Mid-Month Murderer - Jack The Ripper Annie Chapman
After Mary Anne Nichols’ murder the police believed that the case could be solved quickly. Other murders in the East End could be linked to gangs, but eight days later they would find out that this case was not going to be that simple.
Annie Chapman
Annie Chapman was born in September 1841 in Paddington, her father was a Private in the 2nd Battalion of Lifeguards and she was the eldest of five children. Annie's parents were not married when she was born but they did get married in the February of the following year.
Drinking was a favourite past time in Victorian society, but this would quickly turn to an addiction, this is what happened to Annie Chapman, her own brother, Fountain Smith, commented that Annie
'first took a drink when she was quite young'
This would become a pattern in Annie's life and sadly it would be her ruin.
Annie married a coachman called John Chapman in 1869 when she was 28, they had three children, Emily, John and Annie. The family had a good life and in 1881 they moved to Windsor as John was hired as a domestic coachman. By all accounts the family had a good life, John's job was very good and the family where happy. Sadly in 1882 Emily (aged just 12) died of Meningitis, if that wasn't bad enough, John who was born with a disability was moved to a 'Cripple's school'. It was now that Annie's drinking began to worsen. The death of her daughter affected her deeply. Their other daughter Annie is believed to have been sent to a school in France.
In 1884 Annie and John separated, although it was said to have been mutual, a police report had stated that she had been arrested for her 'drunk and immoral ways', so it could have been that John was not happy with Annie's drinking, it could even have affected John's job. Nevertheless, John sent Annie 10 shillings a week on a semi regular basis, via the post office.
Annie would also help herself by working to add to the money John sent her. However, when he died on Christmas day in 1886 the money stopped and Annie needed to make extra money so turning to prostitution seemed to be her only option. By 1888 Annie was lodging in Crossingham Lodging House in Spitalfeilds. She was regularly seeing a man called Edward Stanley, he would lodge with her from Saturday to Monday, they had known each other since Annie lived in Windsor and he would sometimes pay for her lodgings.
Stanley seemed to care for Annie a lot as he was even heard saying to the deputy of the lodgings that if Annie turned up with any other men he was to refuse her entry. To me it shows that he didn't want Annie to be a prostitute, this was his way of trying to stop her as well as paying for her lodgings, but maybe he didn't take into consideration her drinking habit.
A few days before her murder Annie and a fellow lodger were involved in a fight, it was either over jealousy for Stanley or a bar of soap that Annie had borrowed and not returned. Annie ended up with a black eye and a bruise on her breast.
On the 7th September, Annie was seen by her friend, Amelia Palmer, on Dorset Street at about 5 pm, Annie told her
''I must pull myself together and go out and get some money or I shall have no lodgings ''
By 11.30 pm Annie turned up at Crossingham and asked if she could use the kitchen which she was allowed to do and stayed there with another lodger drinking until 1 am. She went to see the House Deputy and asked if he could keep her bed free for a little while so she could try and get her money together, she said she wouldn't be long so he agreed.
At 1.30 am Annie walked back to the lodgings this time eating a baked potato, she still did not have the money for her lodging, but she asked them to still hold her room and she would go and get it. Elizabeth Long was the last person to see Annie alive, she saw her on Hanbury Street, Annie was talking to a man, he had his back to Elizabeth so she couldn't see him, she knew it was 5.30 am as she heard the clock on the Brewery House chime.
A little after this Albert Cadosch, a carpenter that lived on Hanbury street, had gone to use the outhouse, he heard a thud against the fence, he thought nothing of it and went back to bed. This thud was more than likely Annie being killed.
At 6 am Annie's body was discovered by a man called John Davis, he ran out onto the street and saw Henry John Holland and James Green who were on their way to work, he called them over and all three men went to try and find a police officer. Davis ran to the police station on Commercial Street and told them what he had found. Inspector Joseph Chandler arrived on the scene, inspected the body and sent for Dr George Phillips, he also sent word to Scotland Yard, informing them of what had happened.
When Dr Phillips arrived and noted the scene, Annie's left arm was placed over her breast and her face was swollen, her neck had been cut badly and there was blood on the fence and the ground, probably from where she had hit the fence and then fell. Phillips and Chandler did a search of the scene, they found a leather apron near the body. They also found Annie's belongings which seemed to have been deliberately placed next to her.
Inspector Addeline of Scotland yard arrived and after talking to Chandler and finding out what had happened they agreed that Annie and Mary Ann had been murdered by the same person. Annie's body was removed and taken to Whitechapel Workhouse Infirmary Mortuary, when Dr Phillip's arrived he was angry to find that two nurses had already washed Annie's body,
Doing the post-mortem, Phillips found that Annie's face and tongue were swollen, the cut to her neck was so bad that it went right through to her spine, nearly taking her head off. Two thumb prints were found on the top of her chest and one to the right hand, they were large which made Phillips believe they were made by a man. From these marks he also thought that the killer would have held Annie by her jaw before cutting her throat.
Her abdomen had been cut open and while on the scene her intestines had been pulled out, still attached slightly by a cord and placed above her right shoulder. When she was moved it was noted that the underside of the intestines were still warm. Part of her stomach had been removed and placed above her left shoulder and there was a lot of blood. While doing the post-mortem Phillips discovered that Annie's uterus, fallopian tubes, ovaries and the upper part of her vagina had all be removed and were missing. Something like this would have taken a doctor being careful an hour, Phillips himself said he would have struggled to have done it in 15 minutes.
The killer must have had anatomical knowledge because of how he had managed to remove those organs so quickly, a portion of Annie's bladder had also been removed. It also seems that Annie had been strangled before her throat was cut, as her face, lips and hands all showed signs of asphyxiation.
From the injuries Phillips said that the cut to the throat and stomach were made by the same knife, and that it was something like a slaughter knife.
At the inquest, again preformed by Wynne Edwin Baxter, Dr Phillips said that the murder must have taken place at about 4.20 am, this would go against all the witness statements made, as Elizabeth saw Annie alive at 5.30. I think the witness time line adds up more than Phillips’ time of death, otherwise Annie's intestine would not have still been warm. Baxter came up with the theory that the murderer was killing these women and stealing their organs to sell them to medical students. Although this theory was never carried over to the other murders.
The public sadly started to come to their own conclusions as to who the murderer was, people were saying that this kind of crime couldn't have been done by an Englishman, that it must have been a Jewish man that did this, thankfully the police stepped in and stopped any riots beginning. Annie was buried in Manner Park Cemetery in a private ceremony, her family asked that the details were not released so it could be kept quite.
The next murder wouldn't be for a couple weeks but sadly Jack would strike twice in one night when he eventually came back.
If you would like to learn more I have put a list together of my sources, so please feel free to have a read, listen and watch :
Thank you
The History Chronicle
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