Author: Richard Jones

As Christmas 1888 approached, debate was raging in the newspapers as to whether the recent murder of Rose Mylett had been carried out by the perpetrator of the previous Whitechapel murders. “JACK THE RIPPER” The Newcastle Daily Chronicle, […]

It is bizarre how, by Christmas 1888, so many cases were appearing before the London courts – and at courts throughout the country for that matter – in which people had, either whilst drunk or in anger, had […]

One of the issues that raised by the newspaper coverage of the Jack the Ripper murders was whether the constant reporting of the atrocities was having a detrimental effects on the impressionable minds and behaviour of the children […]

The Globe, on Monday the 17th of December, 1888, published the following account of the court appearance of Thomas Murphy who had been arrested and charged with having attempted to murder Police Constable Whittemore:- POLICEMAN SHOT AT NOTTING […]

Between late 1889 and 1894 Victorian Britain, and London in particular, was hit by an influenza pandemic that had originated in Russia. The Russian flu, as it became known, caused widespread disruption throughout the country, and nobody seemed […]

“Let’s be honest, despite the fact there was no fog on the nights when Jack the Ripper carried out his murders, fog was such a common occurrence in Victorian Britain that it really has seeped into the consciousness […]

Let me honest here, I abhor the titles “Ripperology” and “Ripperologist” – although I enjoy the company of and greatly admire individual “ripperologists.” Why? Quite simply because they are non-terms, invented by people who study – or studied […]

One way in which people have always found solace in the wake of horrible happenings is to use humour as a coping mechanism. The Jack the Ripper murders were no exception to this, and, as the murders were […]

December 9th, 1888, was a Sunday, and so there were only a limited number of newspapers actually published on that day. However, each of those that was published featured stories about people who had found themselves embroiled in […]

By December, 1888, the unknown miscreant who was responsible for having perpetrated the Whitechapel murders had become universally known as Jack the Ripper, thanks to the publicity afforded to the Dear Boss letter. It is somewhat surprising just […]