In the Victorian era London was known as a dark, cold, viscous place and was well known for its many murders. No murders were as well known as those of the notorious Jack the Ripper. He not only murdered several women but he also mutilated their bodies. He was never caught for any of his murders and no one ever really identified the monster responsible for all these viscous killings. What makes Jack the Ripper the most notorious serial killer of all time? Well, the fact that he not only murdered helpless woman but also mutilated their bodies and the fact that he was never caught or identified for his wrong doings has a lot to do with it.
In the several murders of Jack the Ripper all of his victims were brutally mutilated. His first recorded victim, Mary Ann Nichols, was found lying on her back at first with no marks found. But later policeman Constable John Neil found that her neck had been slashed twice which cut through her windpipe. After the body was stripped, it was discovered that her abdomen area had been mutilated. This murder was not the only murder by Jack the Ripper where the body was mutilated. Many other murders by Jack the Ripper were found mutilated including the murders of Annie Chapman, Elizabeth Stride, Catharine Eddoes, and Mary Jane Kelly. In the double murder of both Elizabeth Stride and Catharine Eddoes, Police Constable Watkins stated, “I saw the body of a woman lying on her back with her feet facing the square, her clothes up above her waist. I saw her throat was cut and her bowels protruding. The stomach was ripped up. She was lying in a pool of blood.”. Jack the Ripper had an obsession with mutilating the bodies of his victims.
Amazingly, Jack the Ripper was never caught or identified for his almost obvious murders. He left the bodies of his murders in the middle of the streets out in the open where it was easily to see. In spite of an extensive investigation of the killings, Jack the Ripper was never apprehended nor convincingly identified (Magellan: White Chapel Murders and Jack the Ripper). Probably the most amazing mystery of Jack the Ripper is his double murder. Literally forty-five minutes after the body of Elizabeth Stride was found police discovered the body of Catharine Eddoes. How this murderer was able to accomplish two such murders in such a short time, particularly with the mutilations of the second victim, without being seen by the police or anybody and then, when the area was in a heightened state of alarm, and create the chalk writing on the archway is nothing short of amazing (Jack the Ripper power pt.). Part of the reason why police never caught or identified Jack the Ripper is that they didn't have the advanced investigation tools that we have today. Fingerprinting techniques were still being developed… blood grouping only developed after the identification of the different types in 1901… and DNA wasn't discovered until 1953 (Magellan: White Chapel Murders and Jack the Ripper). It is still incredible that they never caught Jack the Ripper.
Jack the Ripper is definitely the most mysterious and well-known serial killer of all time. He lived in a time and place of violence and poverty. The Whitechapel district of London at the end of the nineteenth century was generally regarded as being a "horrible black labyrinth, reeking from end to end and swarming with human vermin, whose trade is robbery and whose recreation is murder (Magellan: White Chapel Murders and Jack the Ripper). London was a horrible place in this time and many women turned to prostitution as a way to make some extra money here and there. All of Jack the Ripper"s victims were all middle aged women involved in prostitution. Jack the Ripper, although very sick and twisted, is the most notorious serial killer whose murders have never been solved.
