British History – Page 41

On this day in history….31st August 1888

On this day in history : 31st August 1888 – Mary Ann Nichols, an East End of London prostitute, is found murdered and mutilated in Whitechapel…. She is the first victim to be attributed to Jack the Ripper….

The Illustrated Police News, 8th September 1888 – Public domain

Mary Ann was born to Caroline and Edward Walker, a locksmith, on the 26th of August 1845…. On the 16th of January 1864 she married William Nichols, who worked for a printing company and together they had five children…. Mary Ann had a problem with alcohol and left her husband several times before the marriage finally broke up in 1881…. At first William supported his estranged wife with an allowance of 5 shillings per week – but in 1882 these payments stopped when William learned of his wife’s prostitution…. The law at the time stated that a man was no longer obliged to provide for his wife if she was earning money through illicit means….

Spending the rest of her days between workhouses and cheap lodging houses Mary Ann made a meagre living on her earnings as a prostitute and on charitable handouts…. As an alcoholic she drank most of her money – she could expect to earn around threepence a time for her trade – the same price as a large glass of gin….

Mary Ann’s last place of residence was at a boarding house in Spitalfields, where she shared a room with Nelly Holland…. At 12.30am on the 31st of August Mary Ann was seen to leave a public house in Brick Lane…. She was then turned away from the lodging house as she did not have the fourpence to pay for her bed for the night…. She was last seen alive by Nelly at 2.30am, standing on the corner of Osborn Street and Whitechapel Road soliciting for ‘business’….

Bucks Row, site of the murder – Image courtesy Hulton Archive – Public domain

At 3.40am cart-man Charles Allen Cross came across Mary Ann and at first was unsure as to whether she was dead or unconscious…. Mary Ann’s skirts had been raised, so after adjusting them to give her some modesty, Cross and another passing cart-man summonsed the police…. A surgeon, Dr. Henry Llewelyn, was called and on his arrival, at around 4am, he pronounced that she had been dead for about half an hour…. Her throat had been cut twice, which would have killed her instantly – and then her abdomen had been mutilated….

Mortuary photograph of Mary Ann Nichols – Public domain

Mary Ann was buried at the City of London Cemetery in a public grave on Thursday the 6th of September 1888…. In 1996 the Cemetery authorities marked her grave with a plaque…. It is thought Jack the Ripper was responsible for the murders of 11 prostitutes between 1885 and 1891….

Mary Ann’s grave marker at City of London Cemetery – Image courtesy : Matt Brown CC BY-SA

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On this day in history….30th August 1901

On this day in history : 30th August 1901 – Scottish inventor Hubert Cecil Booth patents the vacuum cleaner…. The first model, “Puffing Billy”, was a large, horse-drawn contraption….

Before Booth introduced his version previous cleaning machines had worked on the principle of blowing or brushing dirt away…. Puffing Billy used suction….

The first machine was made for Osborne House on the Isle of Wight – which was then used as a naval officers training college…. The huge piece of apparatus measured 4’6″ x 4’10” x 3’6″ and had to be parked outside the building with its hoses having to be fed through the windows…. A five horsepower piston oil engine was used to drive a large suction pump….

Booth founded ‘The Vacuum Cleaner Company Ltd’ to manufacture his cleaner, its head office being in Fulham, South West London…. To market the machine a team of men in white suits toured the streets…. To demonstrate to a potential customer dirt would be thrown on to their carpet, a hose from the big red beast parked outside reeled in and the petrol motor would be started…. The dirt would then be sucked into a container attached to the hose…. But a deep clean could not be expected, it typically only collected surface dirt….and the machine was also incredibly expensive, costing approximately £350….

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On this day in history….29th August 1842

On this day in history : 29th August 1842 – The signing of the Treaty of Nanking by Britain and China, ending the first of the Opium Wars…. It also sets the foundations for Britain’s leasing of Hong Kong….

Signing of the Treaty of Nanking on board HMS Cornwallis – by Captain John Platt, Bengal Volunteers – Engraved by John Burnet – Public domain

The first Opium War lasted from 1839 to 1842; Britain invaded the Chinese mainland and occupied the island of Hong Kong in 1841 and then used it as a military base…. When Britain finally won the war Hong Kong was ceded to the British in the Treaty and so became part of the Empire….

British bombardment of Canton from the surrounding heights, May 1841 – Edward H. Cree – Public domain

A second Opium War resulted in Britain acquiring further territory – the southern part of the Kowloon Peninsula and Stonecutters Island…. In June 1898 a deal was struck between the Chinese and British agreeing that Britain would lease Hong Kong and the surrounding territories for 99 years….

It was during the 1970s that Britain and China began to consider Hong Kong’s future colonial status – and by the beginning of the 1980s negotiations to return it to China were underway…. After two years of tough bargaining a joint declaration was signed – agreeing that Britain would withdraw from Hong Kong on the 1st of July 1997….

City view of Kowloon, Hong Kong Island and the Hong Kong skyline – Ryan Cheng CC BY-SA 2.0

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On this day in history….28th August 1207

On this day in history : 28th August 1207 – Liverpool is granted a Royal Charter by King John – officially making it a Borough of England….

Liverpool in 1680 – the earliest known image of Liverpool – (c) Merseyside Maritime Museum; Supplied by The Public Catalogue Foundation – Public domain

Liuerpul (as it was known then – coming from the Old English ‘liver’, meaning thick or muddy and ‘pol’ for pool or creek) – literally meant a pool with muddy water…. Originally it started as a tiny fishing village on the banks of the Mersey – at the time of the Domesday Book in 1086 it was not even big enough to warrant a mention….

By the time the Royal Charter was issued the village had just seven streets formed in the shape of a letter ‘H’…. King John needed to establish a port in northwest England to defend English interests and trade in Ireland…. Liverpool quickly grew into a busy port, helped by a weekly market that attracted visitors from a far…. A small castle was even built to help defend it (later to be demolished in 1726)….

A further charter was granted to the townsfolk in 1229, giving the merchants of Liverpool permission to form a guild – enabling the town to become self-governing…. The first mayor was elected in 1351 and the Borough of Liverpool continued to flourish…. In 1715 Liverpool became home to the World’s first-ever wet dock….and was given city status in 1880….

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On this day in history….27th August 1979

On this day in history : 27th August 1979 – Lord Louis Mountbatten is killed when the IRA detonate a remote-controlled 50lb (23kg) bomb upon his boat….

Lord Mountbatten in 1976 – by Allan Warren CC BY-SA 3.0

Lord Mountbatten, a second cousin of Queen Elizabeth II and uncle of Prince Philip, had been enjoying a fishing trip with family members as part of a family holiday…. His boat, Shadow V, was sailing off the coast of County Sligo, Ireland when the bomb exploded….

Fisherman pulled 79-year-old Lord Mountbatten from the water – he was still alive but died before being brought ashore; both off his legs had been blown off….

Also onboard the boat were his eldest daughter, Patricia (Lady Brabourne), her husband John (Lord Brabourne) and their 14-year-old twins, Nicholas and Timothy…. Nicholas was killed, along with a 15-year-old crew member, Paul Maxwell…. Lord Brabourne’s 83-year-old mother, Doreen, died from her injuries the following day….