Ripper Of Royal Blood

NOTED AUTHOR HINTS AT IDENTITY.

Jack the Ripper May Have Had Royal Blood.
BY RODNEY PINDER.
Associated Press Staff Writer.

LONDON, Nov. 2. - Buckingham Palace, home of Queen Elizabeth II, said: "We have no comment."
Scotland Yard said: "It's rather a long time ago. We just don't know."
Everyone seemed to want to forget.
But Thomas Stowell, surgeon and respected author, is convinced he knows - and he's not telling, only hinting.
His hints have convinced many people that Jack the Ripper, among the most notorious murderers in English criminal history, was a member of the British royal family.
To be precise: Edward, Duke of Clarence, grandson of Queen Victoria, brother of King George V and once heir to the throne of England.

Died In 1892.

Edward officially died in 1892 "after a short illness." Some historians believe the duke was a homosexual and died in a mental hospital, crippled by syphilis.
It is possible, experts believe, that before he succumbed to the ravages of the disease he slaughtered at least five and probably 20 prostitutes in the grimy, foggy back streets of 19th century London, carving their bodies bestially with a razor-sharp knife.
The finger of suspicion was firmly laid on Edward this week by Stowell in The Criminologist, a limited circulation magazine for students of crime.

Jack the Ripper, whose murderous journeys through London's sleazy East End in the fall of 1888 baffled Scotland Yard - or appeared to - was, according to Stowell: "The heir to power and wealth. His family, for 50 years, had earned the love and admiration of large numbers of people by its devotion to public service. He was the heir to a title, his mother was a stern Victorian matriarch."
Friends of Stowell believe he is convinced the Ripper was Edward.

Gay Young Bachelor.

A prominent criminologist, who asked that his name be withheld, said: "There is no reason why this shouldn't be true. And Stowell is entirely reliable in what he writes. His evidence can be taken as gospel.
"It's the nearest we'll ever get to the truth. Stowell, after all, was almost there."
Stowell, now in his 80's, was a child when the murders were committed. He became friendly with the daughter of Sir William Gull, the royal physician of the period. Gull, he says, knew the man Stowell suspects of the crimes - and attempted to cover for him.

The suspect, said Stowell, was a gay young bachelor who contracted syphilis on a world tour. The infection gradually dominated his life. He was in a homosexual brothel when it was raided by police.

The hunt for the Ripper was called off because people knew he was in a mental home, Stowell asserts.
Author Colin Wilson, who wrote Encyclopaedia of Murder, said in an interview today: "Edward was a homosexual. He was arrested in a brothel raid and then was sent around the world by Victoria.
"There is some evidence that he died in a mental hospital between Ascot and Windsor in 1892, of syphilis. And he was in London at the time of the crimes.
"I don't think we'll ever know definitely who the Ripper was. I don't think police destroyed their records - as has been suggested - I just don't think they had any."
Wilson added Stowell feels "pretty strongly" about the royal family.

Newspaper Blunt.

Stowell said in an interview today: "I have no comment whatsoever on the speculation about Edward.
"The secret of who I suspect will never be revealed by me. I've too much respect for the family."
The Sunday Times said bluntly his evidence meant Edward was the Ripper.
Had he any thought of revealing the name once the Ripper's relatives were dead? "I shan't live to see that time," he laughed.
"He has descendants - no, not descendants, an active co-related branch of the family - living. His brother succeeded to the title and had children.
Was he the only person with the secret? "I believe his family knew, Stowell replied. "But I shall never tell."

Source: Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Tuesday November 3, 1970, Page 3

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"Ripper" Author Didn't Intend to Implicate Duke.

London, England - UPI

The doctor whose magazine article touched off speculation that Jack the Ripper was the duke of Clarence said Monday he intended no such implication.
"I have at no time associated his royal highness, the late duke of Clarence, with the Whitechapel murderer or suggested that the murderer was of royal blood," Dr. Thomas E.A. Stowell, 88, said in a letter to the Times.
Stowell, an eminent author and physician, wrote in a criminologist magazine that Jack the Ripper was a young man of noble blood and heir to a title. He refused to name his suspect, saying he had too much affection for the suspect's family.
Stowell said he had been collecting evidence on the subject of the 19th century sex killer for 50 years.

Source: The Milwaukee Journal, November 9, 1970, Page 24

Author Reveals New Evidence of Jack the Ripper's Identity.
By MAGNUS LINKLATER.

LONDON, Dispatch of the Sunday Times - The grim but perennially fascinating specter of Jack the Ripper has been raised again by the most sensational claim yet made about the murderer's identity, published in The Criminologist, the journal of forensic science and criminology.
The author, Thomas Stowell, is an eminent surgeon. Now in his 80's, he was a child when the murders were committed and he remembers the excitement they caused among the housemaids "behind the green baize door."
The killings, which took place in the autumn of 1888 in the east end of London, were particularly grisly. At least five girls were murdered, and four of them were disemboweled. The murderer was never apprehended.
For nearly 50 years, says Stowell, he has kept to himself evidence about the real identity of Jack the Ripper, for fear of involving, as witnesses, some close friends who were still alive.
But now he has set it down.
This evidence suggests that the murderer was a man so senior in the hierarchy of the land, of so noble a family that the police, when they realized who was involved, were forced to conceal his identity. Even now, Stowell will not disclose who he thinks it was, but he provides some generous clues:
"He was the heir to power and wealth. His family, for 50 years, had earned the love and admiration of large numbers of people by its devotion to public service to all classes, particularly the poor, but as well to industry and the workers.
"His grandmother, who outlived him, was very much the stern Victorian matriarch, widely and deeply respected. His father, to whose title he was the heir, was a gay cosmopolitan and did much to improve the status of England internationally. His mother was an unusually beautiful woman with a gracious personal charm and was greatly beloved to all who knew her."
Stowell is clearly referring to a very eminent family. Possibly, even, a royal one. He goes on to say that his suspect, whom he refers to as "S," was a young bachelor who went on a world tour just after the age of 16, and during his journey contracted syphilis.
The disease caused him to cancel at least one important public engagement at the last moment, and gradually began to dominate his life.
Stowell contends that "S" was treated by Sir William Gull, the royal physician. It was said that on more than one occasion Sir William was seen in the neighborhood of Whitechapel on the night of one of the murders.
"It would not surprise me to know that he was there for the purpose of certifying the murderer to be insane so that he might be put under restraint," writes Stowell, who knew the physician's daughter, Caroline Acland.
Stowell says Mrs. Acland told him that she had seen in her father's diary the entry: "Informed blank that his son was dying of syphilis of the brain."
The entry was November, 1889.
Sir William had realized early on that his eminent patient was in fact the perpetrator of the Ripper murders, Stowell says, and invoked the assistance of the commissioner of police, Sir Charles Warren, to keep the name secret. It is for this reason, suggests Stowell, that so many clues were destroyed (at one stage a message left by Jack the Ripper was said to have been obliterated by Sir Charles).
And it could explain why police vigilance was relaxed after the death of the last victim, Mary Kelly, in November, 1888. The police knew, says Stowell, that the murderer was restrained in a mental home. The coroner in the Kelly case chose deliberately to suppress evidence and said so. Did he too, know the real identity of Jack the Ripper?
Another authority, Donald McCormick, author of The Identity of Jack the Ripper, re-published, names the killer as a Russian doctor called Konovalov who, he says, knew four of the murdered women and disappeared after the last murder. But Konovalov fits none of Stowell's evidence - and McCormick mentions in passing another suspect who does.
It is a sensational name: Edward, Duke of Clarence, grandson of Queen Victoria, older brother of King George V, and heir to the throne of England. All the points of Stowell's odd story fit this man. He did die young, he was ill, he was most certainly affected mentally by his illness.
All Stowell would say was: "I would never dream of doing harm to a family whom I love and admire by revealing the name."

Source: Nashua Telegraph, Wednesday November 11, 1970, Page 9

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"Ripper's' Secret Dies With Doctor.

LONDON (AP) - A doctor who claimed to know the identity of Jack the Ripper has taken his knowledge to the grave.
Dr. Thomas Stowell, an 88-year-old surgeon, wrote in a criminologists' magazine that the man who terrorized London's East End in the 19th century was "a scion of a noble family."
When he died last Sunday, Stowell left a folder labeled: Jack the Ripper. His son said today he burned the dossier unread.
"I read just sufficient to make certain that there was nothing of importance," Dr. I. Eldon Stowell said, "The family decided that this was the right thing to do. I am not prepared to discuss our grounds for doing so."
The elder Stowell's vague hints in the magazine led to speculation that Jack the Ripper may have been Prince Albert Victor, Duke of Clarence, elder son of King Edward VII and a great uncle of Queen Elizabeth who died in 1892.
But he wrote a letter to the London Times the day before he died, denying that the prince was Jack the Ripper.

Source: The Ottawa Citizen, November 16, 1970, Page 23

This article is dated August 16, 1970, which was 3 months before the Criminologist article appeared in November of 1970.

Jack the Ripper, the notorious killer of London streetwalkers in the 1880's, may have been a member of the British aristocracy. Dr. Thomas Stowell, a senior fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons, says the identity of the "Ripper" was known to high society and police. In order to protect the family, police merely put him under house arrest while ostensibly continuing their hunt. Stowell said: "I cannot blame this man's family for not wanting it known who Jack the Ripper was..and it won't be revealed by me. Although the killer has been dead for many years, some members of his family are still in prominent positions in this country."

Source: Sunday Star Citizen, August 16, 1970, Page two - section C.

Many Ripperologists erroneously claim that the Royal Conspiracy Theory, or that being the theory in which Jack the Ripper was none other than Prince Albert Victor, was first publicised by Dr. Thomas Stowell, however, here I found an article from 1968 (two years before Stowell's article appeared in The Criminologist), whereby an individual named Colin Wilson says he discovered the theory, and then went public with the disclosure. So, in actuality, it was Colin Wilson who first publicised this theory. Stowell actually wanted it not to be disclosed.

Suggests Jack The Ripper Was Victoria's Grandson.

VANCOUVER (CP) - British novelist Colin Wilson says he has discovered a theory that Jack the Ripper was a grandson of Queen Victoria.
Mr. Wilson, a writer in residence at suburban Simon Fraser University, said in an interview that a London brain surgeon told him in 1960 the notorious English killer was the Duke of Clarence, grandson of Queen Victoria.
He said he kept the new theory under wraps for seven years because the surgeon, whom he refused to name, asked him not to make it public. Mr. Wilson did not say why he was disclosing it now.
Mr. Wilson said he personally believes a man named John Montague Druitt was the Ripper.
"I don't think the surgeon's report is true," he added. "I look upon it as a humorous anecdote."
Scotland Yard has never officially solved the bizarre murders of women which took place in London in 1888. Druitt was identified as the Ripper in a book published by a Yard detective who participated in the investigation.
Druitt committed suicide shortly after the last murder. Mr. Wilson said the official story behind the duke's death is that he died in an 1892 flu epidemic.
"The surgeon said the duke died in 1892 of syphilis - general paralysis of the brain - in a hospital near Windsor, which is just 10 miles from Ascot," added Mr. Wilson, author of more than 20 books.

Source: The Brandon Sun, Thursday February 1, 1968, Page 2