(Real Name - Severin Klosowski)
The Borough Poisoner
Victims:
Mary Isabella Spink (41) Prince of Wales tavern, Finsbury, London, 25/12/1897
Elizabeth (Bessie) Taylor (36) Monument tavern, Borough, London, 13/2/1901
Maud Eliza Marsh (19) Crown public House, Borough, London, 22/10/1902
3 victims, all pretending to be Chapman's wife?? Murders took place in London between December 1897 and October 1902.
All three women were poisoned with
Antimony. Rumor and legend has it that Chapman may have been "Jack The Ripper", operating away from familiar ground after it became too hot to operate in the East End.
Chapman was a Russian Pole who was supposedly a barber-surgeon. Hanged at Wandsworth prison 14th December 1903 the arresting officer is said to have said to the Ripper investigator, Inspector Abberline, "... I've got Jack!" Was he ??
Chapman lived with a married woman called Isabella Spink, although at the time he was married to another woman in America. He used Isabella's money to set himself up as a landlord and within a few months she became ill and died.
Chapman the hired Bessie Taylor, a barmaid, to help him with his duties, when Bessie died the doctors became suspicious. But, it was not until the death of Maud Marsh, whose mother called in the police, and all three women's bodies were exhumed, that antimony was found in their systems. Police suspected that Chapman may have been Jack the Ripper, giving up the knife and turning to poison as a way to avoid detection.
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George Chapman In more depth
