The Double Situation

[How Brown]

Joe Chetcuti made a comment on how he would like to see the 40 days between the Double Event to November 9th.....and the 40 days after the MJK Massacre were handled by press and police and to make comparitive notes along the way.

I remember Stephen Ryder mentioning on the "Is It Real" documentary that to him it seemed as if there was a sense of a serial killer already at work in the East End after the Nichols murder....and yet,as we know...the press coverage dissapated after the November 9th murder as well as the perception ( not the absolute concrete reality...) that the police "lightened" up after MJK's death.

I combined these two events because they have some similarities in their respective cases..

Anyone care to begin discussion?

[Dan Norder]

I think the biggest difference in coverage in November is not because anyone thought the killings were over but simply because the press had less to work with. All October there was the inquests of two victims, a torso found, bloodhounds being tested, Warren to vilify and all sorts of letters coming in. In November there was no inquest to speak of, the bloodhounds and Warren all packed up and left town, and the letters were old news and known to be mostly nonsense.

And the idea that it all ended after Kelly has far more to do with how modern books present the case than the public perception at the time. The Ripper investigation and news reports went on for years after that.

[Donald Souden]

Howard,

I would suggest that any comaparisons would be badly flawed at best. Certainly a mere measure of column inches would not work because all manner of outside events influence the space newspapers devote to any particular story. Also, "tone" is an important element of asny newspaper story, yet is quite subjective and, like beauty, in the eye of the beholder.

Also to be taken into the equation is that then, as now, newspapers often have an agenda that goes beyond merely reporting the "news." For example, most of the newspapers in 1888 bore an animus toward Sir Charles Warren (even those that, in general, supported the Conservative Salisbury government) and actively sought his departure. Indeed, many of the "Ripper stories" in October were actually attacks on Warren and the Metropolitan Police. As it turned out, Warren resigned at the time of the Kelly murder and so one good excuse for "all Ripper, all day" newspaper coverage of the Whitechapel murders was eliminated.

But then as I keep saying, we must grudgingly accept that those alive in 1888 were not living their lives for the future satisfaction of Ripperologists.
Darn, right?

Don.