Lucy Wolsey Documentary is here.

[spyglass]

Hi all, The Lucy Wolsey JTR Documentary is finally here, its being screened on Friday 03.01.25 BBC 2 9.00pm.
It looks like a four part series, but not clear if all four episodes are about JTR.

Regards and a Happy New Year to all

[Geddy2112]

I think JtR is only one episode with others mentioned of being William The Conquer part 2 and The Gunpowder Plot part 3 with Bloody Mary being part 4.

[spyglass]

I think JtR is only one episode with others mentioned of being William The Conquer part 2 and The Gunpowder Plot part 3 with Bloody Mary being part 4.

Yes , I think your right, I remember these other subjects being mentioned now.

[Herlock Sholmes]

What are the odds of Halle Rubenhold not being involved? She’s appeared with Lucy Worsely before. I like Lucy Worsely but…call me cynical but I sense something agenda-driven. Maybe I’m wrong.

[spyglass]

What are the odds of Halle Rubenhold not being involved? She’s appeared with Lucy Worsely before. I like Lucy Worsely but…call me cynical but I sense something agenda-driven. Maybe I’m wrong.

I think she might be involved, So I feel a bit of trepidation, However, I know Wolsey has an interest in the Whitechapel Murders and Victorian crime from other programs she has presented, if not her specialist subject, I'm hoping for a balanced program.

As I understand it, it's not going to be a "pick a suspect from a list" type program, It seems it will concentrate more on the press and newspaper coverage at the time and since.

[Herlock Sholmes]

I think she might be involved, So I feel a bit of trepidation, However, I know Wolsey has an interest in the Whitechapel Murders and Victorian crime from other programs she has presented, if not her specialist subject, I'm hoping for a balanced program.

As I understand it, it's not going to be a "pick a suspect from a list" type program, It seems it will concentrate more on the press and newspaper coverage at the time and since.

I hope so Spyglass. Her programmes are always interesting and entertaining. Her three parters on Conan Doyle and Agatha Christie were good.

A bit of a Worsely mystery - I read a fair while ago that she was writing a book on Florence Nightingale and it should have been out last year but there’s no sign of it. I wonder why not? Now, cynical Herlock might be striking again but… is this something to do with the current PC climate? There is a blatantly agenda driven movement to promote Mary Seacole and demonise Nightingale that’s pretty disgraceful to be honest. So many false claims have been made in an attempt to promote Seacole as some kind of nursing prototype when she was nothing of the kind and to suggest that FN tried to prevent her becoming a nurse when even Seacole herself said that she never wanted to be a nurse. There were many pioneering women of colour in medicine and other disciplines over the years who all struggled against waves of intransigent sexism and, no doubt, some misogyny but these never get a mention because it appears that Seacole has been nominated as the ‘chosen one.’ Has Florence now become a bit ‘toxic’ and has Lucy, in essence, chickened out? I hope not.

[spyglass]

I hope so Spyglass. Her programmes are always interesting and entertaining. Her three parters on Conan Doyle and Agatha Christie were good.

A bit of a Worsely mystery - I read a fair while ago that she was writing a book on Florence Nightingale and it should have been out last year but there’s no sign of it. I wonder why not? Now, cynical Herlock might be striking again but… is this something to do with the current PC climate? There is a blatantly agenda driven movement to promote Mary Seacole and demonise Nightingale that’s pretty disgraceful to be honest. So many false claims have been made in an attempt to promote Seacole as some kind of nursing prototype when she was nothing of the kind and to suggest that FN tried to prevent her becoming a nurse when even Seacole herself said that she never wanted to be a nurse. There were many pioneering women of colour in medicine and other disciplines over the years who all struggled against waves of intransigent sexism and, no doubt, some misogyny but these never get a mention because it appears that Seacole has been nominated as the ‘chosen one.’ Has Florence now become a bit ‘toxic’ and has Lucy, in essence, chickened out? I hope not.

I dont know much or anything on either Nightingale or Seacole to be fair, but will look into it.

l know that Worsley has been criticised for suggesting parts of History have been whitewashed over the years and that alot that has been taught as fact for years may not be correct.
For instance she argues that the famous speech made by Elizabeth 1st at Tilbury and always quoted in Films and taught as fact was more than likely written by the Victorians, or at least some of the original speech was added too, and indeed is backed up by arduous research she has done
Also she claims the Tudors were the masters of "fake news" and love to embellish everything.

I think it always healthy to question what we've been taught in History, as Churchill once said
" History will be kind to me, for I intend to write it "

Regards

[Herlock Sholmes]

I dont know much or anything on either Nightingale or Seacole to be fair, but will look into it.

l know that Worsley has been criticised for suggesting parts of History have been whitewashed over the years and that alot that has been taught as fact for years may not be correct.
For instance she argues that the famous speech made by Elizabeth 1st at Tilbury and always quoted in Films and taught as fact was more than likely written by the Victorians, or at least some of the original speech was added too, and indeed is backed up by arduous research she has done
Also she claims the Tudors were the masters of "fake news" and love to embellish everything.

I think it always healthy to question what we've been taught in History, as Churchill once said
" History will be kind to me, for I intend to write it "

Regards

Couldn’t agree more Spyglass. She’s absolutely right to point out where legend or agenda has taken over in the past. I’m just hoping that she hasn’t gone along with just that kind of thing when it happens today. I don’t think for a minute that she’d knowingly promote false history but I know how sensitive people in the public eye are these days about being seen to be on the ‘wrong side’ of a debate/discussion when certain groups have decided on which is the ‘correct’ position to hold.

[Geddy2112]

What are the odds of Halle Rubenhold not being involved?

According to the Internet Movie Database imdb.com she is involved... the programme seems to be about the impact of Jack The Ripper rather than the case itself.

[Pcdunn]

I dont know much or anything on either Nightingale or Seacole to be fair, but will look into it.

l know that Worsley has been criticised for suggesting parts of History have been whitewashed over the years and that alot that has been taught as fact for years may not be correct.
For instance she argues that the famous speech made by Elizabeth 1st at Tilbury and always quoted in Films and taught as fact was more than likely written by the Victorians, or at least some of the original speech was added too, and indeed is backed up by arduous research she has done
Also she claims the Tudors were the masters of "fake news" and love to embellish everything.

I think it always healthy to question what we've been taught in History, as Churchill once said
" History will be kind to me, for I intend to write it "

Regards

Interesting. I just watched an episode last night rhat Lucy Worsley did on Queen Anne and her reign. I knew very little about this royal lady, other than she had had an era of furniture and design named after her, so it was enlightening to learn she had united the English and Scottish Parliaments and created Great Britain. I also learned about her ruling in wartime and being instrumental in starting the British involvement in the Atlantic slave trade.

And, as Lucy often loves to deal in private affairs of the Royals, she also detailed Queen Anne's lack of a married life, her intense friendships with ladies-in-waiting, and the blows her reputation took after her death by biographers and historians who claimed Anne's accomplishments were the works of others.

[Linotte]

I think she might be involved, So I feel a bit of trepidation, However, I know Wolsey has an interest in the Whitechapel Murders and Victorian crime from other programs she has presented, if not her specialist subject, I'm hoping for a balanced program.

As I understand it, it's not going to be a "pick a suspect from a list" type program, It seems it will concentrate more on the press and newspaper coverage at the time and since.

Both Hallie Rubenhold and Julia Laite are involved. I don’t see Worsley taking too controversial of a stance as she has to maintain her brand and reputation. I think she has a lot of control over where these programs go with these subjects and this is something she wants to explore.

I’m really interested to see how this plays out for Rubenhold, her claims, and her overall brand, though.

The next parts are based on my own observations and speculation, so this is all allegedly in my opinion.

Rubenhold seems to have progressively been distancing herself from the toxicity of what happened with The Five after what occurred at Capital Crime last May. There was also an incident on social media back in September where she tried to stir up some drama at the expense of Tik-Tokker Jools Lebron and the “very demure” meme. That ended up backfiring and showed that a lot of younger people in her own field don’t take her seriously, almost like they think she’s a joke. She’s also trying to establish herself as a serious crime historian. So while the Worsley documentary appearance is a good opportunity for her to present herself as such, it also puts her on a world stage and exposes her and her claims to a wider audience. It’s almost like she’s trying to rebrand herself as a serious crime historian and Ripper victim expert based more on the work and not on the drama, but all of that stuff is still easily found online.

So I’m curious to see how this all plays out for Rubenhold just given the fact that this exposes her to a wider audience, many of whom aren’t as into social media or may be offline altogether. I know she had support from a lot of academia when The Five was released and everything unfolded with that. But I think there’s just as many academics who don’t know about it or simply didn’t pay attention to the controversy. Judith Walkowitz, for example, who wrote City of Dreadful Delight, is employed at Johns Hopkins and is still producing work. I haven’t been able to find anything to confirm that she supports Rubenhold’s work on the C5 or not. My guess is that this may start up the conversation again, just in different circles, and it may yield some really interesting stuff. I think we may hear from Walkowitz about this.

And IMO, given how Rubenhold seems to be trying to leave the drama surrounding The Five behind her and bring it up as, “Oh, this is a thing I produced work on.” I think there is some peer review in the works and she knows about it. So again, I’m interested to see how this all plays out this year.

[Pcdunn]

Saw a trailer for the new Worsley program in which she stated it will differ from most Ripper ptesentations because it will not present a new suspect or rehash the crimes themselves.

Instead it will "examine the reasons why the Victorians were so fascinated with Jack the Ripper." She mentions exciting new investiagations into social history. I hope she focuses less on the victims and more on the newspapers' role in exciting the public about these murders.

[Herlock Sholmes]

I’m afraid that I wasn’t massively enthusiastic although I do like Lucy Worsley and her programmes. I accept of course that my slightly negative opinion might be down to the fact that’s it’s a subject that I’m over-familiar with as this was never intended as a documentary aimed at viewers with 20, 30 or 40 years of interest in and knowledge of the case. We all knew of Victoria’s letter and her suggestions for example of course. Overall the programme was well done and well presented. Halle Rubenhold continues to be obsessed with the word prostitute though (way more so than we are it seems to me) It was a well made point about the exaggeration of the ‘80,000’ prostitutes made by the second guest (I can’t recall her name) but Halle still wants to float her idea that the victims weren’t prostitutes. I can totally understand wanting to make the point that they were firstly women and victims and that they shouldn’t be defined by their activities as they most certainly were at the time but not at the expense of the truth. That they were women, forced by the horror of their predicament into prostitution to survive. So yes, don’t label them as prostitutes but they were women who engaged in prostitution.

[Doctored Whatsit]

I’m afraid that I wasn’t massively enthusiastic although I do like Lucy Worsley and her programmes. I accept of course that my slightly negative opinion might be down to the fact that’s it’s a subject that I’m over-familiar with as this was never intended as a documentary aimed at viewers with 20, 30 or 40 years of interest in and knowledge of the case. We all knew of Victoria’s letter and her suggestions for example of course. Overall the programme was well done and well presented. Halle Rubenhold continues to be obsessed with the word prostitute though (way more so than we are it seems to me) It was a well made point about the exaggeration of the ‘80,000’ prostitutes made by the second guest (I can’t recall her name) but Halle still wants to float her idea that the victims weren’t prostitutes. I can totally understand wanting to make the point that they were firstly women and victims and that they shouldn’t be defined by their activities as they most certainly were at the time but not at the expense of the truth. That they were women, forced by the horror of their predicament into prostitution to survive. So yes, don’t label them as prostitutes but they were women who engaged in prostitution.

Yes, this is pretty well what I thought after watching the program. I understand the suggestion that the murdered women probably deserved some sympathy as they were often unemployed and abandoned wives and widows etc, which is why they were called "unfortunates", but as they engaged in prostitution we cannot be surprised that they were recorded as "prostitutes" by the police, and not "victims of fate"!

[spyglass]

I’m afraid that I wasn’t massively enthusiastic although I do like Lucy Worsley and her programmes. I accept of course that my slightly negative opinion might be down to the fact that’s it’s a subject that I’m over-familiar with as this was never intended as a documentary aimed at viewers with 20, 30 or 40 years of interest in and knowledge of the case. We all knew of Victoria’s letter and her suggestions for example of course. Overall the programme was well done and well presented. Halle Rubenhold continues to be obsessed with the word prostitute though (way more so than we are it seems to me) It was a well made point about the exaggeration of the ‘80,000’ prostitutes made by the second guest (I can’t recall her name) but Halle still wants to float her idea that the victims weren’t prostitutes. I can totally understand wanting to make the point that they were firstly women and victims and that they shouldn’t be defined by their activities as they most certainly were at the time but not at the expense of the truth. That they were women, forced by the horror of their predicament into prostitution to survive. So yes, don’t label them as prostitutes but they were women who engaged in prostitution.

More or less agree.
It was well presented, although there wasnt anything new to me in the whole hour that really didnt seem to cover that much.
I mean, anyone in the know knew the Victorian press was all about sensationalism in this case, so nothing new there.
I certainly dont go along with the idea thatKelly's inquest was dealt with differently because of the press previous behaviour.
As for Rubbenhold, I felt relieved that she only had a couple of minutes with her obsession, It felt the makers had reigned her in slightly or cut most of her drivel out.
I have argued with her supporters before that the victims prostituted themselves for money out of desperation, No one blames or judges them for that in Ripperology circles...but it is was what is was sadly.

Regards.