Joseph Barnett was the first person the police suspected of the murder of Mary Kelly: he knew her movements and her habits, he was one of the few people who knew how the bolted door could be opened from outside, he might well have felt he had a motive, and he certainly had the opportunity. A large percentage of murders are committed by people known to the victim and the evidence suggests not that Mary Kelly had met someone and brought them home with her but rather that she was in bed (her clothes were neatly folded by the bed “as though they had been taken off in the ordinary manner”) and she was wearing only what was described at the inquest as a “linen undergarment.” Medical evidence strongly suggests that she was murdered in a lying-down position and probably in her sleep.
It is likely that Barnett, who is described by most of the people who knew him as a decent enough sort of chap, may well have been a very plausible character. A contemporary drawing of him at the inquest, captioned: “J. Barnett, the friend of the deceased” depicts a cool customer well in control of himself. He certainly convinced the police of his innocence and never seems to have been seriously considered as a suspect again. It is quite remarkable, when you come to look, how little material is to be found about Joseph Barnett in all the books devoted to the murders; he is a shadowy, vague, ordinary, almost likeable figure who gives his evidence in a straightforward manner and then more or less disappears. If he was the Ripper not only did he succeed in covering his tracks at the times of the murders but he has been fortunate in that later writers on the murders all seem to have accepted him for what he appeared to be.
It is interesting to note that in Barnett’s initial statement, given to Detective Inspector Frederick Abberline only hours after the body of Mary Kelly had been discovered, Barnett stated that “in consequence of not earning sufficient money to give her and her resorting to prostitution, I resolved on leaving her.” Three days later he denied this was the reason for his leaving Mary Kelly and somewhat nervously he said he had left her “because she had a woman of bad character there; that was the only reason I left.”
It is not disputed that Barnett had employment at Billingsgate Market when he first met Mary Kelly and he was in some sort of a position to support her but later he was often out of work and he had been without any kind of work for several months at the time of the murder of his recent common law wife. When things were difficult Mary Kelly had to procure what little money she could and in the only way she knew how.
It is not difficult to visualise Barnett, perhaps following the murder of Martha Tabram, a local prostitute, in a property near where he had at one time lived with Mary Kelly, conceiving the idea that he might well frighten Mary Kelly off the streets altogether by terrifying her and her fellow prostitutes, since reasoning with her seemed to have no effect.
To some extent Barnett, if that is what he did, was successful. By selecting prostitutes who lived nearby and who were personally known to Mary Kelly (this seems highly likely), Barnett certainly caused Mary Kelly to think twice and even three times about going onto the streets and where and when she did so. There is evidence that Mary Kelly was much interested in the Ripper murders; she encouraged Barnett to buy daily newspapers and if he did not do so, she bought them herself. In addition, as The Times reported, she had the habit of going regularly to the Britannia public house in Fish Street Hill, but she had not visited the Britannia for at least a month before her death. Obviously she sought to avoid places and areas likely to be visited by Jack the Ripper; some, at least, of the Ripper victims frequented the Britannia and the public house sent a floral tribute to Mary Kelly’s funeral with a card inscribed “From friends using certain public houses in common with the murdered woman.”
In the event Mary Kelly certainly met her death at the hands of the killer or killers who became known as Jack the Ripper and afterwards her body was violated far more than any other Ripper victim. The previous four women who had been murdered and whom most Ripperologists accept as Ripper victims, were all in their forties, although they all looked nearer sixty; they were all chronic alcoholics who would almost certainly do absolutely anything and go anywhere for the price of a tipple of gin: Mary was a little more selective. The Ripper murders were marked by increasing savagery which would be consistent with a murderer’s attempts to frighten prostitutes (or one prostitute in particular) into staying off the streets. In the case of poor Mary Kelly the murderer spent literally hours dissecting the pregnant body.
It is interesting to try to fathom what was going on in Barnett’s mind at the time of the Kelly murder. He must have felt rejected and insulted by her apparent preference for a woman sharing her bed rather than he who was in all probability the father of the child she was carrying. His murder (if he was indeed the murderer) of other prostitutes had not had the desired effect. He was, it seems certain, genuinely fond of Mary Kelly, but now she no longer wanted to have anything to do with him. After he moved out following the violent quarrel, which must have been a painful memory, he had continued to visit Mary, right up to and including the evening of her death and, on his own admission, he gave her money whenever he could. But it was all to no avail. After staying a few days with Mary Kelly one prostitute moved out and Barnett was ready to move back in, but Mary wasn’t agreeable. Perhaps she had woken up to the fact that of recent months she had supported Barnett far more than he had supported her; perhaps the fact that she could well be bearing his child was the reason she could no longer bear the sight of him (as a Roman Catholic she would know that she had to have the child; there was no question of an abortion) and then there were his demands on her body. According to Julia Venturney, who lived at number 1, Miller’s Court and had known Mary Kelly and Joe Barnett for about four months, Mary Kelly could no longer bear Joe Barnett and was very fond of another man who very often “ill-used her.”
Joseph Barnett must have been annoyed and worried. He had murdered three or more prostitutes in an unsuccessful attempt to frighten Mary Kelly off the streets and now she would have nothing to do with him. He must have known she was sick of her way of life and would have liked to go back to Ireland where she was born, or Wales where her parents had moved to, and where they might still be living—but he must have known too that she was virtually starving and was openly talking of suicide.
After Barnett admittedly visited Mary Kelly during the early evening of 8 November, there are witnesses who said they saw Mary with a man later that night and she was “very drunk”; another witness reported seeing a man standing in the street, possibly waiting for someone to come out of Mary Kelly’s room. Could this have been Joseph Barnett; or was it a prospective client waiting for her to be free? Perhaps his last meeting with Mary Kelly had been the decisive one for Joseph Barnett. Something may have snapped in his brain. If she would not be his, she would be no one else’s, not any more.
When the coast was clear Barnett could have returned to Mary Kelly’s room where, by that time, she could well have undressed and retired to bed; he could have let himself in by withdrawing the bolt by means of the broken window. Once at the bedside he may have stripped off his clothes to eliminate the risk of bloodstains and then, transported by frustration and bitter, blinding rage, he could have savagely cut Mary Kelly’s throat and then slashed and torn at her body in such a frenzy that something like six hours were needed by people familiar in dealing with corpses to put the body together again.
Even the nature of the shocking atrocities he committed on the body of Mary Kelly have significance in view of his likely psychological state. He cut out her heart; he cut off her breasts; he cut the flesh from her thighs; he ripped out the unborn child from inside her body and burnt it; he pushed one of her hands into her open stomach; he furiously cut her about the face until she was unrecognisable.
Once the hours of fury had passed Joseph Barnett might well have resumed his usual urbane manner: bland, cool, and collected. He could have been sufficiently calm to have identified the body: by the hair and eyes, he said. The police
usually look at the family and close friends first in a murder enquiry, “because,” as one detective said in 1987 concerning a murder hunt, “that’s where we usually find the murderer.” The police suspected Joseph Barnett, questioned him for several hours and examined his clothes for bloodstains, but in the end they must have been satisfied, although, as far as we know, he had no alibi other than claiming to be asleep in a lodging house.
After the Kelly murder Barnett was in demand for questioning and interviews and soon he was turned out of his lodgings in Bishopsgate as being a nuisance. He is said to have moved in with his sister in a flat in Portpool Lane, Holborn. He certainly made several statements to newspapers and was a major witness at the inquest where he “laboured under great emotion,” “spoke with a stutter” and produced a curious effect by beginning every answer by repeating the last word of every question asked. He was evidently completely engrossed in what was being said to him and in his reply. Nevertheless he must have been relieved to reach the end of his testimony and to be told by the coroner: “You have given your evidence very well indeed.”
As an employee from time to time at the enormous Billingsgate fish market, Barnett could easily have acquired the rudimentary anatomical knowledge that some specialists thought the murderer possessed and he must have made a number of friends among the rough and coarse characters there. The “fish fag” of Billingsgate even gained a place in Bailey’s Dictionary where “a Billingsgate” is defined as “a scolding, imprudent slut.” Here Barnett could easily have picked up a short and sharp knife any time and as easily left it when he had finished with it, where it would have caused no suspicion, even if it was still bloodstained. The knife that killed and mutilated Mary Kelly was never found.
Even the Jack the Ripper letters (as we shall see) reflect what could have been Barnett’s anger and purpose. “I am down on whores”…“shan’t quit ripping them till I do get buckled” (arrested)…“my knife is nice and sharp”…etc. And there is the rhyme that may have been sent as a joke but could equally have applied to Barnett as to other suspects:
“I’m not a butcher
I’m not a Yid
Nor yet a foreign skipper
But I’m your own light-hearted friend
Yours truly Jack the Ripper”
The first letter was signed “Jack the Ripper” and at least one newspaper of the day stated that Joseph Barnett was known to some of his friends as “Jack.” Barnett even fits several descriptions of men the police wished to interview and he bears a striking resemblance to the drawing of one suspect reproduced in the Daily Telegraph dated 6 October 1888.
Joseph Barnett lived in many different parts of the East End of London and during a period of four years he seems to have had about ten different addresses. He was therefore fully conversant with the whole area, a necessary acquirement for the murderer, who used this knowledge to get to and from the murder sites easily and quickly to elude capture. Most of those who investigated the Ripper murders thought at the time that the murderer must be resident in the locality.
On 30 September 1888, when the Ripper claimed two victims, Elizabeth Stride and Catherine Eddowes, a bloodstained piece of material, which turned out to be a piece of Catherine Eddowes’s apron, was found in a dark courtyard where the murderer had evidently washed his hands only moments before: another indication that he knew his way intimately and well around those mean streets and dark alleyways.
It must also seem likely that the murderer was known to the victims or his presence did not alarm them, for none of them appears to have been sufficiently alarmed at his approach to scream, if of course they were aware of his approach. Joseph Barnett is likely to have been known to the local prostitutes who would know Mary Kelly, with whom he had been living for over a year. He could easily have disarmed them by asking whether they knew the whereabouts of Mary Kelly at that time or some equally innocent question before darting forward and slitting their throats before they could utter a sound.
A lot more research may be called for before Joseph Barnett can be unquestionably identified as Jack the Ripper but he does appear to have answered the description of a prime suspect, to have had the motive, the means, the opportunity, and he was known to be violent.
—
In December 1986 I noticed a small newspaper report to the effect that John Morrison of Leytonstone, London, had become deeply interested in Mary Kelly (or Marie Jeannette Kelly as she liked to be called), Jack the Ripper’s last victim, and he had even arranged for a memorial stone to be erected over her grave. I wrote to him and what follows has been compiled from the information, cuttings, letters, and material that he has been kind enough to send me. He tells me that one room in his home is known as “Jack the Ripper’s Headquarters”! It contains a mountain of evidence pertaining to the unsolved Ripper crimes that he has accumulated.
John Morrison, a keen amateur historian, devoted over four years to researching the Ripper murders and in particular the last known victim, Mary Kelly, when he realised that she was buried in a cemetery very near his home. He asked to see the Burial Register and discovered that Mary Kelly lay in grave number 16, Row 67. The Register entry notes: “Marie Jeannette Kelly brought from Shoreditch Mortuary 19 November 1888.” The exact place of burial was pointed out to John Morrison who believes that Jack the Ripper was an Irishman named James Kelly who escaped from Broadmoor and murdered his former mistress, Mary Kelly.
James Kelly came originally from Liverpool and John Morrison thinks that Mary Kelly may have also come from the same town; he says the only evidence that she came from Ireland and moved to Wales is contained in the evidence of Joseph Barnett allegedly quoting what Mary Kelly had told him and because of her association with James Kelly and the child she bore or for some other reason it could well be that Mary Kelly did not want her Liverpool connection to become known.
It is a historical fact that James Kelly murdered his wife in Liverpool, was pronounced insane and was committed to Broadmoor Hospital (opened in 1863) a special hospital for the treatment of psychiatric patients of dangerous, violent or criminal propensities. James Kelly escaped from Broadmoor on 28 January 1888, using a pass key made from a corset spring, and The Guinness Book of Records, for some years, included his thirty-nine years’ freedom as “the longest escape from Broadmoor.” It is stated that after an adventurous life in Paris, in New York, and at sea, he returned in April 1927 to ask for re-admission to Broadmoor! After some difficulties this was arranged and he died there in 1929.
In a way John Morrison’s long study and absorption with Mary Kelly and the Ripper murders all began when he dreamed that he would find the true name of Jack the Ripper in The Guinness Book of Records. It will be noticed that James Kelly was at liberty during the time of the Ripper murders and when similar crimes were reported from Paris and New York: otherwise nothing whatever seems to have been heard of him in all those thirty-nine years. Back in Broadmoor his warders were warned that he apparently suffered from delusions and fantasies, imagining himself to be Jack the Ripper, which he continued to do until his death.
John Morrison says, “Kelly’s escape was never made public because the authorities wanted to keep their embarrassment to a minimum. This led, in fact, to the resignation of Commissioner Warren from Scotland Yard in 1888.” John Morrison tells me he has “been in contact with leading criminologists who are very interested in his findings and in the fact that he may be the man who exposes the biggest official charade of all time”…what he calls “James the Rip-off”!
John Morrison’s theory that James Kelly is Jack the Ripper is based on quite a remarkable number of coincidences linking Kelly with facts known about the hitherto unidentified killer. Until other more plausible explanations are forthcoming John Morrison sticks firmly to his conviction as to the identity of Jack the Ripper.
He is convinced that Scotland Yard, the Home Office, and a number of famous people always knew that James Kelly was the Ripper and his researches have all pointed t
o there being a cover-up in 1888 to “save face” at Scotland Yard and he is certain that this cover-up continues to this day. Broadmoor, he says, is equally embarrassed for in making good his escape Kelly took with him a large hospital pay-roll!
John Morrison tells me that his enquiries have elicited the fact that James Kelly killed his wife for the sake of his lover, Mary Kelly, when he lived in Liverpool. After the trial Mary fled from Liverpool and became a prostitute. All this and a great deal more John Morrison says he has discovered without any co-operation from the respective authorities.
When he made enquiries at Broadmoor he was told that no record existed of a James Kelly ever being a patient there; and following enquiries at the Home Office he says the James Kelly entry was withdrawn from The Guinness Book of Records and there is no mention of James Kelly in the current issue.
John Morrison has written to people like the Prime Minister asking why James Kelly has been “wiped off” the records at Broadmoor and withdrawn from The Guiness Book of Records. In reply the Home Office said it had no knowledge of any request to withdraw the James Kelly entry in the Guinness Book and all official records relating to the Kelly case had been released for public inspection at the Public Records Office at Richmond in Surrey.
John Morrison tells me he wrote to the Records Office and received by way of a reply a statement that any papers relating to the Kelly case “are not yet open to public inspection.” He further claims that he has been approached by callers and other people who have appeared to be very upset by his researches; some having even warned him to cease his investigations into the Ripper case.
I have to say here that I contacted Norris McWhirter who edits The Guinness Book of Records and whom I happen to have met and in his reply, dated 2 February 1987, he says: “I do not know what gave John Morrison the idea that we deleted the entry on James Kelly on instruction ‘by people in high authority.’ No such ‘instruction’ was given to us and indeed we would not have accepted it. The reason why the entry was dropped was because of pressure of space and the fact that Kelly’s thirty-nine-year ‘absence’ was surpassed by the American, Leonard T. Fristoe, who escaped from Nevada State Prison in 1923 and was turned in by his son in 1969, after forty-six years of freedom. The other point of which we took cognisance was that Broadmoor is not strictly a prison but a secure mental hospital, in which the inmates are not deemed to be culpable…”
The Big Book of Jack the Ripper Page 19