The Mary Jane Kelly project .pdf.

Now, in a new report, ‘The Mary Jane Kelly Project’, the research team has revealed the likelihood of locating and identifying the last known victim of Britain’s most infamous serial killer known as ‘Jack the Ripper’, who is thought to have killed at least five young women in the Whitechapel area of London between August and November 1888.
The team conducted a desk-based assessment of the burial location of Mary Jane Kelly and visited St Patrick’s Catholic Cemetery, Leytonstone, on 3 May 2016 in order to examine the burial area. Research was carried out in the cemetery’s burial records and a survey of marked graves in the area around Kelly’s modern grave marker was undertaken.
Dr King concluded: “As information presently stands, a successful search for Kelly’s remains would require a herculean effort that would likely take years of research, would be prohibitively costly and would cause unwarranted disturbance to an unknown number of individuals buried in a cemetery that is still in daily use, with no guarantee of success.
“As such it is extremely unlikely that any application for an exhumation licence would be granted. The simple fact is, successfully naming someone in the historical record only happens in the most exceptional of cases.
“Most human remains found during excavations remain stubbornly, and forever, anonymous and this must also be the fate of Mary Jane Kelly.”

The snaring of Irish girls

 An interesting concept if applied to Mary Jane Kelly:
The snaring of Irish girls is accomplished with more art than by the lassoing method that used to prevail in Ratcliff-highway. One of the most ingenious, but most diabolical methods of capture is that which consists in employing a woman dressed as a Sister of Merry as a lure. This I have been assured by ladies actively engaged in work among the poor is sometimes adopted with great success.
The Irish Catholic girl arriving at Euston is accosted by what appears to be a Sister or Mercy. She is told that the good Lady Superior has sent her to meet poor Catholic girls to take them to good lodgings, where she can look about for a place. The girl naturally follows her guide, and after a rapid ride in a closed cab through a maze of streets she is landed in a house of ill fame.
After she is shown to her bedroom the Sister of Mercy disappears, and the field is cleared for her ruin. The girl has no idea where she is. Every one is kind to her. The procuress wins her confidence. Perhaps a situation is found for her in another house belonging to the same management, for some broth-keepers have several houses. Drink is constantly placed in her way; she is taken to the theatre and dances. Some night, when worn out and half intoxicated, her bedroom door is opened – for there are doors which when locked inside will open by pressure from without – and her ruin is accomplished. After that all is easy – except the return to a moral life.
W T Stead.

Mary Jane Kelly

No it isn't Mary Kelly, even though she has several internal organs at her feet. It's an Anatomical Venus. The “Venerina” or “Little Venus” wax anatomical model by Clemente Susini, 1782. Photo by Joanna Ebenstein at, appropriately enough, The Whitechapel Gallery. Courtesy of the Palazzo Poggi, Bologna, Italy. 2010.

Was Mary Kelly a Fenian?

In the Autumn of 1884 female body parts were found with a tattoo ink mark on the forearm indicating the victim was most probably a prostitute:

Tottenham Court Road Mystery of 1884.

October 24, 1884

The Times reported that, “Yesterday considerable excitement was caused in the neighbourhood of Tottenham-court-road by the discovery of human remains, supposed to be those of a woman, under circumstances suggesting foul play.” A skull with flesh still adhering to it, as well as a large piece of flesh from the thighbone, were discovered. Around the same time, a parcel containing a human arm was found in Bedford Square. The arm, which had been thrown over the railing, contained a possible clue to the victim’s identity, a tattoo, which more then likely, meant the woman had been a prostitute.

Five days later, a police constable was passing Number 33 Fitzroy Square, when he noticed a large brown paper parcel. Upon investigating, he found it contained a portion of a human torso. The murderer, it would seem, was one who was exceedingly daring or lucking in depositing the remains. According to the Pall Mall Gazette, “the side walk in front of the house is constantly patrolled by police . . . It is believed that the parcel was deposited between ten o’clock and ten fifteen, when the police relief takes place.” The building that the remains were placed in front was also a military drill-hall and armoury.

So what’s so intriguing about that?

Allan Pinkerton

wrote to Gladstone to offer the assistance of his organisation claiming that British detectives:

 are, so far as my experience with them is concerned, a body of first class, intelligent men and many of their operations could not be excelled for brilliancy and important results. But is of the “shadows” or “informers” that I wish to speak . . . Pinkerton to Gladstone, July 8th, 1882.

(Abberline worked for Pinkerton after he retired from the police force.)

The Special Irish Branch was formed in March 1883, to combat the threat of Irish terrorism. The Fenians (Irish Nationalists) exploded a bomb at Scotland Yard in 1884, and the following year they bombed the Tower of London and Houses of Parliament. The “Irish” label was dropped in 1888 as the department’s remit was extended to cover other threats. They became known simply as Special Branch the original headquarters of the Metropolitan Police was a house at 4 Whitehall Place, not far from Trafalgar Square, but the rear entrance, which the public used, was in Scotland Yard.

Scotland Yard paid their informants.

From 1837 Cobb explored cases, particularly murders, to find the right type of officers to act as detectives. In turn, the most successful of these officers began to discover and use rudimentary methods that went on to become the basic tools of the modern day detective e g the surveillance of suspects, the use of informers and the gathering of evidence.

Monro’s memoirs confirm the use of Pinkerton’s Detective Agency as the preferred operational contact point:  (Monro memoirs, 1903).

“Pinkerton, Robert requesting assistance for his detective in Cronin case”. Entries show that the detective was a J R Saville and his job was “looking after John Hayes suspected of the murder.” Dr Patrick Cronin was a prominent Chicago member of Clan na Gael who, after falling out with its leader Alexander Sullivan over the use of the organisation’s funds, was expelled and murdered on May 4th, 1889 (Le Caron, 1894). 

Entries reveal that, whether by accident or design, Metropolitan Police Special Branch arrived at an ideal intelligence gathering scenario, with two or more informants working unknown to each other in the same organisation and hence able to supply independently corroborated information to MPSB concerning each others activities. This enabled an accurate assessment to be made concerning their veracity and afford a valuable check on whether the activities they reported to their handler corresponded to truth.

Coulon moved to 19 Fitzroy Square, taking up residence in a house that his anarchist colleagues, who were by now having their doubts about him on other matters, considered was much too respectable for a man who had just been dismissed from his teaching post at the anarchist school (Quail, 1978). The Chief Constable’s Register lends credence to this. Immediately following the second reference to his employment at the International Anarchist School comes an entry stating; “Coulon – suspected of being a police spy”.

Who was Auguste Coulon? According to Quail (1978), he was in regular correspondence with the Socialist League and possibly lived in Dublin before moving to France. Numerous entries in the Chief Constable’s Register confirm his presence in Ireland, his establishment of an Anarchist group in Dublin and the consequent interest in him by the Dublin Metropolitan Police.

Maurice Moser, an Inspector in the Metropolitan Police Irish Bureau, reveals in his memoirs how he carried out surveillance in Paris on Irish suspects. This was with the full knowledge and co-operation of the French police, which assisted in drugging the drink of a suspect, relieving him of his recently collected post, steamed a letter open, copied, and returned it to his pocket before he regained consciousness. (Moser, 1890).

Mary Kelly was Irish, travelled to Paris and her identity remains hidden. She claimed she was frightened of someone – according to Barnett. She preferred poverty in the East End to remaining in relative comfort in the West End. An inexplicable decision, but perhaps Mary Kelly is even more intriguing than we thought. Women were also on the payroll of the MPSB. So is there a connection between Mary Kelly, Fitzroy Square and the MPSB?

Kelly moved to Cardiff and lived with a cousin and worked as a prostitute. The Cardiff police have no record of her. She says she was ill and spent the best part of the time in an infirmary. None of her story, as told to Barnett, is completely verifiable.

Mary Kelly in brief:

Mary Kelly arrived in London in 1884. She may have stayed with the nuns at the Providence Row Night Refuge on Crispin Street. According to one tradition she scrubbed floors and charred there and was eventually placed into domestic service in a shop in Cleveland Street.

According to Joseph Barnett, on arriving in London, Kelly went to work in a high class brothel in the West End. She says that during this time she frequently rode in a carriage and accompanied one gentleman to Paris, which she disliked and returned to London.

Fitzroy Square is directly off Cleveland Street.

What could be in those JTR files that Scotland Yard needs to protect witnesses after one hundred and thirty years? Perhaps there is a valid reason Scotland Yards’s JTR dossiers remain sealed after all. The IRA and English are newly at peace. An open sore is healing. Is it worth jeopardising the peace for mere Ripperologist curiosity?

Mary Kelly often visited a friend in Lambeth at the Elephant and Castle. Abberline and PC Long lived in Lambeth. One the paymaster and one the assassin?

Curiously, PC Long of A division arrived in London the same year (1884) as Mary Kelly.

The common theme is London, Ireland, Paris, informants, Pinkertons, Lambeth and Fenians. This is yet another series of coincidences amid the puzzle that is JTR. But as Metropolitan Police Special Branch honed their skills, how much had they learnt of utilising smoke and mirrors?

Twelve hours later ...
Continuing this line of research, it seems it's not such an eccentric concept. A few others have postulated a Fenian involvement. Therefore, the big question therefore is why? What would the Fenians gain from JTR's slaughter? Quick answer: it's doing what terrorism does. Frightens people.

Mary Jane Kelly

Mary Jane Kelly's portrait from facial mapping.
 Detective Inspector Walter Dew:
"All this was horrifying enough, but the mental picture of that sight which remains most vividly with me is the poor woman's eyes. They were wide open, and seemed to be staring straight at me with a look of terror".

The mad butcher

This is an odd music-hall song:. "Mary Jane you don't know her, but - ha"

THE MAD BUTCHER


Once I was happy and gay
But now I'm dreadfully changed
And all my acquaintances say
That I am insane and deranged
I once was as red as my beef
But now I'm as white as my veal
My senses have flown thro' my grief
And my heart is as hard as my steel.

Chorus: I'm the mad butcher; I'm the mad butcher
I'm the mad butcher; they say I'm insane
I'm the mad butcher; I'm the mad butcher
Brought to this state all thro' false Mary Jane.

Mary Jane you don't know her, but - ha
The thought of her now makes me start
She shone on my path like a star
But she's stolen my pluck and my heart
Each day she'd call in at the shop
When my heart ‘gainst my ribs would go thump
When she asked me to weigh her a chop
And some suet, a jolly good lump.

Chorus:

She smiled at me one afternoon
I grew hot and cold by degrees
I told her my love very soon
In the sawdust I knelt on my knees
But she spurned me and then what was more
I know you will say it was too bad
She married the tailor next door
And ever since then I've been mad.

Chorus:

One day I'd a furious shock
I hacked and I chopped up the meat
At one blow I severed the block
And I pitched the sheep's head in the street
By turns I now laugh and then cry
But somehow I've lost all my trade
I cry, buy, buy, the buy, buy, buy, buy
But my customers all seem afraid.

Chorus:

 Written by Henri Clark (1840-1905)

Mary Jane Kelly

An interesting entry in the genealogical files. Parsonstown Union workhouse was erected on a seven-acre site half a mile to the east of Parsonstown.
Mary Jane Kelly claimed she had a relationship/marriage with a John Davies. Did she name her son after the father? The date of the son's birth fits the story, a tenuous but intriguing link.

Mary Jane Kelly
mentioned in the record of John Kelly
Name     Mary Jane Kelly
Gender    Female
Son     John Kelly
Name     John Kelly
Gender     Male
Birth Date     12 Mar 1881
Birthplace     Parsonstown, Kings, Ireland
Mother's Name     Mary Jane Kelly.

	The grim Parsonstown Union workhouse.

Mary Kelly's portrait?

Mary Kelly's portrait?

Jack jump up and kiss me

Damask Rose and a Purple-and-Blue Wild Violet (Heartsease) and used to adorn the coffin of Mary Kelly.
The synonyms of the flower are, I think, quite ironic in the circumstances:
Synonyms---Wild Pansy. Love-Lies-Bleeding. Love-in-Idleness. Live-in-Idleness. Loving Idol. Love Idol. Cull Me. Cuddle Me. Call-me-to-you. Jack-jump-up-and-kiss-me. Meet-me-in-the-Entry. Kiss-her-in-the-Buttery. Three-Faces-under-a-Hood. Kit-run-in-the-Fields. Pink-o'-the-Eye. Kit-run-about. Godfathers and Godmothers. Stepmother. Constancy. Pink-eyed-John. Bouncing Bet. Flower o'luce. Bird's Eye. Bullweed. Viola ref.

Meet me in the entry (entry an alley, especially of a covered passageway). Jack jump up and kiss me. Cull me and love lies bleeding. Those four phrases sum up Mary Kelly's death.

Mary Kelly sang, 'Only a violet I plucked from my mother's grave' just hours before she was slain.

Considering Mary Kelly's affiliation with violets, wouldn't it be a fitting gesture if someone sprinkled heartsease seeds about her grave ...

Widow and child

The Herts. Advertiser & St. Albans Times on 10.11 describes Kelly's son as around 10-11 years of age and adds: "The story of the crime current among the neighbours is that this morning - what time cannot at present be ascertained, but at any rate after daylight - she took a man home to her own room, presumably for an immoral purpose."

This stated age of the child would tie in with Mary's, John Davies's death, (1880) and reported to leave a widow and child -'who will be well tended by the Friendly Society'.

The Fisherman's Widow and Mary Kelly.

Several images are suggested as the framed print The Fisherman's Widow that Mary Kelly hung above her fireplace (Miller’s Court).

I think it is:

The Fisherman's Widow by J.H. Burgers, shown in the Winter Exhibition at the French Gallery, 120, Pall Mall.

Original engravings and etchings were an expensive item in the Victorian era . It is unlikely Mary would have kept an object that would, if pawned, supply her with needed cash. Wood engravings were a cheap and cheerful mode of decoration for the labouring classes. 
The Fisherman's Widow, an image printed for The Illustrated London News, was published on the 5th December 1868, twenty years before her murder, probably in shabby condition, and worthless. The complete publication sold for 1d.

The title was shown beneath the print. Any journalist could, without any knowledge of fine art, embellish his story with that detail.

There is something in the image that is evocative of the Irish migration caused by the potato famine, which would resonate with Mary Kelly ...

Another coincidence surrounds Mary Kelly

Just when I think that's it. No more coincidences, what happens? This happens.
Okay, he's Dutch but I doubt his name is Maria. It is Maryn, Martyn, or Maartyn, one time lover of Mary Kelly and Adrienus L Morgestern's brother. But look at the names in the family unit, Maria and a Jeannette.
Census 1881:

Maria A Morgestern
England and Wales Census, 1881
Name     Maria A Morgestern
Event Type     Census
Event Date     1881
Event Place     Fulham, London,Middlesex, England
Registration District     Fulham
Residence Note     Victoria Rd
Gender     Male
Age     26
Marital Status (Original)     Single
Occupation     Gas Stoker
Relationship to Head of Household     Brother
Birth Year (Estimated)     1855
Birthplace     Alphen Priel (F), The Netherlands
Page Number     46
Registration Number     RG11
Piece/Folio     74/23
Affiliate Record Type     Household
Household
   
Role
   
Gender
   
Age
   
Birthplace
Adrienus L Morgestern        Head     M     33     Alphen Priel (F), The Netherlands
Jeanette S Morgestern          Wife     F     28     Mzerbo (F), The Netherlands
Johanna C Morgestern         Daughter     F     7     Proogendael
Maria Morgestern                Daughter     F     6     Proogendael
Wilhelmin L Morgestern     Daughter     F     4     Fulham, Middlesex, England
Petronella C Morgestern     Daughter     F     3 M     Fulham, Middlesex, England
Maria A Morgestern           Brother     M     26     Alphen Priel (F), The Netherlands

John Davies of Brymbo didn't exist? So who's this?

Jack the Ripper.John Davies, collier, of  Brymbo, died in a mining accident. Is this the husband of Mary Kelly and said not to exist? If so Mary Kelly had a child.
"c. 1879: At the age of 16 she marries a collier named Davies. He is killed in an explosion two or three years later. There is a suggestion that there might have been a child in this marriage."
According to the family records he was twenty six when he died and born in 1854. As he died in June 1880 that's a five month window to find his place and date of birth date and through him discover 'Mary Kelly'.

Mary Kelly. The man killed in the mine. John Davies.

Mary Kelly. The man killed in the mine. John Davies.

Name:             DAVIES John

Age: 27

Date: 29/01/1880

Year:   1880

Occupation:    Collier

Colliery:         Westminster

Owner:            Westminster and Brymbo Coal & Coke Co Ltd

Town: Wrexham

County:           Denbighshire

Notes:             Fall of roof. Died 5th June.

Birth 1854

John Davies

Event Type     Burial

Event Date     09 Jun 1880

Event Place    Brymbo, Denbighshire, Wales

BRYMBO DENBIGHSHIRE

12th February 1880

______________________________

Friday last, incidence. John Davies seriously hurt in one odd serious accident at work - Westminster and Brymbo Coal & Coke Co Ltd. Fall of roof. Other workers involved in work accidents are Penrhos, one called Richard Owens - two members at Bethel (W). It is good that I understand that they are now improved in Rhagorol, Gohebydd.

The Cambrian News and Merionethshire Standard

18th June 1880

Family Notices

Death Notices

______________________________________

DAVIES—June 5, aged 26, at Brymbo, John Davies.

EDWARDS—June 8, aged 66, Mr. William Edwards. Tan-y-Bryn, Sion, Ysceifiog, formerly assistant over-seer of that parish.

HUGHS—June 7, aged 17, the son of Evan Hughes . . . 

___________________________________

Mary Jane Kelly A.K.A.. Marie Jeanette Kelly, Mary Ann Kelly, Ginger, Fair Emma

But why Fair Emma?

PASSING ENGLISH

OF THE VICTORIAN ERA

A DICTIONARY OF HETERODOX
ENGLISH, SLANG, AND PHRASE

Whoa, Emma! (Street, '80's).
Entreaty to be modified addressed to
women with marked appearance or
behaviour in the streets. It came from
an inquest on a woman who had died
under astounding circumstances. She
was suffering from inflammation; she
induced her husband to allay her pain
by the use of a small Dutch clock
weight. Finding relief from the con-
tact of the cold iron, she urged the
husband to continue the operation
whereupon she died. At the inquest
the husband had to defend himself.
He urged that he said to his wife,
'Whoa Emma! ' over and over again,
but she would not listen to him. For
years this phrase lasted as a street
Protest, too often shot at drunken
women. (See Outside Eliza, Now
we're busy.)

Outside Eliza (Low. London).
Drunk again, Eliza. Applied to
intoxicated, reeling women.
Derived from a police case where a barman
stated that he said to the prisoner
over and over again, 'Outside, Eliza'
but she would not go, and finally
smashed a plate-glass window.

The mind boggles as to what he was doing with that clock weight.

Mary Kelly's room.

The Miller Court Murder, Whitechapel: Site of Mary Kelly's Lodgings, from "The Penny Illustrated Paper", published 17th November 1888.