On Tuesday 18th November 2008 the Broadmoor High Security Hospital files on Thomas Hayne Cutbush were opened to the public.
Yesterday morning Richard Jones and Paul Begg were at the Records office at 9am to view those records.
There has been a great deal of speculation in recent weeks that the files might contain information that would prove that Thomas Cutbush was Jack the Ripper.
No serious researcher into the 1888 Whitechapel Murders thought the files would contain such a sensational discovery, but the Thomas Cutbush files did prove quite interesting.
For a start they did provide a description of Cutbush at the time he was transferred from Holloway Prison to Broadmoor. Interestingly there are similarities beteen him and descriptions given by witnesses who may have seen the face of Jack the Ripper.
It is also evident from the files that Cutbush was violent and there are several mentions of his having attacked attendants and fellow inmates. On one occassion when his mother and aunt visited him at Broadmoor his mother tried to kiss him on the cheek and he bit her face and proceeded to swear at the two women.
Cutbush died of Kidney failure in 1903 and his file provides an intriguing glimpse in to the state of mind of a leading Jack the Ripper suspect of the 1890's.
But it also gives a view of every day life for those confined to Broadmoor in the 1890's.
Whether or not Thomas Hayne Cutbus was Jack the Ripper, the files make it clear that he should me looked at in a new light as a potential suspect and, as Richard Jones says "doubtless we will be hearing more of him over the next few years."
You can read about what was found on the files by at the Thomas Cutbush Files section on our main website.
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