The murder tour and review of the year
Well the murder tour this time was a tremendous success. I dressed up and looked very dapper indeed, perhaps I over did it, James said we should do it suited and booted and then promptly turned up in trainers and wearing fingerless gloves and looked like old man Steptoe. We started off in Whitechapel on the Jack the Ripper trail, this was a little disappointing as a lot of the murder sites have been demolished or completely redeveloped. Ironically the biggest crime about the whole thing was not the murdered women but the destruction of the Victorian buildings and streets.
Strangely when we went to the site where Annie Chapman the second victim was murdered it had long since been demolished and is now part of the Spitalfields Market a few yards from the Rough Trade shop. I had walked down there many times before without ever realising what an infamous deed had taken place there, in fact I bought a purple silk scarf from a retro stall in the very spot. Sometimes your surroundings seem so innocuous and ordinary you just have no idea of the grim things that happened there in the past. We even went to the street where a bloodied scrap of apron from Catherine Eddowes was found in a stairwell above which the Ripper had written in white chalk “the Juwes are not the men that will be blamed for nothing” I always found this a very strange aspect of the case and I can’t believe the police quickly rubbed it off the wall, such vital evidence! The tenement has long since been demolished but it was amusing when we arrived at the spot and someone had written on the wall in big white letters “JUWES”
By this time we were freezing and it was coming up to 1100am when the pubs opened so we strolled down Brick Lane to get to ‘The Blind Beggar’ for our first drink. The pub is famous for a few reasons - the Salvation Army was formed there but it was also in the saloon bar where Ronnie Kray shot dead George Cornell of the Richardson gang. The song playing when he was shot was ‘The Sun Ain’t Gonna Shine Anymore’ by the Walker Brothers, I was half tempted to put this on the juke box but thought this may have been taking it a bit far!
After this we headed up to Hampstead Heath to the The Magdala pub where Ruth Ellis shot her lover, I am still upset they hung her, I don’t believe in capital punishment anyway but her lover was a real horrid piece of work. Over a couple of pints we looked at our plan and decided that Melrose Place was far too far to travel if we wanted to fit it all in and decided just to head to Cranley Gardens instead - Nilson murder - less people there but it has such a goulish sounding name we had been fascinated by it for years. It was really odd going there and was by far the best place we had visited so far. The street itself is beautiful and very well-to-do; you can image everyone on it voting Conservative - it must have been such a shock to them one morning when they woke up to the news that a gay serial killer lived next door to them.
What was really amazing about Cranley Gardens was something that I touched on earlier, it was mundane and average and non-descript. It was the type of property you could imagine you or your friends or family living in, that was what was so spooky about it. Indeed some of us live in properties like that now, we are just not aware of what happened there or it has not come to light yet.
By this point though we were knackered after zipping all over London and just wanted to finish off in the pub so we called it a day and decided to do Jack ‘the hat’ McVitie and the place Joe Orton was murdered another day. Whilst doing the tour I was drunkenly updating my status update on Facebook for each site and was surprised at how jealous people were getting wishing they could have come. Which was nice and made me feel less of a freak. I definitely want to do more soon, they are deeply fascinating and living in London there’s just so much history and so many events to do.
Well we are in the dying moments of 2008, as I was thinking about writing my end of year sign off, I was thinking that it had been a bit of a nothing year, obviously because I feel I have been drifting along and not grasping the reality of the now and either looking at the past or dreaming of the future. Either way I have given the present short shrift and that gives the feeling that it was just another transitional year.
Having said all that, in some ways it was quite an eventful year, we went to San Francisco for over two weeks, got Loulou’s health sorted out, went to some good parties, went to Italy, got two kittens, turned 30, got an amazing vintage Omega watch, ate some amazing gingerbread, built up an amazing collection of vintage pornography, lost a good friendship, possibly managed to salvage another (time will tell) and understood myself a lot better, namely;
I am dyspraxic
Despite placing so much empathise on friendship I can be quite flaky with people
I am a collector
What I want is not what I need - I also found out some other stuff about me but that is for a different entry.
So 2009 eh, 2007 and 2008 I always felt were transitional years, hopefully 2009 should be the year I recoup - unless of course as Morrissey sang ‘You just haven’t earned it yet baby’ My mum has always said I am a number 9 person which bodes well - I am optimistic about next year and I will see you all there.
Strangely when we went to the site where Annie Chapman the second victim was murdered it had long since been demolished and is now part of the Spitalfields Market a few yards from the Rough Trade shop. I had walked down there many times before without ever realising what an infamous deed had taken place there, in fact I bought a purple silk scarf from a retro stall in the very spot. Sometimes your surroundings seem so innocuous and ordinary you just have no idea of the grim things that happened there in the past. We even went to the street where a bloodied scrap of apron from Catherine Eddowes was found in a stairwell above which the Ripper had written in white chalk “the Juwes are not the men that will be blamed for nothing” I always found this a very strange aspect of the case and I can’t believe the police quickly rubbed it off the wall, such vital evidence! The tenement has long since been demolished but it was amusing when we arrived at the spot and someone had written on the wall in big white letters “JUWES”
By this time we were freezing and it was coming up to 1100am when the pubs opened so we strolled down Brick Lane to get to ‘The Blind Beggar’ for our first drink. The pub is famous for a few reasons - the Salvation Army was formed there but it was also in the saloon bar where Ronnie Kray shot dead George Cornell of the Richardson gang. The song playing when he was shot was ‘The Sun Ain’t Gonna Shine Anymore’ by the Walker Brothers, I was half tempted to put this on the juke box but thought this may have been taking it a bit far!
After this we headed up to Hampstead Heath to the The Magdala pub where Ruth Ellis shot her lover, I am still upset they hung her, I don’t believe in capital punishment anyway but her lover was a real horrid piece of work. Over a couple of pints we looked at our plan and decided that Melrose Place was far too far to travel if we wanted to fit it all in and decided just to head to Cranley Gardens instead - Nilson murder - less people there but it has such a goulish sounding name we had been fascinated by it for years. It was really odd going there and was by far the best place we had visited so far. The street itself is beautiful and very well-to-do; you can image everyone on it voting Conservative - it must have been such a shock to them one morning when they woke up to the news that a gay serial killer lived next door to them.
What was really amazing about Cranley Gardens was something that I touched on earlier, it was mundane and average and non-descript. It was the type of property you could imagine you or your friends or family living in, that was what was so spooky about it. Indeed some of us live in properties like that now, we are just not aware of what happened there or it has not come to light yet.
By this point though we were knackered after zipping all over London and just wanted to finish off in the pub so we called it a day and decided to do Jack ‘the hat’ McVitie and the place Joe Orton was murdered another day. Whilst doing the tour I was drunkenly updating my status update on Facebook for each site and was surprised at how jealous people were getting wishing they could have come. Which was nice and made me feel less of a freak. I definitely want to do more soon, they are deeply fascinating and living in London there’s just so much history and so many events to do.
Well we are in the dying moments of 2008, as I was thinking about writing my end of year sign off, I was thinking that it had been a bit of a nothing year, obviously because I feel I have been drifting along and not grasping the reality of the now and either looking at the past or dreaming of the future. Either way I have given the present short shrift and that gives the feeling that it was just another transitional year.
Having said all that, in some ways it was quite an eventful year, we went to San Francisco for over two weeks, got Loulou’s health sorted out, went to some good parties, went to Italy, got two kittens, turned 30, got an amazing vintage Omega watch, ate some amazing gingerbread, built up an amazing collection of vintage pornography, lost a good friendship, possibly managed to salvage another (time will tell) and understood myself a lot better, namely;
I am dyspraxic
Despite placing so much empathise on friendship I can be quite flaky with people
I am a collector
What I want is not what I need - I also found out some other stuff about me but that is for a different entry.
So 2009 eh, 2007 and 2008 I always felt were transitional years, hopefully 2009 should be the year I recoup - unless of course as Morrissey sang ‘You just haven’t earned it yet baby’ My mum has always said I am a number 9 person which bodes well - I am optimistic about next year and I will see you all there.