It was 1888.  There was so much poverty, disease and violence in London … and hopelessness.  Women were often beaten and abandoned by their husbands.  In desperation, many of them turned to prostitution.

Sadia, our Jack the Ripper Tour guide, talked to us in front of one of the old lodging houses in the East London neighbourhood of Whitechapel.  19 Princelet Street.  People drowned their sorrows with gin and then looked for a place to sleep, so they wouldn’t be killed on the street after passing out.

You could get a room for the night.  If you couldn’t afford that, it was four pence for a mattress. If even that was beyond you, two pence would get you a spot on a rope strung across a room.  You leaned over and tried to sleep standing up.  Sadia told us that’s where the word “hangover” came from.  O my God …

The famous story about Jack the Ripper should really focus on the five women he killed and mutilated.  They were all prostitutes in Whitechapel, considered scum by polite society, and denied a church burial plot when they died.

In Amsterdam I stood for a long time in front of the house where Anne Frank and her family hid from the Nazis in World War II.  I wanted to feel a spot on the Earth where man’s humanity to man happened.

And yet there still are countless places around the globe where horrendous acts unfold.  But hardly any of us know about them.

Now in London, I want to be in locations that were part of the Whitechapel murders.  Last night Sadia pointed out the Ten Bells tavern where at least two of the victims were regulars – Annie Chapman and Mary Kelly.

I vowed to come back to the corner of Commercial Street and Fournier Street.

And the next day … here I am.

The mural on tile is entitled Spitalfields in Ye Olden Time – Visiting a Weaver’s Shop.  It was here when Mary Kelly was enjoying her gin and friends.

Now the pub is filling up mid-afternoon.  Lots of guys standing …very few women here.  I’m falling into sadness for Mary and Annie.

Mary was Jack’s fifth victim.  Powerful friends of hers fought to have her buried in a church graveyard … and it happened.  It was a six-mile walk from Christ Church Spitalfields (which I can see through the window) to St. Patrick’s Catholic Cemetery.  Many people walked beside Mary’s casket.  Thousands lined the route, some of them crying.

Earlier today, I stood in front of Mary’s gravestone.  I cried too.