This one was super interesting. You hear a lot about "Jack The Ripper" and who he could have been, but you never hear too much about the victims. In this book the author goes into details about the five victims. Their family backgrounds, what brought them to London, and, of course, how they were murdered. If you are a Ripper fan, then this will be an interesting book to dive into.

Dr. Robert Hume has given us a thorough look at the lives of Jack the Ripper's victims. The book is well researched and written.

Princess Fuzzypants here: This book was a pleasant surprise. Jack the Ripper has held the public’s attention since he first began his wicked murders in 1888. Most books are filled with vivid detail and great supposition, often “convicting” one man or another in print for the horrendous crimes. The mantel has been worn by those both high and low born. But in film and print, the victims have been often treated as harlots who in some small way got their just desserts. Character assassination was layered on top of the slaughter.
This book looks at the five women and rather than judging, it simply tells the stories of how they came to such an awful end. Not one started out in a way that would have indicated how it would turn out. Some, like Mary Kelly, lived in much better circumstances. Drink was often both a means for blotting out the worst of their existences and the cause of the circumstances in the first place. Deaths of love ones often set them on paths different to those they might have chosen. Violence often chased them into corners from which they would not escape. They were women the reader would be forgiven for pitying. If not that, the reader, at the very least, has the chance to see each as the multi-faceted people they once were. Kudos for compassion and clarity.
Five purrs and two paws up.

I think everyone must have heard of Jack the Ripper. But have you heard of his victims? Do you k ow a y of their names? We get detailed background of the five victims. The book has been well researched into the women's backgrounds. Pictures of the victims post mortem are aslo included. These women worked the streets to aid their struggle to live. This is a well written and researched book.

I would like to thank NetGalley, Pen & Sword and the author Dr. Robert Hume for my ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Mary, Annie, Elizabeth, Catherine and Mary Jane are all forever linked in history. Their names might not be instantly recognizable, and the identity of their murderer may have eluded detectives and historians throughout the years, but there is no mistaking the name and reputation of Jack the Ripper.

For nine weeks during the autumn of 1888, the Whitechapel Murderer brought terror to London’s East End, slashing women’s throats and disemboweling them. London’s most famous serial killer has been pored over time and again, yet his victims have been sorely neglected, reduced to the simple label: prostitute.

The lives of these five women are rags-to-riches-to-rags stories of the most tragic kind. There was a time in each of their lives when these poor women had a job, money, a home and a family. Hardworking, determined and fiercely independent individuals, it was bad luck, or a wrong turn here or there, that left them wretched and destitute. Ignored by the press and overlooked by historians, it is time their stories were told.

Dr Hume has given a surprising insight into the hidden lives of these ladies and their struggle with life in 1888, and then Jack the Ripper comes into their lives. Dr Hume seems to be a very knowledgeable person in the history of this important topic. I was very impressed with the writing and now wish to learn more about this time in England's history.

Excellent book on the history of Jack the Ripper's victims. It was so interesting to read about a crime from the victims' perspective. We often place too much importance on the murderer than the peoples' whose lives were savagely interrupted. This book shed light on the history of Ripper's victims who were otherwise forgotten because they were, at one point, prostitutes. Only thing I didnt care for was one of the crime scene photos which showed one of the women completely naked and disfigured.

I love reading about this era and how the people lived. I found this book really informative about the victims rather than jack the ripper.
A well researched book, I was very impressed.

People all over the world are familiar with the name ‘Jack the Ripper’, the infamous serial killer who, in 1888, slaughtered at least five women in the Whitechapel area of London. Interest in the case has never waned, with detectives and amateur sleuths determined to work out the identity of the man who instilled terror in the women forced to ply their trades on the streets. But what about the identities of the victims? Their names, Mary Ann Nichols, Annie Chapman, Elizabeth Stride, Catherine Eddowes and Mary Jane Kelly are well-known, but what of their lives? Robert Hume aims to show us that these women were more than just the victims of the Whitechapel killer.

Ever since watching the TV mini-series ‘Jack the Ripper’ starring Michael Caine and Lewis Collins, I have had an interest in the serial killer and, as a result, have developed a penchant for Victorian crime fiction and non-fiction. Whereas a lot of real-life crime books devote much of their content to the victims, the early lives of those taken by the Whitechapel killer have been shrouded in mystery. Earlier this year, I read the brilliant The Five: The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper by Hallie Rubenhold, and so I was pleased to discover that another author has taken on the task of bringing these unfortunate women back into the public eye.

Although there are brief discussions about the crimes and some statements from eye-witnesses, the focus is placed firmly on the women and their lives prior to their untimely deaths. This is done in a very readable way and it was easy to picture the squalid streets and the circumstances the destitute found themselves in. Robert Hume paints a very vivid picture of Whitechapel with its crime-ridden passages where the only refuge for most people was in one of the numerous public houses. It is hard to feel nothing but sympathy for these women who, often through no fault of their own, found themselves selling themselves on the street just to find a bed for the night.

One of the things I enjoyed most about the book was the many photos that accompanied each woman’s story, whether it be images of the victims themselves or of the area in which the crimes were committed. It is good to see the women in happier times instead of just in the mortuary photos that feature in most other books about the subject.

The Hidden Lives of Jack the Ripper’s Victims is a very readable book for anyone interested in finding out a bit more about the five canonical victims or, indeed, for anyone interested in the social history of the poor in the Victorian era.

The author's painstaking research and attention to detail is obvious in the writing of this book. There were many facts that I only discovered after reading this!

Everyone knows the story of Jack the Ripper and possibly the names of the victims but what about the lives of those females before they were brutally taken.

This book delves into the lives of the victims, where they came from, who they were and how they ended up in Whitechapel to ultimately become a victim of Jack the Ripper.

I've read a few books about Jack the Ripper but have never found one that delves into so much detail about the victims lives.

All 5 seem to have made some mistakes or fallen on hard times resulting in them having to move to Whitechapel to find cheaper lodgings.
During the times of Jack the Ripper the East End of London was occupied by many slums and many females found a shortage of work forced them to the only source of income available to them, prostitution.

The book is very well researched but may not be for the squeamish as it does contain mortuary photographs of all the victims. This was a fascinating insight in to the lives and conditions of those whose unfortunate circumstances may have made them the victims they became.

It is fair to say that the “Whitechapel Murders” of 1888, otherwise known as “Jack the Ripper” murders have to be the ones most extensively written about in books, articles and examined in TV, films and other media. There has been debate as to “who did it” and “why” and recent debate whether more victims can be identified. There have been the locations, the gruesome details of the state of the victims and the quality and nature of the policing. But throughout much of the debate, other than identifying the women as “prostitutes”, very little attention has been placed on them as people. This book looks at five women who were murdered between the 31st August and 9th November and tries to track their back history that took them to this place and fate.
Sources will be contemporary newspaper reports. police and legal records – some identified by the author, others analysed by other researchers. But, in spite of the tendency for there to be poorer surviving records of working people, new records have been found for some of the victims. These are used to track the women and pad out the shorter previous narratives of their lives. Each will have a chapter and collectively they build a broader picture of the difficulties of life in poverty stricken East End London in this period.
The author will discuss the locations, financial background, the failing economy, the impact of the massive growth of London on housing, the scale of immigration from both the wider British Isles and abroad and the particular financial risks to women who were rarely paid the same as men and who thus struggled financially without wider family income. People who fell through the cracks might need to rely on the - unreliable -system of work houses, infirmaries, or occasionally prisons. Institutions that had their own rules of admittance and support. But Hume also depicts the realities of life if you could not afford a stable weekly rent - the reliance on “lodging houses” paid on a daily rate with residents restricted in their hours of entry, what they could do there – and critically for the 5 women – the inability to hold any possessions safely unless they wore them or carried them on their persons. This is life on the edge and shows why they chose prostitution – a last resort – to keep income coming in. But behind the grim reality all these women continued to work, pay their way, support families and friends and live their lives to the best of their abilities as they started to slide down the financial ladder. Their lives became worse, the risks increased – of illness and early death -even before murder intervened.
All five stories show this inevitable slide, albeit from different places. Marriage failures often tripped the crisis – drink and domestic violence could play their part. Illness, often exacerbated by pregnancy and childbirth was another risk factor. But we are shown Londoners born and incomers, including one from Sweden. Some once worked in seemingly secure jobs with links to the Royal household. The youngest Mary Jane Kelly (25) married a supposedly respectable (undoubtedly odd) middle class man – supported them both through high class prostitution – before choosing to "disappear" due to fear of her husband who was stalking her. Her life in the East End was difficult and short.
Collectively these tales show how easy it was for women to fall into dangerous poverty; it shows the nature of that poverty on a daily basis and how it could impact on their wider families. It shows that the “safety nets” were more likely to be temporary sticking plasters. But overall we see the squalor of East End London in the 1880s.
The importance of this book is that it focuses on real people – women who have been callously marginalised elsewhere. No, it does not have the depth of economic analysis or of place given by other historians – and yes there are a cluster of extremely fine women historians who have used place (and occasionally crime) to show people’s lives in greater detail. But it is nonetheless an important read for those interested in history of the working classes, particularly because it is not “theoretical” it was real.

A fascination with serial killers was always lurking within me, even as a wee tot. As a teen / young adult, I prefaced inviting new guests to my home with, "Don't judge me by my bookshelf!" (I still use this disclaimer, but with a thrown in, "or my Netflix queue!"). Of all the years that I have spent studying psychology, serial killers, violent crimes, modus operandi, etc., I have not taken the time to read about the victims beyond the basics (age, gender, etc.). Now that I am faced with it, I think that The Hidden Lives of Jack the Ripper's Victims is the first book I have read solely about / dedicated to telling the stories of the victims. Until this book, I never quite allowed myself to consider that some of Jack the Ripper's victims could have been fascinating or interesting. This book was a reminder that as a society and as individuals, we have become so desensitized. This book has made me really think beyond what's intriguing about the killer and consider that these victims were indeed people with their own stories that needed to be told. I would recommend this book to just about everyone I speak bookish with.

I wouldn’t say I enjoyed this book, given the subject matter, but I did find it extremely interesting. Hume here focuses on the lives of Jack the Rippers victims and the book is full of little snapshots into a woman’s life in London/society at this time. It is a somber and disturbing read reminding us of just how at the mercy of men (even if they weren’t killers) these women were.
I was very pleased to find that ‘Jack’ and his identity was not the focus here, so many books slip down that road, instead these women are given a voice separate to the horror of their deaths.
As it should be.

I love true crime and this book really did it in for me. My skin was crawling.
Jack the Ripper is one of my favourite serial killers so this book captivated me from the get go.

The five victims were women living in London with the hope of finding a better life. They were looking for jobs during a time that women were given the worse jobs and very little money. Four of the five women were English while one woman came from Sweden. These women had written ballads, lived on country estates, ran coffee houses, and work with printers. Women were living in a time where women had lived during a time of growing poverty and homelessness. These women died as a result of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

The author gives a detailed explanation of the women’s lives starting from childhood and going forward in their lives to death. He also details what life was like in the White Chapel area and similar areas. I got the impression that it was a very bad time to be a woman. Women were not treated very well to say the least. It’s a humbling experience to read what these five women went through to live their lives. It is a book that I will not forget.

A book that looks at the victims rather than at Jack the Ripper
It shares information about them which makes them real people
I found this book incredibly interesting

I was given an arc of this book by Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

The Hidden Lives of Jack the Ripper's Victims by Robert Hume is a piece of nonfiction that decided to focus on the victims instead of being just another run of the mill Ripper book. That was what intrigued me about the book. I was fascinated to learn more about each of these women and their lives in lower working class late Victorian London. I found this book to be quite successful. The book was easily accessible for any level history fan. I found all the little bits of information about larger Victorian society to be very interesting. A great way to set the women in the world they lived in. I also enjoyed all the pictures scattered throughout the book. Hume provides plenty of evidence history for that he writes. I did feel that at times he speculated too much about people's motivations, but it doesn’t hinder the reading experiences. Overall, I found the book to be very interesting. I learned a lot about these women. I would recommend this book to anyone who is interested in the Ripper murders, true crime fans, social history fans or dark history fans.

4 stars

An interesting walkthrough of the background of Jack the Ripper' s victims. This book gives a well-researched biography of each of the women. It includes where they were born, their early lives and their individual paths to becoming women of the night and ending with their tragic deaths. No attempt is made to identify Jack, which is appropriate because this book is about his victims and how they met their horrible ends.

Mehr als nur einfache Opfer - hier wird mit dem Mythos der "einfachen Hure" aufgeräumt und das Leben der Rippen-Opfer näher beleuchtet, was eine ganz andere Sichtweise auf die Geschehnisse wirft. Das Buch schildert eine genaues Bild der Frauen der damaligen Zeit.

Fazit: Geschichte kann so spannend sein!
(abgerundet durch Fotos, Karten und Zeichnungen)

An accurate account of the Whitechapel Murders of 1888, focusing on their victims rather than on the character of Jack the Ripper; by placing the spotlight on their personal lives.

A great book that should be read together with “Who was Jack the Ripper? All suspects revealed”, written by the H Division Crime Club and published by Pen & Sword.

Thanks to NetGalley and Pen & Sword for a copy of this book to read and review.