Jack The Ripper on the Goldfields???

Deeming Jack the Ripper?

Deeming a Goldfields Murderer? ……. Or was he really ‘Jack the Ripper’?

This black hearted Englishman caused mass hysteria in the streets of Perth and Melbourne and began with his arrest by two West Australian police troopers at Southern Cross for the brutal pick axe murder of his newly wed bride. It brought Perth to a standstill when five more of his victims were found embedded in cement. It raged on as he was tried and hung in Melbourne.

Deeming and a sketch of a ripper victim

Frederick Bailey Deeming was a monster. Was he also Jack the Ripper? Could he have been the mysterious “Mr Lawson” who behaved so strangely the morning two of the Rippers victims died, the man described in a gypsy woman’s prophesy?

Deeming was capable of many things, as his life story shows. Youngest of a poor Birkenhead family’s seven children he ran away to sea at 16 and worked as a ships steward and roamed the world. By his mid 30’s he had been a bigamist, bankrupt, jail-bird, con man and swindler on four continents.  Woman seemed fascinated by his piercing blue eyes, his wavy sandy hair, his tales of far off lands and his lavish gifts of diamond rings.

The Murdered innocents

In the English summer of 1891 it became a fatal attraction as that July Deeming, posing as an ‘Army Inspector’, rented Dinham Villa at Rainhill near Liverpool (England). He took a fancy at once to his landlord’s daughter, 25 year old Emily Mather. Romance blossomed until his abandoned wife Marie turned up unexpectedly from Australia with their four children. Deeming managed to pass her off as his sister. Then saying he had to repair the villa’s damp floor he bought a pick axe and cement. As his wife and children slept he crept into their room and slit their throats all except for a daughter who he strangled then he hid the bodies under the floorboards and buried them in cement. A few days later Deeming threw a party to announce his engagement to Emily. He danced with the unsuspecting guests on his family’s graves below.

Deeming with his first wife

He married Emily and then took her to Australia. Their ship docked at Melbourne on the 15^th December 1891 and the newlyweds moved into a rented cottage in Windsor. On Christmas Eve Emily died, felled by six blows to the skull from a battle-axe before her throat was cut. Deeming levered up a hearthstone, stuffed her trussed up corpse into the hole and covered it with cement.

In the New Year he sailed for Sydney on board he met Kate Rounsfell. He proposed to the startled girl on the spot, gave her a large diamond ring (torn from the finger of his latest victim) and gained a new fiance. Deeming escorted Kate home to her family and said he was heading for the West Australian Goldfields. Kate promised to follow him as soon as he found them a house. But time was running out.  In March a new tenant inspected the empty cottage in Windsor. She complained about the objectionable smell.  The police were called and discovered Emily’s decomposing body under the hearth. Detectives were soon on the killers trail. It led to a shipping clerk who remembered booking a passage to Fremantle for a man calling himself baron Swanston.

Victorian police cabled Perth police who discovered Swanston, alias Deeming had stayed in a city hotel and left a forwarding address. Telegraphed orders were immediately sent to the isolated police post at Southern Cross “Arrest at once” and wire when effected.  That morning two constables rode off to the Fraser’s gold mine and arrested the new manager. “I’m perfectly innocent, this is all a mistake”, said Deeming before setting out with his captors in a mail coach on the 320 km journey to Perth. As they jolted over rough red dirt roads, sensational news broke out. English police had dug up the floor at Dinham Villa and found the bodies of four children and a woman. Kate Rounsfell then on her way to Southern Cross was lucky, her sister sent her a telegram.

“FOR GODS SAKE GO NO FURTHER”.

Hundreds watched at York while he was put into a railway carriage with blacked out windows. Perth ground to a halt as 5000 people besieged the station. Fearing a riot police transferred Deeming to the East Perth waterside lock-up in a horse and trap. While Deeming was in his cell a rumour began, he had already confessed to the murders of two London prostitutes. It reached London where in the nightmare autumn of 1888 and unknown maniac had slashed the throats of five east end prostitutes and mutilated their bodies. “Is the man Jack the Ripper” people wanted to know. A young East End dressmaker identified Deeming from a photograph as a man she had known in 1888 by the name of Lawson.

On the night two Ripper victims died they had gone walking in the nearby streets until parting at 11pm. Next day Deeming appeared very agitated as he read about the double murder. Pointing to a story that put the murders at just after 1am he exclaimed “Look at the time, I couldn’t have committed them could I?” he disappeared soon after. Scotland Yard dismissed the dressmaker’s story, for them the case was closed. Jack the Ripper was either dead or in a lunatic asylum. Then a South African private detective gave Deeming an alibi. He called himself ‘Harry Lawson” during London’s autumn of terror, but in a gold swindle thousands of miles away in the Transvaal.

The flood of stories grew, one claimed Deeming believed his mother ghost told him to kill woman. Deeming stood trial in Melbourne for the wilful murder of Emily Mather. His lawyers chose the defence of insanity. It crumbled on the third day when the doctors who examined him would not swear he was insane. Deeming made a long speech from the dock saying that hysteria whipped up by the press had denied him a fair trial. The jury found him guilty and sane. The judge passed sentence of death. Deeming showed no emotion.  The doctors gave evidence that Deeming has confessed in his cell to the last two “Ripper” murders and they were convinced he wasn’t lying.

Deeming’s House in Southern Cross, Former Police Lockup

A popular souvenir post card of the time

Deeming was led to the gallows the next morning, May 23^rd 1892, with his face covered by a white hood, his last words were “Lord receive my spirit”  Perhaps Deeming was indeed Jack the Ripper or maybe just his double, what do you think?

Further reading:   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_Bailey_Deeming

Frederick B Deeming

F B Deeming’s Death Mask

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Moya Sharp

Owner at Outback Family History

My name is Moya Sharp, I live in Kalgoorlie Western Australia and have worked most of my adult life in the history/museum industry. I have been passionate about history for as long as I can remember and in particular the history of my adopted home the Eastern Goldfields of Western Australia. Through my website I am committed to providing as many records and photographs free to any one who is interested in the family and local history of the region.

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