Jonathan A's Atlanta's Black Jack The Ripper of 1911 Forum

[Jonathan A]

Minnie Wise

file:///C:/Users/emperor%20john/Downloads/Minnie%20Wise.pdf

[Jonathan A]

Belle Walker

Here is the article on Belle Walker, killed on May 28, 1911. What's interesting is that the Georgian reports that another woman was killed there less than two weeks earlier in the same area(only a yards away) in a similar fashion This is interesting because the only other black woman killed in May was Rosa Rivers who was killed May 7th, 1911(about three weeks from Betty) and she was shot as opposed to having her throat slit. I don't know if she was killed near where Betty was killed. Either the Georgian mistook the details of Rosa's killing or they are talking about a different murder that was not reported.

[Jonathan A]

Bette Walker

Here is the article on Belle Walker, killed on May 28, 1911. What's interesting is that the Georgian reports that another woman was killed there less than two weeks earlier in the same area(only a yards away) in a similar fashion This is interesting because the only other black woman killed in May was Rosa Rivers who was killed May 7th, 1911(about three weeks from Betty) and she was shot as opposed to having her throat slit. I don't know if she was killed near where Betty was killed. Either the Georgian mistook the details of Rosa's killing or they are talking about a different murder that was not reported.

Sorry I forgot to post the link

http://atlnewspapers.galileo.usg.edu/atlnewspapers/view?docId=news/aga1911/aga1911-2696.xml&query=jack%20the%20ripper&brand=atlnewspapers-brand

[Howard Brown]

Alice Owen

Gettysburg Times
February 17, 1912
**************

[Howard Brown]

Its surprising that the Atlanta murders didn't become more well known considering the content ( regardless of whether this victim did have her heart removed, the suggestion was there) of these lurid articles


Belvidere ( Illinois) Daily Republican
November 22, 1911
**************

[Jonathan A]

Interesting. I did not encounter this case before, I will have to see if I can find it in the constitution.

This crime is not mentioned in the Atlanta paper

[Jonathan A]

1917-Ripper Return.

November 1917.
Negress Found with Head Crushed.
Gruesome find in small residence on East Fair Street.
Another notorioius Jack the Ripper case has come to light. The Ripper cases figured prominently in the charges against Chief of Police, James Beavers, when he was first tried. On the very nnight that Beavers was reinstated, by the police borad of commisioners, "Jack" got busy, having been quiet after bEavers was deposed.
The body of Laura Blackwell, a negress, was found yesterday in her residence at 233 East Fair Street. The woman's throat was cut, her head crusshed, and most of her clothing destroyed by fire. Nothing else in the house was molested and no weight is given to the tehory that a burgular committed the murder. Detective Bass Rosser has been assigned to the case

This article incorrectly states that the Ripper was quiet after Beavers was deposed as chief. In fact two murders had occuredd in 1915 when Captain Mayo was Acting Chief.

[Jonathan A]

Alleged Ripper Tried.

John Brown, a negro accused of the murder of Laura Blackwell, a negro scrub woman employed at the courthouse, went on trial Thursday morning before a jury in Judge John Humphries division of the superiror court. Brown is accused of one of the "Jack the Ripper murders which puzzled the police about two years ago. The woman was found in an alley in the rear of East Fair Street with her thorat cut and head crushed, wounds similiar to those inflicted on several other negro women, victims of Jack the Ripper

This occured in 1920

[Jonathan A]

Ripper Convicted.

February 29, 1920
Hohn Brown, a negro was convicted for the second time Friday night for the murder of Laura Blackwell and was sentenced to life imprisonment. It was charged by the state that Brown killed the woman in her home at East Fair Street by cutting her throat and crushing her hyead with an axe. He is characterized by the police as a "Jack the Ripper" and is believed by the police to have committed similiar crimes prior to his arrest. Brown had been previously convicted and sentenced to life but had been given a new trial by Judge B.H Hill.

[Jonathan A]

A couple of months later

Alleged Ripper Behind Bars
Claude Alexander, a negro who lives at the corner oif Garibaldi and Mary streets, and who was arrested yesterday by city detectives Jones and Whately in connection to the murder of Chattie Worsham, a negress of 2 Lowe's alley, sometime Saturday night. Claude is believed by the officers to be Jack the Ripper who ghas operated so extensively in darktown settlements of this city and other towns, terrifying the dusky populations by numerous murders of both men and women.


A couple of things to note about this article.
1-Back in Februaryof that year, the police were claiming that John Brown was the Ripper, now they are saying that Claude is the Ripper. Either John was the true Ripper and was caught, or he was a copy cat. Even worse, he might have been an innocent man imprisoned.
2-No mention of Claude being tried or even indicted, so it appears that he had been released and Chattie's case unsolved.
3-The most interesting part of thisarticle is the last sentence, which attributes to the Ripper murders of both men and women. Before, only the women murders were attributed to the Ripper. There were white men who were said to be attacked by a "Black Jack the Ripper" but this was in Bristol(1911) and Augusta(1913). Could the Ripper have atatcked black men as well. The sentence reminds us of the Atlanta article in 1903 which mentioned several black men saying that they had been attacked by a black man with a knife.

[Jonathan A]

Last Ripper Murder

Police Find Victim of Another Ripper
An uindentified negro woman, about 25 years of age, was found dead on the Southern Railroad tracks early Sunday night, between Peyton and the Chattahoochee station.
Lieutenant J.M Carroll, of the county police force, found the woman lying alongside the tracks with a knife wound in her left temple, and evidence that a scuffle had ensued. The body had been moved to Ivy Undertaking establishment and is being held ppending identification. County officers are investigating. The crime recalls the operations in and around Atlanta a number of years ago of a mysterious "Jack the Ripper" who was credited with more than a dozen murders.

A couple of things to note.
1-The woman was young and black, seh had a knife wound to the temple(most of the Ripper victims had their throats cut, but a few had knife wqounds to the temple) the victim was killed on a weekend(most of the Ripper victims were killed on the weekend) There was evidence, p[erhaps a trail, that a scuffle had broken out(remember the case of Sadie Holley, who was discovered by a man who said that he noticed signs of a scuffle on the dirt)

[Howard Brown]

Good man, Jon A ! Thanks very much

[Jonathan A]

Blow Flowed

Blow Flowed in Crimson tide

[Howard Brown]

Even back then Jon.... US cities could rack up sizeable murder numbers, yet when Britain reached double digits, their press made it out to be a national crisis (like they did in 1897, if I recall...year of Miss Camp's murder).
What does Chicago have now ? 1002 shooting victims* and that's a little less percentage wise from the year before.
Imagine London having 1002 shooting victims in less than six months.


*shooting victims, not murder victims.

[Jonathan A]

Even back then Jon.... US cities could rack up sizeable murder numbers, yet when Britain reached double digits, their press made it out to be a national crisis (like they did in 1897, if I recall...year of Miss Camp's murder).
What does Chicago have now ? 1002 shooting victims* and that's a little less percentage wise from the year before.
Imagine London having 1002 shooting victims in less than six months.


*shooting victims, not murder victims.

In Britain, prostitute murders make big stories by the time a serial killer takes three, wheres in the US, it took a long time before Gary Ridgeway's crime made front page news throughout the country, even though by that time he had done more than fifty. Here in Ny, we have the Long Island Ripper who has never been caught and he has fifteen and yet he remains largely unheard of because he targeted prostitutes.

They were having some of the same debates over gun control that we have now. Judge Broyles suggested placing more fines on illegal gun carriers.
Another thing that is similar is the racial stats. At that time, Atlanta was at least 40% black and yet most of the victims and killers were black.