BLOODY JACK Chapter Eleven

 

I was not surprised that Coroner Baxter was eager to resume his inquest into the death of Mary Ann “Polly” Nichols, which he did promptly on Monday morning, 3 September, 1888. But I was surprised by the first witness presented – Detective Inspector John Spratling, from the Bethnal Green “J” Division. 

Spratling had not even arrived at the murder scene until after Polly Nichols' body had been removed, leaving just a blood stain on the sidewalk to be examined. Even then, Spratling had quickly followed Polly's body to the Montague Street Morgue, where he found the corpse already stripped by the two workhouse morgue attendants. It was at this point that Coroner Baxter demanded to know who had given the attendants “authority” to do that. “I don't object to their stripping the body,” said the prickly Baxter, “but we ought to have evidence about the clothes.”

The clothes had been left lying on the floor of the tiny exam room– a black straw bonnet  trimmed with black velvet,  a reddish brown coat and an ulster jacket with seven large brass buttons, a brown linsey dress which looked new, both a gray woolen and a flannel petticoat, with “Property of Lambeth Workhouse” stenciled on their waistbands, and a pair of stays “in fairly good condition”. Baxter immediately became focused on the stays, which women wore before the invention of the modern girdle. The police, concerned that the case was veering off course, sent for the clothing.

While waiting for the missing stays, Inspector Spratling explained he had returned to Buck's Row that evening and examined the pavement up to Brady Street, and down to Baker's Lane, but found no traces of blood, dispelling the possibility Polly Nichols had been killed any where but where her body had been found. 

And after interviewing the residents in the houses on the south side of Buck's Row, including a woman who was awake and pacing in her kitchen between 3 and 4 that Friday morning, he could find no one who had heard a struggle or a woman crying out. Polly Nichols had been murdered quickly, probably by chocking, and all of the knife wounds had been inflicted after her death. And, in answer to a jury question, Spratling said all the wounds had been inflicted through her clothes.

Slaughter-house worker Henry Tompkins offered that he had heard no shouts or disturbance, and he was followed by 40 year old Police Constable Jonas Mizen - badge number 56 “H”, Whitechapel division. With 15 years on the force, he was the “extra” Bobby at the scene, who had been sent to fetch the ambulance cart, and he now explained how and why he arrived there. While rousting drunks and vagrants sleeping on the street around Hanbury Street and Baker's Row – part of his beat - he had been approached by Charles Cross (above), who told him there was a policeman on Buck's Row who had found a woman who was either dead or dead drunk, and who had asked for assistance. Mizen eventually responded, but not very quickly.

Charles Cross, a.k,a Charles Allen Lechmere, then testified he never told PC Mizen another policeman needed him.  Then William Nichols, Polly's estranged husband, testified the failed marriage was entirely Polly’s fault.  Then Emily Holland testified about her conversation with Polly at the corner of Whitechapel Road and Osborn Street  And after half a dozen other witnesses testified they had heard and seen nothing on Buck's Row that night, Corner Baxter (above)  got to the witness he wanted to grill – the mentally impaired 53 year old ex-dock worker and Workhouse poverty case, Robert Mann.

By this time the clothing had been brought to the inquest, and Detective Inspector Joseph Helson of Bethel Green division said the stays (above) had been so loosely tied the stab wounds could have been inflicted merely by throwing Polly's dress up over her knees, which she or the killer could have done. But Baxter, the firm advocate of procedure, was not to be dissuaded from uncovering the failings of his "lessers".  Robert Mann testified his breakfast had been interrupted by the arrival of the body before 5:00 am that Friday morning.  He had admitted the the police to the mortuary, and after breakfast had returned with 68 year old James Hatfield, and together they had disrobed the body.

Baxter (above) demanded to know, “Had you been told not to touch it?” -  meaning the body. Mann replied simply, “No.” Then Mann  made the mistake of adding, “Inspector Helson was not there.”  Baxter asked, “Did you see Inspector Helson?”  Mann suddenly realized he had said too much, and gave the standard servants' reply “I can't say”.  In other words not yes and not no. Still on the scent, Baxter asked  “I suppose you do not recollect whether the clothes were torn?” Mann responded, “They were not torn or cut.” Baxter gave his wounded prey a little more rope. “You cannot describe where the blood was?” And Mann took the hint and answered, “No sir, I cannot.” Then Mann jumped, asking, “How did you get the clothes off?”  At this point, Robert Mann realized that somehow he was now caught, but he didn't seem to know what his mistake had been. So he responded simply, “Hatfield cut them off?”

A member of the jury came to Mann's rescue, asking “Was the body undressed in the mortuary or in the yard?” And Mann could now understand what this betters believed his mistake was.  The “gentlemen” were worried that a woman, even a dead one, had been naked in public. So he proudly answered, “In the mortuary.” The break gave Coroner Baxter the chance to play the “better man”, when he pointed out to the jury what they must have known from the instant Mann had opened his mouth.  Baxter said, “It appears the mortuary-keeper is subject to fits, and neither his memory nor statements are reliable.” Of course, if that were true, why call him as a witness, except to humiliate him in public?

But Baxter was so determined to re-establish the social order that he then called the elderly dim witted James Hatfield to the stand next, and asked him, "Who was there?”  Hatfield replied, “Only me and my mate.” Then the old man went on to explain, he first took off Polly's ulster,   “... which I put aside on the ground. We then took the jacket off, and put it in the same place. The outside dress was loose, and we did not cut it. The bands of the petticoats were cut, and I then tore them down with my hand. I tore the chemise down the front. There were no stays.”

Baxter asked who had told them to do all of this, and Hatfield responded, “No one...We did it to have the body ready for the doctor.”  Baxter seemed offended by Hatfield's impudence. He demanded, “Who told you the doctor was coming”. The idea that an assistant morgue attendant would have expected a doctor to appear  after the arrival of a murdered woman, did not seem to occur to Coroner Baxter. But even the partially senile Hatfield was too smart to fall for this trap.  He said only, “I heard someone speak of it.”  Baxter pressed ahead. “Was any one present whilst you were undressing the body?” Hatfield stepped lightly aside to avoid the trap. He answered, “Not as I was aware of.”

You can almost hear the arrogance and sarcasm dripping from the transcript as Baxter then asked the old man, “Having finished, did you make the postmortem examination?” Hatfield explained, “No, the police came.” Baxter missed the joke entirely. Clearly enjoying his own power,  he sneered, “Oh, it was not necessary for you to go on with it! The police came?” “Yes,” said the assistant morgue attendant,  “ They examined the petticoats, and found the words "Lambeth Workhouse" on the bands.” “It was cut out?”, asked the bureaucrat. “I cut it out,” said the old man. Supremely confident, Baxter asked, “Who told you to do that?” And now Hatfield sprang his own little trap. He answered, “Inspector Helson.”

Now it was Inspector Joseph Helson's chance to rescue the coroner, by pointing out he had arrived at about 6:30 that morning, thus giving a time line to Hatfield's story. But Coroner Baxter still tried to salvage the old man's reputation.  He challenged the witness, “Did not you try the stays on in the afternoon to show me how short they were?”  To which Mr. Hatfield gracefully replied, “I forgot it.”  Baxter was now able to tell the jury, “He admits his memory is bad.” Hatfield admitted that, and Baxter took his little victory and closed by saying, “We cannot do more.”

After Mary Ann Monk testified that at about 7:00 pm on Friday 31 August, 1888 she had seen Polly entering a pub on New Kent Road, indicating that like Martha Tabem, Polly Nichols had been pub hopping, the inquest was adjourned until 17 September, to give the police two more weeks to gather evidence, and for Coroner Baxter's bruised ego time to recover. But it also gave Bloody Jack time to recover as well.

- 30 -

BLOODY JACK Chapter Four

 

I suspect that even in Whitechapel, Mary Ann Connolly stood out. She was about 50 years old and stood 6 feet tall, Her face was "reddened and sodded by drink". She went by the street monikers of "Moggg" and  “Pearly Poll”. And on the morning of Thursday, 9 August, 1888, the broad shouldered woman marched into the White Chapel Commerce Street station house, and in a deep raspy voice announced  she knew the name of the woman who had been murdered in George Yard on Tuesday morning. Detective Edmund Reid quickly went down stairs to interview the woman.

According to Pearly Poll, she was currently living at Crossingham's Lodging House, aka The Round House, a private “dosshouse” at 35 Dorset Street. She had known Emma Turner for four or five months, and the two had become “drinking partners”. 

The evening of the Bank Holiday, Monday, 6 August, they made the rounds of several pubs, until about 10:00 p.m. when they met two soldiers, a Guardsman and a corporal,  in the Two Brewers pub on Brick Lane (above). 

Pub hopping for the next ninety minutes, their last stop was The White Hart pub (above), next to the entrance of George Yard (above, right) on Whitechapel High Street. Just before midnight, the four split up. The last Poll had seen of Emma Turner, she was disappearing into the shadows of George Yard alley with her guardsman customer.

Poll had taken her corporal up the block to Angel Alley (above, right), an even narrower, darker 3 foot wide passage between Whitechapel and Wentworth streets, next to The Angel pub. 

There Poll performed her service up against the wall (above, to the left of the shop window), called  a "tup penny upright",  or a "thru penny knee trembler". 

Thirty minutes later, having earned enough for her bed in the doss house, Poll left the corporal standing at the corner of Wentworth and George Yard (above, bottom center), waiting for his friend to reappear.

Detective Reid thought the story had problems. Poll's claim that she left a corporal at the corner of Wentworth and George Yard at 12:15 am, was similar to Constable Barrett's story of speaking to a soldier at the same spot about 2:00 am. Could Pearly Poll have been mistaken by 2 hours? Looking into the woman's gin soaked eyes Reid thought that was more than possible. He did not share his concerns, nor did he tell Poll that he now had two names for the woman found murdered in George Yard 

Instead he paid Poll a few shillings, and promised her more if she returned tomorrow for a trip to the Tower of London, to review the soldiers stationed there. And then he hurried her out the door. He had an appointment that afternoon at The Working Lads' Institute.

According to lawyer, merchant and devout Methodist, Henry Hill, in 1875 one of his employees spied a messenger, sent to pick up some new quill pens, returning to the company offices. The boy had the quills jutting out of the top of his hat, thus freeing his arms to hold open a “penny dreadful” adventure story (above), which he was devotedly reading as other pedestrians swerved to avoid colliding with him.

The employee thought him such a laughable creature, he told their boss. But Mr. Hill was not amused. He summoned the messenger to his office and found, “The boy went to neither night school nor Sunday school, and read no other literature than the sensational stories...”  This boy,  lamented Mr Hill, “...is as much a heathen as any inhabitant of India or China.” And he decided to fix that.

Two years later the socially minded Mr. Hill, founded The Working Lads Institute, a subsidized private club where working class young men could relax, socialize and “network” in an atmosphere of sobriety and thriftiness. 

And in 1885 the Working Lads' Institute built new quarters at 285 Whitechapel Road (above), next door to the Whitechapel Underground Station (above, half visible to the left) and just across the street from the London Hospital. 

The Institute boasted a dormitory, a library, a gymnasium and a “Swimming Bath.” (above) It also offered educational classes for those seeking to better their lot in life. To defray costs, the institute rented its classrooms for various functions, including corner's inquests, like the one held to investigate the murder of the unidentified woman found butchered in George Yard.

Coroners (above, center bg) usually lacked medical training, and the inquests they held, were not trials. The coroner could issue subpoenas and question witnesses (above, left)  in front of a jury (above, right), drawn from the rolls of “freeholders”, who owned enough property to have the right to vote. The jury would then pass judgement whether the death was accidental, careless or criminal. But they could not charge anyone with a crime. 

Still, in the words of a modern author, such inquests added two valuable extralegal elements to the judicial process. “First it invited armature and expert perspectives at the same time,...Second...it had narrative...” In other words, without the restrictions of chain of custody, or against hearsay testimony, and because they were often well attended by the press, an inquest provided an often salacious story of why and how an individual had died, usually within 48 hours of the event. The police and prosecutors could then follow up the corner's evidence, if they deemed it advisable.

Deputy Coroner George Collier (above) called this jury to order at 2:00 p.m., on Thursday 9 August, 1888, just 56 hours after the woman found in George Yard had been declared dead. In attendance, beside the jury – the foreman was a Mr. Greary – was Collier's assistant Mr. Banks. There was also Detective Inspector Edmund Reid, dressed in his usual impeccable manner, with Metropolitan Police Sargent Green beside him, taking notes. Before the jury was called to order it was Reid who informed Collier that they now had two identities for the dead woman, Emma Turner and/or Martha Turner. Collier decided not to release either name until one could be confirmed. Then he began to call witnesses.

Elizabeth Mahoney testified that she and her husband John had returned home to George Yard at 1:40 a.m., and she had almost immediately gone back out and returned “no more than five minutes later”. She had seen no one in the stairwell on either trip. Cabbie Alfred Crow testified he had seen someone lying on the stairs at about 3:30 a.m.  And John Reeves testified to finding the body just before 5:00 am. Constable Barrett testified he had examined the body and sent for Dr. Timothy Kileen.

Doctor Killeen had declared the victim dead at 5:30 a.m. He estimated the woman's age at about 36 years old and 5 feet, 3 inches tall.. He now said there were 36 stab wounds to the body, many of which could not have been self inflicted - 7 to the lungs, 1 to the heart, 5 to the liver, 2 to the spleen and six to the stomach. 

He now said that most of the wounds were inflicted by a knife, but one wound, which penetrated the breastbone, might have made by a bayonet. He felt certain all had been inflicted while the victim was pre-mortem - while she was still alive. And he gave the time of death as about 2:30 a.m., Tuesday, 7 August, 1888. He found blood between the scalp and skull, and added that the woman's brain appeared pale but healthy. There was food in the digestive tract. When pressed by Mr. Collier he admitted some of the wounds might have been inflicted by a left handed man.

Coroner Collier called this “one of the most terrible cases that one can imagine. The man must have been a perfect savage to have attacked a woman in this way.” He then ordered the inquest be continued in  2 weeks time, so the woman's identity could be confirmed. This was important because most murder victims knew their killers. But it was just another indication of how little the authorities were ready for the hell which had descend upon Whitechapel, London.  

- 30 -

BLOODY JACK Chapter Eleven

 

I was not surprised that Coroner Baxter was eager to resume his inquest into the death of Mary Ann “Polly” Nichols, which he did promptly on Monday morning, 3 September, 1888. But I was surprised by the first witness presented – Detective Inspector John Spratling, from the Bethnal Green “J” Division. 

Spratling had not even arrived at the murder scene until after Polly Nichols' body had been removed, leaving just a blood stain on the sidewalk. Even then, Spratling had quickly followed Polly's body to the Montague Street Morgue, where he found the corpse already stripped by the two workhouse morgue attendants. It was at this point that Coroner Baxter demanded to know who had given the attendants “authority” to do that. “I don't object to their stripping the body,” said the prickly Baxter, “but we ought to have evidence about the clothes.”

The clothes had been left lying on the floor of the tiny exam room– a black straw bonnet  trimmed with black velvet,  a reddish brown coat and an ulster jacket with seven large brass buttons, a brown linsey dress which looked new, both a gray woolen and a flannel petticoat, with “Property of Lambeth Workhouse” stenciled on their waistbands, and a pair of stays “in fairly good condition”. Baxter immediately became focused on the stays. The police, concerned that the case was veering off course, sent for the clothing.

While waiting for the missing stays, Inspector Spratling explained he had returned to Buck's Row that evening and examined the pavement up to Brady Street, and down to Baker's Lane, but found no traces of blood, dispelling the possibility Polly Nichols had been killed any where but where her body had been found. 

And after interviewing the residents in the houses on the south side of Buck's Row, including a woman who was awake and pacing in her kitchen between 3 and 4 that Friday morning, he could find no one who had heard a struggle or a woman crying out. Polly Nichols had been murdered quickly, probably by chocking, and all of the knife wounds had been inflicted after her death. And, in answer to a jury question, Spratling said all the wounds had been inflicted through her clothes.

Slaughter-house worker Henry Tompkins offered nothing new, and he was followed by 40 year old Police Constable Jonas Mizen - badge number 56 “H”, Whitechapel division. With 15 years on the force, he was the “extra” Bobby at the scene, who had been sent to fetch the ambulance cart, and he now explained how and why he arrived there. While rousting drunks and vagrants sleeping on the street around Hanbury Street and Baker's Row – part of his beat - he had been approached by Charles Cross (above), who told him there was a policeman on Buck's Row who had found a woman who was either dead or dead drunk, and who had asked for assistance. Mizen eventually responded, but not very quickly.

Charles Cross, a.k,a Charles Allen Lechmere, then testified he never told PC Mizen another policeman needed him.  Then William Nichols, Polly's estranged husband, testified the failed marriage was entirely Polly’s fault.  Then Emily Holland testified about her conversation with Polly at Whitechapel Road and Osborn Street  And after half a dozen other witnesses testified they had heard and seen nothing on Buck's Row that night, Corner Baxter (above)  got to the witness he wanted to grill – the mentally impaired 53 year old ex-dock worker and Workhouse poverty case, Robert Mann.

By this time the clothing had been brought to the inquest, and Detective Inspector Joseph Helson of Bethel Green division said the stays (above) had been so loosely tied the stab wounds could have been inflicted merely by throwing Polly's dress up over her knees, which she or the killer could have done. But Baxter, the firm advocate of procedure, was not to be dissuaded from uncovering the failings of his "lessers". Robert Mann testified his breakfast had been interrupted by the arrival of the body before 5:00 am that Friday morning. He had admitted the the police to the mortuary, and after breakfast had returned with 68 year old James Hatfield, and together had they disrobed the body.

Baxter (above) demanded to know, “Had you been told not to touch it?” -  meaning the body. Mann replied simply, “No.” Then he made the mistake of adding, “Inspector Helson was not there.”  Baxter asked, “Did you see Inspector Helson?”  Mann suddenly realized he had said too much, and gave the standard servants' reply “I can't say”.  In other words not yes and not no. Still on the scent, Baxter asked  “I suppose you do not recollect whether the clothes were torn?” Mann responded, “They were not torn or cut.” Baxter gave his wounded prey a little more rope. “You cannot describe where the blood was?” And Mann took it, answering “No sir, I cannot.” Then Mann jumped, asking, “How did you get the clothes off?” Robert Mann realized that somehow he was now caught, but he didn't seem to know what his mistake had been. So he responded simply, “Hatfield cut them off?”

A member of the jury came to Mann's rescue, asking “Was the body undressed in the mortuary or in the yard?” And Mann could now understand what he must have done. The “gentlemen” were worried that a woman, even a dead one, had been naked in public. So he proudly answered, “In the mortuary.” The break gave Coroner Baxter the chance to play the “better man”, when he pointed out to the jury what they must have known from the instant Mann had opened his mouth.  Baxter said, “It appears the mortuary-keeper is subject to fits, and neither his memory nor statements are reliable.” Of course, if that were true, why call him as a witness, except to humiliate him in public?

But Baxter was so determined to re-establish the social order that he then called James Hatfield to the stand next, and asked him, "Who was there?”  Hatfield replied, “Only me and my mate.” Then the old man went on to explain, he first took off Polly's ulster,   “... which I put aside on the ground. We then took the jacket off, and put it in the same place. The outside dress was loose, and we did not cut it. The bands of the petticoats were cut, and I then tore them down with my hand. I tore the chemise down the front. There were no stays.”

Baxter asked who had told them to this, and Hatfield responded, “No one...We did it to have the body ready for the doctor.”  Baxter seemed offended by Hatfield's impudence. He demanded, “Who told you the doctor was coming”. The idea that an assistant morgue attendant would have expected a doctor to appear  after the arrival of a murdered woman, did not seem to occur to Coroner Baxter. But even the partially senile Hatfield was too smart to fall for this trap.  He said only, “I heard someone speak of it.”  Baxter pressed ahead. “Was any one present whilst you were undressing the body?” Hatfield stepped lightly aside the trap. He answered, “Not as I was aware of.”

You can almost hear the arrogance and sarcasm dripping from the transcript as Baxter then asked the old man, “Having finished, did you make the postmortem examination?” Hatfield explained, “No, the police came.” Baxter missed the joke entirely. Clearly enjoying his own power,  he sneered, “Oh, it was not necessary for you to go on with it! The police came?” “Yes,” said the assistant morgue attendant,  “ They examined the petticoats, and found the words "Lambeth Workhouse" on the bands.” “It was cut out?”, asked the bureaucrat. “I cut it out,” said the old man. Supremely confident, Baxter asked, “Who told you to do that?” And now Hatfield sprang his own little trap. He answered, “Inspector Helson.”

Now it was Inspector Joseph Helson's chance to rescue the coroner, by pointing out he had arrived at about 6:30 that morning, thus giving a time to Hatfield's story. But Coroner Baxter still tried to salvage his reputation.  He challenged the witness, “Did not you try the stays on in the afternoon to show me how short they were?”  To which Mr. Hatfield gracefully replied, “I forgot it.”  Baxter was now able to tell the jury, “He admits his memory is bad.” Hatfield admitted that, and Baxter took his little victory and closed by saying, “We cannot do more.”

After Mary Ann Monk testified that at about 7:00 pm on Friday 31 August, 1888 she had seen Polly entering a pub on New Kent Road, indicating that like Martha Tabem, Polly Nichols had been pub hopping, Then the inquest was adjourned until 17 September, to give the police two more weeks to gather evidence, and for Coroner Baxter's bruised ego time to recover. But it also gave Bloody Jack time to recover as well.

- 30 -