Jack the Ripper and the Historical Jesus

George Grosz as Jack the Ripper, Self-Portrait with Eva Peters in the Artist's Studio, 1918

["Jack the Ripper was a forgery invented by journalists to link a series of unrelated murders and sell newspapers, according to a new book." So begins a review by the Daily Mail regarding the new book published by Dr. Andrew Cook titled Jack the Ripper: Case Closed.

The reason I found this interesting, besides my fascination with the Jack the Ripper murders, was the content of the book which sounds eerily similar to studies of another historical figure whom some pseudo-historians claim also didn't exist and was a forgery by his inventors. Of course, I'm speaking of Jesus.

I really do not have a strong opinion on whether Jack the Ripper was a historical figure or a forgery by a desperate newspaper company fallen on hard times. I havn't even read the book, as interesting as it seems. What I do know is that others before Cook have closed the case on Jack the Ripper thinking their findings presented undisputable proof, but they didn't. And neither does this one.

Instead I think the author confuses the media hype surrounding the murders, with the actual investigation of the murders themselves. No doubt there were many forgeries to sell newspapers, but this does not discount a single murderer. We know also that the name "Jack the Ripper" was invented by journalists to make the story more interesting and this became standard practice later on ( the Boston Strangler, the Green River Killer, the Axeman of New Orleans, the Beltway Sniper, and the Hillside Strangler, besides the derivative Yorkshire Ripper almost a hundred years later and the unnamed perpetrator of the "Thames Nude Murders" of the 1960s, whom the press dubbed Jack the Stripper).

But when one examines the investigation itself and the most compelling investigations and autopsies, there leaves little doubt that all five murders were done by the same hand. According to police surgeon Dr. Thomas Bond in 1888, who based his assessment on his own examination of the most extensively mutilated victim, Mary Kelly, and the post mortem notes from the four previous murders:

"All five murders no doubt were committed by the same hand. In the first four the throats appear to have been cut from left to right. In the last case, owing to the extensive mutilation it is impossible to say in what direction the fatal cut was made, but arterial blood was found on the wall in splashes close to where the woman's head must have been lying. All the circumstances surrounding the murders lead me to form the opinion that the women must have been lying down when murdered and in every case the throat was first cut."(1)

Dr. Cook's assessments are nothing new and not very compelling. One cannot seriously consider that five or six killers were at work in the same area around the same time using the same methods. In one particular instance two killers would have had to killed in the same area on the same night. Furthermore, why did all of them stop their killing spree after the murder of Mary Kelly? The only thing I would agree with Dr. Cook is that the other six Whitechapel murders were not done by Jack the Ripper.

So just as we have to put up with books published every two years or so that claim Jesus never existed, though the evidence overwhelmingly supports the fact that He did, so also we have to put up with books claiming they closed the case on Jack the Ripper, even though the overwhelming evidence supports the fact that they have not. -J.S.]

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1. Stewart P. Evans & Keith Skinner, The Ultimate Jack The Ripper Sourcebook, p. 399–402.

Jack the Ripper 'was invented to win newspaper war'

May 1, 2009

Daily Mail UK

Jack the Ripper was a forgery invented by journalists to link a series of unrelated murders and sell newspapers, according to a new book.

The unsolved murders of five prostitutes in London's East End in 1888 have spawned innumerable theories over the identity of the 'real' Jack the Ripper - with candidates including artist Walter Sickert, Alice In Wonderland author Lewis Carroll and even Queen Victoria's grandson the Duke of Clarence.

But now historian Dr Andrew Cook claims to have blown all these theories out of the water by dismissing the notion of a brutal, murderous spree by one 'serial killer' altogether.

In his book Jack The Ripper: Case Closed, he argues that the famous letter bragging about the killings - signed 'Jack the Ripper' in the first-ever use of that name - was actually forged by journalists desperate to sell their newspaper.

Dr Cook says streetwalkers Mary Nichols, Catherine Eddowes, Mary Kelly, Elizabeth Stride and Annie Chapman were killed by different men, as were the six other Whitechapel victims often added to the Ripper's toll.

He takes his evidence from police and medical experts at the time who expressed doubts about the single killer theory even as it began to take hold on the public imagination.

The senior Whitechapel policeman at the time of the killings admitted in his retirement speech that he did not believe Mary Kelly was killed by 'Jack the Ripper', Dr Cook points out.

The assistant police surgeon who examined all five victims, Percy Clark, told the East London Observer in 1910: 'I think perhaps one man was responsible for three of them. I would not like to say he did the others.'

However, comments like this were a drop in an ocean as the myth of the lone rogue killer took hold of the Victorian imagination.

Dr Cook shows that the newly-launched Star newspaper was the first to claim that one man was behind three of the 1888 killings.

Even though most experts today agree that two of these - Emma Smith and Martha Tabram - were not carried out by the same man, the Star's prurient accounts of the on-going murders massively boosted its circulation.

The Star only unveiled the notorious letter from 'Jack the Ripper' in the midst of a drastic fall in sales after the exoneration of a bootmaker it had identified as a key suspect.

Handwriting expert Elaine Quigley, recruited by Dr Cook to examine the letter, has identified it as the work of Star journalist Frederick Best.

But the public was convinced, Dr Cook says - and the concept of a lone rogue killer on the loose in the East End backstreets may have helped the real culprits literally get away with murder.

Official police photograph of Mary Kelly's murder scene in 13 Miller's Court.