‘The Seventh Horrible Murder’ by an anonymous artist

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The Seventh Horrible Murder

1888

Wood engraving, by an unknown engraver

This front cover represents what was believed to be the seventh, but was actually the fifth murder, this time of Mary Kelly. The anonymous artist provides a great deal of information. The victim in life is placed in the centre of the composition and all around are scenes journalistic reporting McCarthy’s grisly sight when he looked through the window in Miller court, the photographing of the body, and its removal to the mortuary. [Commentary continues below.]

Image scan and text by Simon Cooke

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But the montage also includes events which are purely speculative, with panels to the right showing the murderer taking Kelly to her death, with the verb ‘lured’ adding a particularly sensational tone, and another of the perpetrator, knife drawn, escaping from the window. Such events are imaginary reconstruction: it is not known if Kelly invited the killer into her room and is not likely that he would have escaped through a window that was broken, least of all with a weapon in his hand. Here, though, fantasies and realities are freely intermixed to create a lurid spectacle of suffering, intrigue, and horror.

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Created 30 May 2025