Jack the Ripper Mystery Solved?
Historian Says More than One Murderer Responsible
A lot of what people “know” about Jack the Ripper is actually opinion generated by scores of writers and investigators who have tried to unravel the mystery over the years. However, there are several generally accepted facts.
Between August 31, 1888 and November 9 of the same year five women were murdered in the impoverished East End of London. Although even this “fact” is in dispute. Philip Sugden in his 2002 book, “The Complete History of Jack the Ripper,” equivocated in answering the question of the number of Ripper victims: “There is no simple answer. In a sentence: at least four, probably six, just possibly eight.”
The Signature of Jack’s Murders
All the five widely accepted victims were prostitutes and they were all killed within a mile of each other.
Casebook: Jack the Ripper claims to be “the world’s largest public repository of Ripper-related information.” The site’s authors say, “The Ripper seized the women by their throats and strangled them until they were unconscious if not dead.” Then, he slit the women’s throats before eviscerating them and often taking away an internal organ as a trophy.
Police Receive “Ripper” Letters
About a month after the first killing (September 27) the London Central News Agency received a letter from someone claiming to be the culprit. The letter, addressed to “Dear Boss,” was signed “Jack the Ripper” and that was the first time that title was used.
At first, police thought the letter, like hundreds of others they had received, was a hoax. But the letter writer predicted that the next victim would have an ear lobe cut off and that is what happened to Catherine Eddowes, one of two women murdered on September 30.
London’s Metropolitan Police Jack the Ripper website says, “The two murders of 30 September 1888 gave the letter greater importance and to underline it the unknown correspondent again committed red ink to postcard and posted it on 1 October. In this communication he referred to himself as ‘saucy Jacky...’ and spoke of the ‘double event…’ He again signed off as Jack the Ripper. The status of this correspondence is still being discussed by modern historians.”
Is the Ripper Mystery Solved?
Now, historian Dr. Andrew Cook says he has uncovered the identity of the "Dear Boss" letter writer. In his 2009 book “Jack the Ripper: Case Closed” Dr. Cook says the letter was written by Frederick Best a reporter for The Star newspaper. He says the reason Jack was never caught was because he never existed; he was an invention of London’s newspapers to boost circulation.
Writing about the book in The Daily Telegraph (May 1, 2009) Matthew Moore comments that “Senior police officers who investigated the 1888 prostitute killings were convinced they were not the work of a single man…”
Dr. Cook found the transcript of an interview given by Percy Clark an assistant police surgeon at the time of the murders. In the interview given 18 years after the events of 1888 Clark said “I think perhaps one man was responsible for three of them. I would not like to say he did the others.”
Ripper Story Probably not Finished
Hundreds of books have been written about the Ripper saga and hundreds of people have been unmasked at the perpetrator. Crime writer Patricia Cornwell boasted that she had cracked the crime in 2002. In her book, “Portrait of a Killer: Jack the Ripper – Case Closed” Ms. Cornwell identified the famous painter Walter Sicket as the culprit, a conclusion rejected by most Ripperologists.
Dr. Andrew Cook may face the same fate and the Jack the Ripper story rolls on for more publishing industry profits.
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