Neill Cream
Neill Cream - An Infamous Killer Born in Scotland - "Jack The Ripper" ???
Neill Cream (1858 - 1892) was born in Glasgow but his parents emigrated to Canada when he was four years old. Cream studied medicine at McGill College, Montreal, where he qualified as a doctor in 1876 but chose to practice as an abortionist (which was then illegal but profitable). The father of one of his "patients", Flora Brooks, forced Cream to marry her at gun-point. During the honeymoon Cream left for London to "continue his medical studies". He returned one year later to find his wife had died of consumption, and he returned to his work as an abortionist. He soon developed a reputation having attempted to blackmail several people and he moved to Chicago, U.S.A.
By 1880 Cream was known to the police having been arrested for murder following a patients death after an abortion, but was cleared of all charges. Later, two more of his (legitimate) patients died, initially police were not suspicious. However, Cream wrote to the coroner claiming that the chemist had put too much strychnine in one of the patients pills and requested that the body be exumed. Police investigated and found that strychnine had been the cause of death but the chemist was not responsible. Cream had eloped with the widow of the victim and the police arrested him and he was jailed for life for second degree murder. In less than 10 years Cream was free after his family pulled strings. He returned to Canada for a brief spell and then to London, using some of the £16,000 inheritance from his father.
Neill Cream had studied the career of Jack the Ripper and settled in Lambeth. Similarly, Cream frequently used the services of prostitutes and spoke freely of his exploits. Yet again Cream used strychnine as a tool for murder. After visiting a prostitute he would give the girl some pills, usually implying they were to improve the complexion, and then leave. It can only be assumed that Cream would get pleasure imagining the agaonising death that would follow the taking of the pills.
Some of his victims survived long enough to give police vital evidence (descriptions etc.) but little could be done, even after post-mortems showed strychnine to be the cause of death. Stangely, Cream proceeded to send bizarre letters to various people claiming that they had killed "Matilda", one of his victims. Matilda Clover was a prostitute that Cream had visited and given pills, she died from strychnine poisoning but her doctor, who had been treating her for alcoholism, wrote "natural causes" on her death certificate, even though she told of being given the pills (whichby then, she assumed were poisened) by a man called "Fred". In 1892 an inquest into the death of two prostitutes, who claimed to have been poisened by a man called Fred, gave the verdict that the girls had been killed by strychnine. There was a public outcry as there was still unease following the Ripper murders.
Cream handed a letter to the police, which he claimed he had sent to the two victims prior to their murder, in which he warned them to be careful of a Dr Harper who, he claimed, had murdered Matilda Clover and a Lou Harvey. Cream, true to form, then sent a letter to Dr Harper accusing his son of the murders and asking for £1,500 (Cream commonly included bribes in his letters but never attempted collection). By then the police had started to notice some of the similarities of the murders and the letters and they compared the handwriting on the two letters, finding them the same they arrested Cream for attempting blackmail.
While Cream was under arrest the body of Matilda Clover was exumed where it was discovered that she too had died by strychnine poisoning. By accusing Dr Harper's son, Cream, had convicted himself as only the murderer would know that Matilda had been murdered! Further to this there were two witnesses that were prepared to testify that they had seen Cream with Matilda prior to her death. There was one more witness to Cream's guilt, Lou Harvey. Police had found her alive and well and found that she had luckily escaped death at the hands of Cream on two occassions. Firstly it was the usual method, Cream visited her and left pills, however her "pimp" had not liked the look of them and had thrown them away. She kept a pre-arranged date with Cream, much to his surprise, where he very forcefully tried to get her to take some more pills. She was then very suspicious so disposed of the pills secretly claiming to have taken them, Cream then left.
With all this evidence and more (including the possession of seven bottles of strychnine) the jury at the Old Bailey trial took only 12 minutes to decide Cream's guilt and he was sentenced to be hung. On the 15th November 1892 at the scaffold Cream dramatically admitted to being Jack The Ripper. However the authorities realised that it was an attempt to glamorise his murderous career or an attempt to postpone the hanging. Cream could not have been Jack the Ripper as he was in jail in Chicago at the time!
It cannot be denied that there are strong similarities between the murders committed by Neill Cream and those committed by Jack the Ripper. Strangely, following the death of Cream, more evidence would come to light.Sir Edward Marshall Hall, a highly respected advocate, claimed he had once successfully defended Cream against a charge of bygamy by claiming he was in prison in Sydney, Australia at the time. This claim had, at the time, been supported by the governor of the jail but upon further investigation Marshall Hall discovered that Cream had never visited Australia. Hall was convinced that Cream had a double in the underworld, and that the two had supplied alibis for each other when necessary. Some writers have further summised that this look-alike may have been the true Jack The Ripper :-O
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