ukjack

For a number of years during the nineteenth century, London was terrorized by two veritable fiends in human form known
only as Jack, and whose identities remain as much a mystery today as they were then. One was a horrific serial killer,
Jack the Ripper. The other an even more grotesque figure, who may not even have been human, Spring-Heeled Jack.
The saga of Spring-heeled Jack appears to have begun in September 1837, when three woman and one man, all in
separate incidents and all in or near London, were attacked by a weird cloaked figure with pointed ears, talon-like claws,
protruding eyes that glowed like blazing orbs and the ability to spit huge flames from his mouth. Equally bizarre was his
capability of leaping immense distances through the air, often clearing walls and sometimes even houses in a single
enormous leap and thus foiling all attempts made to capture him.

One the evening of February 18, 1838, teenage sisters Margaret and Lucy Scales were walking home through the
Limhouse district after visiting their older brother when a tall phantom like figure holding a small lamp leapt out of the
shadows encompassing the entrance to Green Dragon Alley, Without uttering a word, he opened his mouth and spurted
great flames of blue fire into Lucy's face, before bounding out of sight moments, later as Lucy fell to the floor, gripped by a
quivering spasm of fear that lasted for several hours afterwards.

Two nights later in East London, someone rang the bell at the gate of the house where 18 year old Jane Alsop lived with
her parents. When Jane opened the door, she could see a tall thin figure standing in the shadows, wearing an expansive
black cloak and some from of helmet. Thinking that he was a policeman, she stepped forward and the man cried out to
her to bring a light quickly, because his colleagues had captured the infamous Spring-heeled Jack. After fetching a
candle, she ran outside with it, but when she gave it to the supposed policeman, she received a terrifying shock. As
reported by The Times two days later: He threw of his outer garment, and applying the lighted candle to his breast,
presented a most hideous and frightful appearance, and vomited forth a quantity of blue and white flame from his
mouth, and his eyes resembled red balls of fire... He wore a large helmet, and his dress which appeared to fit him very
tight, seemed to her to resemble white oilskin.

But worse was to come. Almost blinded by the flames belched into her face by this monstrous apparition. Jane staggered
back, and her attacker lunged at her with fingers that seemed to her to be made of metal, as sharp as the talons of some
great beast or bird of prey, shredding her dress and tearing the flesh on her arms, neck, and shoulders. Screaming with
pain and terror, Jane pulled out of his grasp and ran towards the door, but he was quicker and caught her again, raking
her skin and pulling out clumps of her hair. Fortunately, her frantic cries alerted to her sisters in the house, who ran outside
and freed her.

All three of the woman then fled inside and slammed the door, but Jack refused to go away, until in answer to the sisters'
frantic cries from an upstairs window some genuine policemen nearby came running. When he saw them, Jack escaped
across a field in a series of huge bounds, dropping his cloak in his haste. So far, his attacks, although terrifying, were not
fatal, but all that changed one day in 1845 when Spring-heeled Jack transformed himself from a deranged madman into a
callous murderer. At that time, Jacob's Island in Bermondsey was a sleazy slum area containing a number of filthy,
decaying houses surrounded by foul marshes and suffused with the stink of disease and death. Here, amid abject poverty
and squalor, a meager existence was eked out by the flotsam and jetsam of humanity, among whom was a 13 year old
prostitute called Maria Davis. On that fateful day, while observed by several people close by, Maria was walking along a
bridge spanning a particularly vile stretch of marsh called Folly Ditch when Spring-heeled Jack abruptly appeared.
Seizing her by the should, he breathed a flurry of flames into her face, then in an almost nonchalant manner he picked up
the screaming girl and threw her over the side of the bridge, directly into the marsh below, where her body swiftly sank into
its suffocating depths. Before any of the horrified onlookers could do anything, this evil entity had bounded away, as
quickly as he had come, leaving the police to dredge the mud and ooze of Folly Ditch in search of Maria's corpse.

Spring-heeled Jack has never been satisfactorily identified. The only contender with any degree of merit was Henry, the
Marquis of Waterford, infamous for his sadistic sense of humor. His general build and protuberant eyes corresponded
with Jack's, and he is known to have been in the relevant area at the time of several of the attacks. Moreover, one while
making one of his famous escapes, Jack's cloak opened and an elaborate cloak opened and an elaborate create
containing a large gold "W" was revealed. However, whereas Waterford died in 1859, Jack's activities continued for
many years afterwards and as far afield as East Anglia and Everton in Liverpool, scene of his last known appearance, in
September 1904.