Whitechapel Flashcards
1
Q
Manpower:
A
- By 1885 the Met was made up by 13,319 men with a population of 5 million
- Only 1,383 were available at any one time
2
Q
Media:
A
- ‘penny dreadfuls’ were very anti-police
- They were designed to sell a ‘good story’ not the truth
- Became so negative from the 1860s police newspapers like the Police Review to challenge negative views
3
Q
Criminal Investigation Department:
A
- A small detective department was added in 1842
- Small and ineffective confusion about whether it was intended to prevent to detect crime
- After a police scandal in 1877, barrister Howard Vincent set up the CID in 1878 with 216 officers
- Did not improve
4
Q
Commissioner Warren:
A
- Appointed in 1886
- Warning to troublemakers-added to the impression that the police were government in uniform
- Called in the army to control protesters in Trafalgar Square on Bloody Sunday
- Added to the growing feeling that the police favoured the middle and upper classes.
5
Q
Context:
A
- One of the capital’s poorest districts with gangs ruling its streets
- Out of 30,000 and 1,000 were homeless
- Long-established Londoners shared the district with more recent Irish and Jewish immigrants
6
Q
What was the housing like?
A
- In overcrowded slum areas known as ‘rookeries’
- Characterised by dirt, disease and crime
- There could be up to 30 people in one apartment
7
Q
Evidence for overcrowding:
A
- In 1877, one rookery contained 123 rooms with accommodation for 757
- 1881 census showed the population as 30,709 and there were only 4,069 occupied houses
8
Q
Lodging houses:
A
- Offered little more than a bed in squalid conditions
- Some has 3 eight hour shifts for max number
- Over 2oo lodging houses in Whitechapel where more than 8,000 a quarter of the local population lived
9
Q
Peabody Estate:
A
- As part of the slum clearing, they were replaced by 11 new blocks of flats
- Designed by Henry Darbishire and paid for by George Peabody, a wealthy American
- Opened in 1881 and provided 286 flats for 3 shillings for a one room flat and 6 shillings for three rooms
10
Q
Work in Whitechapel:
A
- Most famous factory was the Bell Foundry
- Most worked in ‘sweated trades’ like tailoring and shoe-making
11
Q
Workhouses:
A
- Set up in the early 19th century as part of the poor relief system
- Offered food and shelter to those too poor to survive
- Tough manual labour and wear a uniform
- Families were spilt up, separate yard for boys, girls, men and women
12
Q
Dr Thomas Barnardo:
A
- First project was a school for children whose parents had died in an outbreak of infectious disease
- One pupil called Jim Jarvis, wanted him to see what conditions were really like took him to a secret rooftop where hundreds of children gathered to avoid the workhouse
- 1870, orphanage for boys later opened a girls home
- When he died in 1905, nearly 100 homes taking care of 85 children each
13
Q
Irish immigrants:
A
- Expanded rapidly in the East End from the 1840s
- Made their living as navigators doing labouring jobs on canals
- Violence against them was commonplace and they were not well-liked
14
Q
Fenians:
A
- In the mid and late 19th century Irish nationalists were demanding freedom from the UK
- Led by the Fenians, a mainly Catholic group
- December 1867, a bomb attack on Clerkenwell Prison huge surge of anti-Irish and anti-Catholic
- In press, they were all seen as probable Fenians and traitors
15
Q
Eastern European Jewish Immigrants:
A
- Wave of immigration in the 1880s
- 1881, Tsar Alexander II of Russia was assassinated and a Jew was to blame
- A wave of violence and abuse against Russian Jews
- Jews fled pogroms in Russia
- By 1888, 95% of the total were Jewish
