Charles Allen Lechmere

Charles Allen Lechmere
Portrait of Lechmere
Lechmere in 1912
Born(1849-10-05)5 October 1849
Soho, London, England[1]
Died23 December 1920(1920-12-23) (aged 71)[2]
Bow, London, England
Other namesCharles Allen Cross
Known forDiscovering the first canonical Jack the Ripper victim
Jack the Ripper suspect
Spouse
Elizabeth Bostock
(m. 1870)
Children11[3]

Charles Allen Lechmere (5 October 1849 – 23 December 1920), also known as Charles Allen Cross, was an English carman who became involved in the unsolved Whitechapel murders after he reportedly found the body of Mary Ann Nichols, the first of Jack the Ripper's five canonical victims.

A native of East London, Lechmere has long been regarded as merely a witness at the crime scene, but since the 2000s, true crime writers have named Lechmere a potential Jack the Ripper suspect, largely due to him providing authorities with an alias surname and circumstantial inconsistencies in his testimony.

  1. ^ "Charles A Lechmere, St George In The East, London, Middlesex, England in England and Wales Census, 1871, database". January 20, 2022. Retrieved November 13, 2023 – via FamilySearch.
  2. ^ Jack the Ripper Suspects: The Definitive Guide and Encyclopedia ISBN 978-1-986-32469-4 p. 32
  3. ^ Williams, Paul (2018). Jack the Ripper Suspects: The Definitive Guide and Encyclopaedia. Toronto: RJ Parker Publishing. p. 32. ISBN 9781986324694. Retrieved November 14, 2023 – via Google Books.