The London Nobody Knows

[steje73]

It certainly gives a better impression than the photos, good as they are. You can also see how Annie could have been there and not discovered by the boot trimming feller. Must get a copy.

[George Hutchinson]

Do you not have Rob's and mine's book then?

PHILIP

[Mike Covell]

Do you not have Rob's and mine's book then?

PHILIP

Are there photo's in it?

I was too engrossed by the text!

It is a great book, shame you two can't do a DVD along similar lines??

[George Hutchinson]

Ha - that wasn't intentionally a bit of free advertising for ourselves. It was just Steje73's view that the film of 29 Hanbury Street is better than photos of it in terms of clarity. Whilst I agree a moving image in colour is infinitely more evocative of the reality, the images in The Whitby Collection are about the clearest of 29 and the backyard you'll find - and remember I've not had them all published yet.

PHILIP

[Mike Covell]

Ha - that wasn't intentionally a bit of free advertising for ourselves. It was just Steje73's view that the film of 29 Hanbury Street is better than photos of it in terms of clarity. Whilst I agree a moving image in colour is infinitely more evocative of the reality, the images in The Whitby Collection are about the clearest of 29 and the backyard you'll find - and remember I've not had them all published yet.

PHILIP

Never have I been so excited about a post on these boards!!!

Does this mean a follow up book???

I do hope so!!!

[Graham]

The day I lost me bottle at the door of 29 Hanbury Street I also visited the other Ripper sites, with the obvious exception of Millers Court. As I recall it was a stinking hot day and the streets were packed.

At Durward Street (Bucks Row) there was a small group of people by the infamous gates and this really brought home to me how appealing to the general public the Ripper Crimes were even in 1969/1971 (can't remember the precise year). I'd read Farson's book (which in my opinion is still a classic) and a few bits and pieces here and there. Anyway, in Durward Street there was this voluble drunk, guy in what I remember as out-of-date Teddy Boy gear, all greasy quiff and missing teeth, and as pissed as a weasel. He was sounding off about the Ripper, and how he vivisected some woman at these very gates, etc., etc. That, more than anything, drove home to me how deep in the East End consciousness were (and are) the Ripper murders. That old Ted turned me on for life (no, not that way, silly...I mean onto the Ripper!) Does anyone else have memories of this character?

I also remember on the Commercial Road that day some poor sod trying to get his conked-out van started in the middle of the road, and was he ever popular!

Bloody hell, that was the best part of 40 years ago....back in those happy days when there was no reality TV to blight our lives....

Cheers,

Old, old Graham

[George Hutchinson]

Graham - Farson's book was first published in 1972, so you must have done the sites before then (seeing as 29 Hanbury Street was no more by the time you could get the Farson).

Mike - the best ones are in the book. There's two more of the backyard and two more of the internal corridor of #29 amongst some others. Nothing you won't have seen before visually, but the images themselves are new. Whitby took a sequence of three shots going along the length of the corridor to the back door. You might think that sounds amazing, but in reality the stairs just get bigger!

PHILIP

[Graham]

Graham - Farson's book was first published in 1972, so you must have done the sites before then (seeing as 29 Hanbury Street was no more by the time you could get the Farson).

Mike - the best ones are in the book. There's two more of the backyard and two more of the internal corridor of #29 amongst some others. Nothing you won't have seen before visually, but the images themselves are new. Whitby took a sequence of three shots going along the length of the corridor to the back door. You might think that sounds amazing, but in reality the stairs just get bigger!

PHILIP

Philip,

I think my ancient brain is confuddled - it was Farson's TV programme (1959) that stuck in my mind and got me interested in the Ripper. However, I very distinctly do recall reading something by Farson prior to my visit to the East End - if it wasn't his book (which I still have somewhere) then what was it?

Off-thread a bit, but I always liked old Dan. He was larger than life, amusing, and informative, and with a spectacular temper. Pity the sauce got him.

Cheers,

Graham

[richardnunweek]

Hi Graham.
As mentioned in a earlier post, I travelled down Hanbury Street at approx 515am on the morning of the 8th September 1965, for it was my intention to revisit each location at precisely ? the time known and to experience the sensation.
Although it is nearly 43 years ago, i can remember a feeling of somewhat fear, but it should be remembered that the sights and sounds experienced at that time were not taken as a cue to log them for future correspondence on a website, therefor myself aged 18 not having a camera, or having the inclination to record my visits in diary form[ If only]. the experiences only remain in my memory, which like Walter Dews recollections fade with time..
Still I can still relay the fact that i was there all those years ago with all the passion of Ripperology.
Regards Richard.

[Graham]

Hello Richard.

I've visited the East End many times since that day I grabbed the door-knob at No 29, but that day sticks in my mind. I didn't even own a camera until about 3 years ago, so there was no thought to posterity - it was just curiosity, pure and simple. My huge regret is that I bottled out, so never knew if the door was locked or not. Had it not been locked - well, I can't say.

I work in the textile trade, and we used to have a customer whose premises were the old police-station in Whites Row. The owner of the business was 'old East End', complete with yarmulka. When I asked him if he 'knew anything about Jack the Ripper', he just said he hadn't got the faintest interest! Talk about being disappointed!

Same when I lived in the USA and visited Dallas - I actually stood on the infamous Grassy Knoll (or as near as I could get to it) but had no camera to record that momentous occasion. But I do recall thinking, as I craned my neck towards the School Book Depository, that 'it was a bloody good shot!'. The guy I was with, a real old-fashioned bible-bashing Texan, said something to the effect that Oswald should have been given a medal....THAT stuck in my memory!

The East End these days is totally different. Much improved, in most respects. To me, it's the delicious smell of curry, more than anything....

Cheers,

Graham

[George Hutchinson]

Hi Graham. That's a more curious one. Maybe it was a newspaper cutting? It could have been some feature when either Odell's or Cullen's books came out in 1965, or possibly the paperback of McCormick's in 1970? What with Dan having been a hack, I guess writing about JTR in a newspaper feature wouldn't have been out of the question!

PHILIP

[Graham]

Philip,

According to his entry in the Ripper A-Z, Dan Farson wrote an article in The TV Times, 7 November 1959, entitled 'On The Trail Of Jack The Ripper'. It must have been this article that stuck in my mind - we certainly had The TV Times in those days.

I wonder how many newcomers to the Ripper realise that it was Farson who re-discovered the Macnaghten Memorandum? Farson referred to Druitt only by the initials MJD in his TV documentaries, also made in 1959.

Cheers,

Graham

[John Bennett]

Ages ago on this thread, Rob C mentioned that the boys fighting in the Thrawl Street clip were in front of the site of No.18. I've just been looking at some old maps and have a feeling that it may actually have been the same building from 1888.

Elsewhere, somebody mentioned that it was probably gone by 1900, after all the tenements were built, but I'm not sure.

From a map of 1876 (18 in green)


And again in 1969/70


It appears that 18 and 18A are the same buildings in both maps (though 17 seems to have gone as well as others. I think this is No.18 outlined, with 18A to its left.


It is also comparable to the illustration from Rob and Phil's book.


Could this be right? Or has it already been ascertained that the property in the film is the same one that stood in 1888?

[Stephen Thomas]

I reckon you're right John.

Do you know why the pic of #18 was in the IPN in 1891?

[George Hutchinson]

Hi Stephen

Rob provided that particular one. Obviously, if you look at the date, it was printed as a result of the Frances Coles murder two weeks previously.

PHILIP