For many years, many have doubted the authenticity of the letters, with some people believing they were all faked to help boost newspaper sales. Now, an expert has come to prove with evidence that the letters were, in fact, fabricated.
There are over 200 letters said to have come from Jack the Ripper.
Police publicized them after receiving the first four.
This only encouraged copycats to send letters that would sensationalize the murderer even further.
It has long been suggested that Jack the Ripper letters were faked. However, new analysis, particularly focusing on the “Dear Boss” letter and “Saucy Jacky” postcard, reveal that these two were written by a single author. The new analysis, which looked closely for similarities in all 209 letters, was conducted by forensic linguist Dr. Andrea Nini.
The "Dear Boss" letter was sent to the Central News Agency on Sept. 27, 1888.
The full letter reads:
‘Dear Boss,
‘I keep on hearing the police have caught me but they wont fix me just yet.
‘I have laughed when they look so clever and talk about being on the right track.
‘That joke about Leather Apron gave me real fits. I am down on whores and I shant quit ripping them till I do get buckled.
‘Grand work the last job was. I gave the lady no time to squeal.
‘How can they catch me now. I love my work and want to start again.
‘You will soon hear of me with my funny little games.
‘I saved some of the proper red stuff in a ginger beer bottle over the last job to write with but it went thick like glue and I can’t use it.
‘Red ink is fit enough I hope ha. ha. The next job I do I shall clip the ladys ears off and send to the police officers just for jolly, wouldn’t you?
‘Keep this letter back till I do a bit more work, then give it out straight.
‘My knife’s so nice and sharp I want to get to work right away if I get a chance.
‘Good Luck.
‘Yours truly, Jack the Ripper
‘Don’t mind me giving the trade name
‘PS Wasn’t good enough to post this before I got all the red ink off my hands curse it. No luck yet. They say I’m a doctor now. ha ha’.
Four days later, the "Saucy Jacky" postcard came in.
The postcard reads:
‘I was not codding dear old Boss when I gave you the tip, you’ll hear about Saucy Jacky’s work tomorrow double event this time number one squealed a bit couldn’t finish straight off.
‘Had not got time to get ears off for police thanks for keeping last letter back till I got to work again.
‘Jack the Ripper’.
Nini found similarities between the "Dear Boss" letter and "Saucy Jacky" postcard.
The similarities include the phrase “to keep back” instead of saying a more popular phrase during that time, “to withhold.” The word “work” was also used to reference the killing. Both letters also shared “ha ha” to express laughter. The first letter was the first instance wherein the name Jack the Ripper was indicated.
“These results constitute new forensic evidence in the Jack the Ripper case after more than 100 years, even though they do not reveal information about the identity of the killer.” – Andrea Nini
Nini explained that people had previously doubted the letters due to the likeness in the handwriting. But their conclusion hadn’t been established. Nini also made the association between these two letters and another text included in the Jack the Ripper case, the “Moab and Midian” letter.
Part of the Moab and Midian letter stated something about a triple murder and the promise of delivering “a bit of face.” The letter was sent by Mr. Tom Bulling to the police. Experts suspect that Bulling was the author. Bulling worked for Center News Agency, and history has it that the company faced “fierce competition” and was also infamous for fabricated news.
Murders by Jack the Ripper remain the most notorious unsolved murder case in the history of British crime.
The serial killer's identity has not been confirmed and speculation on the matter remains rife to this day.
This new analysis may not have provided clues to Jack the Ripper’s identity, but it served as supporting evidence for the theory that suggests journalists made the letters up to sell more newspapers.
