Was Charles Lechmere Jack the Ripper?

On the morning of August 31 1988, Charles Lechmere left his home and headed out for work at roughly 3:30am. When he turned into Buck’s Row, he allegedly came across the body of Mary Ann Nichols. Moments later, he was joined by Robert Paul. Lechmere approached Paul and asked him to take a look at a woman lying in a gateway.

Despite finding the body, Lechmere escaped suspicion from the police and was seen as an innocent bystander. In recent times, that perception is being challenged. If the Nicholas case was being handled today, he would come under intense scrutiny.

The argument is that Lechmere was in the act of committing the murder but was interrupted by Robert Paul. Lechmere then hide the murder weapon and pretended that he just found the body. Nichols injuries were less severe than the other victims, so it appears the murderer was interrupted before he could finish the deed.

To flee the scene, he told PC Jonas Mizen a woman was lying in Buck Rows and a policeman requested assistance. There was no policeman with the body and he lied to avoid giving his details. When PC Mizen got to the body, there happened to be a policeman standing by the body. A stroke of luck for Lechmere. If no officer was there, PC Mizen would have realised Lechmere lied and a manhunt would have surely ensued.

Later Robert Paul’s newspaper interview revealed Lechmere’s presence at the scene that night and he had no choice but to come forward to the inquest. Strangely, Lechmere testified under a false name, he said his name was Charles Allen Cross (Cross was the surname of his stepfather). He also claimed to work as a carman (delivery driver) and gave his address as 22 Doveton Street in Whitechapel. However, official records showed no one called Cross living at that address.

Despite his suspicious behaviour, his deception went uncovered and he drifted away into obscurity. It wasn’t until 2005, when a group of Ripperologists solved the mystery of his identity.

Was he trying to conceal his identity, or was it merely a force of habit? After all, contemporary examples of people doing the exact same thing are not hard to find. The most compelling evidence against Lechmere is that his morning commute between home and work roughly coincides with the time and place of the murders. Except for the murders of Catherine Eddowes and Elizabeth Stride who were killed on a Sunday. The only day Lechmere wasn’t working.

Not only that but all the murders were committed around weekends and public holidays. Why would a man who supposedly timed the murders with his morning commute gravitate towards days of rest? In any case, Lechmere’s mother lived a few blocks south of Berner Street. The neighborhoods around which is also where Lechmere spent his childhood. As such, it’s speculated that Stride and Eddowes were killed after Lechmere paid a late-night visit to his mother.

While he claimed to be employed at a delivery firm known as Pickfords, there are no surviving records of his employment. If he did work for Pickfords, there is a fair chance that he delivered meat and would thus have been exposed to slaughter and blood on a daily basis. Lechmere remained in East London until his death in 1920 at the age of 71.

While there is no evidence of Lechmere ever being suspected by the police, it is difficult to believe that he was completely overlooked. Many case files have not survived, so any doubts investigators might have had could have long since disappeared.