Jack the local.

[Markus Aurelius Franzoi]

Billycocks are felt hats with narrow brims. It makes sense that two local laborers would call a deerstalker a billycock.

THE BILLY-COCK HAT

By joemasonspage on December 7, 2011


This was a popular nickname for the Bowler hat in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The name, and indeed the hat, originated in England at Holkham in Norfolk. It was intended as a practical version of the top hat for use by gamekeepers on the estate.

https://joemasonspage.wordpress.com/...illy-cock-hat/

[Adam Went]

Hi Trevor and San Fran,.

One thing I do agree with Trevor on is that we shouldn't get too caught on witness descriptions because one, they are notoriously variable (see all the differences) and unreliable, and two, we can't actually say with absolutely certainty that the man they saw was in fact the killer. Why Packer's description is even mentioned is an oddity to me, as he has been completely discredited.

Cheers,
Adam.

[Markus Aurelius Franzoi]

Why Packer's description is even mentioned is an oddity to me, as he has been completely discredited.

Cheers,
Adam.

Packer's description is actually at variance with the other witnesses. I have him down as saying a wideawake hat, which could be deduced as a Rembrandt hat. You'd have to deduce he mixed up the flaps with the upturned sides of a wideawake. I don't think it greatly helps the Rural/Huntsman Outsider With A Deer Stalker hat theory.

Isn't a wideawake more in keeping with a working class person than part of a Victorian gentleman's "country ensemble" like a deerstalker?

https://www.countrylife.co.uk/countr...bout-you-78581

[Adam Went]

Hi San Fran,

More so it's that Packer's known to have been fabricating his story, so I don't think we need pay any attention at all to his version of the type of headware Jack was sporting.

Cheers,
Adam.

[Gary Barnett]

Packer's description is actually at variance with the other witnesses. I have him down as saying a wideawake hat, which could be deduced as a Rembrandt hat. You'd have to deduce he mixed up the flaps with the upturned sides of a wideawake. I don't think it greatly helps the Rural/Huntsman Outsider With A Deer Stalker hat theory.

Isn't a wideawake more in keeping with a working class person than part of a Victorian gentleman's "country ensemble" like a deerstalker?

https://www.countrylife.co.uk/countr...bout-you-78581

We’ve already established that the deerstalker was ubiquitous, worn by all classes of society. You might just as well say that a suspect was wearing shoes and Dukes of the realm wore shoes so we’re looking for a Duke.

[Markus Aurelius Franzoi]

Is the deerstalker ubiquitous to all members of the upper classes? Did regular London businessmen sport them?

If you accept JtR as a "respectable" person, based on the half dozen or so corroborating and credible witnesses (even leaving Packer out), at least as a premise, can you therefore look for a hunter or gameskeeper, or a rural gentleman, or could it equally be a citified gent?

[Gary Barnett]

As I mentioned previously, the Bank of England issued a ‘memo’ to their staff about inappropriate dress, including the wearing of deerstalkers. Soldiers, clerks, labourers, factory workers, dockers wore them. One mention was of the son of a publican.

[Gary Barnett]

Perhaps we should collect a few.

American Fenians:

[Gary Barnett]

November, 1878:

[Gary Barnett]

October, 1889.