Jack the Ripper: The Hand of a Woman

only partially, since death had occurred, Phillips said, when the supply of blood to the brain was interrupted because the throat had been severed. The incision to the skin was jagged, indicating the direction in which the cut had been made – from left to right.
    There were three scratches to the victim’s neck, below the lobe of her left ear. They ran in the opposite direction to the incisions about the throat. They appeared to be the marks left by the three middle fingernails of the murderer’s right hand; yet if that were the case, my father and I thought that they must have been unusually long nails. Were they a man’s nails, we wondered, or was it more likely that such long nails might have belonged to a woman?
    If they were a woman’s nails, what sort of a woman might have nails of such length? Whitechapel was home to many thousands of people who, for the greater part, lived in abject poverty. Single women had to fend for themselves, while married women were required to contribute to the household budget as best they could. For these women, life was hard and many worked long hours in factories, warehouses and laundries as seamstresses, jute pickers, washerwomen and the like, none of whom would be likely to have grown nails of a sufficient length to have caused the marks found on the victim’s neck. Neither, we thought, would they have belonged to a midwife, who, by the very nature of her job, would have required short, trimmed nails to avoid scratching her patients – or new-born children. It seemed to us more likely that they belonged to a woman who did not have to work for a living, a woman of independent means, or a woman who was supported by her husband: in other words, a woman who might have been well-to -do.
    There were two recent bruises on the right side of the murdered woman’s head and neck, one on the cheek and the other at a point corresponding with the scratches. They appeared to indicate how the murderer had grasped the victim during the attack.
    The injuries to the abdomen, Dr Phillips thought, had been inflicted after death. The abdomen was entirely laid open, from top to bottom. The injuries to the abdomen, Dr Phillips thought, had been inflicted after death. The abdomen was entirely laid open, from top to bottom. The intestines, still attached to the body by a cord, now lay across the woman’s upper body and over her right shoulder. The uterus and its appendages, with the upper portion of the vagina and lower two-thirds of the bladder, had been entirely removed. No trace of these body parts could be found anywhere in the yard; the only logical conclusion to be drawn is that the murderer must have taken them away. The incisions were cleanly cut, skirting the rectum, and dividing the vagina low enough to avoid injury to the uterus. Dr Phillips gave his opinion that the work was “Obviously that of an expert – of one, at least, who had such knowledge of anatomical or pathological examinations as to be enabled to secure the pelvic organs [the uterus] with one sweep of a knife….”
    As for the weapon used, the doctor said that all the injuries had been inflicted with the same knife: a very sharp weapon, probably with a thin, narrow blade, six to eight inches long; perhaps a small amputating knife.
    Much blood had been spilled where the body was found and Dr Phillips thought that the murderer would have been covered in a very great deal of blood, “especially on his hands”.
    There were no signs of a struggle, or that the attack had been sexually motivated, and no evidence of rape, sexual assault, or even that recent intercourse had taken place – this conclusion was reached despite the position of the victim’s legs. Once again, no evidence could be found that showed that the murderer had any sexual interest in the victim.
    Dr Phillips suggested that if the removal of the uterus had been performed “deliberately, with care and for the right medical reasons, say for pathological research, it might have taken a skilled surgeon perhaps an hour to complete. But if no care were required, it would take considerably less time, but even then, no less than a quarter of an hour”. It was clear, he said, that “whoever had attacked and murdered the poor woman was determined to acquire her uterus”.
    As for the time of death, the doctor estimated that it might have occurred at 4.30 a.m., but he had reservations; that summer had been the coldest since records began, and during the early