last address

[smezenen]

A litle help please, I seem to have confused myself. The victim page for Mary Anne Nicholes states that just 6 days before she was murdered she moved from Wilmott's Lodging House at 18 Thrawl Street to the White House at 56 Flower and Dean Street.

It goes on to read:

12:30 AM -- She is seen leaving the Frying Pan Public House at the corner of Brick Lane and Thrawl Street. She returns to the lodging house at 18 Thrawl Street.

1:20 or 1:40 AM -- She is told by the deputy to leave the kitchen of the lodging house because she could not produce her doss money. Polly, on leaving, asks him to save a bed for her. " Never Mind!" She says, "I'll soon get my doss money. See what a jolly bonnet I've got now." She indicates a little black bonnet which no one had seen before.


If the White House was her last address why would she have returned to the house on Thrawl the night she was murdered?

[John Bennett]

I guess for reasons that were known only to Nichols herself. Anything else would be pure speculation.

She spent three weeks at Wilmott's and possibly, after only 6 days of lodging at the White House, went back as she was familiar with it. Emily Holland tried to get her to return to Wilmott's when they met on the morning of the murder. Nichols, however, apparently wanted to go somewhere where men and women were allowed to sleep together (possibly the White House).

On the night/morning of her murder, Mary Ann Nichols did seem a little 'all over the place', as well as drunk. Who knows what decisions were going around in her head that night?

JB

[smezenen]

Thanks JB.
That was where my train of thought should have gone I guess, but I was struck with the thought that the part about returning to 18 Thrawl might be a typo then got confused altogether about how it read.

[Simon Wood]

Hi All,

And on Polly Nichols' death certificate was written "Lodging House, 35 Dorset Street, Spitalfields".

Go figure.

Regards,

Simon

[John Bennett]

Hi All,

And on Polly Nichols' death certificate was written "Lodging House, 35 Dorset Street, Spitalfields".

One can only imagine where that came from. Unless there's some bit of info out there I've not seen before!

[smezenen]

Simon,
unless I am also reading the death certificate wrong that column of the certificate says;

Wife of
William
Nicholes
Printing
machinist
lodging house
35 dorset street
spitalfields

I believe the address is attributed to her husband, whom she was seperated from. So that would not have been her address at the time.

[John Bennett]

I believe the address is attributed to her husband, whom she was seperated from. So that would not have been her address at the time.

William Nichols lived in Coburg Road, Old Kent Road (South London), so it's not his address.

The mystery continues.

[Simon Wood]

Hi All,

Bear in mind that the deceased's details were provided by Coroner Wynne Baxter.

What did he know that we don't?

Regards,

Simon

[John Bennett]

The Nichols and Chapman inquests were taking place during the same period at one point, because Baxter's inquests took so bloody long.

Maybe he got his victims mixed up?

[smezenen]

Possibly a mix up, its also possible that William was staying at the lodging house temporarily during the inquest to avoid travel and that it was the address given to Wynne Baxter at the time. Conjecture but possible.

[iris84]

Hi All,

And on Polly Nichols' death certificate was written "Lodging House, 35 Dorset Street, Spitalfields".

Go figure.

Regards,

Simon

Would that be the same dorset street where mary kelly lived and died? I mean, obviously not the exact same address, but could this add to the theory that at least some of the victims knew each other?

[Sam Flynn]

Would that be the same dorset street where mary kelly lived and died? I mean, obviously not the exact same address, but could this add to the theory that at least some of the victims knew each other?

Yes and no. Polly Nichols was a relative newcomer to Spitalfields - as, for that matter, was Mary Jane Kelly - either way, neither of the two were Dorset Street contemporaries. Liz Stride had spent most of her London life in Poplar and St George's East, whilst Annie Chapman had spent a considerable proportion of her adult life outside the East End. Only Chapman and Kelly lived within reasonable proximity of one another - but at opposite ends of Dorset Street, which housed the best part of a thousand other inhabitants. The chances of any of these women being personal friends is extremely remote.

[KatBradshaw]

It could be that if she was very drunk she was blindly heading somewhere familiar. I once got a taxi back to the wrong house when I was a student for the same reason.

Or maybe she knew somewhere good to pick up a customer that way?

[Jon Guy]

Hello

The Frying Pan Alley was on the corner of Thrawl St, if she was in there around closing time and she had no money she probably knew the "kitchen" where she could sit down with friends was just around the corner.

[heartme]

Peeved Polly

According to author James Tully's book, "Prisoner 1167: The Madman Who Was Jack The Ripper", Polly was more than a little "peeved" at being ejected from Thrawl Street, since she had been dossing there for the past three weeks and was not trusted for the money until morning.