Slumming in Whitechapel

[Wickerman]

"Upper-class men and women had long ventured into the low haunts of London in pursuit of illicit pleasure".....

"Charity and philanthropy mingle with immoral pursuits and voyeuristic curiosity in these definitions, which refuse to be definitive".

Slumming: Sexual and Social Politics in Victorian London, 2004, Seth Koven

Whether as individuals, or in groups, for illicit personal reasons, for philanthropic, socio political, or social reform, the attraction towards the dark and lawless quarter of London grew in popularity throughout the 19th century.

Though we might prefer to deny it, there is a streak of Jekyll and Hyde in all of us. The urge to spend "nights in Whitechapel" ran through my veins in 1972, so I know to a degree, from whence I speak.

Regards, Jon S.

[Phil H]

Though we might prefer to deny it, there is a streak of Jekyll and Hyde in all of us. The urge to spend "nights in Whitechapel" ran through my veins in 1972, so I know to a degree, from whence I speak.

I recall that in 1986/87 a friend and I planned to spend the 100th anniversary night of each murder at the appropriate location. It never happened. But the motivation wasn't "slumming" it was a fascination with JtR!!

Also, I'm not sure that, given modern conditions (MUCH improved over those of 1888) a desire to go the the East End is quite what men had in mind in 1888.

Phil H

[Wickerman]

I recall that in 1986/87 a friend and I planned to spend the 100th anniversary night of each murder at the appropriate location. It never happened. But the motivation wasn't "slumming" it was a fascination with JtR!!

There just isn't a broad choice of appellations. "Slumming" encompasses everything, from the casual and curious outsider (as in my case), to those who sought the riskier low-life and illicit pleasures that were available at the time.

The Jekyll and Hyde mentality did exist, wealthy men would spread themselves abroad through the streets of Whitechapel and reside for as long as it took in dirty rooms to live the other life and partake in whatever illegal and sexual pleasures could be obtained in the time they had, as hi-lited below.

"In the late Victorian era London's East End became a popular destination for slumming, a new phenomenon which emerged in the 1880s on an unprecedented scale. For some slumming was a peculiar form of tourism motivated by curiosity, excitement and thrill, others were motivated by moral, religious and altruistic reasons. The economic, social and cultural deprivation of slum dwellers attracted in the second half of the nineteenth century the attention of various groups of the middle- and upper-classes, which included philanthropists, religious missionaries, charity workers, social investigators, writers, and also rich people seeking disrespectable amusements."...

"In fact, for a considerable number of Victorian gentlemen and ladies slumming was a form of illicit urban tourism. They visited the most deprived streets of the East End in pursuit of the 'guilty pleasures' associated with the immoral slum dwellers. Upper-class slummers sometimes spent in disguise a night or more in poor boarding houses seeking to experience taboo intimacies with the members of the lower classes. Their cross-class sexual fellowships contributed to diminishing class barriers and reshaping gender relations at the turn of the nineteenth century."

http://victorianweb.org/victorian/history/slums.html

Which is why we cannot rule out any middle-class adventurer when we contemplate the identity of the Whitechapel murderer. Especially, when we read witness descriptions of "well-dressed men" seen in the vicinity of these crimes.

Regards, Jon S.

[Lechmere]

The motivation of middle class 'do gooders' going to the east end to do missionary work or to help the 'fallen' is complex and would in some instances have a similar root to sexual slummers. However I would be cautious of drawing too much from modern commentaries that are light on examples of sexual slummers or indeed of people who lived a while in doss houses to see how the other half lived.
Jack London and later George Orwell were exceptions not the rule.
To claim that these social minglings contributed to the breaking down of class barriers is to overstate thngs dramatically.

So far as the Whitechapel murders are concerned it is of course theoretically possible that an isolated toff may have lived locally and committed the crimes. But unlikely. There is a need to think that the culprit must have been above the heaving mass - that old chestnut about the need for criminal conscience (absent in the atavistic nasses) and the comfort that a superior person was
required to outwhit the police.
Of course not everyone who walked into the east end was a scruffy urchin. Plenty of pictures exist of well dressed east Enders in the late Victorian period.

[Phil H]

And there were plenty of pretty well-off East-Enders living cheek by jowl with the poorer classes, as various maps show. So if a "toff" dunnit, we cannot dismiss a local "toff" either.

Which is why we cannot rule out any middle-class adventurer when we contemplate the identity of the Whitechapel murderer. Especially, when we read witness descriptions of "well-dressed men" seen in the vicinity of these crimes.

Sorry, but that's pretty indiscriminate and undiscerning by way of analysis to me. Perhaps you cannot dismiss it, but I can look at the area and would take a view that someone who melted into the shadows and the mass would be far more likely to escape that a better-dressed man. Statistically, that is surely most likely.

Maybe it has to do with my starting my reading in the 60s/70s when a "toff" as JtR was the usual assumption. Matters' Dr Stanley; Druitt, Knight's conspiracy of Gull etc, were all "toffs". The figure in the cape, top hat and with Gladstone bag in hand was archetypal.

The case only started to mke sense for me when the "Kosminski" type suspect came to the fore.

Sure we cannot rule out a "toff" - but my suspicion is always that those who want to make that case have their own suspect in mind somewhere.

Phil H

[Barnaby]

Psychologically, it is interesting as to why we still like to slum. I find it exciting both when I am invited to a party above my socioeconomic status and when I frequent seedy bars in bad areas arguably below mine. But there is no doubt where I both have more fun and find more trouble! Hanging out with my own is far away the most common but actually the least titillating.

[John Bennett]

Though we might prefer to deny it, there is a streak of Jekyll and Hyde in all of us. The urge to spend "nights in Whitechapel" ran through my veins in 1972, so I know to a degree, from whence I speak.

I recall that in 1986/87 a friend and I planned to spend the 100th anniversary night of each murder at the appropriate location. It never happened. But the motivation wasn't "slumming" it was a fascination with JtR!!

Also, I'm not sure that, given modern conditions (MUCH improved over those of 1888) a desire to go the the East End is quite what men had in mind in 1888.

Phil H

In my late teens and early 20s (late 1980s), I seem to have had the same urges. Whereas many of my friends enjoyed comfortable local pubs or trendy/indie bars and clubs, a few of us used to prefer to schlepp down to the East End and savour the delights of derelict Durward Street and the quirky rough-n-readiness of pubs like the Roebuck and Frying Pan.

I didn't realise it then, but I guess we were 'slumming it'!

More recently, Mark Ripper and I went roaming Shoreditch to find an un-trendified boozer. We found one, in Hoxton Street. Toothless but friendly locals and non-stop horseracing on the telly.

[caz]

The motivation of middle class 'do gooders' going to the east end to do missionary work or to help the 'fallen' is complex and would in some instances have a similar root to sexual slummers. However I would be cautious of drawing too much from modern commentaries that are light on examples of sexual slummers or indeed of people who lived a while in doss houses to see how the other half lived.
Jack London and later George Orwell were exceptions not the rule.
To claim that these social minglings contributed to the breaking down of class barriers is to overstate thngs dramatically.

So far as the Whitechapel murders are concerned it is of course theoretically possible that an isolated toff may have lived locally and committed the crimes. But unlikely. There is a need to think that the culprit must have been above the heaving mass - that old chestnut about the need for criminal conscience (absent in the atavistic nasses) and the comfort that a superior person was
required to outwhit the police.
Of course not everyone who walked into the east end was a scruffy urchin. Plenty of pictures exist of well dressed east Enders in the late Victorian period.

Hi Lechy,

How many examples would you expect to find documented? We know from the sheer numbers of prostitutes how much sex was being sold on those seedy streets or in the doss houses, but we don't expect many documented examples of the customers or the transactions.

And again we see the misuse of the old proverb about the exception proving the rule. 'Proving' in this context meant 'testing'. In short, any exceptions to a given rule will test the validity of that rule. When you think about it, an exception cannot possibly confirm, or prove a rule, can it?

Mind you, it's quite refreshing to see your comments (and Phil's) acknowledging that the well dressed and relatively wealthy did live side by side then, as they do now, with the roughest and poorest elements of the East End, and were not quite the few and far between sore thumbs that others have been insisting on for so long.

All this means is that the man whose fantasy turned to murder and mutilation during 1888 could have been pretty much anyone with the same access to Spitalfields-based unfortunates as the men who used them for cheap-as-chips regular sexual relief. And that means from the Hugh Grants downwards, although I would tend to exonerate anyone who had no money at all to show a prospective victim, or who didn't even look good for tuppence.

Love,

Caz
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