Her head was almost severed and her stomach torn open and pulled apart. Her body was found in a passageway behind 29 Hanbury Street, her few possessions laid out next to her body. She was Annie Chapman, a 47 year old prostitute. On the 8th September the second victim was found. She was subsequently acknowledged to be the first of the ‘Ripper’s’ victims. Her stomach had been hacked open and slashed several times.
Her face was bruised and her throat had been slashed twice and nearly severed. The ‘terror’ started on Friday 31st August when the body of Mary Ann Nicholls, aged 42, was found in Bucks Row (now called Durwald Street). The only relief from this miserable life was a bottle of gin bought for a few pence, to give blessed oblivion. The overcrowded population lived in hovels, the streets stank of filth and refuse and the only way to earn a living was by criminal means, and for many women, prostitution. Whitechapel in the East End was like a festering sore on the face of Victorian London in the late 19th century.
For three months in 1888, fear and panic stalked the streets of London’s East End.ĭuring these months five women were murdered and horribly mutilated by a man who became known as ‘Jack the Ripper’, although some believe the true number to have been eleven.
