Author: Richard Jones

On 23rd February, 1893, a murder took place in Poplar, in the East End of London, that genuinely shock the people of the district. The victim was an elderly woman by the name of Ann Darby. The St […]

By 1892, it was becoming more than apparent that something had happened that had prevented Jack the Ripper from being able to claim another victim, and that this had now been the case for several years. Commentators, however, […]

By February 1890, although, with hindsight, we now believe that no Jack the Ripper atrocities had taken place since the brutal murder of Mary Kelly on 9th November, 1888, the Victorians were not so sure, and, as a […]

The South Wales Echo, on Monday, 29th October, 1888, carried the following report about how a man from Halifax paid a visit to Sheffield, where, thanks to a bizarre and unfortunate series of events, he found himself mistaken […]

As the Assistant Commissioner and the head of the Criminal Investigation Department (CID), Dr Robert Anderson (1841 – 1918) was the highest ranking police official with direct responsibility for the Jack the Ripper investigation, and this put him […]

It might seem that fake news is a modern phenomenon, but, in fact, it’s been around for a long, long time. One thing is certain about the Jack the Ripper murders – they most certainly sold newspapers. Indeed, […]

Well, it’s February, it’s freezing cold, and it’s just the sort of weather to stay indoors and find ways of enjoying Victorian history without having to venture out into the winter. Enter, the February 2019 Jack the Ripper Quiz […]

By the time of the Jack the Ripper murders in 1888, the Metropolitan Police force, under the command of the Chief Commissioner, Sir Charles Warren, was coming under constant criticism in the newspapers. Several high profile cases – […]

In February, 1889, Thomas Murphy was sentenced to ten years penal servitude for feloniously wounding Police Constable Walter Whittimore (many newspaper reports spelt his name as Whittemore) in the course of a burglary in December, 1888. Constable Whittimore was […]

On 14th December, 1888, Police Constable Walter Whittimore (the early newspaper reports spell his name as Whittemore), of the Metropolitan Police’s X Division, was shot in the leg whilst trying to apprehend two burglars in the district of North […]