Social media and the internet has become fertile territory for hoaxes, pranksters, and impostors. Fake news. Fake obituaries. Wild conspiracy theories. The demonising and bullying of innocent people. “Doxing” individuals by publishing their addresses and personal details. Yet – all of this has been going on, in different ways, for hundreds of years. Though especially…
Two black men, born into slavery in north America, went on to become high-profile boxers and celebrities in Georgian England winning big cash prizes. But these boxing fights were racially charged despite their popularity. And both men would die penniless. These are the forgotten black boxers who struggled but ultimately failed to become world champions….
Jack the Ripper and Abraham Lincoln By Tony McMahon – Troubador: publisher – out on May 28, 2024 Order your copy here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Jack-Ripper-Abraham-Lincoln-greatest/dp/1805143646/ Astonishing new evidence reveals that a man suspected of being Jack the Ripper in 1888 was also implicated as a plotter involved in the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln in 1865. A…
Werewolves and London go together like… Well, they certainly get matched quite often, most famously in the 1981 movie, An American Werewolf in London. As the video below explains, with myself as your host, London has been a recurring venue for our lupine friends. What is a werewolf? What are the origins of the Werewolf…
On June 26, 1830 – one of the most unpopular monarchs of England died. King George the Fourth breathed his last. And it seems that nobody particularly cared. This was possibly the worst royal funeral ever! Goodbye to a hated king! The Times published an astonishing commentary referring to George as a “pompous and secluded…
On 29 January 1820, King George III died bringing an end to a very long reign of sixty years, long surpassed by Queen Elizabeth II who was on the throne for seventy years. George III was Elizabeth’s great-great-great-great-grandfather. Because of intermarriage, they’re related in other ways too. Unlike the funeral of Queen Elizabeth, that of…
One of the greatest unsolved English murder cases is The Merstham Tunnel Mystery that happened in 1905. The body of 22-year-old Mary Sophia Money, 22, was found in a railway tunnel on the South-Eastern Railway line south of London. Mary was a bookkeeper employed at a dairy in Lavender Hill where she lived with the…
In 1820, a group of English radical activists plotted to kill the entire British government while they were sat down to dinner in central London. The Cato Street Conspiracy – so-called from the place where they met to plot – was uncovered and the ringleaders executed in a public and grisly manner. One of those…
Beneath what is now the London School of Economics lies the remains of a “molly house” – a gay bar basically – once located in the long demolished warren of streets that made up Clare Market. The White Swan pub was on the corner of Vere Street, which you can no longer find. This drinking…
I’m an avid collector of old – and I mean very old – newspapers. From the year 1766, I own a copy of The London Chronicle with the most extraordinary front page article. It recounts the story of a “female husband” – a woman who donned male apparel and lived openly as the ‘husband’ of…
