1888
– A blanket of fog covers the black cobblestone streets
of Old London’s East End. The district
of Whitechapel is notorious for its alehouses,
gangsters, illegal gambling and prostitution.
Also referred to as ‘Outcast
London’, the streets are quiet tonight. Gas lanterns
barely break through the darkness, as drunken prostitutes
occupy dimly lit street corners, in search of their next
client. Times are hard and you have to do whatever it takes
to get through the winter.
It’s Thursday night and it’s
been a slow one for Mary Ann Nicholls.
Mary (also know as Polly) leaves
‘The Frying Pan’ (a lodging house were
she’s been drinking with friends), and decide to head
on home. She leaves, finishing the last of her liquor, dropping
the bottle on the sidewalk. It is 00:30.
01:40 - Mary ends up in
the kitchen of the lodging house, were she’s been
staying for the past couple of weeks, but she is shown away
by the caretaker, as she cannot produce any money for her
night’s stay. She has nowhere to go, nowhere to sleep.
She leaves against her will, but vows to return with some
money. As she moves down the street, she stumbles as she
walks. She’s been battling with alcoholism for quite
a couple of years now.
02:30 - Mary bumps into
with Emily Holland, on her way home from
watching the Shadwell Dry Dock fire. Emily
is the owner of the lodging house where Mary
used to stay. She tries to convince Emily
of letting her stay for just the night, but she refuses.
Mary tells Emily that
she had the money three times already during the day, but
that she ended up drinking it all away. Eventually Mary
leaves, telling Emily that she wouldn’t
be long and that she would return with some money, soon.
As
she disappears into the choking fog, a dark figure appears
in her view, from the Bucks Row’s side. She approaches
the man and offers her services by “displaying the
merchandise”. She walks right up to the man and tries
to seduce him, as best she can, fighting to maintain her
composure. She touches the man on the shoulder, but the
man only looks at her from under the brim of his hat, seemingly
uninterested. But Polly is a desperate lady. She moves in
even closer, pushing herself up against him. She again offers
herself to the dark stranger…this time he accepts.
 |
The
body of
Mary Ann Nicholls |
03:35 - The body of Mary Ann Nicholls
is found in Bucks Row on the cobble road, by a driver on
his way to work. She had been strangled and mutilated. Her
throat had also been slit. On Friday, 31 August
1888, Jack the Ripper officially commits
his first ever killing. The death of the 43 year old mother
of five sparks a three month reign of terror, confusion
and dead prostitutes in Old London Town.
After this first murder had occurred, the
media first dubbed him ‘Leather Apron’, but
it was only later, after a series of letters were sent to
both media offices and the police, that the name Jack
the Ripper got associated with the ‘Whitechapel
Murders’.
 |
Mary’s
final resting place |
Jack the Ripper
was certainly not the first serial killer ever, but what
exactly set him apart from all he others? Why exactly the
hype surrounding this mysterious killer? Why has this specific
case kept criminologists, all over the world, so intrigued
for all of these years?
Well, it’s pretty simple really.
Even though Jack the Ripper was
not the very first, ever, killer of this caliber, he was
however, the first to make his public appearance in a large
metropolitan area (the city of London), at a time of social
development, as well as, a time where literacy was not viewed
as a luxury anymore, which meant that a much larger part
of the general population could now read and write.
This was a time of global communication,
and with this, the press, with all of the attention it gave
to this series of murders, made this “a new thing”
and made Jack the Ripper into
what the world saw him to be. It was also the press that
gave him the name that would still send shivers down spines,
more than a hundred years later.
Friday, 7 September 1888 –
It is 17:00 and the 45 year old Annie Chapman
is walking down Dorset Street, in the Whitechapel
district. As she is walking, she grabs her chest with both
her arms, and she coughs. Annie is clearly
not doing well. She’s had this cough for almost 2
months now and it’s getting worse by the day. Earlier
today, she received some medication from the dispensary
at a local casual ward.
She fiddles around her coat pocket and
produces a little medicine bottle. She quickly places two
tables in her mouth and swallows them dry. She puts the
bottle back into her coat pocket and, as she looks up, almost
stumbles into Amelia Palmer. Annie catches
a fright and Amelia takes her by the shoulders,
smiling, asking if she is all right. Annie
and Amelia have been working these streets
together, for years now. They trust each other and they
look out for one another. Probably the closest thing to
friendship the two of them have ever known. Annie
replies by saying that she’ll have to get her act
together and start working, or she won’t have any
lodging money for the night. She continues, and tells Amelia
that she’s been too ill to do anything the entire
day. The two of them continue talking for a while longer,
and then go their separate ways.
01:35 - It is the early hours of Saturday
morning and Annie returns to the Crossingham’s lodging
house, where she goes to the kitchen and eats a baked potato.
While she is having her late supper, the caretaker (and
night watchman) of the lodging house, John Evans,
calls her over and takes her to the owner of the house,
Tim Donovan. In the office of Mr. Donavan,
Annie explains to him that she is short of some
of her lodging money. Annie has owed Mr. Donavan far too
much in the past and he is not in a generous mood tonight.
He tells her to go and collect the money first, before she
can enter her room again. She leaves, but not before organizing
with John Evans to keep her room for her
until she returns with the money. He agrees and Annie
disappears into the dark, searching for a client.
 |
The
wooden fence at 29 Hanbury Street |
05:40 - Albert Cadoch,
a carpenter by trade, goes out through the backdoor of his
home at 27 Hanbury Street, on his way to the outhouse. As
he goes into his backyard he suddenly hears a scuffle, coming
from the other side of the wooden fence separating his house
from 29 Hanbury Street. He freezes, holding his breath.
He tries to make sense of what he had just heard. He tilts
his head slightly. He heard a woman’s voice; can it
be…there it is again!
As Albert stands frozen in his backyard,
he suddenly hears the same muffled voice…’No!’
Then there is a thump against the wooden fence. He flinches
as he hears the bump against the fence, and then - absolute
silence… He snaps into action and rushes back into
his house, grabs his coat and rush out the front door. His
footsteps echo through the deserted cobblestone streets
as he dashes towards the spot where he heard the woman’s
voice, just moments ago. He has to be certain that she is
alright.
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