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From the Vault - Annie Chapman - The Ripper's Second Victim · Who Did What Now With Katie Charlwood

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Speaker 1: Hi again, delicious friends, 'tis I Katie Charlewood, History Harlotte
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Speaker 1: and reader all books. And here we are with another
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Speaker 1: episode from the Vault, Annie Chapman, the second canonical victim
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Speaker 1: of the serial killer known as Jack the Ribber. With
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Speaker 1: it being up in the news again, I think it's
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Speaker 1: important to remember the people behind the headlines, behind the drawings,
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Speaker 1: behind the story. Bear in mind this episode is a
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Speaker 1: few years old, so the audio is not super in
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Speaker 1: some places, but I hope you can power through that.
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Speaker 1: Thank you for listening, and I'll see you when I'm
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Speaker 1: feeling better. And bear in mind that this is a
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Speaker 1: few years old. The audio might not be the same
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Speaker 1: that you're used to, but I hope you can enjoy
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Speaker 1: it anyway, Thank you, and I will say you in
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Speaker 1: the next episode.
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Speaker 2: If my use of language is more of an issue
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Speaker 2: to you than the horrible atrocities which I describe many times,
1:05
Speaker 2: then Paul, I do not know what to tell you. You
1:07
Speaker 2: need to sort ode your priorities, Okay, okay. Also, when
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Speaker 2: I add there's like a trigger warning for this episode,
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Speaker 2: I'm going to be discussing suicide and child mortality and
1:23
Speaker 2: addiction and murder, you know, violence, against women. There's all
1:28
Speaker 2: of that involved in this thought. You should know. Now,
1:33
Speaker 2: how are things with me? Well, you know, things are
1:36
Speaker 2: really good. I had an article appear in the newspaper
1:39
Speaker 2: which was pretty cool when I was discussing Gronowel and
1:42
Speaker 2: the importance of you know, giving women their names back
1:45
Speaker 2: and their stories back. And so I was chatting to
1:48
Speaker 2: this journalist and I mentioned that, oh, yeah, no, I'm
1:50
Speaker 2: covering the five canonical victims of Jack the Ripper because
1:53
Speaker 2: you know, their stories are important to me. Frankly, the
1:57
Speaker 2: lives of five women shouldn't matter less than so I'm good.
2:00
Speaker 2: We don't even know. Oh, if you're in the States,
2:04
Speaker 2: I'm going to be at the Heartland Pagan Festival. My
2:07
Speaker 2: brain just skipped a beat there and I'm at the
2:10
Speaker 2: Pagan festival in Kansas into the night. It's the Memorial weekend.
2:15
Speaker 2: I am really bad with dates, todight tell you that.
2:19
Speaker 2: I'm like awful with dates, not just the ones I
2:23
Speaker 2: go on. But yeah, my mom actually said to me,
2:27
Speaker 2: you know, if you go on a date with someone,
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Speaker 2: it'd be nice if you actually had a second one.
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Speaker 2: Thanks mom, Love that love that voter confidence there, Mom,
2:37
Speaker 2: that's great. I mean She's not wrong, not by any
2:41
Speaker 2: stretch of the imagination. I'm not doing well in the
2:45
Speaker 2: dating department. Really, it's I don't know. Well, here's the thing.
2:50
Speaker 2: I mean, if I am too much. Yeah, the last day,
2:53
Speaker 2: one of the last dates I was on, my mom
2:55
Speaker 2: was like, were you a bit much? And I'm like, well, clearly, yeah, yes,
3:01
Speaker 2: it's me, Like I don't. I don't do that kind
3:06
Speaker 2: of stuff, like halfheartedly. So I am too much? You know,
3:13
Speaker 2: is the manic Pixie dream girl or is she just
3:15
Speaker 2: near a divergent whym's to say. But here's the thing, like,
3:20
Speaker 2: if I am too much, you are well within your
3:23
Speaker 2: means to go and find less. Bye bye, you know,
3:27
Speaker 2: it's just go. It's co But yeah, it's been, it's been.
3:33
Speaker 2: It's been not great for me in the romance department.
3:35
Speaker 2: And I don't know if it's gonna get any better.
3:38
Speaker 2: I don't know. Oh, it was Mother's Day. It's a
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Speaker 2: mothering Sunday as it's called n it's here in UK
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Speaker 2: and Ireland, right, And so I got two cards, one
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Speaker 2: of which is a lift the flap situation with like
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Speaker 2: I had to can like follow a path of flowers
4:01
Speaker 2: to each a flower pot which was like, ha ha,
4:03
Speaker 2: I pranked you, but also I love you, which is nice.
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Speaker 2: I mean, I'll take it. Thanks son, And my girl
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Speaker 2: made me this. She made me this card and it
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Speaker 2: had like cut out unicorns on it, but it also
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Speaker 2: had a drawing of me on the inside with one
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Speaker 2: tiny arm, one big mama arm, and a snout, which
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Speaker 2: is fine, I guess. Thanks thanks for that. Thanks for that, sweetie.
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Speaker 2: And googly eyes, so everything was forgiven. With the googly eyes.
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Speaker 2: I love googly eyes, google eyes. Who doesn't love googly
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Speaker 2: eyes though? Like that's well good, so my children know
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Speaker 2: me at least they have fun cards and it was good. Also,
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Speaker 2: you know, all per me, per per little mother over here.
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Speaker 2: You know, if you want to donate and help me
4:49
Speaker 2: celebrate Mother's Day belatedly, paper dot commsage who had won?
4:54
Speaker 2: Now where's the head of what? Now? Pod? I don't remember?
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Speaker 2: Link is in the description down below. Help me pay
5:02
Speaker 2: for all of these ridiculous old newspaper subscriptions I have.
5:06
Speaker 2: Do you know how many old newspapers I read? It
5:11
Speaker 2: is ridiculous. I mean it's fun because I do enjoy it,
5:15
Speaker 2: but also I am I am too many and also
5:20
Speaker 2: books Bye by too many books. But it's for reference.
5:23
Speaker 2: I need it. But I know what you're thinking. You're thinking,
5:26
Speaker 2: what your jibber jabber in fact me, in fact you.
5:29
Speaker 2: I will. But first we've got to get our source
5:32
Speaker 2: on Jack the Ripper. Just the Facts by Paul Begg.
5:39
Speaker 2: Life and Labor of the People in London, Religious Influences
5:42
Speaker 2: by Charles Bith About Your Drunkards Act of eighteen seventy nine,
5:48
Speaker 2: The Story of the Household Cavalry by Sir George Arthur.
5:53
Speaker 2: The Prostitute's Body Rewriting, Prostitution and Victorian Britain by Nina Atwood.
6:00
Speaker 2: The Five by Hallie rubin Holt, The Memorials of the
6:05
Speaker 2: Hamlet of Knightsbridge by George Henry Davis. Family Secrets Living
6:10
Speaker 2: with Shame from the Victorians to the present day by
6:12
Speaker 2: Deborah Cohen. Living in sin cohabitating his husband and wife
6:16
Speaker 2: in nineteenth century England by Ginger Frost. And of course
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Speaker 2: we have history dot com and biography dot com. I
6:25
Speaker 2: use it uncomfortably good. Then let's begin. Dark Annie Annie Chapman,
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Speaker 2: as she will be one day Mississippi. She is yet
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Speaker 2: another woman to suffer under the fucking Victorian shame. Regime
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Speaker 2: and also you know, society, culture and mental illness, which
6:50
Speaker 2: is super fun, super fun. Now. Ah, the more I
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Speaker 2: read into these stories and the more I'm digging through research,
7:00
Speaker 2: which just the angrier I've become, Like I'm just enraged,
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Speaker 2: Like I know, we can turn around and be like
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Speaker 2: things are so great now, fuck off, don't start that
7:14
Speaker 2: just because things were shit one hundred years ago doesn't
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Speaker 2: mean they're perfect now. And I don't have time for
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Speaker 2: your bullshit, frankly, but Annie's story is so fucking tragic,
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Speaker 2: like so many of these women who were just insulted
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Speaker 2: and downtrodden and destroyed in life and in death, and
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Speaker 2: any attempt to reclaim their name or their personhood is
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Speaker 2: shat on and spat on by fucking ripperologists. Anyone who
7:46
Speaker 2: calls themselves yeah, hmm, that was good, cheered on my words,
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Speaker 2: but I'm mad, so I'm gonna keep it in. Anybody
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Speaker 2: who refers to themselves as ripperologist is a cunt. And
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Speaker 2: I don't say that lightly because they have no respect
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Speaker 2: for the women and their suffering. And this is from
8:04
Speaker 2: someone who wanted to be a riparologist, like I am
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Speaker 2: fairly certain that in one of the drawers in my
8:10
Speaker 2: bedroom right now. There is a whole thing about the
8:15
Speaker 2: possibility of the suspects of Jack the Ripper, like I
8:18
Speaker 2: have a whole thing on it. I've had books on it.
8:21
Speaker 2: I could probably tell you too many, too many locations
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Speaker 2: of where stab wounds happened in certain people, like I
8:29
Speaker 2: know far too much about this case. And I felt
8:34
Speaker 2: for a lot of the nonsense too, because a lot
8:37
Speaker 2: of the information we were given was regurgitated by the press.
8:44
Speaker 2: You know, this was a time where newspapers would last
8:47
Speaker 2: like a week, sometimes set week, a couple of weeks,
8:50
Speaker 2: and then some would last for ages and bias and
8:56
Speaker 2: prejudice and everything that goes with it, all flung in together,
9:00
Speaker 2: and of course, huh hm, a less than savory police force.
9:06
Speaker 2: I know you're shocked, You're shocked, but I am getting
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Speaker 2: ahead of myself, and I think it's time to turn
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Speaker 2: back and talk about the person. Annie Smith was born
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Speaker 2: in September eighteen forty one, there or thereabouts. We're not
9:26
Speaker 2: entirely sure exactly of her day of birth, but roughly. See.
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Speaker 2: The thing about Annie is she was illegitimate because she
9:37
Speaker 2: was born to Ruth Chapman and George Smith. Now, George
9:47
Speaker 2: Smith was a member of the cavalry. He was a soldier.
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Speaker 2: He was a pretty good one, you know, and the
9:56
Speaker 2: army had this thing back in the day that you know,
9:59
Speaker 2: they I mean, they didn't have that much money, so
10:02
Speaker 2: they didn't want them to be you know, cohorting with
10:06
Speaker 2: ladies of the night, and instead they wanted them to
10:10
Speaker 2: have you know, good working class girlfriends, right, but the
10:14
Speaker 2: intention was to never marry them, you know. And yes,
10:19
Speaker 2: so it was like a kind of level of respectability
10:23
Speaker 2: because at the time, I think the only approved like
10:27
Speaker 2: one and not as wrong six yeah, six, and every
10:32
Speaker 2: hundred marriages were like approved, So you would have to
10:37
Speaker 2: be really fucking lucky to get it approved. Now, by
10:41
Speaker 2: all accounts, George must have been, you know, just very
10:45
Speaker 2: well liked by his commanding officers, because after two years
10:54
Speaker 2: of being together he is allowed to marry Ruth. But
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Speaker 2: not only that, not only is their marriage approved, but
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Speaker 2: it was backdated in the military records to make it
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Speaker 2: look like they had been you know, married longer, and
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Speaker 2: to basically state that Annie was legitimate. So Annie Eliza Smith,
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Speaker 2: She's born five months later, Ruth is pregnant again because
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Speaker 2: clearly George and Annie had some great passion, right, they
11:31
Speaker 2: clearly had love. So growing up Annie is she's an
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Speaker 2: army brat and this family they live in the barracks
11:44
Speaker 2: like because at the time, you know, separate housing for
11:48
Speaker 2: army wives military wives wasn't a thing. So they would
11:51
Speaker 2: be like in the corner of a room and sometimes
11:55
Speaker 2: it would be like I want to say, like a curtain,
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Speaker 2: like some kind of you know, barrier, but army wives
12:04
Speaker 2: they would wash and breastfeed and do all the other
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Speaker 2: stuff in front of other soldiers. Now I'm not saying
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Speaker 2: this is the safest environment, but uh, it's gonna be
12:21
Speaker 2: one of two things, right, And it's either going to
12:23
Speaker 2: be like really fucking dodgy because you know, blood is
12:28
Speaker 2: thicker than water, which, by the way, is a thing
12:30
Speaker 2: about soldiers. It's about going into battle together. So the
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Speaker 2: brotherhood of you know, the cavalry, whatever the fuck, they
12:38
Speaker 2: would either be standing up for themselves and you know,
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Speaker 2: turn a blind eye to shit happening, or they would
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Speaker 2: be so close and bonded that you know, they would
12:48
Speaker 2: hold each other accountable and they would ensure the safety
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Speaker 2: of each other's families because it's very much you know,
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Speaker 2: this special little bubble, like it's a particular type of community.
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Speaker 2: So Annie growing up Jesus, I mean, proper army brat
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Speaker 2: they live in like twelve different places, because you know,
13:10
Speaker 2: you're in the army, you don't get to have the
13:12
Speaker 2: same where you're going. Luckily he wasn't posted abroad. Again,
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Speaker 2: I think he just add like a really good relationship
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Speaker 2: with his commanding officers, So twelve locations, but didn't have
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Speaker 2: to like go out to the desert or the jungle,
13:27
Speaker 2: which I think is you know, I mean that's that's
13:32
Speaker 2: a silver learning. Yeah, definitely. So growing up Annie would
13:38
Speaker 2: have been sent to this regiment school, so unlike a
13:43
Speaker 2: lot of other working class women or children like, she
13:47
Speaker 2: would learn to like read and write, and then I
13:50
Speaker 2: think at like some point during the day after they
13:52
Speaker 2: did like you know, general learning, like boys would go
13:55
Speaker 2: and do one thing and the girls would learn skills
13:57
Speaker 2: like knitting, crochet and all that jazz. Because of course
14:05
Speaker 2: women's work, proper lady things, right, proper Victorian ladies. We're
14:09
Speaker 2: supposed to know how to embroider and other such amazing qualities.
14:15
Speaker 2: I say that as if I don't embroider myself, I
14:18
Speaker 2: do it I do embroider. Like I embroider, I can't crochet.
14:22
Speaker 2: I can just about net, but I can weave and
14:27
Speaker 2: I can what was the other one. I can do net, weave, embroider,
14:31
Speaker 2: and I can darn, so like I can do listen.
14:35
Speaker 2: It's good to have skills, just you never know when
14:37
Speaker 2: they're going to come in handy. When the apocalypse comes,
14:40
Speaker 2: I'll be I mean, I'll be reading old houses for clothes,
14:43
Speaker 2: but I can mend things. It's fine. I'm not saying
14:47
Speaker 2: I'd survive the Hunger Games, but you know i'd survive winter.
14:52
Speaker 2: But anyway, the good thing is because of her father's regiment,
14:55
Speaker 2: you know, she's staying in some pretty decent places. She's
14:58
Speaker 2: in Nightspread, she's in Windsor, so she's at least adjacent
15:02
Speaker 2: to society. So Annie grows up to be well mannered
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Speaker 2: and polite and well spoken and a fairly respectable Victorian girl,
15:13
Speaker 2: you know, and things are going okay. I mean, it's
15:17
Speaker 2: not the best of situations, but at one point, I
15:21
Speaker 2: think in about eighteen fifty four, when Annie's twelve, they're
15:26
Speaker 2: living in a shared accommodation with like two other families,
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Speaker 2: which is, you know, pretty good. Unfortunately, a disease is
15:36
Speaker 2: spreading through the city, Scarletina as it was called, which
15:42
Speaker 2: is scarlet fever. So scarlet fever is spreading through and
15:48
Speaker 2: at twelve years old, Annie watches four of her siblings die.
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Speaker 2: And if that isn't tragic enough, it's over the course
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Speaker 2: of three fucking weeks. Three weeks she loses her two
16:04
Speaker 2: and a half year old sister, Miriam, followed quickly by
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Speaker 2: her five month old brother William. The next to go
16:14
Speaker 2: is her five year old brother Eli, and well, Eli
16:21
Speaker 2: is being buried. Her other brother is diagnosed with typhus
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Speaker 2: So George Thomas he is. He's either just turned twelve
16:35
Speaker 2: or he's about to be twelve. He's on the cusp
16:38
Speaker 2: and he passes away. Four of her younger siblings because
16:47
Speaker 2: she's the oldest. So her brother, who she grew up with,
16:51
Speaker 2: who she's known her whole life, he's gone, the little
16:56
Speaker 2: sister who she probably would have been looking after while
16:59
Speaker 2: her mum, you know, cared for her newborn. She's gone,
17:05
Speaker 2: the new baby of the family. He's gone, and her
17:09
Speaker 2: five year old brother also gone. Three brothers and a sister,
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Speaker 2: So four out of the six Smith children wiped out
17:24
Speaker 2: in three weeks. And you know, child mortality and infomrtality
17:29
Speaker 2: isn't exactly you know, unsurprising in the era, doesn't make
17:34
Speaker 2: it any less rough on the people that are there,
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Speaker 2: Like it might have been a part of life, but
17:40
Speaker 2: it's still going to be absolutely fucking, got wrenchingly horrific
17:45
Speaker 2: to lose a child. Now, a few years later, in
17:56
Speaker 2: eighteen sixty one, another brother enters the scene. Her mum
18:03
Speaker 2: gives birth to Fontaine Hamilton Smith. He's named after two
18:08
Speaker 2: commanding officers that George Smith had. Clearly he respected them,
18:13
Speaker 2: and they must have been very They must have mattered,
18:21
Speaker 2: you know, to name his son after these people, it
18:24
Speaker 2: had to be a reason. It can't just have been
18:27
Speaker 2: that they were there, you know. But again, army life,
18:32
Speaker 2: they must have been there for him and his family
18:35
Speaker 2: in some way during this time, like they would have
18:40
Speaker 2: had to hire doctors that they couldn't afford. So I
18:44
Speaker 2: have a sneaking suspicion that one of the captains, one
18:47
Speaker 2: of these fellas they helped, you know, because also funerals
18:52
Speaker 2: not free, So I have a feeling there was some
18:55
Speaker 2: kind of contribution there, Oh goodness. So yeah, before before
19:09
Speaker 2: Fontaine comes onto the scene, Annie is graced with three
19:13
Speaker 2: more sisters, Emily, Georgina, and Miriam. Clearly they liked that
19:18
Speaker 2: name because they named a second child that But okay,
19:21
Speaker 2: I think it's weird, but to each their own. I'm
19:25
Speaker 2: assuming there was a good reason for this. But you know,
19:30
Speaker 2: by the time Annie is fifteen, chances are you know,
19:35
Speaker 2: school's ending, so that's normally the point where she would
19:38
Speaker 2: be expected to go and do other work. And she
19:41
Speaker 2: had a younger sister who could take over the household
19:45
Speaker 2: so care for the little ones, help her mama out,
19:49
Speaker 2: So there really wasn't a reason for Annie to be there.
19:53
Speaker 2: So Annie gets a job as a domestic servant, and
19:59
Speaker 2: by eight sixty one she's actually a housemaid eleven domestic
20:06
Speaker 2: servant for a sixty seven year old successful architect and
20:10
Speaker 2: his retired brother, so William Henry Lure and whatever his
20:16
Speaker 2: retired stockbroker brother's name is, mister Lure. I don't know
20:22
Speaker 2: his name. I couldn't find it. But she was living
20:25
Speaker 2: at their address. She was a domestic servant, and she
20:27
Speaker 2: was like the bottom of the wrung. So she was
20:31
Speaker 2: one of three housemaids, and there would have been two
20:35
Speaker 2: above her, so they would have paid her, you know,
20:38
Speaker 2: a fairly okay wage for the time, but they would
20:41
Speaker 2: have taken like Alba off for love in and then
20:43
Speaker 2: they would have given her basically an allowance, or she
20:47
Speaker 2: would buy things for herself like sugar and tea and beer.
20:54
Speaker 2: Why is the beer relevant, Katie? Why do you ask? Well,
20:58
Speaker 2: I'm glad you asked, because I will tell you alcohol
21:04
Speaker 2: is going to be a constant in Annie's life. And
21:10
Speaker 2: she's working a lot, she's far away from family, and
21:15
Speaker 2: she would have got time off to go to like
21:16
Speaker 2: Sunday Mass, to go to church because you know Victorians
21:19
Speaker 2: and they're pieting. But other than that, very little free time,
21:23
Speaker 2: and the free time she did have was probably quite lonely.
21:28
Speaker 2: I mean, there were two other domestics there, but this
21:32
Speaker 2: is a woman who grew up in army barracks and
21:38
Speaker 2: a large family and sharing houses with other people. So
21:43
Speaker 2: I mean, this is really going to be one of
21:44
Speaker 2: two ways again, two ways in it. She's either going
21:49
Speaker 2: to be quite happy that she had privacy and time
21:52
Speaker 2: to herself, or she's going to feel secluded and separated
22:01
Speaker 2: from her family and really bloody lonely and already as
22:06
Speaker 2: a teenager. This girl has suffered trauma like you don't
22:12
Speaker 2: see so many people die and have it not affect you.
22:16
Speaker 2: Speaking of trauma, George Smith had been in the army
22:20
Speaker 2: for what twenty one years of his life more than
22:22
Speaker 2: that actually, but for twenty one years it had been
22:26
Speaker 2: his life. The Second Regiment Lifeguards had been everything that
22:32
Speaker 2: George and Ruth and their family would have been a
22:36
Speaker 2: part of for the majority of their time together. So
22:41
Speaker 2: when he gets to a certain point in a certain
22:43
Speaker 2: age and he has to retire because of how well
22:48
Speaker 2: he's held in regard and how well he's done, and
22:50
Speaker 2: he hasn't caused any shit, he gets a really good
22:55
Speaker 2: position as a gentleman's servant. So a gentleman's valet is,
23:01
Speaker 2: and it is valet, not valets. Valets do cars. Valet's
23:04
Speaker 2: look after gentlemen. They sort their clothes, they take care
23:07
Speaker 2: of them like a personal assistant. They're like above a butler, really,
23:13
Speaker 2: if one can afford a butler. But in the hierarchy
23:16
Speaker 2: of like servitude, being a valet is it's pretty high
23:21
Speaker 2: up there. You're doing well, you are tip top. So
23:26
Speaker 2: he gets into the service of a crimean war hero, right,
23:33
Speaker 2: Roger William Henry Palmer, who ends up being elected to parliament. Right,
23:38
Speaker 2: he's a member of parliament, being a gentleman's valet to
23:45
Speaker 2: you know, a member of parliament. That is, that is
23:48
Speaker 2: a very comfortable life, you know what I say, comfortable
23:52
Speaker 2: life compared to you know, other you know, servantry, servantry,
23:57
Speaker 2: that's not correct, other forms of servitude, backbreaking labor. You know,
24:02
Speaker 2: this is, you know, this is upwardly mobile, especially for
24:06
Speaker 2: their station. So he gets to do things that he
24:11
Speaker 2: couldn't do before, and he ends up with a lot
24:13
Speaker 2: more free time. And this is a man who was
24:18
Speaker 2: surrounded by people and is now no longer surrounded by people.
24:23
Speaker 2: So he's gone through a major life change. He's experiencing
24:27
Speaker 2: more alone time, and he's probably having to come to
24:32
Speaker 2: terms with all the shit he's gone through in his life.
24:39
Speaker 2: On the plus side, because he's with the Palmer Man,
24:42
Speaker 2: the Palmer Man, what the fuck? Anyway, he gets to
24:46
Speaker 2: travel to like Mayo and Ireland and go to castles
24:49
Speaker 2: and estates and manors and gets to just travel a bit,
24:54
Speaker 2: see the world, get to taste their lovely beverages like
24:58
Speaker 2: whiskey and others delights see George. Unsurprisingly, is an alcoholic
25:06
Speaker 2: and you're thinking, wow, that came out of nowhere. It
25:09
Speaker 2: is what it is, but think about it. Victorian era
25:13
Speaker 2: suffer trauma. Everything has booze in it, or probably I'm fetamines.
25:19
Speaker 2: They're like, hey, you got a drinking problem. Take cocaine. No, no, cocaine, raisins. No, No,
25:27
Speaker 2: it's cocaine. It's an old jog, but it's a goody.
25:31
Speaker 2: And you know, heroin opium. Like they were just like,
25:36
Speaker 2: you're addicted to this. Take this other addictive substance. It's fine.
25:40
Speaker 2: It's really fucking weird. But okay, I mean they didn't
25:43
Speaker 2: understand how that worked. But just you know, get to
25:50
Speaker 2: say one thing is a gateway. Drug is more less
25:53
Speaker 2: than a correct it's more drugs. Everything has drugs. Ah,
25:58
Speaker 2: you're drinking drugs. Take the drug. So yeah, he has
26:04
Speaker 2: more alone time and things clearly are starting to weigh
26:09
Speaker 2: on him. Plus, when he was in the barracks and
26:11
Speaker 2: he was with other soldiers, drinking was probably very much
26:15
Speaker 2: the norm. It's what people did. It's you know, social interaction.
26:20
Speaker 2: Alcohol is the social lubricants. So they say, so him
26:23
Speaker 2: drinking a lot wouldn't have been you know, out of turn.
26:28
Speaker 2: But over the years things get worse for George and
26:35
Speaker 2: the promotion he gets doesn't help. So he ends up
26:41
Speaker 2: balloting for Captain Thomas Naylor Leland and things go well
26:48
Speaker 2: for them. He's a really good valet. He's very well
26:50
Speaker 2: respected and he is really well paid. So for him
26:54
Speaker 2: and Ruth, this is fabulous, you know. But on the
27:00
Speaker 2: thirteenth of June eighteen sixty three, Captain Leland he's acting
27:05
Speaker 2: as a steward at these races in Wrexham, right, yes, Wrexham,
27:13
Speaker 2: and he's staying in officer's quarters. And George is staying
27:18
Speaker 2: in this pub. He's staying a room of a pub
27:21
Speaker 2: an Elephant and Castle, and he's you know, going to
27:25
Speaker 2: bed for the night. He seems quite cheerful, everybody seems fine.
27:30
Speaker 2: But when they go to look for him in the morning,
27:34
Speaker 2: they find George in a pool of his own blood.
27:39
Speaker 2: Because George has ended his own life, and not any
27:43
Speaker 2: careful way, not in a quiet way, not any pleasant
27:45
Speaker 2: way by any stretch of the imagination. And you're thinking
27:48
Speaker 2: a pleasant way, you know, people take it in pills
27:51
Speaker 2: and things. There's easier ways to go. This man slit
27:55
Speaker 2: his own throat. Now I'm going to stop for a
28:00
Speaker 2: moment to talk about mental illness and addiction, mainly depression
28:04
Speaker 2: and suicidal thoughts, because it can just be a flating moment,
28:11
Speaker 2: a tremendous moment of despair, but that moment can be
28:16
Speaker 2: all it takes to snuff out all of someone's existence,
28:23
Speaker 2: and the pain and absolute torture someone must be going
28:28
Speaker 2: through to cut their own throat like that is vicious.
28:37
Speaker 2: Clearly this man was suffering, and whether the signs where
28:41
Speaker 2: there or not, his life is over. And this is
28:47
Speaker 2: going to affect everyone in his life, including again his
28:52
Speaker 2: daughter Annie, who has not only watched again four of
28:57
Speaker 2: her siblings die, but now she knows her father has
29:02
Speaker 2: ended his own life. And this is Victorian London. This
29:06
Speaker 2: is you know, blasphemy, a sin, This is horrific. So
29:11
Speaker 2: not only does she have that contend with, she will
29:14
Speaker 2: have this Christian guilt and shame just smothering her and
29:24
Speaker 2: addiction in family it's usually her hereditary. Not usually, I
29:29
Speaker 2: mean quite often it's hereditary. I'm not going to make
29:32
Speaker 2: any judgments, but it's quite possible that this is the
29:40
Speaker 2: trigger for her, that this is the moment that Annie
29:44
Speaker 2: also starts taking solace in a bottle. Now they do
29:49
Speaker 2: put him down, as you know, suffering from temporary insanity,
29:52
Speaker 2: and that George is fond of a drink. But something
29:58
Speaker 2: peculiar happens, because Ruth and her children, like Annie's family,
30:05
Speaker 2: could have very easily ended up in a workhouse. But
30:09
Speaker 2: clearly George had been well respected because Leyland he had
30:16
Speaker 2: provided some money. And then somehow Ruth ends up having
30:25
Speaker 2: a boarding house. And at some point after her receiving
30:31
Speaker 2: this boarding house, a young coachman named John Chapman comes
30:36
Speaker 2: to stay. Now we don't know how Annie came to
30:40
Speaker 2: meet John Chapman, but we do know that somehow their
30:44
Speaker 2: paths crossed, whether she was visiting the lodging house or
30:49
Speaker 2: she was staying there, but they met, they made a connection,
30:54
Speaker 2: They courted, and they got married. May eighteen sixty nine,
30:58
Speaker 2: the Chapman's are wed, and Annie was now missus Annie Chapman,
31:03
Speaker 2: the wife of a gentleman's coachman, which is a step up,
31:09
Speaker 2: like she is working away up in the world, because
31:11
Speaker 2: again this is a very upwardly mobile situation. In eighteen seventy,
31:19
Speaker 2: their first child was born. Now, instead of you know,
31:23
Speaker 2: having her mum come to her, Annie goes back to
31:25
Speaker 2: her mum's house to you know, as soon as she
31:28
Speaker 2: feels like labors happen, and she's like, nope, fuck this
31:31
Speaker 2: for a gemisoldiers, I'm off to my mum's And off
31:34
Speaker 2: she goes, and she gives birth to her first daughter,
31:38
Speaker 2: so little Emily is born, but Emily suffers from epilepsy.
31:43
Speaker 2: Now at the time this would have been connected to
31:46
Speaker 2: maternal drinking. So if somebody was drinking alcohol, you know,
31:51
Speaker 2: while pregnant, this kind of link was made to epilepsy.
31:58
Speaker 2: In eighteen seventy two, second daughter is born Ellen Georgina,
32:02
Speaker 2: and she passes away in less than a day. She
32:07
Speaker 2: doesn't survive the day. And in eighteen seventy three and
32:13
Speaker 2: a Georgina she's born with fatal alcohol syndrome. And as
32:21
Speaker 2: someone who has seen this firsthand, not my own kids,
32:24
Speaker 2: my kids are little tanks, but like, it's fairly recognizable.
32:32
Speaker 2: And in an era where boos and drugs were just
32:38
Speaker 2: being thrown at you and in foot, it's not fucking surprising.
32:42
Speaker 2: I mean the Victorian ever, I know, events really fucking depressing,
32:46
Speaker 2: like great advancements but also shit times. But yeah, Georgina,
32:59
Speaker 2: she's in eighteen seventy six. She's born in April and
33:05
Speaker 2: she dies in May. So the first eight years of
33:09
Speaker 2: their marriage, you know, Chapman, he's working in London. He's there.
33:17
Speaker 2: John is a coachman. Things are going well, but you know,
33:22
Speaker 2: it's fine. But he does get a better position and
33:30
Speaker 2: gets to leave London. But just before they go, Annie
33:39
Speaker 2: gives birth to George William Harry in eighteen seventy seven
33:44
Speaker 2: and he passes away I think early January and seventy eight.
33:55
Speaker 2: In July eighteen seventy nine, she gives birth to Miriam
33:59
Speaker 2: Lily and she dies at ten weeks old. In eighteen eighty,
34:13
Speaker 2: John Alfred he's born and he suffers from paralysis. Now,
34:21
Speaker 2: according to Annie's sisters, all of this is because Annie drunk.
34:26
Speaker 2: Now Annie's family, a lot of them are part of
34:28
Speaker 2: the temperance movement. They're like so sober anti alcohol, and
34:32
Speaker 2: as we know, alcohol and Victorian times is seen as
34:35
Speaker 2: like big massive sin. There's all the shame and guilt
34:39
Speaker 2: and everything that goes along with it. And yeah, when
34:44
Speaker 2: John gets a job being a coachman or possibly a
34:48
Speaker 2: stud groom, were not entirely sure by the time he's
34:55
Speaker 2: there in working for the Barries who knew money but
35:00
Speaker 2: wanted to be impressive. So they had lived like pretty
35:04
Speaker 2: close to the Royals, and then they had this estate
35:07
Speaker 2: in the countryside. Now they stayed out in this estate
35:12
Speaker 2: and they even hosted They even hosted Royalty at times,
35:15
Speaker 2: the Barris obviously, But for Annie, things weren't great because
35:23
Speaker 2: Annie consistently used alcohol as a crutch. And Annie not
35:31
Speaker 2: a mean drunk, not an angry drunk. She just seemed
35:37
Speaker 2: to be sad, which given everything she's gone through, I'm
35:42
Speaker 2: not fucking surprised she's upset. She's sad. She's often found wandering,
35:51
Speaker 2: so the police would find her just kind of about.
35:56
Speaker 2: She'd be walking down lanes, sometimes in the middle of
35:59
Speaker 2: the street, times out on a country road. She would
36:02
Speaker 2: just be around. Like. It gets to the point that
36:11
Speaker 2: her sisters, who were avid toddlers, they try and get
36:14
Speaker 2: her to take these like pledges of temperance, and like
36:17
Speaker 2: at the time, it's basically seen as if you sign
36:20
Speaker 2: your name and you agree that that's all you need,
36:23
Speaker 2: it's gonna make you magically not be an alcoholic and
36:27
Speaker 2: not be addicted to booze. Okay, cool, that's abstinence doesn't
36:34
Speaker 2: fucking work lads, by the way, just saying, but yeah,
36:40
Speaker 2: when Emily, with her oldest daughter, is twelve, she gets
36:48
Speaker 2: ill and looks like scarlet fever, and clearly something I
36:55
Speaker 2: think this triggered something in Annie because this reminds her
36:59
Speaker 2: of the time when she lost so much. And then
37:02
Speaker 2: when the doctor comes, he tells her it's meningitis. So
37:05
Speaker 2: she knows her child's gonna die, and she takes solace
37:09
Speaker 2: in the bottle. Of course she fucking does, because she's
37:11
Speaker 2: an alcoholic. So she starts drinking and oh she goes,
37:19
Speaker 2: and one day, when she's drowning her sorrows, Emily dies
37:26
Speaker 2: and she's not with her and she is found wandering
37:34
Speaker 2: between the villages. They find her and it's this that
37:40
Speaker 2: leads her to go to a sanatorium. So she gets
37:43
Speaker 2: placed in basically a priory. So she goes. She's supposed
37:47
Speaker 2: to detox and get out of it, and apparently she
37:51
Speaker 2: does pretty well there. She's respectful, she's polite, she doesn't drink,
37:56
Speaker 2: she doesn't try and sneak in stuff. John visits her
38:00
Speaker 2: like things are pretty nice considering, and she is determined,
38:07
Speaker 2: like she is fully on board. She doesn't want to
38:10
Speaker 2: drink anymore. Her sister is roll like, she's a changed woman.
38:14
Speaker 2: She's one of us. She's teetotal, she's fabulous, she's a bioneer.
38:19
Speaker 2: And things are going well for a long time until
38:25
Speaker 2: John gets a cold. He gets a cold one day
38:29
Speaker 2: and he still has to go out and look after
38:32
Speaker 2: the horses and do his bit. That wasn't an intentional pun,
38:37
Speaker 2: and he decides, you know what, I'm gonna have a
38:39
Speaker 2: little sniffer, a wee hot toddy, and he does. But
38:44
Speaker 2: before he leaves, he does what he does every day
38:48
Speaker 2: and gives his wife a kiss just before he steps
38:52
Speaker 2: out the door. And it is then that she tastes
38:56
Speaker 2: the whiskey on his lips. And this, this just starts
39:02
Speaker 2: a downward spiral. She one way or another, she starts drinking.
39:08
Speaker 2: I don't know if there was any boos in the house.
39:10
Speaker 2: Well there must have been some, because he had a whiskey.
39:13
Speaker 2: But she ends up drinking, and she ends up wandering.
39:19
Speaker 2: And at this point the barris they are doing pretty
39:22
Speaker 2: well for themselves, and it would be worse than disrespectful,
39:28
Speaker 2: worse than everything else, and they had to get rid
39:31
Speaker 2: of Annie. And John had a choice. He had to
39:36
Speaker 2: choose his wife or his occupation, and the two of
39:42
Speaker 2: them they make a decision to separate, and so they do,
39:46
Speaker 2: and she leaves and she heads for London. But things ended,
39:52
Speaker 2: I don't want to say amicably, but probably as amicably
39:55
Speaker 2: as they could because John is paying her ten shillings
39:58
Speaker 2: a week, which is more than most would have gotten
40:01
Speaker 2: in any form of separation. He is ensuring that he
40:04
Speaker 2: is supporting her because it seems like John truly did
40:09
Speaker 2: love her, and so Annie, although having you know, enough
40:15
Speaker 2: money to cover those like middle class treats that she'd
40:18
Speaker 2: become accustomed to, that ten shillings generally went towards boots.
40:26
Speaker 2: And when she's living with her family, her pioneering, teetotal,
40:31
Speaker 2: abstinate family. Yeah, that's that's gonna go. It's gonna go
40:35
Speaker 2: really fucking well. No, it's absolutely not. It did not
40:38
Speaker 2: go well. So she gets the heck at a dodge
40:41
Speaker 2: and she ends up well out of Nexbridge. And this
40:47
Speaker 2: is a woman now who is on the streets of London.
40:52
Speaker 2: She's had to leave her husband and her children. She
40:56
Speaker 2: can't go back to her family. Everything about her is
41:02
Speaker 2: shameful according to Victorian standards. She's not a good wife,
41:06
Speaker 2: a beautiful wife, a good mother. She has an addiction
41:10
Speaker 2: and that is just a fucking sin. How dare she like, Oh,
41:14
Speaker 2: I'm so mad at Victorian's so mad. She just was
41:19
Speaker 2: seen as less than And then she finds comfort in
41:24
Speaker 2: a man, John Sivy, and she gets called missus Sivey.
41:30
Speaker 2: They end up lodging together and a lot of their
41:35
Speaker 2: money goes to booze because both of them are alcoholics.
41:41
Speaker 2: They lead on each other. It's a toxic codependent relationship,
41:47
Speaker 2: I guess, but it's all she has. And so she's
41:52
Speaker 2: with him, and she's got her ten shillings from John,
41:57
Speaker 2: but she's also got her crochet and embroidery and her needlework,
42:03
Speaker 2: which she sells markets like she sells this. She's got
42:07
Speaker 2: a skill. You know, something came handy told you would
42:10
Speaker 2: come back around. And that's how she supplements like her
42:13
Speaker 2: life style, her living. But also in addition, furthermore, again
42:21
Speaker 2: remember that according to you know, Victorian standards, she's an
42:25
Speaker 2: adultress at this point, because by eighteen eighty six, you know,
42:30
Speaker 2: they should be fine. They've got John's money, Cilly's working,
42:35
Speaker 2: she's selling her crochet and shit like they should be
42:38
Speaker 2: very comfortable, but they're staying in like the dodgy part
42:42
Speaker 2: of London because they're buying loads of booze. But in
42:47
Speaker 2: December eighteen eighty six, the money stops, the ten shilling,
42:53
Speaker 2: it just ceases. And it's then that Annie finds out
42:57
Speaker 2: that John Chapman is ill, definitely ill, on his deathbed
43:01
Speaker 2: in fact, and Annie walks twenty five miles in two days,
43:07
Speaker 2: like in fucking winter in England. She is going to
43:11
Speaker 2: see her husband, like she has to go to him,
43:15
Speaker 2: and she does and she sees him and I mean,
43:20
Speaker 2: it's not going to be a pleasant reunion, but clearly
43:23
Speaker 2: the two of them cared for each other. See. She
43:25
Speaker 2: finds out that he had retired six months earlier, and
43:29
Speaker 2: it was only when he could not physically get out
43:31
Speaker 2: of his bed that he stopped sending her her support.
43:36
Speaker 2: And when she visits him, she says that he too
43:42
Speaker 2: has succumbed to alcoholism and he's suffering psoriasis of the liver.
43:47
Speaker 2: When John dies and Annie returns to London, she is distraught.
43:52
Speaker 2: She is distressed, she's sobbing, and it's not just the money.
43:59
Speaker 2: This is someone who was an important part of her life.
44:01
Speaker 2: The father of her children, and it mattered to her.
44:04
Speaker 2: And not long after her return, Civy leaves. Their relationship
44:08
Speaker 2: is over, whether because she didn't have the extra money
44:11
Speaker 2: or because she was clearly inconsolable over this. The following year,
44:17
Speaker 2: Annie is clearly suffering from tuberculosis. She had consumption and
44:23
Speaker 2: it is really really affecting her to the point where
44:25
Speaker 2: she can't crochet or knit or embroider. She's not able
44:28
Speaker 2: to sell her wares, and she is struggling on the
44:32
Speaker 2: streets of Whitechapel, and every penny is spent on the
44:37
Speaker 2: demon drink, Dark Annie's demon drink, and she couldn't bring
44:44
Speaker 2: herself to go back to her family. She couldn't even
44:47
Speaker 2: consider her staying in the tuberculosis ward anything that could
44:51
Speaker 2: have helped her. But when things are dark and awful
44:57
Speaker 2: and you're struggling and suffering, you don't make good decisions.
45:02
Speaker 2: And Annie, now a widow, she starts a relationship up
45:07
Speaker 2: with the stude Stanley, who ends up you know, fitting
45:11
Speaker 2: her bill for like her lodging house and things like that,
45:14
Speaker 2: to the point where he tells the owner, like the
45:18
Speaker 2: deputy manager, the steward, if you will whatever you know
45:22
Speaker 2: to make sure she doesn't go with any men, because
45:25
Speaker 2: he's just like, Nope, she is mine. And by all accounts,
45:28
Speaker 2: Annie didn't go with any men. Like there is no
45:32
Speaker 2: record of her anywhere of her soliciting or selling sex
45:38
Speaker 2: or any of that. There is no record of her
45:41
Speaker 2: being a prostitute during her life, not one. But for
45:45
Speaker 2: whatever reason, on the seventh of September, Annie she doesn't
45:52
Speaker 2: have the bill fitted for her. Stanley isn't paying and
45:57
Speaker 2: Annie had managed to get couple of pennies of her
46:01
Speaker 2: brother Fontaine, and instead of paying for her lodgings, she
46:07
Speaker 2: got beer. And Donovan, who ran the lodging house, he
46:12
Speaker 2: kicked her out and he sent her out onto the streets.
46:15
Speaker 2: And Dannie was no stranger to sleeping rough like a
46:18
Speaker 2: lot of these women. Sometimes you just had to do
46:21
Speaker 2: what you had to do. And so she heads to
46:25
Speaker 2: the yard near Hanbury Street. She goes through the gate
46:30
Speaker 2: and she goes to sleep, and it is then her
46:34
Speaker 2: life is ended, and so ends the story of Dark Annie.
46:41
Speaker 2: Annie Chapman, the second canonical victim of Jack the Ripper,
46:48
Speaker 2: a woman whose life was not just dotted with tragedy,
46:53
Speaker 2: it was rained on, It was showered on it was
46:56
Speaker 2: a fucking monsoon, and I'm not even sure if there
47:02
Speaker 2: was anything that could have been done to combat that,
47:05
Speaker 2: not with the way society was, not with the way
47:08
Speaker 2: they were conditioned, not with the way women were treated.
47:13
Speaker 2: And that makes me so fucking mad. So what did
47:18
Speaker 2: we learned today? We learned that Victorian society fucking sucks.
47:23
Speaker 2: That John Chapman was, by all accounts, a good husband,
47:26
Speaker 2: and that if you were struggling from mental illness or
47:31
Speaker 2: addiction problems, no matter how hard, no matter how difficult,
47:34
Speaker 2: no matter how desperate they may seem, please get help.
47:39
Speaker 2: Please reach out to somebody, Like I'm the worst person
47:43
Speaker 2: to talk to because I have struggled with many issues
47:46
Speaker 2: in my life, but even God even talked to me,
47:53
Speaker 2: Jesus if it helps, Like I'm not the most relatable
47:57
Speaker 2: or you know, considerate person in the world, but fuck,
48:01
Speaker 2: you're struggling, call this the margins. Call somebody Jesus, email me,
48:04
Speaker 2: like I will talk to you if you need it,
48:07
Speaker 2: Like I am not not the best person at giving advice,
48:13
Speaker 2: because clearly I am a puddle of despair, But it's fine.
48:22
Speaker 2: Just take a moment longer. That's all you need, Just
48:29
Speaker 2: one moment after another after another. It's just moments. Let's
48:34
Speaker 2: keep going. But okay, so that so ends the story
48:41
Speaker 2: of Dark Hannie. And if you fuck liked this retelling,
48:45
Speaker 2: liked my information, liked me getting really mad? Please rate
48:49
Speaker 2: and review five stars on Spotify, Apple podcasts all that jam,
48:53
Speaker 2: leave read, leave good reviews. Please say nice things. If not,
48:56
Speaker 2: just talk about how shit people are, like I don't care.
48:59
Speaker 2: I do care. I actually care quite a lot too much,
49:02
Speaker 2: some might say, but let's just skip to the reviews
49:06
Speaker 2: because I'm too mad for reading. You know what, Reach
49:12
Speaker 2: China Rich Girlfriend, because honestly, if you need some joy
49:15
Speaker 2: in your life, the Crazy Rich Asians trilogy is just fantastic.
49:19
Speaker 2: For watching. There is a show called Roar on on
49:26
Speaker 2: Apple and it makes me mad, but it's it's it's
49:30
Speaker 2: a good venting thing. And for listening, just listen to
49:32
Speaker 2: Taylor Swift because I think we all need that in
49:34
Speaker 2: our lives. Okay, good, good talk everybody. Now I am
49:41
Speaker 2: going to bid you all farewell adios or revoir of
49:45
Speaker 2: what is there? My friends, Bye bye,