Jack & H.H Holmes: Synonymous Victorian Serial Killers - Essay Sample

Introduction

Jack, the Ripper and H.H Holmes are not news to many concerning crime. There two names are synonymous for all the wrong reasons and even at one point, it was claimed that they were the same person. There are so many similarities between these two characters going by how they carried out their activities. They were both Victorian serial killers for over a decade and the drawing in the similarities in the way that they carried out their operations is just appalling. Many people have even recommended that the two criminals could have been the same; which is fascinating, if not astonishing, prospect (Frost). Jack the Ripper, the scandalous serial executioner, began his deadly acts from the streets of the East End in 1888. His heartless homicides and heartbreaking exploitations of the innocent people are as yet an unsolved puzzle and the character of the man still stays strange to date. Be that as it may, while Jack was prowling around the lanes and rear entrances of White chapel, alarming innocent occupants with his ruthless homicides in the mist lit back streets of Victorian London, his compatriot and a murderer were stretching over the lake (Fox and Jack). H.H. Holmes was one of the main serial executioners in American history. He cleaned and damaged his targeted people's bodies in his Illinois lodging named the 'Murder Castle' before dissolving the bodies in corrosive acid. Even though his precise number of unfortunate casualties is not known, it is believed that he may have murdered up to 200 individuals. He was then found out, confined, and hanged.

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There are a series of similarities and bizarre comparison activities of events encompassing H.H. Holmes and Jack the Ripper. One of the most striking likenesses between the two killers was the way that both their targets were ladies. What is more, both serial murderers unmistakably had psychopathic tendencies and frightful homicide stories a chilling mix. Another theory that consistently springs up in the Ripper case is that the suspect may have had some level of medical knowledge or skill (Begg and Martin). It is said that the mutilations on his targets resembled work by a gifted doctor, which focuses on yet another scaring similarity between Holmes and the Ripper. H.H. Holmes was a certified physician, and the Ripper had some medical skills. The knowledge between the two drives many believers to agree on a conclusion regarding the two murderers.

Jeff Mudgett, a certified legal practitioner, who happens to be the grandson of H.H. Holmes, asserts that Holmes and Jack the Ripper are the same. Specialists and psychologists have examined the hypothesis of close resemblance in many ways throughout the years, as indicated by Mudgett, Scotland Yard criminologists who visited the US looking for the Ripper as they got suspicious and believed that he might be hanging out in hiding (Frost). They also agree that Holmes was the strangest man behind the Whitechapel Murders, taking on the appearance of Jack the Ripper as an assumed name to do his detestable wrongdoings. Mudgett opines that Jack the Ripper orchestrated the Canonical Five homicides, slaughtering five sex workers before getting away to the US to avoid the British police who were trailing him. He proceeded to state that the examination was prematurely ended midway, which helped Holmes return to his killing business in Chicago. To help his case, Mudgett submitted tests of manually written content from both H.H. Holmes and Jack the Ripper for audit (Frost). After close investigation, penmanship specialists have affirmed that it is an imaginable probability that the two examples could have been composed by a similar hand. This sort of investigation by Mudgett sets the balls rolling for the modern policing system.

The speculations are countless, as has been progressed by yellow journalism drawing attention to the inclusion in the sensationalist reporting pattern. With the many similarities between H.H. Holmes and Jack the Ripper, yet over a century later that all these are yet to be ascertained. The character of the killer liable for the Canonical Five still stays a secret, however, with the obvious suspect as advanced by Mudgett in his analysis. Be that as it may, among Ripperologists and psychologists, the chase is still on! One can feel the fear and frightfulness of the Ripper's criminal acts first hand by visiting Jack the Ripper murder scenes (Begg and Martin). Journalists have been venturing back in time as they investigate the sights and hints of Victorian London with a select Ripper-Vision. They are following in the strides of Jack the Ripper himself as one visits the homicide locales and other imperative areas in the Whitechapel Murders case.

From the onset of the police investigations, Scotland Yard was thrown off balance. The main thing known without a doubt about Jack the Ripper, as most scholars do, is that he slaughtered ladies. Edmund Reid, one of the investigators tasked with examination of the case, there were several certainties about the case. The five ladies were all current or previous sex ladies; the entirety of the exploited people was from the lower class, with living close to four miles from each other (Begg and Martin). Every one of the killings was submitted after bar closing time. To Reid's key facts can be included another remarkable detail. Nobody at any point heard a single shout or called for help, unordinary for such a thickly populated neighborhood. None of the bodies showed the struggle for defense wounds, for example, cuts or wounds on the hands and lower arms (Fox and Jack). From the police examinations, the other aspect that every one of the cases shared for all intents and purpose was, obviously, the executioner's use of a knife and his standard example of murdering the ladies as well as polluting their dead bodies. In any event, three of his unfortunate casualties were found with internal organs removed, a detail that drove the yellow journalists and press of the day into a frenzy (Frost). Panic and confusion spread over the entire East End of London with fears for the unknown

In a nutshell, the cases between the two most lethal criminals have attracted interest from a wide range of personalities and specialists in an attempt to disseminate and clarify the confusions that amount to psychological understanding. The sentimental press in what could throw anything and everything that could e seen as the onset of yellow journalism was thrown in a frenzy reporting everything that could help in clarifying this case. Also, the police and investigators were thorough with homicide specialists, paralegal officers like Jeff Mudgett, setting the trends for the unearthing of the murder so foul. To date, the case of Jack the Ripper and H.H Holmes remains unsolved completely.

Works Cited

Begg, Paul, and Martin Fido. The Complete Jack The Ripper AZ-The Ultimate Guide to The Ripper Mystery. Kings Road Publishing, 2015.

Fox, James A., and Jack Levin. "Serial murder: myths and realities." Studying and Preventing Homicide: Issues and Challenges. California: Sage Publications (1999).

Frost, Rebecca. Words of a Monster: Analyzing the Writings of HH Holmes, America's First Serial Killer. McFarland, 2019.