The famous newspaper-created pseudonym for the famous Whitechapel serial killer, ‘Jack the Ripper’, has long provoked comments from anti-Semitic individuals, authors and scholars. This is not, as some might have it, wholly unjustified in so far as such comments normally include the assertion that ‘Jack the Ripper’ was probably or in fact a jew. As someone with a long-standing interest in both the anti-Semitic cause and the ‘Jack the Ripper’ mystery: I thought it would be pertinent to make a short presentation and analysis of what evidence we have to suggest that ‘Jack the Ripper’ was a jew. I have done so without references in this case as the facts to which I allude can easily be found in any authoritative recent history to the Whitechapel murders such as Paul Begg’s work. I will write and publish a more detailed article with full citations laying out the case for a jewish ‘Jack the Ripper’ at a later date, but I thought to comment on the principle popularly known evidence for this thesis in this article.
The charge that ‘Jack the Ripper’ was jewish is actually one of the more reasonable suggestions that we can make about this infamous serial killer. Unfortunately this cannot be proven one way or the other, as with many things to do with the Whitechapel murders, as we do not actually know who ‘Jack the Ripper’ was, why he or she did what they did, which of the victims (canonical and non-canonical) were theirs and most importantly: why the killings stopped when they did.
However that said there are three important pieces of evidence that have been used in arguing for a jewish ‘Jack the Ripper’, which we must examine. These are simply: the chief suspect of Melville McNaughton and Donald Swanson; Aaron Kosminski, was jewish, the writing on the wall near the body of the fourth canonical victim; Catherine Eddowes, and the fact that several of the murders occurred very close to jewish social groups. We might further add that another early suspect; John Pizer, was also jewish, but he was suspected more on the basis of gossip rather than anything else and was soon released as he proved to have been elsewhere at the time of the murders. Other jewish suspects that have been presented have been Aaron David Cohen or David Cohen and Nathan Kaminsky, but both of these are conjectures/theories offered by modern authors (hence not directly related to general anti-Semitic discourse). We should also note that several key witnesses regarding possible sightings of ‘Jack the Ripper’ were jews.
The first piece of evidence is the suspicion of McNaughton and Swanson, who were both senior members of the Metropolitan police force at the time of the Whitechapel murders, of the Polish jew: Aaron Kosminski. We have to give credence to this precisely because McNaughton and Swanson were in a position to have all the facts at their disposal and also to be close enough to the heart of the investigation to form their own reasonable hypothesis as to the identify of the perpetrator. We cannot from the distance of over a hundred years dismiss their
‘on-the-ground’ assessment as they had access to knowledge and experience, which has sadly not been passed down to posterity (the Whitechapel murders suffered from a lapse in interest of circa forty years between the last canonical murder and the revival of public interest in the 1930s with the publication of a popular book on the subject of the killings).
We should also note that Kosminski is one of the two suspects, along with the non-jewish Francis Tumblety, in the Whitechapel murders that those who devoted themselves to the study of the Ripper crimes have not been able to satisfactorily dismiss as a suspect and whose timeline and motivation we have suggestive evidence for being in-line with that of ‘Jack the Ripper’.
The only problem with Kosminski’s timeline is that he was sent to a lunatic asylum in 1891 not in 1888/89 after the murders. This is however easily solved if we point out that the Isaac Kosminski of Goulston Street (where the writing on the wall seemingly accusing the jews of the murders and the fourth victim; Catherine Eddowes, was discovered as well as being in the heart of ‘Jack the Ripper’s’ territory [it also explains how ‘Jack the Ripper’ disappeared so quickly after the
‘double event’ murder]) may well have been Kosminski’s brother. This would also explain why Aaron Kosminski came to the attention of the policemen investigating the Whitechapel murders, which has otherwise been left unaddressed. It also gives us our conjectural reason as to the delay between the end of the canonical murders and the committal of Kosminski in so far as his brother had been keeping him in check or locked up (as Kosminski had been severely delusional and mentally ill since at least 1885) until such time as he could be sent to a lunatic asylum. As it happened Kosminski was sent to a workhouse, we may conjecture by his brother when he became too difficult to handle or he ran out of money, who then sent him to be interned and treated in a lunatic asylum.
We, however, need to note that despite the flurry of activity in the first four murders. ‘Jack the Ripper’ may well not have committed the fifth and most famous, which has recently been persuasively argued to have been related to Mary Kelly’s boyfriend on the basis of a number of discrepancies in the traditional narrative and her boyfriend’s testimony. This matters precisely because the frenzied killing of the first four was decidedly different to Mary Kelly (who was, in my opinion, simply butchered as opposed to having a serial killer ritual performed as in the other four cases) and was only lumped in with the Ripper murders, because it occurred at the same time and bore a passing similarity to the other four murders. This
‘lumping together’ of murders that do not strictly belong together is not uncommon in the many contemporary and modern works on the Whitechapel murders with all sorts of additional victims killed around that time being presented as new ones. This serves to illustrate to the reader that even the most widely believed fact in the Whitechapel murders is not necessarily what it seems: largely due to the hype placed upon the murders by the press at the time, which used them as an excuse to do a bit of moral crusading about the living conditions in east London at the time particularly in relate to the doss houses and rookeries.
We need to point out that the best argument for Kosminski not being ‘Jack the Ripper’ is that he was later certified as not dangerous by the Colney Hatch asylum although two minor violent episodes did occur during his time in that institution. This argument centres on the assumption that Kosminski had maintained the same basic behaviour patterns, which is obviously problematic given that we have no record of Kosminski’s mental state or possible proclivity towards violence in 1888 when the murders occurred. In essence it comes down to whether you prefer the gut instinct of the two senior officers who named Kosminski as their primary suspect or you believe the diagnosis of Kosminski as not dangerous in addition to the belief that said diagnosis was also true several years earlier during the Whitechapel murders. On a personal note: I think it is safe to argue that we must believe the detectives as opposed to the later diagnosis as they were in a position to gauge whether Kosminski could have performed the crime at the time, while the Colney Hatch asylum diagnosis is not (that is not to say that the McNaughton and Swanson’s opinion is infallible or correct, but that it is more cogent evidence than the Colney Hatch asylum’s later diagnosis).
Before we leave Aaron Kosminski we need to realise that Kosminski was not the only prime suspect as Frederick Abberline, one of the lead detectives on the Whitechapel Murders from Scotland Yard, felt that ‘Jack the Ripper’ was probably the non-jewish Pole: Seweryn Antonowicz Klosowski (better known to history as the serial killer, with a completely different modus operandi to ‘Jack the Ripper’, George Chapman). The assertion that Chapman was the murderer has however been long discarded by authors on, and researchers into, the Whitechapel murders. That said we must remind ourselves once again that Kosminski is one of the two most likely candidates, along with Francis Tumblety, that have been presented as ‘Jack the Ripper’. If ‘Jack the Ripper’ was jewish: it was more than likely Aaron Kosminski.
The second piece of evidence that is used to argue for a jewish ‘Jack the Ripper’ is the writing on the wall in Goulston Street, where Isaac (and probably Aaron) Kosminski lived, which is better known as the
‘Goulston Street Graffito’. This piece of graffiti was and is held to be importance by some in the case because a bloody piece of Catherine Eddowes’ apron was found underneath it (which also happens to point to Kosminski being ‘Jack the Ripper’ if Isaac Kosminski was indeed his brother). The writing has been recorded as saying slightly different things by different sources, but the official police version of the writing, as reported by constable Alfred Long and accepted by Sir Charles Warren (the then Metropolitan Police Commissioner), stated as follows:
‘The Juwes are the men that will not be blamed for nothing.’
The second version, recorded by the detective Daniel Halse, stated:
‘The Juwes are not the men who will be blamed for nothing.’
The third version, recorded by the surveyor Frederick William Foster, stated:
‘The Juwes are not the men To be blamed for nothing.’
‘Juwes’, of course, is simply a vernacular spelling of jews in English and all three versions the meaning has stayed the same with only superficial differences in expression of that meaning. The meaning should be simply understood as a two-fold message:
‘the jews are never blamed for things that they do’ and/or
‘the jews have really done what they are blamed for’. Both meanings are fundamentally the same message (i.e. the jews should be blamed for what they have done but they aren’t always blamed for what they have done) and therefore we cannot quibble over meaning or the message, but to say that it is simply a standard anti-Semitic argument, then as now, regarding the jews.
As to the graffiti’s relevance: it would be best to take a sceptical angle here by pointing out that the East End of London, particularly Whitechapel, at this time was home to a very large community of émigré jews from Eastern Europe and anti-Semitic feelings were, understandably, running high. This would make the existence of anti-Semitic graffiti on a street, where we already know that at least one jew lived, nothing unusual. After all there has never been any proof for the assertion, which is occasionally made, that ‘Jack the Ripper’ wrote those words and it seems rather unlikely that the Ripper stopped and decided to write a bit of anti-Semitic graffiti implicating jews indirectly. After all if the Ripper was jewish, as some have argued using the Goulston Street graffiti, then why on earth would he or she implicate themselves by pointing directly to it as there were many non-jews as well as jews living in the East End of London, particularly Whitechapel, at this time.
The far more likely explanation of this graffiti, as attested to by the fact that it has not been argued to be of any significance [but rather is merely incidental] among authors on and researchers into the Whitechapel murders for quite some time, is that it was simply there when ‘Jack the Ripper’ passed by and dropped the piece of apron. As stated anti-Semitic graffiti would have not been unusual and it is unlikely there is any reason that a bloodied part of Eddowes’ apron was dropped under that graffiti intentionally. In fact what is far more likely, if we look at Kosminski as a prime suspect once again, is that he took the part of the bloodied apron as a souvenir, but found upon returning to his brother’s house in Goulston street that he could not hide it (as it is doubtful his brother Isaac would have been involved in the murders), in addition to the removed organs and entrails [which if you believe the
‘From Hell’ letter (which I personally don’t) the Ripper fried and ate], so it was quickly discarded in favour of the far more valuable souvenirs.
In essence this second piece of evidence is a red herring in the argument for a jewish ‘Jack the Ripper’ in so far as it seems to proffer a useful piece of evidence for that thesis, but it actually forces the person using that evidence for said thesis to journey into the realms of wild conjecture as to why on earth ‘Jack the Ripper’ would do something as silly as tell the world that he or she was, in fact, a jew. This more often than not simply renders their argument nonsense by virtue of their point being made on unreasonable conjectures not to mention absurd filler of stories of jewish ritual murder (the Whitechapel murders bear no relation to the phenomenon of jewish ritual murder as they didn’t involve exsanguination or any reports of highly religious/travelling jews being involved) and out-of-context quotations from the Babylonian Talmud.
The third piece of evidence, which is not normally used [as it has not been remarked on much even inside the considerable amount of literature on the Whitechapel murders], that can be used to argue for a jewish ‘Jack the Ripper’ is the fact that several of the murders took place next, or very close, to jewish social clubs. This piece of evidence is interesting in that it is offers us a potential source for the killer (killing the first prostitute after an evening at the social club) and also a reason why the killings occurred as late as they did (club meetings [which often dragged on till late at night] etc). However that said the fact that several of the murders were next, or very close, to jewish social clubs cannot be used unless we can demonstrate that ‘Jack the Ripper’ was either a member of these clubs (which is quite possible) or that these locations were deliberately chosen by him or her for the murders.
These two conditions however are as nothing compared to the reasonable counterargument that it was standard practice among prostitutes (or ‘shilling whores’ as they were contemporarily known) to take their clients to a quiet place where they were not likely to be disturbed to perform the desired coital services. This argument simply dismisses the presence of these jewish social clubs near several of the murders as being coincidental, which is reasonable if we assume that the prostitute was the one suggesting which quiet spot would be best. It is however quite possible that ‘Jack the Ripper’ suggested the appropriate quiet place and not the prostitute given that the one thing we know almost as a certainty is that ‘Jack the Ripper’ was a local and did not look out of place (otherwise he would have attracted unnecessary attention, been easily recognised and described and promptly identified and caught). Hence ‘Jack the Ripper’ would more than likely have known of good local quiet spots that he could have simply suggested to the prostitute before hand.
This counters the reasonable assertion that it was the prostitutes dictating where the Whitechapel murders happened and raises the possibility that ‘Jack the Ripper’ picked at least some of the spots. If ‘Jack the Ripper’ was a member of these clubs then he or she would have known that these clubs would have concluded their business or should be doing so soon: hence offering him or her a quiet place to take the prostitute in question and commit his or her next murder.
That said the argument on both sides is quite plausible and which side you take depends on which event you deem more likely: the Ripper dictated the quiet spot or the prostitute dictated it. There is little to choose between them (even Occam’s razor cannot help you as both are equally simple solutions), but if you deem the former more likely than the possibility that the jewish social clubs were involved as a ‘known quantity’ to the Ripper raises its head.
In essence then the fact that there several of the murders were next, or very close, to jewish social clubs could be of importance, but only in a conjectural sense until more information relating to this becomes available through new research or finds.
So to summarise: we have examined the three central pieces of evidence for the jewish ‘Jack the Ripper’ thesis. We have discussed the strong possibility that the mentally-ill jew Aaron Kosminski was the murdered but also noted that he is only one of two extremely probable suspects. However we have also pointed out that if ‘Jack the Ripper’ was jewish then it is very likely to have been Aaron Kosminski as he best fits the facts that we know about the Ripper.
We have discarded the
‘Goulston Street Graffito’ as being without importance to the jewish ‘Jack the Ripper’ theory, because despite appearances it doesn’t offer any evidence for said thesis. Finally we have discussed the possibility that the jewish social clubs next, or very close, to several of the murders played a role in ‘Jack the Ripper’s’ actions and we have pointed out that this may well be true, but that it is a conjectural argument that requires further evidence to qualify, modify or discard.
Therefore we must conclude that a jewish ‘Jack the Ripper’ is a likely and significant possibility, but that if ‘Jack the Ripper’ was a jew then it was more as a mundane serial killer rather than anything more exotic such as a jewish ritual murderer as some anti-Semites have suggested down the years.
Originally published at the following address:
http://semiticcontroversies.blogspot...-and-jews.html