You Don"t Know Jack: The Search for Jack the Ripper.

             Jack the Ripper is one of the most notorious yet romanticized characters in modern history. His gruesome prostitute murder rampage of 1888 in Whitechapel, a poor district on the East Side of London, shocked Victorian society and fascinated the world for over a century. Jack the Ripper is not the first serial killer in history, but he is the first greatly publicized killer of the modern age. It is generally accepted among 'Ripperologists" that he had five victims, all prostitutes, between August 31st and November 9th 1888. Almost everyone has heard of Jack the Ripper, but who was he? Well, no one knows for certain but there are over fifty theories regarding his identity ranging from a would-be King of England to a murderous Polish Jew. We may never discover who he was, but we must analyze some of these theories and form our own conclusion on the identity of this most "fascinating individual" (Wilson & Odell 163).

             A few things must be said about Jack the Ripper and his murders before one can review the suspects. Jack the Ripper committed five gruesome murders in the autumn of 1888. All victims except one were disemboweled, severely mutilated, and some even had organs removed. It can be established by the heinous nature of his crimes that he was very mentally disturbed. Colin Wilson, a "famous British Criminal Psychologist" (Colby-Newton 47) believes he was a sick man, twisted by hate and saturated with "sadistic cravings" (qtd. Colby-Newton 47). But he must have possessed some knowledge of anatomy and, as Dr. Sequiera puts it, he must have been "no stranger to the knife" (qtd. Wilson & Odell 138). We come to this conclusion by analyzing level of the mutilations of his victims. The fact that he was able to remove a kidney from Catherine Eddowes in less than 10 minutes (Rumbelow 98) suggests at least some knowledge of anatomy and possibly some surgical skills.