alex-iod-blog

[victorianwhitechapel]

Alice McKenzie timeline

1845 – Alice Pitts is born in the Precincts of Peterborough Minster, Cathedral, in Cambridgeshire, England (March 8) .

1860 – Aged 15, Alice works for Mrs Strickland in her refreshment rooms in St. John Street, Peterborough.

1861 – Aged 17, she no longer lives with her family, but in the household of a master brazier named Edward Miller in High Cross Street, Leicester where she is employed as a house servant.

1863 – Alice marries chair and cabinet maker Joseph Kinsey or McKenzie at All Saints Church, Leicester, Leicestershire, East Midlands (October 11).

1866 – Alice and Joseph are parents of Joseph James, born at Freeman’s Common, St Mary, Leicester (July 21).

1866 – Baby Joseph James dies of ‘marasmus’ (a form of malnutrition) at 4 Joseph Street, St. Mary, Leicester (October 12).

1867 – Joseph Kinsey dies aged 25 of tuberculosis(February 18).

1873 – 27 year-old laundress Alice is convicted of ’D & R’ at Southwark police court, central London. She is fined 10s and sentenced to 7 days imprisonment with hard labour, which she serves in Wandsworth Prison, South West London (October 31 to November 6).

1875 – She is admitted to the Whitechapel Infirmary from Leman Street police station because she was ‘Ill and destitute’ (August 13 to 20).

1877 – She is admitted to the Whitechapel Infirmary due to an ulcer (June 14 to 23).

1877 –  Alice is admitted to the St George Workhouse, Mint Street, Southwark having been charged with being drunk, but is discharged the same day (August 1).

1878 – Her father dies aged 74 in Peterborough (March).

1878 – Alice is convicted at Southwark police court of being ‘drunk in a thoro'fare’. She is fined 5s and sentenced to 7 days imprisonment with hard labour, which she serves in Wandsworth Prison (June 26 to July 2).

1883 – Alice lives, on and off, with Irish porter John McCormark or Bryant at various East End common lodging and doss-houses.

1883 – She is admitted to the Whitechapel Infirmary due to an ulcer (August 11 to 24).

1883 – Alice is admitted to the workhouse infirmary by a policeman who found her drunk in Dorset Street (November 5 to 16).

1883 – Alice is admitted to the Whitechapel Infirmary for alcoholism and fits (December 20 to 23).

1885 – Her mother Martha dies in Peterborough aged 74 (December).

1889 – Alice is arrested for causing a disturbance in a butcher’s shop in Long Causeway, Peterborough (January).

1889 – Alice resides with John McCormack mainly at Mr. Tenpenny’s common lodging house, 52 Gun Street, Spitalfields while working for her Jewish neighbours as a washerwoman and charwoman (April).

1889 – Alice spends the day at the common lodging house but the evening possibly at the Cambridge Music Hall with a blind boy (July 16).

1889 – Alice chats with three women, Margaret Franklin, Catherine Hughes and Sarah Marney in Flower and Dean Street, and then leaves alone toward Whitechapel (July 16).

1889 – P.C. Walter Andrews discovers the murdered body of Alice at Castle Alley, a dark and dismal snickleway that led off Whitechapel High Street. She was 44 (July 17).

Your life was difficult and cut short. You were free at last… 🌼

[victorianwhitechapel]

Alice McKenzie's clothes and possessions

At the time of her murder, Alice was wearing:

- A black coat.

- A brown/black staff skirt.

- A red staff bodice.

- A linsey petticoat.

- Black stockings.

- Buttoned boots.

- A Paisley shawl.

She also had:

A clay pipe.

Gone but not forgotten. May she rest in peace. 🌺

[victorianwhitechapel]

Coincidences...

This is a clay pipe.

Today I was working in an archaeological site and we found a clay pipe (not this one, photo from wikipedia). In the area I was with two other people, one of them found it.

It is a medieval site in Ireland, but the clay pipe is modern. 20th century said the boss.

Today we found a clay pipe.

130 years ago today, it was the last day Alice "Clay Pipe" McKenzie was last seen alive. She smoked clay pipes.

Coincidences...

[victorianwhitechapel]

I really love your blog and that you are giving the victim's perspective more than the killer's, investigation and theories perspectives. Is these women who really matter, in the end. I would like to know, of all the movies, TV series etc, which one do you think portraits the victims the best way? (More realistic), which one do you love more for the settings or costumes? Or even the storyline? If you would have to do a show about it, which actresses would you choose and storyline? Thank you! ♥️

Hi!

Thank you very much for your interesting question…

There are several films which I find they are the best to travel back in Victorian era in Whitechapel area: Murder By Decree (1979), Jack the Ripper TV series (1988), The Ripper (1997) & From Hell (2001).

From these films mentioned above, in my opinion, there are two which make great portraits of the victims as they are a great foccus on the film, these films are “The Ripper” (Janet Meyers, 1997) and “From Hell” (The Hughes Brothers, 2001) although the victims are portrayed being prostitutes because is what we knew back them, now we now this information wasn’t correct at all.

I think all of these films have a great set and in those films the dresses and the storyline is good but I loved the dresses and the neighbourhood set in “From Hell”, but the storyline, although it was really interesting, it wasn’t an original idea because in Murder by Decree (Bob Clarke, 1979) and in Jack the Ripper TV series (David Wickes, 1988), we had seen the same theory. It would be great if a new film comes, it would be foccused into a very different theory.

Nowadays I wouldn’t make a film about Whitechapel murders but a TV series, just like Ripper Street (which I loved!!) but focusing on the lifes of the victims. Ripper Street is very very cool but it happens like two or three years after the murders, perhaps a prequel would be great!! (starring Matthew McFayden and Clive Russell of course!!).

I would like that in this new TV series (perhaps it would be good just one season, compelling 8 chapters, each one foccused in one victim, but then, as the story goes by, you can see the victims cross paths and some chapters can be foccused in more than just one victim). The chapters I would film would have the name of each central woman and they would be aired in chronological order of their findings, so they would be:

   Martha

   “Polly”

   “Dark” Annie

   Kate

   “Long” Liz

   Mary “Jeannette”

   Alice "Clay Pipe”

   Frances

The other victims, Annie Millwood, Margaret Himes, Emily Horsnell, Rose Mylett, Emma Elizabeth Smith & Elizabeth Jackson would be featured as well but not as a main character because we have just little information on them, but they deserve to be on this, so there would be references on them in the chapters.

As for the actresses, I think the cast directors of the film “From Hell” did a great job choosing the actresses as they really ressemble the victims.

This is my list for the actresses portraying the victims, as I stated above, some of the actresses will be the same as "From Hell”.

Samantha Spiro as Martha Tabram:

Annabelle Apsion as Mary Ann “Polly” Nichols

Sarah Paulson as “Dark” Annie Chapman

Ruby Bentall as Catherine “Kate” Eddowes

Susan Lynch as “Long Liz” Stride

Eleanor Tomlinson as Mary Jane Kelly

Anna Maxwell Martin as Alice “Clay Pipe” McKenzie

Sophie Skelton as Frances Coles

And I would cast Sarah Greene as Ada Wilson. This character might appear in several chapters, being questioned by the police in several times, as she saw the culprit face to face.

Well, here you have it, I hope you like the actresses chosen, it was really hard to find someone who could play “Dark” Annie and someone who could play Alice McKenzie, I’ll try my best. If you have other actresses who could fit in the characters, please post!! :D

[victorianwhitechapel]

🔵CHAPTER 201: ALICE🔵🔞 On Wednesday 17th July 1889 it starts to rain at 12:45 am. PC Andrews is making his round and everything has been very quiet. Until now. He discovers the body of a woman lying on the pavement with her only posessions of a clay pipe and a copper farthing. 25 minutes before she wasn't there. The Whitechapel fiend was still on the loose... RIP Alice McKenzie... 🔹🔹 Era el miercoles 17 de julio de 1889, a las 12:45 de la noche empezó a llover. PC Andrews estaba haciendo su ronda y todo había estado muy tranquilo. Hasta ahora. En aquel momento descubrió el cuerpo de una mujer tendido al suelo con sus únicas pertenencias: una pipa de arcilla y una moneda de cobre. 25 minutos antes ella no estsba allí. El demonio de Whitechapel seguia suelto... DEP Alice McKenzie... 🔹🔹 #victorian_playmo #AliceMcKenzie #AliceClayPipe #AliceClayPipeMcKenzie #OTD #130yearsagotoday #itwas130yearsagotoday #victoriantimes #victorianeastenders #PCAndrews #asambleaplaymobil #victorianwhitechapel #whitechapel1889 (at Whitechapel) https://www.instagram.com/p/B0ArZI9CE5p/?igshid=1z8eh0npao3a