Jack The Ripper Research Paper

In the early morning of August 31, 1888, Jack the Ripper named his first victim. Mary Ann Nichols was a homeless prostitute who worked in the district of Spitalfields. Between one o’clock and two o’clock, Mary was thrown out of her lodging house at 18 Thrawl Street, Spitalfields. Fate had dealt her a rough hand. She was a 43-year-old mother of five children, separated from her husband. This forced her into prostitution. An hour or so after losing her lodging, she was seen by one of her roommates roaming the streets of Whitechapel drunk. This was the last time Mary Ann Nichols was seen alive. At 3:40 a.m a street carter found her lying in a darkened stable doorway. Her throat had been slit and her body was mutilated. Jack the Ripper had killed his first victim. Now for decades historians

have tried to uncover the identity of the notorious serial killer that prowled the streets of London’s East End in 1888, and his identity has finally been revealed.

Aaron Kosminski is Jack the Ripper.

From August through November of the year 1888, a murderer prowled the streets of London’s East End, preying on prostitutes that worked in the districts of Aldgate, Spitalfields, Whitechapel, and the City of London proper. To most historians and criminologists he is known plainly as the Whitechapel Murderer, but to most, he is known as Jack the Ripper. Jack the Ripper, however, is a name the killer never claimed for himself. It originated from a letter the murderer had sent to the Metropolitan police. The murders of Jack the Ripper were grisly. The Ripper murdered his victims quickly with a slash across their throats, but the grisly part was the manner in which he mutilated the bodies. Which became more shocking with each victim. The number of victims remains the subject of much debate. Most historians number the victims at five. These victims were Mary Ann Nichols, Annie Chapman, Elizabeth Stride, Catherine Eddowes, and Mary

Jane Kelly. Other authors, however, add other prostitutes to this list. Some authors even exclude Elizabeth Stride. No matter who you include or exclude from the list, you arrive at the conclusion that the victims were of the lowest rung of the social ladder. They were drunkards who were a statistic to all except for a few acquaintances and family members. Yet the murders caused an enormous uproar. There are many reasons for this uproar. First, although the Whitechapel murders are not the first known cases of a serial killer, these crimes took place in the heart of a major urban city, which only increased the feeling of dread along with the number of victims. But this wasn’t just London; it was Victorian London, the London of workhouses and sooty back alleys. Which helped set the scene for these grisly murders, and helped the newspapers, sensing a terrific story, milk the story rather shamefully. However, the newspapers were never able to say exactly who Jack the Ripper was. Until now.
Aaron Kosminski was identified as Jack the Ripper through DNA testing. In 2007, Russell Edwards bought a shawl from an auction. He told The Daily Mail, “that he had forensic testing conducted on a shawl stained with blood and semen.” The DNA results came in. “Edwards said the results of the testing of the substances found on the shawl determined Jack the Ripper was actually Aaron Kosminski, a Polish man living in London at the time of the murders in 1888, near where at least one of the victims was found. Samples from the shawl revealed DNA for two different people, both of which were matches to descendants of the victim who owned the shawl - Catherine Eddowes - and Kosminski.” However, Edwards admitted, “when he bought the shawl at auction, provenance was lacking, but he received a letter from the seller saying her ancestor was a police officer at the scene of Eddowes’ murder and took the item.” The DNA results prove that Aaron Kosminski was indeed Jack the Ripper. However, there is more evidence that incriminates Kosminski.
Aaron Kosminski was identified as the suspect in question, by a witness, to one of the five murders tied to Jack the Ripper, but police didn’t have enough evidence to convict him. “The witness was a Jew who was said to have refused to give evidence.” Now the historians and criminologists “know of only two Jewish witnesses.” Joseph Lawende and Israel Schwartz. Joseph Lawende “identified the woman as Eddowes by her distinctive clothing, but he said he would not be able to recognize the man if he saw him again.” Joseph Lawende was a witness but not the key witness. However, the second Jewish witness, “Israel Schwartz is different. He actually saw a man assault Elizabeth Stride, and since it is unlikely that two different men attacked Stride in the same spot within 15 minutes of each other, Schwartz almost certainly spotted the killer. As a witness he better fits Anderson’s description as “the only man to have a good view of the murderer.” Anderson explained in his notes, “that the witness had refused to testify because “the suspect was also a Jew and also because his evidence would convict the suspect, and witness would be the means of murderer being hanged which he did not wish to be left on his mind.” So with Schwartz being a Jew, he did not want to be the reason that Kosminski, a fellow Jew, would be convicted of murder and sentenced to hanging. However, Anderson, a police officer on the Ripper case, wasn’t the only one to suspect Kosminski. Many others suspected Kosminski as well.
Police officers at the time of the murders took handwritten notes stating that they believed Aaron Kosminski was the notorious Jack the Ripper, but they couldn’t prove it. Chief Inspector Donald Swanson was one of the men on the case at the time who believed Kosmiski to be the serial killer. “In his annotations, he names Aaron Kosminski as the suspect in the notorious Ripper case.” In Swanson’s notes, he explains why he believed Kosminski to be the killer who stalked east London back in 1888. Sir Robert Anderson was another police officer on the case who believed Kosminski to be guilty. Aaron Kosminski fits all of Anderson’s criteria to be the suspect. “From Anderson’s account the suspect was male, Polish, and a Jew (and one of the eastern European immigrants); he lived in the heart of the district, and he had “people” (presumably a nuclear family rather than the whole East End Jewish population) to protect him.” Living in the heart of the district was an advantage because of his knowledge of the area. Having people to protect him was an asset because no one would testify against him.
However, many people say that Jack the Ripper was actually a man by the name of Thomas Cream. People say that it is Cream because he was an abortionist, “arrested in connection with the poisoning of prostitutes.” He was hanged in 1892. “His departing words were “I am Jack the Ri…” as the rope snapped taut.” However, he could not have been Jack the Ripper because “he was in jail at the time of the last murders.” So Thomas Cream is not Jack the Ripper even though he had a hatred for prostitutes and admitted it as the rope snapped tautly.
In conclusion, Aaron Kosminski is the notorious serial killer, Jack the Ripper. Kosminski has been proven guilty through DNA testing on Catherine Eddowes shawl. He was also identified by a Polish witness who saw him fighting with Elizabeth Stride. He was also the prime suspect of the police officers at the time but was never convicted because there was a lack of evidence.