The happy days of the Empress Marie Louise

But a common killing knife available to the Ripper would have been the kukri, with its unique blade that sweeps into a forward bend. The blade lengths can vary, and the knives are sturdy enough for chopping vines, branches, or even small trees. When Queen Victoria was the Empress of India, many British soldiers wore kukris, and the knives would have found their way into the English market. Jack the Ripper wrote in a letter dated October 19th that he "felt rather down hearted over my knife which I lost comming [sic] here must get one tonight." Two days later, on the Sunday night of October 21st, a constable discovered a bloody knife in the shrubbery not far from where Sickert's mother lived. The knife was a kukri. Such a knife could have been used on Mary Kelly. The kukri was used in battle to cut throats and sever limbs, but because of its curved blade, it is not a stabbing knife. "The skin 8t tissues of the abdomen… were removed in three large places… The right thigh was denuded in point to the bone… The lower part of the [right] lung was broken and torn away… The Pericardium was open below 8t the heart absent." These autopsy details come from pages 16 and 18 of the original report and seem to be the only pages from any of the autopsies to have survived ...»