From Hell: Is IT important only for the kidney?

[Howard Brown]

Tommy:

I'm gonna take that early edition to work today and look for it...not that I have any doubt that its in there....but I never knew that was in there. I don't dismember it off the top of my shoulders....er,head.

Sig

[Chris G.]

1. It went to a private citizen who was hunting for the Ripper.
2. It was sent to a prominent private citizen who was leading the "street hunt" for the Ripper.
3. It came AFTER the incident with Ms.Marsh the day before in her pop's shop.
4. It didn't just boast of future deeds....it may have provided the end result of a committed deed.
5. It made an enormous buzz within the police department...not to mention the press.
6. It may have been a faked act,which would certainly led to the culprit's imprisonment.
7. It might have been the actual kidney...despite the consensus of many people now.

So....did the kidney "make the letter" or did the letter have enough meat in it to make its bones ?

I believe Tom Wescott and Chris George felt the letter was worthy of investigation just a couple of years ago for the possible link to D'onston ( the use of the word praserved....which was also found in a (correctly spelled ) letter by Donston to the police). You never know....

Hi Howard

A year after the Lusk letter, Albert Bachert, by then head of the Whitechapel Vigilance Committee, was the recipient of a series of letters supposedly from the killer. One of them is quoted in the East London Advertiser of Saturday, 19 October 1889:

JACK THE RIPPER SCARE.

Mr. Albert Backhert [Bachert], chairman of the Whitechapel Vigilance Committee, has received the following letter: "Whitechapel, 9th October, 1889. Dear Boss, - I write you these few lines to let you know, as you are the Boss of the Vigilant Society, that the last job wasn't me. You might have known it wasn't me, for I shouldn't have made such a 'botch' of it. Never mind, young man. You can keep your lamps open for the 18th of October. I am on the job again. There's no blood knocking about or I let you see some. Never mind. Look out, old man. Your a brave sort. You thought you had me once. Don't forget the 18th. - Yours in haste, JACK THE R. - Albert Backhert." The envelope bears the East London postmark, and was posted on Saturday. The writing corresponds with that in the letters received by Mr. Backhert previously. The "B" and "R" are a facsimile of those in the two letters that were sent to Mr. Backhert before the Miller's-court and Castle-alley murders, and these two letters turned out to be true. In this instance, however, the letters "J. R." are on the envelope as well as on the address.

Albert Bachert bears a very curious relationship to the murders and appears in a large number of period news reports either directly related to the case or because of various scrapes he got himself into. Much like Roslyn D'Onston he seems to have had a great need to push his way into the case. If D'Onston did not send the Lusk letter, someone like Bachert might qualify as the type of person who could have, possibly because he wanted to scare Lusk and get him to resign so he could push his way into leading the vigilance group. It's not clear when Bachert joined the vigilance group or if the committee fell moribund and was resurrected by Bachert a year later. At that time, was he really receiving "Ripper" letters or was he writing them to himself to keep his good self in the news?

Best regards

Chris George

[Tom_Wescott]

Chris,

Wasn't Albert's real first name John?

J.A. Bachert = J. H. Batchelor?

August 1887 - both Le Grand and Albert Bachert write letters to the police complaining of a constable.

Oct. 1888 - Le Grand and Bachert each make their first press appearances regarding the murders on the same day, each serving up a 'suspect' that matched one of those described by a legitimate Berner Street witness (Le Grand/PC Smith, Bachert/Mrs. Mortimer). The Three Nuns was home to a smaller vigilance committee with which Bachert may have been attached.

Bachert later headed the committee that employed Le Grand.

Not really a theory I'm pursuing with vigor, but enough interesting parallels that it's worth thinking about.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Chris G.]

Chris,

Wasn't Albert's real first name John?

J.A. Bachert = J. H. Batchelor?

August 1887 - both Le Grand and Albert Bachert write letters to the police complaining of a constable.

Oct. 1888 - Le Grand and Bachert each make their first press appearances regarding the murders on the same day, each serving up a 'suspect' that matched one of those described by a legitimate Berner Street witness (Le Grand/PC Smith, Bachert/Mrs. Mortimer). The Three Nuns was home to a smaller vigilance committee with which Bachert may have been attached.

Bachert later headed the committee that employed Le Grand.

Not really a theory I'm pursuing with vigor, but enough interesting parallels that it's worth thinking about.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

Ha, interesting thoughts, Tom, that Bachert and Batchelor might have been one and the same. I should think though that since both individuals had a certain visibility in the case, it would be hard for people not to note that Bachert had posed as Batchelor. Bachert's father's name was John Bachert. I am not sure that his given name was John Albert Bachert. I think it was plain Albert Bachert, though I am open to being corrected.

Chris

[Tom_Wescott]

Chris,

Le Grand and Batchelor only made the one public appearance and that was following the double event. Bachert really didn't become a media darling until much later. I agree that Bachert is a long shot behind James Hall as a contender for Batchelorhood, but the names are quite similar and there's something about Le Grand and Bachert the suggests a connection.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Joe Chetcuti]

Hello Howard,

Many years ago I photo-copied those words from Macleod out of a Ripper book, but I neglected to write down the name of the book. What a mistake that ended up being!

Doggone it, Robert and I were banging our heads in the wall last summer looking for the book that contained these exact Macleod quotes. Do you remember what a pain in the neck that was, Robert? Man, we'd find bits and pieces of those quotes from other Ripper books, but it just wasn't the complete quotes that I had once photo-copied.

Macleod originally published his words in a periodical called The Criminologist during August 1968. I remember Stephen Ryder telling me that he had a copy of that Criminologist issue in his collection, but I was still determined to find the Ripper book that contained Macleod's words.

At this point I called on the services of secret agent Judith Stock. She is the one person who knows everything about Ripper literature. Of course she found it instantly! Judith provided me the name of the book, its edition, the page number, and the whole works. Macleod's quotes had come from Mr. Rumbellow's book.

It's funny. I've now placed all my pre-2007 Ripper material in my cellar, and I'm almost afraid to go down there. I picture myself getting swallowed by a hungry mountain of paperwork.

[Robert Linford]

Joe, what's that line from Emo Phillips? "When I was a little boy my parents kept telling me 'Don't open the cellar door.' It was five years before I saw the sun."

[Tom_Wescott]

Hey, I just remembered I have the full text of the McLeod article on PDF if anybody wants it.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Howard Brown]

Tom:

First of all....thats an interesting idea you have about how similar the surnames are. You've got that eye for detail,dude.

Second of all....by all means...send the MacLeod pdf to me or if you wish,put it up here when you have the opportunity. Thats a nice gesture,Tom.

Thirdly....I found two references in the first edition ( In retrospect,I did read this before.....but simply forgot it.) of The Complete by Mr.Rumbelow in regard to the "handwriting" that Joltin' Joseph Chetcuti mentioned.

The first is on page 84 and the second is on page 117.

Should anyone wish me to post the passage(s),let me know,since this may not be found in editions other than the first one by DR.

Dear CG:

I owe you a beer or two, sor. Thanks for reminding me of Bachert ( or as Rumbelow spelled him, Backert)....

I was going to ask people about what Bachert is alleged to have said to police officials...ah,let me set a thread up for that tonight. But thanks C.G.

Yes,at least to me Bachert looks similar to Stephenson in how he might have made some effort to insinuate himself into the Case.

Dear Joe:

No need to go check for those dates,buddy. We got 'em. Thanks for the effort in explaining where it came from. I do have a first edition Rumbelow.

[David Jackson]

Hi all.

Because I was mostly on the Eddowes trail today I was also thinking about this letter, which i've always been relatively happy as being genuine.

The main reason for this is that the kidney, from everything i've heard at least, was human. Is there any evidence against that?

If not, I think it's another case of not seeing the wood for the trees.

If the kidney was human, I think it hugely unbelievable that the letter wasn't sent by the killer, and that's even before considering that Eddowes' kidney (or part of) was missing and that it had signs of a condition she had.

I know many people had the condition she reportedly have, but how many people would have a human kidney hanging around to use in this letter?

So to answer the initial point of this thread, yes, I think the kidney is central to the letter, though some of the details are certainly interesting.

[Sam Flynn]

The main reason for this is that the kidney, from everything i've heard at least, was human. Is there any evidence against that?

To my mind, there's no particularly strong evidence that it was.

[David Jackson]

To my mind, there's no particularly strong evidence that it was.

Didn't at least two doctors (Brown and Openshaw) say it was human after examining it?

[Stephen Collyer]

Forget the kidney. To me that's a sideshow. The things that give me the creeps about From Hell are the calm matter of factness of it & also the psychological mess that is the handwriting. No camp boastfulness, no neat & tidy copperplate.
From a less credible point of view, the whole knif & whil misspellings seem very contrived.
I still think that if any correspondence was sent from JTR during that Autumn the From Hell is it.

[Howard Brown]

Stephen, all

Just a thought but if you feel From Hell is legitimate ( I'm not arguing whether it is or isn't).....then you probably don't feel a Jewish/Continental man was the killer, correct ?

I had a problem with the GSG and a preferred suspect for a while which is like the above.
I don't think a seaman would have etched the graffiti, although a murderous seaman would be at the top of my suspect list...yet I'm of the opinion the graffiti is legit. In short, I can't have them both ( in my mind ) but I think they are both are.

Anyone else like that ?
Perplexed In Pennsylvania

[Sam Flynn]

Didn't at least two doctors (Brown and Openshaw) say it was human after examining it?

That little nugget of info only comes down to us via secondary and, in my opinion, rather questionable sources, David. In some contemporary accounts, it was claimed that it was the "ginny" kidney of a 45 year-old woman... which is dubious to say the least. The consumption of gin doesn't alter the appearance of a kidney, and you really can't tell a person's age to any degree of precision, even with an intact specimen. Determining the person's sex would have been nigh-on impossible, as male and female kidneys vary widely in size, and there's a degree of overlap: some male kidneys are smaller than women's, and some women's are larger than the typical male's. Furthermore, chromosomal sex typing wouldn't be discovered for almost 20 years, so we can rule out tests for any "XX" chromosomes present in the cells. Aside from questionable, and sometimes conflicting, contemporary accounts, we have the the hugely unreliable memoirs of Major Henry Smith, writing many years later, and clearly intent on puffing up his involvement in the case.

There were even contemporary experts who cast serious doubt on whether the kidney was even human, as in this report from 20th October 1888: http://www.casebook.org/press_report.../18881020.html