The archivist stumbled upon a walking cane that was said to be carved with the image of a suspect in the Jack Ripper murder case. Jack Ripple was the notorious serial killer who took the East End by storm in the fall of 1888 and murdered at least five female sex workers in the Waichier area: Mary Ann Polly "Nichols, Anne Chapman, Elizabeth Stredder, Catherine Edo, and Mary Jane Kelly. The victims were killed by slitting their throats, some were even mutilated, and their internal organs were removed.
This skillful dismemberment has sparked widespread speculation that the killer may have been engaged in a skilled occupation using blades and scalpels, such as a surgeon, barber, or butcher. For 129 years, dozens of people have been suspected of being involved in the case, but the case remains unsolved. However, police had already zeroed in on some suspects at the time and had even conducted an investigation based on a jigsaw puzzle portrait of the suspect's face, from which the cane is believed to have been carved.
The cane was originally given to Aberlin, the chief inspector of the Metropolitan Police in London, in 1888 by his team. However, with the closure of the Bramhill Police Personnel Academy in 2015, the cane was missing for years. However, the cane was rediscovered by two staff members at the Police Academy last year while sorting through police memorabilia artifacts that had been transferred to storage.
While this creepy carving is unlikely to settle the debate over Jack Ripple's identity, the archivist believes it is an intriguing relic of this dark murder in London's history.
"Finding this cane is an exciting time for us. Jack Ripple is one of the biggest and most notorious murders in our history, and his crimes have significant significance as they pave the way for modern policing and forensics, as police begin to experiment and develop new techniques such as scene protection, analytics, and photography to try and solve these murders," Anthony Cash, content creator at the Police Academy, said in a statement.
"This walking cane is a fascinating artifact that represents an important period in the history of policing, and we are thrilled to be exhibiting it in Leyton, along with the original newspaper clippings, so that our officers can see for themselves how far we've come in policing since then," Cash concluded.