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I recently watched Charles Chaplin's 'City Lights'. His last great silent comedy and a masterpiece by any standards. My wife and I laughed and cried and so impressed was I that I bought a copy of Chaplin's autobiography to learn more about this great comedian.
Chaplin, of course, was born in London in 1889 and spent much of his childhood in Lambeth.
In the book, he relates a conversation he had with H.G.Wells about his belief that he possessed some form of extrasensory perception. To support his case, Chaplin tells of a number of extraordinary incidents in which this sixth sense made itself known.
One of them relates to one George Chapman:
'...That was the end of the discussion but I could have told him of another experience, of the time when as a boy, I stopped at a saloon in London Bridge Road and asked for a glass of water. A bluff, amiable gentleman with a dark moustache served me. For some reason I could not drink the water. I pretended to but as soon as the man turned to talk to a customer I put the glass down and left. Two weeks later, George Chapman, proprietor of the Crown public house in the London Bridge Road, was charged with murdering five wives by posioning them with strychnine. His latest victim was dying in a room above the saloon the day he gave me the glass of water.'
As with so much connected to the Ripper case, there's no way of ever corroborating this story but, in any case, it sounds like an extraordinary encounter. A boy soon to become the world's most celebrated man meeting what some believe to be the century's vilest villain and experiencing an 'intuitive' moment.
Perhaps Charlie's legendary instinct for communication ran even deeper than is generally accepted.
Chaplin, of course, was born in London in 1889 and spent much of his childhood in Lambeth.
In the book, he relates a conversation he had with H.G.Wells about his belief that he possessed some form of extrasensory perception. To support his case, Chaplin tells of a number of extraordinary incidents in which this sixth sense made itself known.
One of them relates to one George Chapman:
'...That was the end of the discussion but I could have told him of another experience, of the time when as a boy, I stopped at a saloon in London Bridge Road and asked for a glass of water. A bluff, amiable gentleman with a dark moustache served me. For some reason I could not drink the water. I pretended to but as soon as the man turned to talk to a customer I put the glass down and left. Two weeks later, George Chapman, proprietor of the Crown public house in the London Bridge Road, was charged with murdering five wives by posioning them with strychnine. His latest victim was dying in a room above the saloon the day he gave me the glass of water.'
As with so much connected to the Ripper case, there's no way of ever corroborating this story but, in any case, it sounds like an extraordinary encounter. A boy soon to become the world's most celebrated man meeting what some believe to be the century's vilest villain and experiencing an 'intuitive' moment.
Perhaps Charlie's legendary instinct for communication ran even deeper than is generally accepted.
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