Between August and November 1888, the Whitechapel area of London was the scene of five horrifically brutal murders. The serial killer was dubbed “Jack the Ripper”. We've all heard that moniker before, right?
All of the victims were prostitutes, and the series of brutal attacks involved mutilation of the bodies. The exact number of victims is still debated among historians and criminologists. The verified five “canonical” (accepted as genuine) victims were Mary Ann Nichols, Annie Chapman, Elizabeth Stride, Catherine Eddowes and Mary Jane Kelly. There were other suspected victims, but these five are generally accepted by most experts.
The killings were characterised by deep throat slashes, abdominal and genital-area mutilation, removal/relocation of internal organs and facial mutilations. The precision of the mutilations led some to speculate that the killer had anatomical or surgical knowledge.
Several letters, supposedly from the killer, were sent to the police and media. The most famous of these is the "Dear Boss" letter, which is where the name "Jack the Ripper" originates. The authenticity of these letters remains a subject of debate.
The police investigation was extensive, involving many officers, thousands of interviews and even offering a reward for information leading to the capture of the murderer. Despite this, no one was ever caught or convicted for the murders.
Over the years, many suspects have been proposed, ranging from local butchers and doctors to: a Russian con artist, a Polish barber, an Irish-American quack and even the eldest son of Edward VII. However, none have been definitively proven to be Jack the Ripper.
In the immediate aftermath of the murders, depictions of the Ripper in the media were often phantasmic or monstrous. In the 1920s and 1930s, he was depicted in film dressed in everyday clothes as a man with a hidden secret, preying on his unsuspecting victims, but by the 1960s, the Ripper had become "the symbol of a predatory aristocracy”, and was more often portrayed in a top hat dressed as a gentleman. The Establishment as a whole had become the villain, with the Ripper acting as a manifestation of upper-class exploitation.
The case has had a lasting impact on popular culture and has been the subject of countless books, films and theories. It remains one of the most famous and unsolved criminal cases in history.
Jack the Ripper was not, by any stretch of the imagination, our first ever serial killer, but his case was the first to create a worldwide media frenzy.
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References
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_the_Ripper
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Jack-the-Ripper
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/womens-life/11773060/Jack-the-Ripper-Why-does-a-serial-killer-who-disembowelled-women-deserve-a-museum.html
Images
1. A woodcut of one of Jack the Ripper's victims. Credit: Rex Features.
2. Official police photograph of the body of Mary Jane Kelly as discovered in 13 Miller's Court, Spitalfields, 9 November 1888
3. Coverage of Jack the Ripper in the Illustrated Police News, 1888
4. London Daily Post, 9 November 1888
5. The sites of the first seven Whitechapel murders, at least five of which have been attibuted to Jack the Ripper
6. The "From Hell" Letter postmarked 15 October 1888.
7. Speculation as to the identity of Jack the Ripper: cover of the 21 September 1889 issue of Puck magazine, by cartoonist Tom Merry
8. 8 September 1888 edition of the Penny Illustrated Paper depicting the discovery of the body of the first canonical Ripper victim, Mary Ann Nichols
