The Whitechapel Vigilance Committee was a group of local civilian volunteers who patrolled the streets of London's Whitechapel district during the period of the Whitechapel murders of 1888. The volunteers were active mainly at night, assisting the Metropolitan Police in the search of the unknown murderer known as the "Whitechapel Murderer", "Leather Apron" and, latterly, "Jack the Ripper".
The Whitechapel Vigilance Committee was founded by sixteen tradesmen from the Whitechapel and Spitalfields districts, who were concerned that the killings were affecting businesses in the area. [1] [2] The committee was led by a local builder named George Lusk, who was elected chairman during its first meeting on 10 September 1888. [3]
Other committee members included publican Joseph Aarons (treasurer), Mr. B. Harris (secretary), [4] and Messrs. Barnett, Cohen, H. A. Harris, Hodgins, Houghton, Isaacs, Jacobs, Laughton, Lindsay, Lord, Mitchell, Reeves, and Rogers. The Daily Telegraph reported on 5 October 1888 that the leading members of the committee were "drawn principally from the trading class, and include a builder, a cigar-manufacturer, a tailor, a picture-frame maker, a licensed victualler, and 'an actor.'" [5] The latter may have been the entertainer Charles Reeves. [6]
Members of the committee were unhappy with the level of protection the local community was receiving from the Metropolitan Police, so it introduced its own system of local patrols, using hand-picked unemployed men to monitor the streets of the East End every evening from midnight to between four and five the next morning. Each of these men received a small wage from the committee, and each patrolled a particular beat, being armed with a police whistle, a pair of galoshes and a strong stick. The committee itself met each evening at nine in a public house called The Crown, and once the establishment closed at 12.30am the committee members would inspect and join the patrols. These patrols were shortly to be joined by those of the Working Men's Vigilance Committee. [7]
As chairman of the committee, Lusk's name appeared in national newspapers and upon posters in and around Whitechapel, appealing for information concerning the identity of Jack the Ripper and complaining about the lack of a reward for such information from the British government. Due to this publicity, Lusk received threatening letters through the post, allegedly from the killer. He is also mentioned in a letter dated 17 September 1888, reportedly discovered among archive materials in the late 20th century; however, most experts dismiss this as a modern hoax. [8]
On 30 September 1888, the committee members wrote to the government under Lord Salisbury in an attempt to persuade them to offer a reward for information leading to the apprehension of the Ripper. When the Home Secretary Henry Matthews refused this request, the committee offered its own reward. [3] The committee also employed two private detectives, Mr. Le Grand (or Grand) and Mr. J. H. Batchelor, [4] to investigate the murders without the involvement of the police.
The "From Hell" letter, which was sent with half of a preserved human kidney, was personally addressed to Lusk, who received the parcel on 16 October 1888. [9] The letter was postmarked on the previous day. [10]
Many scholars [11] of the Ripper murders regard this letter as being the communication most likely to have been sent by the actual murderer. [12]
Annie Chapman was the second canonical victim of the notorious unidentified serial killer Jack the Ripper, who killed and mutilated a minimum of five women in the Whitechapel and Spitalfields districts of London from late August to early November 1888.
Mary Ann Nichols, known as Polly Nichols, was the first canonical victim of the unidentified serial killer known as Jack the Ripper, who is believed to have murdered and mutilated at least five women in and around the Whitechapel district of London from late August to early November 1888.
A series of murders that took place in the East End of London between August and November 1888 have been attributed to an unidentified assailant nicknamed Jack the Ripper. Since then, the identity of the Ripper has been widely debated, with over 100 suspects named. Though many theories have been advanced, experts find none widely persuasive, and some are hardly taken seriously at all.
The "Saucy Jacky" postcard is the name given to a postcard received by the Central News Agency of London and postmarked 1 October 1888. The author of the postcard claims to have been the unidentified serial killer known as Jack the Ripper.
The "From Hell" letter was a letter sent with half of a preserved human kidney to George Lusk, the chairman of the Whitechapel Vigilance Committee, in October 1888. The author of this letter claimed to be the unidentified serial killer known as Jack the Ripper, who had murdered and mutilated at least four women in the Whitechapel and Spitalfields districts of London in the two months prior to Lusk receiving this letter, and whose vigilance committee Lusk led in civilian efforts to assist the police in identifying and apprehending the perpetrator.
Mary Jane Kelly, also known as Marie Jeanette Kelly, Fair Emma, Ginger, Dark Mary and Black Mary, is widely believed by scholars to have been the final victim of the notorious unidentified serial killer Jack the Ripper, who murdered at least five women in the Whitechapel and Spitalfields districts of London from late August to early November 1888. At the time of Kelly's death, she was approximately 25 years old, working as a prostitute and living in relative poverty.
Elizabeth "Long Liz" Stride is believed to have been the third victim of the unidentified serial killer known as Jack the Ripper, who killed and mutilated at least five women in the Whitechapel and Spitalfields districts of London from late August to early November 1888.
Catherine Eddowes was the fourth of the canonical five victims of the notorious unidentified serial killer known as Jack the Ripper, who is believed to have killed and mutilated a minimum of five women in the Whitechapel and Spitalfields districts of London from late August to early November 1888.
Martha Tabram was an English woman killed in a spate of violent murders in and around the Whitechapel district of East London between 1888 and 1891. She may have been the first victim of the unidentified serial killer Jack the Ripper.
The "Dear Boss" letter was a message allegedly written by the notorious unidentified Victorian serial killer known as Jack the Ripper. Addressed to the Central News Agency of London and dated 25 September 1888, the letter was postmarked and received by the Central News Agency on 27 September. The letter itself was forwarded to Scotland Yard on 29 September.
Seweryn Antonowicz Kłosowski, better known under his pseudonym George Chapman, was a Victorian era Polish serial killer known as the Borough Poisoner.
Jack the Ripper was an unidentified serial killer who was active in and around the impoverished Whitechapel district of London, England, in 1888. In both criminal case files and the contemporaneous journalistic accounts, the killer was also called the Whitechapel Murderer and Leather Apron.
George Akin Lusk was a British builder and decorator who specialised in music hall restoration. He was the chairman of the Whitechapel Vigilance Committee during the Whitechapel murders, including the killings ascribed to Jack the Ripper, in 1888.
The Whitechapel murders were committed in or near the impoverished Whitechapel district in the East End of London between 3 April 1888 and 13 February 1891. At various points some or all of these eleven unsolved murders of women have been ascribed to the notorious unidentified serial killer known as Jack the Ripper.
Thomas Horrocks Openshaw was an English Victorian and Edwardian era surgeon perhaps best known for his brief involvement in attempting to solve the notorious Jack the Ripper murders of 1888.
Joseph Lawende was a Polish-born British cigarette salesman who is believed to have witnessed serial killer Jack the Ripper in the company of his fourth victim, Catherine Eddowes, approximately nine minutes before the discovery of her body on 30 September 1888.
The Goulston Street graffito was a sentence written on a wall beside a clue in the 1888 Whitechapel murders investigation. It has been transcribed as variations on the sentence "The Juwes are the men that will not be blamed for nothing". The meaning of the graffito, and its possible connection to the crimes attributed to Jack the Ripper, have been debated for over a century.
George Albert Godley was a police officer of the Metropolitan Police who was involved in the hunt for Jack the Ripper in 1888.
The Thames Torso Murders, often called the Thames Mysteries or the Embankment Murders, were a sequence of unsolved murders of women occurring in London, England from 1887 to 1889. The series included four incidents which were filed as belonging to the same series. None of the cases were solved, and only one of the four victims was identified. In addition, other murders of a similar kind, taking place between 1873 and 1902, have also been associated with the same murder series.
Charles Allen Lechmere, also known as Charles Allen Cross, was an English carman who became involved in the unsolved Whitechapel murders after he reportedly found the body of Mary Ann Nichols, the first of Jack the Ripper's five canonical victims.
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