The Real Story of Jack the Ripper

He is one of the most famous serial killers of all time, but who actually was Jack the Ripper and what actually happened during his reign of terror. Just before 4 am on August 31, 1888, on London’s seedy Buck’s Row, a cart driver named Charles Cross saw the body of a woman lying on the ground. In the early morning gloom, it was initially impossible to tell if she was drunk or dead. Cross was soon joined by another carter, Robert Paul. The two men saw the woman’s skirts were pulled above her waist. They smoothed them back over her knees and went searching for a policeman. What the two carters didn’t notice in the shifting shadows was the woman’s throat had been cut so brutally that her head had almost been decapitated. Beat officer John Neil discovered that gruesome fact on closer inspection of the body. (He later testified at the inquest that when he had passed that way just 30 minutes earlier, “there was not a soul about.”) P.C. Neil sent another colleague to fetch a local medic and soon Dr. Rees Ralph Llewellyn arrived on the scene. He quickly examined the body and found that the arms and legs were still warm. Llewellyn believed the woman had been dead for less than 30 minutes. Her killer may have still been lurking nearby when Cross and Paul came upon the body.... Host: Simon Whistler Editor: Daven Hiskey Producer: Samuel Avila Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices