull it aside.
34:21That's when he saw the severely mutilated body of a woman
34:24lying upon a bed in the corner of the room.
34:30Miller's Court was soon crawling with police.
34:33But the door to Room 13 was locked and had to be forced open with a pickaxe.
34:38What they found inside was truly the stuff of nightmares.
34:43"The sight we saw, I cannot drive away from my mind."
34:47"It looked more like the work of a devil than of a man."
34:50"The whole scene is more than I can describe."
34:53"I hope I may never see such a sight again."
34:56Dr. George Phillips described the body as "cut all to pieces".
35:00Dr. Thomas Bond described the woman's face as "hacked beyond recognition".
35:05The abdomen had been "emptied of its viscera" while the throat had been:
35:10"severed all round down to the bone".
35:13The body had been monstrously disfigured with loose organs dispersed all around it.
35:19The room itself was sparsely furnished and offered little in the way of clues.
35:24Two tables, one or two chairs, and a small cabinet.
35:28Amongst the ashes of a fireplace, the police found patches of burned clothing.
35:33Had the killer tried to dispose of evidence, or had it merely been used for warmth and light?
35:39The victim was identified almost immediately.
35:42Her name was Mary Jane Kelly, and she was the tenant of 13 Miller's Court.
35:47But nearly everything about Kelly's life is shrouded in mystery.
35:51She was presumably of Welsh or Irish descent and in her mid-twenties,
35:56making her the youngest victim by far.
35:59But given that no matching records of a Mary Jane Kelly have been found,
36:03it's probable that she was using a fake identity.
36:06In any case, Kelly had not been living alone.
36:09Up until a few days before the murder, she had cohabited with a man named Joseph Barnett.
36:15They only separated on October 30 because Barnett disapproved of Kelly's prostitution
36:20and the people with whom she associated.
36:24But they did see each other again.
36:26On the evening of November 8, Barnett paid Kelly a visit.
36:29Upon his arrival, he found Kelly in the company of a woman who was just about to leave.
36:35Unfortunately, there are conflicting accounts about who this woman was,
36:39when Barnett arrived, and how long he stayed.
36:42If we chose to believe Barnett,
36:44he arrived at some point between seven and a quarter to eight and left before nine o'clock.
36:51Shortly before midnight, Kelly was spotted in the company of a man by her neighbor Mary Ann Cox.
36:57When Cox passed the couple, they were about to enter Kelly's room.
37:01Cox bid Kelly goodnight, but she was "very much intoxicated" and barely able to respond.
37:08Once they had gone inside, Cox could hear Kelly singing.
37:12When Cox then left the court about an hour later, Kelly could still be heard singing.
37:19By two o'clock, Kelly had apparently ventured back outside,
37:22for she was spotted by a man named George Hutchinson.
37:25The two of them were supposedly well-acquainted, and Kelly had asked if he could spare a few coins.
37:31But Hutchinson was broke, and Kelly was desperate for money, so they soon parted ways.
37:37Moments later, Hutchinson observed Kelly being accosted by a well-dressed man.
37:42The two of them had a seemingly jovial interaction and began walking north.
37:48Hutchinson found it suspicious that such a well-dressed man would
37:51seek the company of a woman like Kelly.
37:54As such, when the couple passed him by, he scrutinized the man's appearance.
37:58He was, for instance, carrying a pair of gloves in his right hand and a small parcel in his left.
38:05Hutchinson decided to shadow the couple as they proceeded to Miller's Court.
38:10Before they vanished up the court, the man handed Kelly a red handkerchief,
38:14and she had supposedly told him:
38:17"Alright, my dear. Come along. You will be comfortable."
38:22Hutchinson remained in the vicinity until three o'clock,
38:25but neither Kelly nor the man reappeared.
38:28At roughly the same time, Cox returned home.
38:31In stark contrast to the loud singing upon her last departure,
38:35Cox was now struck by the complete absence of sound and light from Kelly's room.
38:42Finally, at approximately four o'clock,
38:44a tenant above and a woman across from Kelly's room heard cries of "Murder!".
38:50The voice was that of a woman, and it appeared to emanate from nearby.
38:54Meanwhile, other denizens of the court heard no screams at all.
39:00According to Dr. Bond, Kelly died between one and two o'clock in the morning.
39:05Dr. Phillips placed the time of death a few hours later.
39:09But some witnesses were quite adamant that they had seen or even spoken to Kelly
39:14as late as eight- or ten o'clock in the morning.
39:17Keep in mind that her body was discovered at a quarter to eleven.
39:21These contradictions are difficult to reconcile, and the precise time of death eludes us to this day.
39:36Mary Jane Kelly is typically regarded as the Ripper's final victim.
39:40Along with Mary Ann Nichols, Annie Chapman, Elizabeth Stride, and Catherine Eddowes,
39:45she is part of the canonical five.
39:48The five victims most likely to have been slain by the same hand.
39:52Martha Tabram might have been a victim of Jack the Ripper, but opinions are divided.
39:59The same is true of at least a handful of other cases.
40:04Even the canonical five are not without controversy, so the total number of victims is a matter of debate.
40:12Presuming that Kelly was indeed the final victim, one has to wonder why?
40:17Why did the murders come to such a sudden end?
40:20Did the Ripper give in to fears of being caught?
40:23Were they imprisoned for a different crime?
40:26Perhaps they succumbed to an illness or committed suicide?
40:30Could they have migrated to another country?
40:32Perhaps they deliberately changed their modus operandi to confuse the police?
40:38The possibilities are virtually endless, which means there is no shortage of suspects.
40:54Following the murder of Mary Ann Nichols,
40:56a rumor began to circulate that someone called Leather Apron was in the habit of abusing prostitutes.
41:04The name quickly made its way into the press
41:06and, soon enough, it became synonymous with the killer.
41:09In fact, Leather Apron was the predominant pseudonym before Jack the Ripper.
41:15But the man identified as Leather Apron was soon cleared of all suspicion.
41:20His real name was John Pizer, and he was in a different part of London
41:24on the night when Nichols was attacked.
41:27This misguided manhunt is somewhat emblematic of the whole investigation.
41:32The police pursued even the most tenuous of leads
41:34due to a lack of evidence and mounting pressure from the public.
41:38They interviewed thousands, investigated hundreds, and developed numerous theories along the way.
41:44In the words of Inspector Frederick Abberline:
41:46"Theories! We were lost almost in theories; there were so many of them."
41:52In an effort to narrow down the search, the police used a primitive form of criminal profiling.
41:58The idea was to analyze the available evidence
42:01to try and gauge what sort of person had committed the crimes.
42:05This profile was prepared by Dr. Thomas Bond, and he described the Ripper as a strong middle-aged man
42:11with an inoffensive appearance who dressed respectably.
42:15Bond's most controversial assessment was that the killer possessed "no scientific nor anatomical knowledge".
42:21This stood in direct opposition to the opinions of his peers.
42:25Most of whom ascribed the Ripper with at least a basic understanding of anatomy.
42:30Based on the witness accounts, the Ripper was a man of average height
42:34with a medium to stout build in his late twenties to mid-thirties.
42:40He wore dark clothes, including a hat of some sort, and had a mustache.
42:44But this sort of aggregation or tabulation of accounts can be quite deceptive.
42:49Not only are many details inconsistent, but they could be describing entirely different people.
42:55For all we know, none of the witnesses ever laid eyes on Jack the Ripper.
43:00So much is up for debate that one can build a case against almost any suspect.
43:05Some have even entertained the possibility that the Ripper was a woman
43:09or possibly a man disguised as a woman.
43:12While Jill- or Jackie the Ripper is an interesting theory, it has failed to achieve any widespread support.
43:21What is rarely in dispute is that the Ripper was either a resident of-
43:25or otherwise familiar with the East End.
43:28After all, he managed to narrowly evade capture on multiple occasions,
43:32which implies intimate knowledge of byways and patrol routes.
43:36He likely had some form of employment
43:39as the murders were committed around weekends and public holidays,
43:42and may have had some degree of anatomical knowledge.
43:47With this unshakable profile in hand, let's take a closer look at a few suspects.
43:53The question is, where do we even begin?
43:57According to criminal profiler and FBI special agent John Douglas,
44:01the Ripper was not only a local but was likely interviewed by the police.
44:06If Douglas is correct, the Ripper might be someone we've already met.
44:11Either a witness or a person close to one of the victims.
44:16What about John Richardson?
44:18The witness in the Chapman case who sat down on the backyard steps
44:22to trim a piece of leather from his boot.
44:24Richardson was indeed suspected by the police, but they found "not a shred of evidence" against him.
44:32His mother also lived on the premises, so he had good reason to be there.
44:42What about George Hutchinson?
44:44The witness who followed Mary Jane Kelly after she was accosted by a well-dressed client.
44:51Hutchinson never clarified his motivation for shadowing the couple.
44:55He merely stated that he was surprised to see a man so well-dressed
44:59in the company of a woman like Kelly.
45:01Was he surprised because he was concerned?
45:04Was he jealous?
45:06Was it about money?
45:07After all, Hutchinson was broke and the client appeared to be wealthy.
45:12Perhaps he waited outside the court with the intention of mugging this well-dressed client.
45:19There are many question marks surrounding Hutchinson.
45:22He has never been positively identified so next to nothing is known about his life.
45:27This makes it very difficult to build a strong case against him.
45:31Hutchinson was interrogated by the police
45:34but ultimately convinced Inspector Frederick Abberline that he was telling the truth.
45:40But not every witness attracted such attention from the police.
45:44Take, for instance, Charles Cross.
45:46The man who discovered the body of Mary Ann Nichols.
46:03On the morning of August 31,
46:05Charles Cross left his home on Doveton Street and headed for work.
46:13When he turned into Buck's Row, he happened upon the body of Mary Ann Nichols.
46:20Moments later, he was joined by Robert Paul, and events transpired as previously described.
46:28Despite his proximity to the crime,
46:30Cross appears to have escaped suspicion from both the press and the police.
46:35He was evidently seen as the innocent passer-by that he appeared to be.
46:40But in recent years, that perception has been challenged.
46:43The argument is that Cross was in the act of committing the murder
46:47when he was interrupted by the approaching footsteps of Paul.
46:51Cross then concealed the murder weapon
46:54and portrayed himself as someone who just found the body.
46:57The injuries inflicted upon Nichols would be consisted with an interruption
47:01as they were less severe than those of later victims.
47:05What's interesting about Cross is that he likely testified under a false name.
47:10He claimed to be employed as a carman, and his address was given as 22 Doveton Street.
47:16But surviving records show that, in 1888,
47:19this address was occupied by a man named Charles Lechmere.
47:23Lechmere was also employed as a carman and, on at least one occasion,
47:28went by the name Charles Cross as it was the surname of his stepfather.
47:34It is now widely believed that Charles Lechmere was the man who appeared at the inquest
47:39and that he assumed the name of his stepfather when he testified.
47:43His motivation for doing so has been the source of much speculation.
47:48Was he trying to conceal his identity, or was it merely a force of habit?
47:53After all, contemporary examples of people doing the exact same thing are not difficult to find.
48:00The most compelling evidence against Lechmere is that his morning commute between home and work
48:07roughly coincides with the time and place of the murders.
48:12Except for the murders of Elizabeth Stride and Catherine Eddowes,
48:16who were killed on a Sunday.
48:18The only day when Lechmere would have been free from work.
48:22Not only that but all the murders were committed around weekends and public holidays.
48:27Why would a man who supposedly timed the murders with his morning commute
48:32gravitate towards days of rest?
48:36In any case, Lechmere's mother lived a few blocks south of Berner Street.
48:41The neighborhoods around which is also where Lechmere spent his childhood.
48:45As such, it's speculated that Stride and Eddowes
48:48were killed after Lechmere payed a late-night visit to his mother.
48:53While he claimed to be employed at a delivery firm known as Pickfords,
48:57there are no surviving records of his employment.
49:00If he did work for Pickfords, there is a fair chance that he delivered meat
49:04and would thus have been exposed to slaughter and blood on a daily basis.
49:10Lechmere remained in East London until his death in 1920 at the age of 71.
49:16While there is no evidence of Lechmere ever being suspected by the police,
49:20it is difficult to believe that he was completely overlooked.
49:23Many case files have not survived, so any doubts investigators might have had
49:29could have long since disappeared.
49:32Now, a witness who definitely attracted attention was Joseph Barnett.
49:47Joseph Barnett was the man who lived with Mary Jane Kelly
49:50up until a few days before the murder.
49:53He and Kelly had supposedly met around April of 1887,
49:56and they eventually moved to 13 Miller's Court.
50:00Barnett was employed as a fish porter but, for reasons unknown,
50:03he lost his job between July and August of 1888.
50:08From that point onwards, the couple struggled to pay rent, and Kelly resorted back to prostitution.
50:15Now, those who believe that Barnett was the Ripper view his loss of employment as a turning point.
50:21The argument is that Barnett was so overcome with guilt and anguish for
50:25driving Kelly back to prostitution that he went on a murder spree.
50:30Murdering one local prostitute after another
50:33in a desperate attempt to frighten Kelly off the streets.
50:38While most of this is pure speculation,
50:40it is true that Barnett disapproved of Kelly's prostitution.
50:44You may recall that Barnett separated from Kelly on October 30
50:48because he disliked the prostitutes with whom she associated.
50:52"[Kelly] never went on the streets when she lived with me."
50:55"She would never have gone wrong again, and I should never have left,
50:58if it had not been for the prostitutes stopping [by] the house."
51:02This might further explain why Kelly was the Ripper's final and most viciously mutilated victim.
51:08The implication being that Barnett felt rejected by Kelly and wanted revenge for the break-up.
51:14According to Barnett, he did pay Kelly a visit on the evening of November 8,
51:19but they had parted on "friendly terms".
51:22He then supposedly went home,
51:24played a card game until half-past twelve before going to bed.
51:29Now, Kelly is presumed to have died in the early hours of November 9,
51:33so Barnett could have returned to Miller's Court sometime after midnight.
51:38While the police did subject him to four hours of interrogation,
51:42Barnett was ultimately released without charge.
51:47Then there's the matter of the locked door.
51:51When the police arrived at Miller's Court, they had to force the door open with a pickaxe.
51:56This raised an important question.
51:58How did the killer lock the door behind him?
52:02According to Barnett, the key to Room 13 had been missing for some time.
52:06Because of this, he and Kelly would:
52:08"[open] the door by reaching through the [broken] window".
52:12The door was said to be equipped with a "catch-lock" and evidently locked itself upon being closed.
52:18If that's true, mystery solved.
52:21But, even if the door was not self-locking, there's s till an obvious solution.
52:26All the killer would have had to do is observe Kelly using the window trick
52:30and then employ that same technique to fasten the door upon leaving.
52:34But those who favor Barnett as the Ripper offer yet another solution.
52:39The key never went missing.
52:41Instead, Barnett is said to have stolen the key and then used it on the night of the murder.
52:47These solutions are all equally valid, and it's impossible to know which one is correct.
52:53There is a slight variation of this theory which states that Barnett did murder Kelly
52:58but was not the Ripper.
53:00Instead, he merely emulated the Ripper to deflect attention away from himself.
53:05Once again, this is pure speculation,
53:07but the murder of Kelly did somewhat differ from the rest in that it was committed indoors.
53:13Barnett remained in the East End until his death in 1926 at the age of 68.
53:20While it's only natural for suspicion to fall upon witnesses and acquaintances,
53:25Victorian detectives did pursue other lines of inquiry.
53:29One prominent theory was that the Ripper suffered from insanity.
53:33And a prime suspect in that category is Aaron Kosminski.
53:44The Whitechapel murders investigation was overseen by numerous high-ranking officers
53:48within the Metropolitan Police.
53:51One of them was Assistant Commissioner Robert Anderson.
53:54Upon his retirement, Anderson repeatedly and unequivocally stated
53:58that Jack the Ripper had been identified.
54:01"There was no doubt whatever as to the identity of the criminal."
54:05Without disclosing the name of this suspect, Anderson described him as a "low-class Polish Jew"
54:11who was "safely caged in an asylum".
54:15He'd been identified by a witness who was described as:
54:18"the only person who had ever had a good view of the murderer".
54:22This unnamed witness had supposedly refused to testify because the suspect was "a fellow Jew".
54:30"I am almost tempted to disclose the identity of the murderer."
54:33"But no public benefit would result from such a course."
54:37While Anderson never revealed the name of this suspect,
54:39his colleagues were a bit more forthcoming.
54:42Chief Inspector Donald Swanson revealed that his surname was Kosminski.
54:48Yet another high-ranking officer, Melville Macnaghten,
54:51described Kosminski as a homicidal and misogynistic resident of Whitechapel.
54:57Surviving records show that an Aaron Kosminski was admitted to a psychiatric hospital in 1891.
55:04Aaron was indeed from Poland, he was Jewish, and had lived in Whitechapel.
55:08He suffered from auditory hallucinations and a paranoid fear of being fed by others.
55:14He was trained as a barber but had "not attempted any kind of work for years".
55:19It's unclear when his mental health began to decline, but upon being institutionalized,
55:24Aaron was deemed to be harmless.
55:26He was "quiet and well behaved" and "apathetic as a rule".
55:31Only on rare occasions would he get "exited and violent".
55:36However, before his confinement, Aaron had once threatened his sister with a knife.
55:42The case against him largely hinges upon the claims made by Anderson, Swanson, and Macnaghten.
55:48Especially the claim that an unnamed witness identified a suspect named Kosminski.
55:54But the descriptions of that suspect are not entirely consistent with Aaron Kosminski.
56:00For instance, Macnaghten stated that the suspect had been:
56:03"removed to a lunatic asylum about March 1889".
56:07Aaron was first confined in 1891.
56:10Swanson wrote that the suspect had been "sent to [the asylum] and died shortly afterwards".
56:15Aaron was still alive at the time and spent nearly three decades in psychiatric care.
56:21As such, it is possible that the suspect Kosminski was someone other than Aaron Kosminski.
56:28It's also possible that these inconsistencies were mere lapses in memory.
56:34After all, these events were recounted years or even decades after the fact,
56:38and Macnaghten even confessed to writing solely from memory.
56:44Regardless of the suspect's true identity,
56:47Anderson was the only ones who seemed convinced of his guilt.
56:50Macnaghten ultimately favored a different suspect and stated that:
56:53"many homicidal maniacs were suspected, but no shadow of proof could be thrown on any one".
57:00Inspector Edmund Reid was of the same opinion.
57:03"Now we have Sir Robert Anderson saying that Jack the Ripper was a Jew."
57:07"That I challenge him to prove."
57:10"I challenge anyone to prove that there was a tittle of evidence against man, woman, or child..."
57:15So when Anderson wrote that there was "no doubt whatever as to the identity of the criminal",
57:20he merely expressed his personal opinion.
57:22There was, in fact, ample doubt and no consensus amongst the police.
57:29But, in recent years, Aaron Kosminski has been resurrected as a prime suspect
57:34due to a controversial DNA analysis.
57:37Okay, so, back in 1888, Acting Sergeant Amos Simpson
57:41is said to have stolen a bloodstained shawl from the crime scene of Catherine Eddowes.
57:45This shawl was then passed down from one generation to the next
57:49before being submitted for DNA testing in 2011.
57:53DNA samples were extracted from the shawl and then compared against maternal descendants
57:58of Eddowes and Kosminski.
58:01In both cases, it was a match.
58:04If the subsequent news coverage is to be believed, the mystery has now been "definitively solved".
58:10Aaron Kosminski was Jack the Ripper.
58:13But, as you can imagine, it's never quite that simple.
58:18First of all, the provenance or chain of custody of the shawl is severely lacking.
58:23There is no evidence of a shawl being found at the crime scene
58:26nor is there any evidence of Simpson ever being at the crime scene.
58:29Furthermore, a destitute woman like Eddowes is unlikely to have owned such an expensive item.
58:36Second of all, the type of DNA used to identify Eddowes and Kosminski was mitochondrial DNA.
58:43This type of DNA is passed down through the female line and is not unique to any one individual.
58:48Thousands can share the same mitochondrial DNA,
58:51which means it can't be used to pinpoint a specific person.
58:55In the words of a geneticist:
58:56"Based on mitochondrial DNA, one can only exclude a suspect."
59:01So, to say that the mystery has been "definitively solved" is widely inaccurate.
59:06There is still plenty of room for doubt.
59:09So, to recap.
59:10A suspect named Kosminski was identified by an unknown witness.
59:15This was enough to convince at least one senior officer of his guilt.
59:19That suspect may have been Aaron Kosminski.
59:22A man who was largely non-violent but once threatened his sister with a knife.
59:28Aaron can neither be incriminated nor eliminated by the DNA evidence.
59:33He spent the rest of his life in psychiatric care and died in 1919 at the age of 53.
59:42Kosminski was not the only suspect advanced by a high-ranking officer.
59:46A completely different suspect who still falls into the same category is Francis Tumblety.
1:00:00Two days before the murder of Mary Jane Kelly,
1:00:03an American physician named Francis Tumblety was arrested in London.
1:00:07As you can probably tell from this photograph, Tumblety was quite an eccentric character.
1:00:13He was born in Ireland around 1833 but was raised in the United States.
1:00:18From an early age, Tumblety gained a reputation for being a medicaster or quack doctor.
1:00:23He engaged in all sorts of medically dubious practices
1:00:26and advertised himself as the "Indian Herb Doctor".
1:00:30He promised to cure anything from dyspepsia and scurvy to cancer and blindness
1:00:35using nothing but medicinal herbs.
1:00:38When he was not posing as a doctor, Tumblety was busy running from the law.
1:00:43He was either accused or convicted for crimes like theft and assault,
1:00:47attempt to induce a miscarriage, and manslaughter of a patient.
1:00:51He was even implicated in the assassination of US President Abraham Lincoln
1:00:55but was ultimately cleared of suspicion.
1:00:58Now, in the early 1860s, Tumblety is alleged to have hosted a lavish dinner party in Washington.
1:01:05Only men were invited to this dinner,
1:01:07and Tumblety had supposedly expressed fierce hatred of women.
1:01:11Furthermore, he showcased a cabinet in his office
1:01:14in which he stored a vast collection of jars filled with anatomical specimens.
1:01:19Some of which were said to contain the wombs of "every class of woman".
1:01:26In 1869, Tumblety ventured across the Atlantic and visited England for the first time.
1:01:31By his own admission, he roamed the streets of London until he became familiar with every part of it.
1:01:36He advertised himself as "The Great American Doctor"
1:01:40and had a few of skirmishes with the police.
1:01:43After a few more voyages between the old world and the new,
1:01:46Tumblety found himself in London in the autumn of 1888.
1:01:50The purpose of his visit and whereabouts at the time of the murders are completely unknown.
1:01:55Tumblety never stayed in place for long and made frequent use of false names.
1:02:01There is a story of a mysterious lodger
1:02:03leaving behind a bloodstained shirt near the murder site of Elizabeth Stride.
1:02:08This supposedly happened on the night of the murder,
1:02:11and some believe that this lodger was Francis Tumblety.
1:02:14But there is no firm evidence of that, and the entire incident is fraught with uncertainty.
1:02:23What we do know is that Tumblety was arrested in London on November 7.
1:02:27According to the press as well as Tumblety himself,
1:02:30he was arrested on suspicion of being Jack the Ripper.
1:02:34Two days later, Mary Jane Kelly was found brutally murdered,
1:02:38and it's unclear whether Tumblety was still in custody or had already been released on bail.
1:02:44Nevertheless, he was ultimately charged with four counts of gross indecency,
1:02:49which had nothing to do with the murders.
1:02:52But Tumblety had no intention of standing trial.
1:02:55Instead, he made his way across the English Channel,
1:02:58boarded a steamship under a false name, and fled back to America.
1:03:02He was pursued by detectives and kept under surveillance, but his offenses were "not extraditable."
1:03:08As such, Tumblety remained in the United States and never returned to England.
1:03:15So, to recap.
1:03:16Francis Tumblety was a misogynistic medicaster who was in London at the time of the murders.
1:03:22He even showcased a collection of wombs,
1:03:25and the Ripper did indeed extracted the womb from two of his victims.
1:03:29I mean, he sounds like the perfect suspect.
1:03:32Perhaps a bit too perfect...
1:03:35There is no doubt that Tumblety was in London in 1888,
1:03:38but the claim that he was a misogynistic collector of human body parts is extremely dubious.
1:03:44It can be traced back to a single article from December of 1888
1:03:48featuring an interview with a man named Charles Dunham.
1:03:52Dunham had a long history of spreading misinformation
1:03:55and has been described as a pathological liar, a forger, and a conman.
1:03:59He was even convicted of perjury.
1:04:02As such, there is every reason to believe that this story is a complete fabrication.
1:04:11Furthermore, Tumblety was both older and taller than the men described by most witnesses.
1:04:17Tumblety was said to be "an enormous man"
1:04:20who liked to dress in flamboyant and militaristic outfits.
1:04:23It's difficult to imagine a tall pompous American
1:04:26sneaking around the streets of Whitechapel virtually undetected.
1:04:31On the other hand, it's unclear which, if any, of the witness accounts can be trusted.
1:04:38Then there's the matter of the rings.
1:04:40You may recall that two brass rings were stolen from the body of Annie Chapman.
1:04:44It's suspected that the rings were taken by the Ripper to be kept as trophies.
1:04:49Now, upon his death in 1903, Tumblety left behind a quite impressive estate.
1:04:55But among his many valuable possessions were a pair of inexpensive imitation rings.
1:05:01Could they have been the same rings taken from the body of Chapman?
1:05:05It's possible.
1:05:07It's also impossible to prove.
1:05:13Chief Inspector John Littlechild regarded Tumblety as a "very likely" suspect,
1:05:19and it's not difficult to see why.
1:05:21If the many rumors about him are to be believed,
1:05:24Tumblety had both opportunity and motive to commit the murders.
1:05:28But therein lies the problem.
1:05:30Much of what we know about Tumblety is founded upon unsubstantiated rumors.
1:05:35Tumblety himself was an attention-seeking charlatan with no qualms about lies and deception.
1:05:41With a suspect like that, one can never be certain where the lies end and the truth begins.
1:05:57To theorize about the identity of Jack the Ripper
1:05:59is to navigate a minefield of hearsay, sophistry, and contradictions.
1:06:04Entire encyclopedias have been dedicated to the compilation of suspects.
1:06:08And with every passing year, they seem to grow ever more expansive.
1:06:12Even though there are hundreds of potential suspects,
1:06:15only a dozen or so are worth more than a brief consideration.
1:06:19Some of the more sensational contenders include famous authors and artists
1:06:23as well as high-ranking officers and members of the Royal Family.
1:06:27But these grand conspiracies and elaborate deceptions seem hopelessly contrived
1:06:33against the sheer simplicity of a suspect like Charles Lechmere.
1:06:37An unassuming delivery man on his way to work.
1:06:41Personally, I remain unconvinced that Jack the Ripper has even been identified as a suspect.
1:06:47The few covered in this video are probable candidates,
1:06:51but it's still possible to make persuasive arguments against them.
1:06:54The same is true of all those left out by necessity.
1:06:58None of them can offer anything more than ambiguity and circumstance.
1:07:03With a suspect pool in the hundreds, that might seem improbable.
1:07:07But London was the largest city in the world.
1:07:10Home to the largest port in the world.
1:07:13It was a city of millions with a large population of poorly documented drifters.
1:07:19It's not difficult to imagine one lowly sailor...
1:07:22...butcher, medic, soldier, barber, merchant, porter, clerk, carman, watchman...
1:07:29...blending into the slums of Whitechapel like a grain of sand.

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