What a sad and interesting tale.

I misread your post and thought the mother was the first dead person found.

Mary Ann must have been in a very bad way to do what she did. I can only imagine the guilt she felt, not only killing her children but failing to join them.

Cut throat razors or poison seem to be the two weapons of choice for our Victorian forebears.

As to Jack the Ripper's identity - I think he was so "ordinary" at the time that he would be quite obscure and unnoticed.

After the frenzy of the final murder of Mary Kelly, I am thinking perhaps he went completely insane and was incarcerated in an asylum. Who knows? I certainly don't hold with this "find a famous person around at the time and then manipulate the evidence to fit" school of thought.

Don't want to sound frivolous after this sad story but to return to the East End - I was

just reading that when American writer Jack London visited the capital around 1904 he

visted a Thomas Cook office asking for a guide to accompany him around the area.

They refused, saying he should contact the police instead. Oh dear.