Read Online Naming Jack the Ripper: The Biggest Forensic Breakthrough Since 1888 by Russell Edwards - Free Book Online
Authors: Russell Edwards
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movements of such gangs, the press had other ideas; the
Star
, a popular radical evening newspaper which would later report
extensively and sensationally about the Whitechapel murders, claimed quite confidently that this latest murder was ‘the third crime of a man who must be a maniac’.
Once again, no culprit was found, but attention began to veer towards the eastern European Jewish immigrants. Not only were they the scapegoat for many of Whitechapel’s social problems,
they also now became a scapegoat for the murders. Amid this growing suspicion and friction, rumours began to circulate about a Jewish slipper-maker with a reputation forill-using prostitutes. Known only as ‘Leather Apron’, because he was supposedly often seen wearing such a garment, his profile began to grow as tale after tale of his
sinister behaviour reached the press. The more sensational newspapers, in their turn, began to build him up as something to be feared, a ‘noiseless midnight terror’ who lurked in the
shadows and from whom no woman was safe. Despite the stories, ‘Leather Apron’ could not be traced.
But fear was beginning to grip the whole area, and when, only nine days later, another body of an unfortunate was found, again with her corpse brutalized, the public, the press and the police
all began to speculate about a madman killer on the loose.
It was about 6 a.m. on the morning of Saturday, 8 September 1888, when John Davis, one of seventeen residents of 29 Hanbury Street, Spitalfields, went down the stairs of the
house and opened the back door leading to the yard. He noticed that the front door of the house, which led directly to the passageway that went to the yard door, was open, but this was nothing
unusual. Nor was it unusual to find drunks sleeping it off in the passageway. He was about to leave for work and was probably going to use the outdoor privy before setting off. As the back door
swung open, he was shocked to see the mutilated body of a woman lying at the bottom of the stone steps leading to the back yard. She was lying beside the fence that separated the yards of numbers
27 and 29, with her head almost touching the steps. Her skirts had been pulled right up, revealing a horrendous gash to the abdomen. On one shoulder were pieces of flesh from the belly and over her
other shoulder was a pile of intestines. Around her neck was a deep jaggedwound that almost severed her head from her body. This latest victim of the Whitechapel horrors was
forty-seven-year-old Annie Chapman, known to some as ‘Dark Annie’, because of her dark hair, or ‘Annie Sivvey’.
Annie Chapman was born Annie Eliza Smith in Paddington, London, in 1841. Like the three women who were murdered before her that year (and many of the unfortunates) she had a family – and
yet she ended up in the squalid district of Spitalfields where she would ultimately meet her end. Again, like the others, alcohol was a major factor in her descent to the very bottom of the social
pile.
Annie married John Chapman, a coachman, in 1869. There is a studio photograph of them, probably at the time of the wedding, looking every inch the respectable, attractive young couple. They had
three children, two daughters and a son, who was born a cripple. The elder daughter tragically died from meningitis aged twelve. Owing to John’s work, they were provided with simple
accommodation by his employers and lived in many affluent parts of west London, as well as Clewer in Windsor; it was while they were here that Annie left the family in around 1885 as a result of
her heavy drinking and the behaviour that resulted from it.
It is possible that John was a heavy drinker too, because the ten shillings he paid Annie weekly following their separation stopped when he died of cirrhosis of the liver and dropsy on Christmas
Day, 1886. The two surviving children, the boy living in an institution called The Cripples’ Home, and a girl who had been well educated
Star
, a popular radical evening newspaper which would later report
extensively and sensationally about the Whitechapel murders, claimed quite confidently that this latest murder was ‘the third crime of a man who must be a maniac’.
Once again, no culprit was found, but attention began to veer towards the eastern European Jewish immigrants. Not only were they the scapegoat for many of Whitechapel’s social problems,
they also now became a scapegoat for the murders. Amid this growing suspicion and friction, rumours began to circulate about a Jewish slipper-maker with a reputation forill-using prostitutes. Known only as ‘Leather Apron’, because he was supposedly often seen wearing such a garment, his profile began to grow as tale after tale of his
sinister behaviour reached the press. The more sensational newspapers, in their turn, began to build him up as something to be feared, a ‘noiseless midnight terror’ who lurked in the
shadows and from whom no woman was safe. Despite the stories, ‘Leather Apron’ could not be traced.
But fear was beginning to grip the whole area, and when, only nine days later, another body of an unfortunate was found, again with her corpse brutalized, the public, the press and the police
all began to speculate about a madman killer on the loose.
It was about 6 a.m. on the morning of Saturday, 8 September 1888, when John Davis, one of seventeen residents of 29 Hanbury Street, Spitalfields, went down the stairs of the
house and opened the back door leading to the yard. He noticed that the front door of the house, which led directly to the passageway that went to the yard door, was open, but this was nothing
unusual. Nor was it unusual to find drunks sleeping it off in the passageway. He was about to leave for work and was probably going to use the outdoor privy before setting off. As the back door
swung open, he was shocked to see the mutilated body of a woman lying at the bottom of the stone steps leading to the back yard. She was lying beside the fence that separated the yards of numbers
27 and 29, with her head almost touching the steps. Her skirts had been pulled right up, revealing a horrendous gash to the abdomen. On one shoulder were pieces of flesh from the belly and over her
other shoulder was a pile of intestines. Around her neck was a deep jaggedwound that almost severed her head from her body. This latest victim of the Whitechapel horrors was
forty-seven-year-old Annie Chapman, known to some as ‘Dark Annie’, because of her dark hair, or ‘Annie Sivvey’.
Annie Chapman was born Annie Eliza Smith in Paddington, London, in 1841. Like the three women who were murdered before her that year (and many of the unfortunates) she had a family – and
yet she ended up in the squalid district of Spitalfields where she would ultimately meet her end. Again, like the others, alcohol was a major factor in her descent to the very bottom of the social
pile.
Annie married John Chapman, a coachman, in 1869. There is a studio photograph of them, probably at the time of the wedding, looking every inch the respectable, attractive young couple. They had
three children, two daughters and a son, who was born a cripple. The elder daughter tragically died from meningitis aged twelve. Owing to John’s work, they were provided with simple
accommodation by his employers and lived in many affluent parts of west London, as well as Clewer in Windsor; it was while they were here that Annie left the family in around 1885 as a result of
her heavy drinking and the behaviour that resulted from it.
It is possible that John was a heavy drinker too, because the ten shillings he paid Annie weekly following their separation stopped when he died of cirrhosis of the liver and dropsy on Christmas
Day, 1886. The two surviving children, the boy living in an institution called The Cripples’ Home, and a girl who had been well educated
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