Was H.H. Holmes Jack the Ripper?
Heinous crimes, but two separate killers?
H.H. Holmes. Jack the Ripper. Names that both true crime
lovers and those less inclined to the true crime community recognize. But were
they the same person? Historians have made a compelling case in recent years.
But I’ll let you decide.
H.H. Holmes
Born Herman Mudgett on May 16, 1861 in Gilmanton, New
Hampshire, H.H. was known to be an intelligent, if odd child. His affluent
family was devoutly Christian, and his mother was often cold and uncaring
towards him, while his father was an alcoholic who like to use physical discipline,
isolation, starvation and other crueler forms of punishment on his children. There
are stories of H.H. experimenting on small animals in his childhood, and some stories
allege that he even killed another child when he was young. His experiments led
him to an intense, often disturbing interest in anatomy and medicine.
A killer is born
H.H. attended the University of Michigan, where he studied
medicine. He was, by all accounts, not the best student, and barely graduated.
H.H. coined his moniker in 1886, when he moved to Chicago
and became a pharmacist. It is believed that he killed the original owner of
the pharmacy that he later took over. He had a three story building created
nearby, where he would trick, trap, and kill his victims.
The Murder Castle
The top floors of H.H.’s building contained his living
quarters and rooms designed specifically for torturing and killing his victims.
The building was rigged with trap doors and chutes, leading to the basement, so
he could secretly dispose of the bodies or burn them in his kiln. He had gas
lines leading to rooms, so he could asphyxiate victims at random. He also had a
dissection table in the basement. He would often dissolve his victims in acid or
remove the skin, then sell the skeletons to medical schools. It is believed
that he had up to as many as 200 victims.
In 1893, H.H. opened his building as a hotel during the Columbian
Exposition. Many female visitors were seduced
by H.H., swindled, and later killed in his Murder Castle. Many people reported
seeing people enter the hotel and never come out. All of H.H.’s fiance’s,
employees, and guests had to have insurance policies naming him as the
beneficiary before staying at his hotel. He paid the premiums on these policies.
The downfall of America’s “first serial killer”
The last murders of H.H. Holmes were those of Benjamin Pitzel and his family,
after a fraud attempt gone wrong. After being on the run, H.H. was arrested in
November 1894. He was convicted in 1895, which he appealed and lost. Herman
Mudgett was hanged on May 7, 1896, and 34 years old.
Jack the Ripper
The ghost that haunted London’s East End in the Autumn of 1888
still haunts many today. Known as one of the biggest cold cases in history,
Jack the Ripper has been looked at by nearly every eye in true crime.
Mary Ann Nicols
8/31/1888
42
Mary Ann was found in a gateway in Buck’s Row. Her body had
been badly mutilated. Known as “Polly” to those close to her, Mary Ann was a
mother of five. She had fallen into poverty and turned to prostitution and
alcoholism upon the dissolution of her marriage. She lived in lodging houses in
White Chapel at the time of her murder, and was unable to pay for the night’s
stay on August 31st. Mary Ann was seen alive for the last time by a
friend around 2:30 a.m. Her friend recalled Mary Ann being very drunk upon
their meeting. Mary Ann told her friend that she needed to make money for
lodging and refused to go along with the other woman.
Mary Ann was found around 3:45 a.m. close to where she was
last seen alive. Her attack had been brutal, nearly severing her head from her
body. She had also been disemboweled.
Annie Chapman
9/8/1888
48
“Dark Annie” had a similar background of alcoholism and casual
prostitution. At the time of her death, Annie was living in a lodging house on
Dorset Street. She was remembered as being generally well liked by the other
tenants. However, the week before her death, Annie had been in a fight with another
tenant, and it had left her bruised and sore. On the afternoon of her last day,
Annie was seen by a friend on the street . Annie looked sick, but she was trying
to hype herself up enough to prostitute for the night to pay for her room. Annie
returned to the lodging house around 11:30 p.m. on September 7th and
spoke to a worker there, telling him she had just gotten out of the hospital. At
1:45 a.m., on September 8th, when an employee approached Annie for
her payment, she was drunk and stated that she didn’t have it. She was escorted
from the lodging house and headed along Dorset Street. Annie was spotted by
another prostitute, Elizabeth Long, at 5:30 a.m. talking to a man on Hanbury Street.
Less than half an hour later, her body was found where she was last seen alive
by a resident of 29 Hanbury Street.
Elizabeth Stride
9/30/1888
45
Originally from Sweden, Elizabeth moved to the East End with
her husband, John in 1869 and opened a coffee shop. Upon their separation, Elizabeth
began staying at lodging houses. She began to abuse alcohol and got in trouble
with the law. At the time of her death,
she had returned to the Spitalfields area (note that Annie frequented this area
as well) to find lodging after being away for a while. After spending the day
housekeeping for the lodging house owner, Elizabeth left her lodging house around
7:30 p.m. on September 29th. She began her night, and by 12:45 a.m.
on September 30th, she had made her way to Berner Road, where a man
saw her being attacked, but believing it to be a domestic quarrel, he crossed
the street and moved on. Elizabeth was discovered at 1 a.m. by the steward of a
nearby club, but being unable to get a clear view of her, he mistook her for
his wife and went inside to get help getting her up. After finding his wife
inside, he retrieved a candle and returned, only to discover the extent of the crime
scene. Elizabeth’s throat had been cut, but her body had not been mutilated,
leading to speculation that the steward interrupted the murder.
Catherine Eddowes
9/30/1888
43
Originally from Wolverhampton, and orphaned as a young girl,
Catherine moved to London with her husband and their three children in the late
1870’s. Her alcoholism and the toxic nature of the relationship led to the end
of the marriage by 1880. Catherine moved into a lodging house, living with John
Kelly. Catherine was remembered as a happy woman, who was well liked.
Catherine and John returned to the East End from and summer
of hop picking on September 28th. Catherine headed to a workhouse,
while John went to the lodging house. After being booted from the workhouse, Catherine
met John, and they pawned his boots for money to eat. Later that afternoon, Catherine
went to meet her daughter, despite John’s warnings of the Ripper. While Catherine
never saw her daughter to request money that day, she did come by it somehow,
as she used it to get drunk, which led to her being arrested. She was released
a little after midnight. Around and hour and a half later, she was spotted by
three men at the entrance to Mitre Square. At 1:45 a.m. a policeman discovered
her body in the Square. Her throat was cut, she was disemboweled, and her cheeks
and eyelids were carved up. The killer stole her uterus and a kidney.
Mary Jane Kelly
11/9/1888
25
Mary Jane is the victim that has the least known about her
life. She was supposedly from Limerick, Ireland. She lived with her boyfriend,
Joseph Barnett, though she had been married and widowed previously. It was after
being widowed that she turned to prostitution. She moved to London and began
working in a high end brothel in 1884. Mary Jane stated that she was treated like
a lady during this time, even being taken to Paris, after which she returned to
London using the name, Marie Jeannette Kelly.
Mary Jane moved to the East End, eventually ending up in the
lodging house on Thrawl Street, where she met Joseph. They later moved to 13 Miller’s
Court. Mary Jane was well liked and considered quite attractive.
After Joseph lost his job, Mary Jane was forced to return to
prostitution. The relationship became volatile, and Joseph moved out. Mary Jane
fell behind on rent at this point. Joseph saw her for the last time on November
8th. A neighbor spotted and spoke to Mary Jane on November 9th.
The neighbor then saw her speaking to a suspicious looking man. The neighbor
saw them enter Mary Jane’s apartment, and he waited for 45 minutes, but when
the suspicious man didn’t emerge, the neighbor moved on. Other neighbors heard
screams at 4 a.m. but discounted them as being typical for the area. At 10:45
a.m. the next morning, the landlord’s assistant stumbled upon the body when he went
to collect rent. The police were called. It was stated that she was, “… not
much more than a skeleton. Her face was terribly scarred and mutilated… 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 through me with a
look of terror.”
How two killers compare
In 1988, FBI agents John Douglas and Roy Hazelwood came up
with a profile for Jack the Ripper, describing him as follows:
Ø
White male
Ø
25-35 years old
Ø
An unmarried loner
Ø
Brought up with a dominant mother and absent father
Ø
A disability or deformity that made him feel different.
Ø
Worked a solitary job
Ø
Was odd or quiet
Ø
Underlying aggression that would explode during
bouts of low self esteem
Ø
No guilt or remorse
H.H. Homes fits the
majority of these descriptions. And that in and of itself is not damning, I agree,
but also consider these facts.
H.H. did not have a known physical disability but is stated
by psychologists to have had the inability to make meaningful connections, which
is certainly a disability. He also liked to experiment on the anatomy of living
creatures. He had medical knowledge, which is an accepted fact in the Ripper
slayings. And to top it off, there is evidence that H.H. was in London at the
time of the murders.
So close but not quite there?
H.H. was not a local of Whitechapel, which is a major deviation
of the profile. He also has no notable public displays of aggression. And the
evidence of his being in London could be called into question. But the major
difference has to be the venue of these murders. H.H. liked the privacy of his
own home, while Jack killed wherever he wanted. H.H. did seem more experimental
with his victims, but he also had more time.
You decide
At the end of the day, we will probably never have clear
answers to the Ripper slayings, but I do think that H.H. makes at the very
least an honorable mention.
Sources:
Bailey Sarian- Youtube
Csp.edu
Jack-the-ripper.org
Jacktherippertour.com
Britannica.com
Biography.com
Crimemuseum.org
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