Catherine Eddowes (14 April 1842 – 30 September 1888) was the fourth of the canonical five victims of the notorious unidentified serial killer known as Jack the Ripper, who is believed to have killed and mutilated a minimum of five women in the Whitechapel and Spitalfields districts of London from late August to early November 1888.

These two murders are commonly referred to as the "double event";[4] a term which originates from the content of the "Saucy Jacky" postcard received at the Central News Agency on 1 October.

A part of a left human kidney, accompanied by a letter addressed From Hell and postmarked 15 October, was later sent to the chairman of the Whitechapel Vigilance Committee, George Lusk.

[19] According to later inquest testimony from Eddowes's daughter, Catherine "Annie" Phillips, her parents began living on "bad terms" largely because of her mother's drinking which increased throughout the 1870s and which her father—a teetotaler—found intolerable.

[24] The deputy of this lodging-house, Frederick William Wilkinson, later stated Eddowes seldom drank to excess, although contemporary records indicate she was brought before Thames Magistrates' Court upon a charge of being drunk and disorderly in September 1881.

[25] Initially, while living in and around Spitalfields, Eddowes most often earned money by performing domestic work such as cleaning and sewing for the Jewish community in nearby Brick Lane, although she is believed to have also occasionally taken to casual prostitution to pay her daily rent.

[34] The two then agreed to split their last sixpence between them; he took fourpence to pay for a bed in the common lodging-house, and she took twopence, just enough for her to stay a further night at Mile End Casual Ward in the neighbouring parish.

[35] In the early afternoon of 29 September, Eddowes informed Kelly of her intentions to travel to Bermondsey to attempt to borrow some money from her daughter, who by 1888 had been married to a gun-maker in Southwark for three years.

[46] Lawende later testified Eddowes—wearing a black bonnet and jacket—was standing talking with a man of medium build with a fair moustache at the entrance to Church Passage, which led south-west from Duke Street and into Mitre Square.

[47] Only Lawende could furnish a clear description of the man, whom he described as approximately thirty, about 5 feet 7 inches (1.70 metres) in height and wearing a loose-fitting "pepper and salt colour loose jacket",[47] a grey peaked cloth cap and a "reddish" neckerchief.

[59] Another policeman to arrive in Mitre Square in response to Morris's whistle, PC Holland, immediately summoned local surgeon George William Sequeira to the scene.

[60] At approximately 2:55 a.m. on 30 September, a blood-stained fragment of Eddowes's apron was discovered at the bottom of a common stairway at a tenement in Goulston Street, Whitechapel by PC Alfred Long.

[69] The subsequent post-mortem records of Frederick Gordon Brown—who arrived at the crime scene shortly after 2:00 a.m.—state: The body was on its back, the head turned to left shoulder.

"[74] George Sequeira, the first doctor at the crime scene, and City medical officer William Sedgwick Saunders, who was also present at the autopsy, also opined that the killer lacked anatomical skill and did not seek particular organs.

Also to testify on the first day of the inquest were the deputy of Cooney's common lodging-house, Frederick Wilkinson, who stated he had known Eddowes for approximately seven years, and that she lived "on good terms" with Kelly.

His testimony was followed by the policeman who found Eddowes's body, Edward Watkins, who testified his beat typically took "twelve to fourteen minutes" to complete, and that when he had passed through Mitre Square at 1:30 a.m. nothing had been amiss.

Three of these individuals testified as to their finding the decedent drunk on Aldgate High Street, her being brought to Bishopsgate Police Station, and subsequent release in the early hours of 30 September.

Their testimony was followed by that of George Morris, who testified as to being informed by PC Watkins of his discovery in Mitre Square, stating: "The constable said, 'For God's sake, mate, come to my assistance.'

This testimony was then corroborated by PC James Harvey, who testified that, although his own beat did not take him beyond Church Passage, he had "not seen anyone nor heard a cry" until hearing Morris's police whistle.

[87] PC Alfred Long then testified to finding a "portion of white apron" at the doorway to numbers 106-119 Goulston Street, and the graffito upon the wall above, which he had noted in his pocket-book.

Long stated he had searched the property within minutes of this discovery, finding nothing amiss, before proceeding to the police station, leaving another constable who had arrived at the scene to "keep observation on the dwelling house, and see if any one entered or left.

The mutilation of Eddowes's body and the abstraction of her left kidney and part of her womb by her murderer bore the signature of Jack the Ripper and was very similar in nature to that of earlier victim Annie Chapman.

[93] The graffito found above the shawl may or may not have been related to the murder, but either way it was washed away before dawn on the orders of Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Charles Warren, who had feared that, should members of the public see the inscription, anti-Jewish riots may ensue.

Ripper author Martin Fido thought it unlikely that the culprit would wait to wash his hands in a semi-public place about forty minutes after the crime, and Smith's memoirs are both unreliable and embellished for dramatic effect.

[98] It has been argued that the postcard was mailed before the murders were publicised, making it unlikely that a crank would have such knowledge of the crime,[99] but this correspondence was postmarked more than 24 hours after the killings took place—long after all details were known by journalists and residents of the area.

[103] On 16 October 1888, a cubical parcel measuring three-and-a-half inches containing half a preserved human kidney was received by the Chairman of the Whitechapel Vigilance Committee, George Lusk.

"[113] Chief Inspector Donald Swanson, who co-ordinated the inquiry, wrote: "similar kidneys might and could be obtained from any dead person upon whom a post-mortem had been made for any cause, by students or dissecting room porter.

"[116] Numerous people lined the streets as the cortège—consisting of an open glass hearse drawn by horses—began the procession from the Golden Lane mortuary to the cemetery at precisely 1:30 p.m.[13] A mourning coach containing John Kelly, four of Eddowes's sisters, and two of her nieces followed the coffin.

[121] The shawl in question is alleged to have been retrieved by a policeman investigating the scene of Eddowes's murder, and subsequently handed down successive family generations before being presented to Scotland Yard's Crime Museum in 1991.

Donald Rumbelow criticized Edwards' claims, saying that no shawl is listed among Eddowes's personal effects by the police, and that the policeman who allegedly retrieved the garment was based in North London in 1888, thus making him unlikely to have been present at any of the crime scenes.