Ripper victims were caught sleeping?

[DJA]

Confident it was Brick Lane.

[jerryd]

Confident it was Brick Lane.

Hi Dave,

From John Kelly's words at the inquest, I would guess the Lane was more likely Petticoat Lane or somewhere in the Aldgate neighborhood.

"I heard she had been locked up at Bishopsgate-street on Saturday afternoon. An old woman who works in the lane told me she saw her in the hands of the police."

[DJA]

Makes sense. Thanks.

Curious that it is the street before Goulston.

[jerryd]

PC Andrews may have approached Alice McKenzie with the intention of turning her out of Castle Alley for sleeping too close to the carts. He states that they often had to rouse rough sleepers in that location and move them along, not arrest them.

JM

Hi JM,

For several reasons I don't think Alice was sleeping in the alley.

1) Andrews' own testimony.

Do people come there? - People often come to sleep in the vans, but when we find them we turn them out. I have not seen the alley used for immoral purposes, and have not seen any women there at all.

2) She didn't have time. PC Allen didn't see anyone in the alley either. DI Reid stated someone was patrolling the alley practically every 5 minutes.

3) Found underneath her dress was a pipe with unburnt tobacco in it and a box of matches. That, to me, leads to the fact she was getting ready to light up. Or light up for somebody.

[jmenges]

Sorry I wasn’t clear...I don’t believe she was sleeping, either. I think her position next to the carts may have prompted Andrews to investigate, though. And if she was sleeping, he was prepared to move her along.

JM

[jerryd]

Ah, I'm with ya. Thanks.

[Wickerman]

"The church yard, known locally as 'Itchy Park' was made a public garden in 1891" (spitalfieldsforum.org.uk), although I was wrong about the monuments, which weren't all cleared away until 1950. According to londonremembers.com, "by 1903 the gardens were widely known as Itchy Park; a notorious rendezvous for homeless men seeking casual work in the fruit market".

It was a popular theory that the record of the mid 60's (1967) by the Small Faces - Itchycoo Park, was inspired by a piece of church waste ground in the East End - Spitalfields Church. Though there are several contesting theories on that topic, and any mention of ducks must be creative writing if it was Spitalfields Church, unless it be a metaphor?

I was there in the early 70's and distinctly remember a number of tramps/homeless sleeping on the stone slabs that were tombstones. You could tell by the drooping eyelids that some were meths drinkers.

[Robert]

A man told me that the song was conceived in Valentines Park, Ilford. The itchykoo bit was something to do with things growing on trees that had the property of making you itch, IIRC.

[MrBarnett]

A man told me that the song was conceived in Valentines Park, Ilford. The itchykoo bit was something to do with things growing on trees that had the property of making you itch, IIRC.

Robert!

What have I told you about talking to strange men in parks?

[DJA]

A man told me that the song was conceived in Valentines Park, Ilford. The itchykoo bit was something to do with things growing on trees that had the property of making you itch, IIRC.

Possibly stinging nettles.

[Ozzy]

When I was at school I remember rosehips being used as "itching powder".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rose_hip

[Sam Flynn]

When I was at school I remember rosehips being used as "itching powder".

Where I grew up in South Wales, we used to call rosehips "itchycoombs". Any relationship to "Itchycoo", I wonder?

[DJA]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ichthyosaur

[Semper_Eadem]

I'm not sure that the Christ Church graveyard, later known as "Itchy Park", was used by rough sleepers to the same degree in 1888 as it was in subsequent years, as it was only cleared of its monuments and turned into a public garden in the 1890s. I'm happy to stand corrected on this, however.

That aside, there were plenty of porches, passageways and other covered places available, all of which would have been far more conducive to sleep than the exposed locations where the victims were found.

That is what I suspected...

[Wickerman]

Thanks Gareth.
To further divert the thread here are my notes/thoughts on the topic that we never got around to discussing on the podcast. Note that in one version he equates “walking the streets” with having an “immoral purpose”.....etc.
JM

Indeed, and Mrs Vanturney had the same interpretation when she told the inquest that Barnett would not permit Mary Kelly "to go on the streets".

There is also a paragraph on the subject of vice in the Star of 12 Oct. 1888.
"Respecting the presence of so many prostitutes in Piccadilly and Regent-street, and the surprise expressed by the public from time to time that they are permitted to ply their calling, he says many of the public were unaware that such women are free to walk the streets so long as they behave themselves."

There is good reason why women of this calling are termed 'street-walkers', and it is well understood that the same phrase "walking the streets" when applied to a man carries a very different meaning as it does when applied to a woman.