"JACK THE RIPPER."

Southland Times, Issue 14580, 22 November 1910, Page 7

"JACK THE RIPPER."

NEW EIGHT OK THU WHITSCHAPEI. CHIMES. LONDON. Oct. 7. - The newly published reminiscences of Lieutenant-Colonel Sir Harry Smith, late Commissioner of Pclice in the City of .London, have a good deal to tell of the efforts of the police to capture the notorious “Jack the Ripper.” “Aftbr the second crime,” he says, ”1 sent word to Sir diaries Warren that 1 had discovered a man very likely to be the man Wanted. He certainly had all the qualifications requisite lie had been a medical student; he had been In a lunatic asylum; he spent al'. his time with women whom he bilked by giving them polished farthings instead of sovereigns, two of these farthings having been found in the pocket of the murdered woman. Sir diaries Warren failed to find him. I thought he was likely to he in Rupert street, Haymarkct. 1 sent * up two men. ami 1 l.ere he was; hut, polIshcd farthings and all lie proved an alibi Without the shadow of a doubt.” Sir Henry Smith considers that, had his orders been carried out the reign of 'terror caused by those murders would have ceased on the night in which one woman was found murdered in Berners street and another in Mitre square. In connection with tills Mitre square murclci he tells anew the story of the greatest bungle committed by the police in connection with tills whole series of ghast- ' Sy crimes. ”My men thoroughly awake at last, igrere scouring the whole neighbourhood, and one of them Halso by name, who had been with us in Mitre square, thinking he had a hotter chance down Whitechapel way. ran at his best pace in that direction. Collision street. Whitechapel. Is a broad thoroughfare running parallel with the Commercial road, just onethird of a mile from the square, 11 nd in that street, at the door of one of the model workmens dwellings erected by Peabody, he saw a light, and halting found a constable of the Metropollitan force looking at the missing piece of apron. It was folded up, and immediately above, written In chalk, wore the ■words, ‘The Jews are the men that won’t be blamed for nothing. 1 It was thus proved beyond, doubt that the murderer, on that evening at any rate, made In the first instance for Whitechapel. Sir Charles Warren was Instantly apprised of this discovery, and, comjng down himself ordered the words to be wifced out, alleging as his reason for doing so that he feared a rising against the Jews. This ■was, I thought, a fatal mistake. It Is just possible the words, if photographed, might b a ve afforded an important clue.” Three or four days later Sir Henry Smith, received a letter addressed to him personally. The writer, who said that he could tell a good deal about the murders, but feared to come to Sir Henry Smith’s office because, being on ticket of leave, he was afraid that he might be apprehended by the detectives, declared that If a letter were addressed to a certain place in Hoxton, to be left till called for, he would get it. What followed is worth telling in .Sir Henry Smith’s own

jwords:— “There were two courses open to me; "to watch the house In Hoxton and apprehend anyone and everyone who called, or to trust the man who, trusted me. J chose the latter. *T wrote making an appointment with liim for 10 p.m. in one of the quietest squares in the West End; assured him I ■would be alone, and that not one detective would accompany me from the Old SJewry. I told him to stand under the lamp at the north-west end. of the gardens, and wait for me. Shortly before the hour named I took up my position on the pavement opposite. Punctual almost to the minute I saw a man advance from the north and halt under the lamp. Crossing- the road at once I walked

quickly up to I.lm, and looked him over Steadily. The man confronting me could not have beer more than five feet two or three inches in height. He was stoutly built, black-bearded, and of an Ugly and forbidding countenance. “ ‘Have you come to see anyone, my man'.’’ I said. “ ‘No, I haven't,’ he replied in a civil Enough tone. “ ‘Well. I have,’ X said, 'and I mean to wait a bit longer to see if lie keeps his appointment.’ " There we stood, facing one another for five or six minutes, when the man turned and walked leisurely away.” . Subsequently Sir Harry Smith had another letter from this man saying, “Now I know I can trust you, I will be at the Old Jewry as soon as I can”; but the man never came. Sir Henry Smith concludes by saying that he lues no more Idea now where the culprit lived or who he was than he had twenty years ago.