Author: Richard Jones

In the 19th century, other parts of the country faced similar problems to those that were frequently reported in Whitechapel. There were, for example, frequent reports of men being either attacked or even murdered, in brothels throughout the […]

At the time of the Jack the Ripper murders, Spitalfields was a dangerous place to be for those who were not acquainted with the area. But, judging by the following story, which appeared in The Launceston Weekly News, […]

On Monday the 22nd of October, 1883, The Pall Mall Gazette published the following letter from the founder and head of the Salvation Army, William Booth, concerning the recent publication of The Bitter Cry of Outcast London. GENERAL […]

Nowadays, we tend to focus our attention simply on the period over which the Jack the Ripper murders occurred in the East End of London. But the Jack The Ripper crimes didn’t happen in a historical vacuum. They […]

Whitechapel in the 19th century could be a violent place, and, the Jack the Ripper murders aside, violence and even murder, were, to say the least, commonplace. Drunkenness was an endemic problem in the district, and much of […]

In November and December 1803, reports began circulating in the parish of Hammersmith to the west of London, that a terrifying ghostly apparition was being encountered by men and women as they made their way along the district’s […]

In the mid-1880s, the problem of the grinding and abject poverty, that was endemic in many parts of London, was the subject of much discussion in the newspapers. On Saturday the 18th of December, 1883, The Reading Mercury […]

One thing you most certainly don’t associate with Spitalfields is the manufacture of fireworks. or, to be more precise, I don’t associate fireworks with the enclave. The weaving trade, fruit and vegetables, tailoring, and boot making – these […]

Following the murder of Annie Chapman, on the 8th of September, 1888, there was an upsurge in newspaper interest in the area in which the Whitechapel murders were occurring. At the time, it was believed by the police, […]

As the Whitechapel murders began – or at least with the dawning of the knowledge that a repeat killer was loose on the streets of Whitechapel – many of the people who lived in the district began complaining […]