Author: Richard Jones

It’s time for another of our Jack the Ripper Quizzes. The concept of the challenge is that you must answer 10 questions on the history of the Whitechapel murders. To be honest it isn’t that difficult as, magically, […]

The following article, which took a look at the impact of the poor law on the lives of those whom it was intended to help, appeared in The Western Times on Wednesday, 24th December 1924:- THE HONOURABLE POOR […]

The Jack the Ripper murders aside, the 19th century East End was home to a seemingly huge criminal class, members of which were frequently turning up in the courts – and thereafter in the newspapers – of the […]

Although the Jack the Ripper murders, as far as we are able to ascertain, did not actually begin until August 31st, 1888 – when Mary Nichols was murdered in Buck’s Row, Whitechapel, the worry about the dangers of […]

Albert Heidman – better known under the sobriquet of “Shiner Bob” – was, to quote the Daily News “a well-known character” around Spitalfields in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. AN INFAMOUS LOCAL CHARACTER The Derby Daily […]

In the closing years of the 19th century, London was plagued by an outbreak of street hooliganism and street robberies that proved an extremely worrying trend to many people. The gangs and ruffians of London really did prove […]

As crimes go, it probably wasn’t the worst crime spree in the 19th century. In fact, there were probably hundreds more misdemeanors that were far, far worse than the knocker twisting spree that occurred in Kilkenny in 1841. […]

By early October, 1888, many theories and suggestions were in circulation as to the best means by which the perpetrator of the Whitechapel atrocities could be hunted down and brought to justice. It was still a bone of […]

The Jack the Ripper crimes generated an awful lot of moralising in newspapers all over the land. There was, needless to say, universal condemnation of the perpetrator of the atrocities. But the fact that his victims were prostitutes […]

It is difficult for us today to get a genuine feel for the excitement that the Whitechapel murders caused, not just in the district where the atrocities were occurring, but throughout the country as a whole. It is […]