The Whitechapel Murders began during the second half of 1888. The murderer, who later became known as Jack the Ripper, was never caught, and his identity continues to be the subject of much study and speculation by so-called "Ripperologists".
The victims where always prostitutes, and the murders savage, including, but not limited to, abdominal mutilations wherein various internal organs were removed. Whether or not the victims were murdered prior to those mutiliations is not known, but it is thought by some forensic experts that they were strangled before being cut open.
All of the Whitechapel Murders were perpetrated at night.
The Victims of Jack the Ripper
Below are the names of those women believed by most Ripperologists to have been victims of Jack.
1) Mary Ann Nichols, (maiden name Mary Ann Walker, nicknamed "Polly"), killed on Friday, August 31, 1888.
2) Annie Chapman, (maiden name Eliza Ann Smith, nicknamed "Dark Annie"), killed on Saturday, September 8, 1888.
3) Elizabeth Stride, (maiden name Elisabeth Gustafsdotter, nicknamed "Long Liz"), killed on Sunday, September 30, 1888.
4) Catherine Eddowes, (used the aliases "Kate Conway" and "Mary Ann Kelly," from the surnames of her two common-law husbands Thomas Conway and John Kelly), killed on Sunday, September 30, 1888.
5) Mary Jane Kelly, (called herself "Marie Jeanette Kelly" after a trip to Paris, nicknamed "Ginger"), killed on Friday, November 9, 1888.
(This list was culled from the notes of Sir Melville Macnaghten who was Chief Constable of the Metropolitan Police Service Criminal Investigation Department in 1894.)
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