Abberline: The Man Who Hunted Jack the Ripper by Peter Thurgood Read Free Book Online

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    Like all police officers, Abberline did have the occasional day’s leave from his duties. It was during these periods that he would go out onto the streets and into the pubs, in his ordinary clothes, and make ‘friends’ with the locals. He was breaking no police rules in doing this, as the streets and pubs were not off limits to police officers, and the way he saw it, if he could gain a little useful information at the same time, then so be it. It is often said that drink loosens a man’s tongue, and this metaphor certainly worked for Abberline. With the inside knowledge he was starting to gain, he soon started solving more crimes and making more arrests than any other officer in his station.
    His superiors, however, were not too happy with his lack of record in arresting women, in comparison with the number of males he arrested. There were plenty of women committing crimes in his area, so why, they asked, was Abberline seemingly ignoring them? As far as Abberline was concerned, the most common offences committed by women during this time were linked to prostitution, with the occasional petty theft or being drunk and disorderly – not exactly crimes of the first magnitude!
    Abberline also seemed to find women in general not as easy to get on with as men. There was no hint of homosexuality in his behaviour, but probably more of an inbred feeling of shyness with women. Bear in mind, he was in his early twenties at this time, and as far as we know, had never had any sort of close relationship with a woman, other than in his family.
    There seemed to be a general perception at this time that women should be seen as the upholders of true womanhood, and that if a woman was seen to transgress such a viewpoint by committing a crime, not only should she be treated harshly, but she should be treated more harshly than men. This, of course, did not seem to fit in with Abberline’s point of view, hence his almost complete abstention in the arrest of females.
    By the time Abberline had been at N Division, Islington, for just two years, his superiors had no option other than to offer him promotion to sergeant. He had, after all, made more arrests and solved more crimes than any other PC at his station. It was also possible that his superiors thought a change in environment might be beneficial, not just to Abberline, but to them too. Abberline took up his new post as sergeant in November 1865 and moved to Y Division, Highgate.
    The distance between his old beat in Islington and his new beat in Highgate was approximately 3 miles, which meant that many of his old contacts were still relatively close to hand. This, of course, was good news for Abberline, and also for his new superiors, who were more than pleased with the way in which he was fitting in and working closely with his new colleagues.
    Highgate at this time had a considerable number of Irish immigrants living within its boundaries, as did Islington to a somewhat lesser extent, so Abberline was quite au fait with the Irish accent and customs. It was just before he moved to Highgate that British agents had uncovered a Fenian plot to increase their activities in Great Britain, and especially London. The Fenians were nineteenth-century Irish Nationalists, organised in 1858 as the Irish Republican Brotherhood. The name ‘Fenian’ derives from the Old Irish word ‘ Fianna ’, who were legendary Irish warriors. Over the years ‘Fenian’ became an Irish derivative for soldier.
    As even more news involving the Fenians started to seep into British Secret Service agents’ hands, it was decided that an undercover squad of police officers was needed to try to infiltrate the Irish community and investigate any possible Fenian activities in London. As Abberline was a natural choice for this operation, with his history of plain-clothes work, he was, in 1867, assigned to special plain-clothes duties, with orders to do whatever was necessary to infiltrate and report back any