Cabman’s Shelters: A Place for Cold London Cabbies and Maybe Jack the Ripper

Ancient Origins

A Cabman’s shelter was a special place in London, England during the second half of the 19th century. These types of shelters were intended to be places where a cabman could obtain hot food and drink whilst working and though few have remained, they have an iconic status even today.

 Although these shelters proved to be very popular in the past, they have been in decline. Today, only a small number of these historic buildings remain. Nevertheless, they are currently Grade II listed buildings, which means that they are protected by law due to their status as heritage assets.

Obelisk, Cabmen's Shelter and Telephone Boxes, Market Place, Ripon. (Tim Green/CC BY 2.0)

A Philanthropic Act
The cabmen shelter was an idea conceived in 1875. The story goes that in January of that year, George Armstrong, the editor of London newspaper The Globe, needed a cab to take him to work. Unfortunately, his servant was unable to find one, and Armstrong was informed that due to the blizzard, all the available cab drivers (who, during that period of time, drove hansom cabs) were taking shelter in a nearby pub.

According to one source, the cabmen were drunk as well, as they were indulging in alcohol whilst waiting for the blizzard to pass and were therefore unable to work. As a result of this incident, Armstrong brought together a group of philanthropists, and established a charity known as the Cabmen’s Shelter Fund.

A cabman. From 'Street Life in London', 1877, by John Thompson and Adolphe Smith. (Public Domain)

The purpose of this charity was to offer cab drivers a place where they could have food and drink, take a break, and seek shelter from bad weather during their working hours.

A cabman’s shelter is easily recognized, as it is small and painted green, Dulux Buckingham Paradise 1 Green, to be precise. The Metropolitan police specified that the size of each shed may be no larger than a horse and a cart, as that they were placed on the public highway. The cost required to build a cabman’s shelter was £200 each, and many of these were paid for by local philanthropists. The first cabman’s shelter was established on Acacia Avenue, St John's Wood (close to George Armstrong’s home), in 1875. Between then and 1914, 61 cabmen’s shelters were established

The green shelter belonging to the Cabmen's Shelter Fund in Russel Square, Bloomsbury London Borough of Camden. (Ethan_Doyle_White/CC BY SA 4.0)

Features of a Cabman’s Shelter
Within each shelter was a working kitchen, in which an attendant could prepare meals and hot drinks for the cabmen who came to the shelters. Alcohol, by the way, is strictly forbidden in the cabmen’s shelters. The sheds are also equipped with tables and benches, and, in spite of its small size, have enough space within them to accommodate up to 10 customers at a time. Although the cabmen’s shelters had a certain level of standardization, it may be added that their quality depended on the area they are located in.

Over the decades, the cabmen’s shelters served not only cab drivers, but also various notable characters. For instance, during the 1890s, bohemian poets such as Ernest Dowson frequented these shelters. According to one writer, these poets would visit such sheds at four o’clock in the morning and would order bacon and eggs. It was not because they wanted this dish at that time, but merely because the bourgeoisie were not doing that.

Portrait of Ernest Dowson. (Public Domain)

The most enigmatic figure known to have been a customer of a cabmen’s shelter is a certain doctor by the name of J. Duncan, who claimed that he was responsible for the murders committed by Jack the Ripper. As he seemed drunk, however, the attendant at the shelter, as well as the other patrons there, did not pay attention to him. Having had his meal, Duncan left the shelter, and was never heard of again.

Things have changed for the cabmen’s shelters since Armstrong’s days. For a start, there are only 13 of these sheds remaining. These include the ones on Kensington Park Road, Russell Square, and Grosvenor Gardens. These shelters, incidentally, are still managed by the Cabmen’s Shelters Fund, and are today Grade II listed buildings.

Although the shelters initially served cab drivers only, today, they may be patronized by the general public as well. Nevertheless, the ‘cabbies only’ rule is still enforced, and therefore only cab drivers are allowed to go inside these shelters. The general public, on the other hand are only allowed takeaways.

Top Image: Cabmans Shelter, Russell Square. Source: N Chadwick/CC BY SA 2.0

By Wu Mingren

The 10 worst Britons in history

History Extra

Illustrations by Jonty Clark

The result is a fascinating, if not strictly scientific, top 10, showing the most wicked, harmful and downright evil character of each century in the past thousand years. The rogue’s gallery includes some famous, and not so famous (or infamous) names: there’s a king, a prime minister and (somewhat surprisingly) a couple of churchmen. It’s a thought-provoking and perhaps controversial list. Read on to discover who were the worst Brits of all...

 

1000–1100

Eadric Streona

Nominated by Professor Sarah Foot of Sheffield University

_{Illustration by Jonty Clark}
Eadric Streona (died 1017) might have been Aethelred II’s chief counsellor and ealdorman of Mercia – but he has a reputation for deception, treachery and murder.
I nominate him because of the villainous part he played in England’s defeat by the Danish king, Cnut. He was implicated in the murder of Gunnhild and Pallig in 1002 and of Ealdorman Aelfhelm in 1006 – at which time the ealdorman’s two sons, Wulfheah and Ufegeat, were blinded. In 1009 when the English were ready to attack the Danes a Chronicler reported that the whole people “was hindered by Ealdorman Eadric, then as it always was”. In 1015 he was directly involved in the murder of two thegns (noblemen) – Sigeferth and Morcar – who, according to chronicles, he “enticed” into his chamber where they were “basely killed”.
In the same year, having been in command of King Aethelred’s army, he changed sides and joined Cnut. He subsequently switched sides a further couple of times, in 1016 joining first Edmund Ironside and then deserting him at the battle at Assandun (Ashingdon) to rejoin Cnut who pursued Edmund into Gloucestershire where the latter died in mysterious circumstances.
This cruel, unscrupulous individual grew rich out of the proceeds of royal taxation and was a traitor to the English cause. But having being initially rewarded by Cnut – when he’d become king of all England – Eadric was killed in 1017 having outlived his usefulness to the new regime. It was a fitting end.
Sarah Foot is the author of Monastic life in Anglo-Saxon England (Cambridge University Press, 2006).

1100–1200 

Thomas Becket

Nominated by Professor John Hudson of St Andrews University

_{Illustration by Jonty Clark}
There are a handful of characters in history about whom prejudice seems impossible to avoid. One such is Thomas Becket (c 1120–70), Archbishop of Canterbury. He divided England in a way that even many churchmen who shared some of his views thought unnecessary and self-indulgent. And he has remained a figure inspiring both devotion and detestation.
He was a founder of gesture politics, with the most acute of eye for what would now be called the photo-opportunity. He was also a master of the soundbite. When put on trial in front of a secular court, he refused to accept its jurisdiction, stating “such as I am, I am your father; I will not hear your judgement”. He pushed his way from the court chamber, bearing his cross before him. Complex issues were confronted by a mixture of inflexibility and grand display.
When he left England during his dispute with Henry II, he went to the kingdom of France, furthering the conflict between Henry and the French king, and at the very least opening himself to the accusation of being a traitor. Certainly he was viewed by some as hypocritical, as he changed dramatically from his ostentatious life-style before he was archbishop. As archbishop, he also looked to contemporary medical views for help in retaining some enjoyable habits, claiming to have to drink wine rather than water because it better suited his stomach.
He was also greedy. In 1164 he was brought to trial in part on charges of embezzlement during his time as royal chancellor, the position he held before he became archbishop of Canterbury. The truth of such charges must remain uncertain. However, the wealth of Thomas and his following by the late 1150s was immense and famous. How did he assemble such wealth? Presumably by profiting from his position in the royal administration.
Those who share my prejudice against Becket may consider his assassination in Canterbury Cathedral on 29 December 1170 a fittingly grisly end. However, it also ensured that, as a martyr, he became a saint with a cult that spread with tremendous speed.
John Hudson is author of The Oxford History of the Laws of England (Oxford University Press).

1200–1300

King John

Nominated by historian Marc Morris

_{Illustration by Jonty Clark}
Once described as a man of “superhuman wickedness”, King John of England (1167–1216) has had a pretty awful press. Perhaps his most damning critic was Matthew Paris, a monk at St Albans, who in the mid 13th century wrote: “Foul as it is, Hell itself is defiled by the fouler presence of King John”.
This kind of verdict was eagerly seized on by 19th-century historians to create the monster of legend, the Bad King John. However, the fact remains that John committed some wicked deeds and was a deeply unpleasant person. He was unpleasant in many ways – in the way he behaved towards people; he was untrusting; he would snigger at people while they talked; he couldn’t resist kicking a man when he was down. What’s more, he was a bully and a gloater. Stories about his cruelty are legion, and the deed which has most damned him in the eyes of the world is the murder, possibly by his own hands, of his nephew Arthur – a rival for the throne.
Granted, John was competent when it came to the small-scale tyrant stuff – he could lead an army, he was energetic and dynamic – but his charisma was all negative. He didn’t inspire loyalty, so people deserted him. That was partly why he lost his father’s continental lands – in effect, squandering the family inheritance.
He was clearly one of the worst kings in English history and his reign will always by defined by that one great evil deed – the murder of his nephew. One good thing to come out of his reign was Magna Carta, an attempt to limit his abuses and ensure they could not be repeated.
Marc Morris is author of The Bigod Earls of Norfolk in the Thirteenth Century (Boydell, 2005).

1300–1400 

Hugh Despenser (the Younger)

Nominated by Nigel Saul, professor of medieval history at Royal Holloway, London University

_{Illustration by Jonty Clark}
I nominate Edward II’s appalling favourite, the Younger Hugh Despenser (died 1326). Despenser was neither so well known nor so notorious as his predecessor in Edward’s favour, Piers Gaveston, but he was far worse. Gaveston was just a playboy. Despenser was pure evil.
Dominant at court in the last years of Edward’s reign, he set about eliminating his enemies and amassing a vast territorial empire in South Wales. His rapacity knew no bounds. He gobbled up the lands and possessions forfeited by those who opposed him and his king. He browbeat the weak and the vulnerable into signing away their estates. He tricked people into parting with their property.
Women were especially vulnerable to his ambitions. Alice Lacy, the Earl of Lancaster’s widow, was thrown into prison and forced to sign away her rights. The widow of Sir John Gifford of Brimpsfield was ejected from her estates. Lady Baret of Swansea was allegedly tortured so badly that she went out of her mind. Visiting merchants were robbed of their property. In a stained glass window in Tewkesbury Abbey, Despenser looks all arrogant and swagger.
But pride cometh before the fall. In the autumn of 1326 the tyrannical regime Despenser headed was toppled, and Edward deposed. At Hereford in November he was visited with the full penalties of the traitor. He was drawn, and then hanged from a gallows 50 feet high; his intestines were torn out and burned in front of him.
Nigel Saul is author of The Three Richards: Richard I, Richard II and Richard III (Hambledon & London, 2005).

1400–1500 

Thomas Arundel

Nominated by Miri Rubin, professor of history at Queen Mary, University of London

_{Illustration by Jonty Clark}
Thomas Arundel (1353–1414), administrator and archbishop of Canterbury, earns his place in this list of infamy not for a single infamous act, but for the long-term effect of his success in bringing together church and state, as never before, in the persecution of unorthodox religious opinion.
In this link between religious ideas and sedition lay the foundation for a system of persecution of religious ideas in England which would be used by rulers for centuries. Until Arundel, England had no part in the intensive inquisitorial and persecutory activities which had long been common practice on much of the Continent. The Concordat between Henry IV and Arundel gradually created such a system through ordinances and statutes.
At Oxford in 1407 he phrased ordinances – later extended as Constitutions for the realm – which limited the translation and reading of the Bible in English. The programme was completed shortly after his death, when secular officials, royal justices and sheriffs, were required by oath to enquire into heresy wherever their powers took them. As a result, he made life harder for a generation of people who wished to express and explore their religious ideas, to read the Bible in a language they understood, and discuss the “big questions”, while his clearing out of “venomous weeds” from Oxford meant that intellectual life there became bland for a very long time.
Above all, by enlisting royal officials, and encouraging neighbours to snoop, suspect and inform – he authorised a thoroughly unpleasant involvement of the state in people’s lives.
Miri Rubin is author of The Hollow Crown: A History of Britain in the Late Middle Ages (Penguin, 2005).

1500–1600

Sir Richard Rich, Lord Rich of Leighs

Nominated by David Loades, emeritus professor of history at the University of Wales

_{Illustration by Jonty Clark}
I’ve chosen Sir Richard Rich (1496/7–1567), who seems to have had no principles, political or religious, but simply joined whichever side seemed likeliest to further his career.
According to John Foxe (author of the Acts & Monuments of the English Martyrs, first published in 1563), he was personally responsible for the torture of Anne Askew – who’d broken off her marriage to an orthodox Catholic – in 1546 and was charged with heresy. He is reputed to have operated the machine himself despite the fact that women (and especially gentlewomen) were supposed to be exempt from torture.
He is alleged to have committed perjury to secure the conviction of Thomas More for treason. He promoted Protestantism under Edward VI, and then persecuted Protestants under Mary.
A lawyer by profession, Rich was a man who was constantly on the make, constantly on the lookout for the main chance. He became a powerful minister to Henry VIII and was Lord Chancellor during much of King Edward VI’s reign.
It is difficult to quite know what to make of him personally but nobody seems to have been very fond of him. Greedy he certainly was, and cruel – to judge from the Anne Askew affair. He was responsible for several burnings of heretics in Essex, and acted as a bigot because it was convenient to appear as such at that time.
In short, Rich was a slippery and unprincipled opportunist. For centuries after his death his name was a byword in the county of Essex for wickedness. Right up to the 20th century, it was said “better a poor man at ease than Lord Rich of Leighs”.
David Loades is the author of Intrigue and Treason: the Tudor Court 1547–1558 (Pearson, 2004).

1600–1700 

Titus Oates

Nominated by John Adamson, a fellow of Peterhouse, Cambridge University

_{Illustration by Jonty Clark}
The self-styled Dr Titus Oates (1649–1705) was in a league of his own, both in the depths of his vileness – a comprehensive blend of vanity, murderous con-trickery, and serpentine guile – and the scale of the evil for which he was responsible.
He was the principal promoter, in 1678, of the fantasy that there was a Jesuit conspiracy to assassinate Charles II (with silver bullets) as a prelude to a French-backed Catholic reconquest of the country.
Undoubtedly his most evil act was allowing 16 innocent laymen, and eight Catholic priests, to go to a hideous death (the penalty for treason being partial hanging, castration and disembowelment alive, and then the quartering of the corpse) as a result of his spurious accusations.
Oates’s entire career was built on the purveyance of various forms of malice and falsity. At the height of the Popish Plot mania, he laid an indictment against the Lord Chief Justice who, refusing to succumb to the popular hysteria, had acquitted four of the men implicated by Oates’s accusations. He would have willingly sent these four, and the Chief Justice, to the gallows for his own aggrandisement.
Anyone who is prepared to see innocent men go to their deaths – and particularly grisly deaths at that – on accusations that he knows to be false qualifies as cruel, bloodthirsty, and a bigot. What makes Oates’s knavery all the more invidious is that his motives appear to have been largely financial: he expected, and eventually obtained, a substantial reward from the Whig interests which profited from his accusations.
In 1678–79, Oates’s actions arguably brought the country close to the brink of another civil war. And while Oates did not create anti-Popery, his fantasies certainly sharply exacerbated a religious hatred that would endure in British society well into the 19th century. In short, he was a thoroughly odious individual.
John Adamson is author of The Noble Revolt: The Overthrow of Charles I
(Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 2007).

1700–1800

Duke of Cumberland

Nominated by Professor Rab Houston, chair of modern history at St Andrews University

_{Illustration by Jonty Clark}
The Duke of Cumberland (Prince William Augustus, 1721–65) showed his wickedness in many ways, not least in his contempt for opponents and for his own men who failed to live up to his strict standards.
He showed a particular disdain for the defeated Jacobites after the battle of Culloden in 1746, who he regarded as cowardly, dishonourable and undeserving of mercy. Thus fleeing soldiers were pursued and slaughtered while the wounded could expect no help except to be shot, bayoneted or clubbed to death.
At a time when the etiquette of warfare was considered very important, Cumberland was able to dispense with it by labelling the Highlanders as inhuman savages. He even condemned officers who had shown mercy to the Jacobite soldiers after the battle, when his orders were to give no quarter. The Highlanders hated him, renaming a weed Stinking Billy in mockery of the English renaming of a flower Sweet William in his honour.
In effect, he used the full power of the fiscal-military British state to commit genocide on the mainland of Britain. He was the equal of Cromwell in Ireland, terrorising a whole people into submission.
The English welcomed the Duke’s victory but opinion turned against him equally quickly. He acquired the title of Butcher because, when told that he was to be made an honorary freeman of a London company for his services against the Jacobites, some wag said it would have to be the Butchers. The Duke’s successes were recognised by his being voted an income of £40,000 per annum in addition to his revenue as a prince of the royal house. It was, in effect, blood money earned by war crimes.
While much of Cumberland’s reputation rests on the immediate events surrounding Culloden, he was also a strong advocate and savage pursuer of the suppression of Highland culture. He left behind him the largest army of occupation ever seen in Britain in order to pacify the Highlands while permanent fortifications were built.
He contributed to a policy of cultural imperialism by disarming the Highlands, abolishing the wearing of Highland dress, suppressing certain surnames linked with the rebellion and seeking to extirpate Catholicism from the land. He even suggested transporting whole clans like the Camerons and MacPhersons to the colonies – a sort of ethnic cleansing.
By helping to destroy the social nexus of the clan that was at the heart of Highland society, he helped sever the bond between chiefs and clanspeople that had been the basis of Highland society for centuries.
Lastly, by institutionalising the prejudice that the Highlanders were uncivilised, Cumberland also contributed to the racist views responsible for their later misfortunes.
Rab Houston is the editor of The New Penguin History of Scotland: From the Earliest Times to the Present Day (Penguin, 2005).

1800–1900

Jack the Ripper

Nominated by Professor Clive Emsley of the Open University

_{Illustration by Jonty Clark}
No-one can touch the serial killer Jack the Ripper for sheer wickedness during 19th-century Britain. Firstly, because he preyed on the most pathetic and vulnerable women in London’s East End. Secondly, for the sheer horror of his brutal crimes.
During his murder spree in the autumn of 1888, Jack the Ripper definitely killed five prostitutes – and possibly a couple of other women too – in the most appalling and extreme circumstances. His victims were disembowelled, their intestines draped over their shoulders and their breasts cut off. This man was manifestly a savage brute and while he may have had mental problems – he must have had, to do what he did – they can’t excuse his terrible actions.
The murders had huge repercussions at the time – and have influenced our view of serial killers ever since. For months after the murders women across the land, be it in Norwich or Newcastle, were terrified to go out at night. And while the press might have coined the name by which this most notorious serial killer is known, this does not detract from the savagery of his crimes. Of course, we assume it was “Jack”, and it probably was, but it just might have been “Jill”.
The Ripper has become a villain – for all time – and his shadow extends to the present day. And the way in which the world responds to modern serial killers such as the Yorkshire Ripper is influenced by the way we responded to the most notorious serial killer of all, Jack the Ripper.
All sorts of people have been accused of being Jack the Ripper: the painter Walter Sickert; rogue royals; Freemasons, you name it – but it seems unlikely we’ll ever know his true identity. However, this has just served to add to the mystique surrounding this most wicked of men.
Clive Emsley is the author of Hard Men: Violence in England since 1750 (Hambledon, 2005).

1900–2000

Oswald Mosley

Nominated by Professor Joanna Bourke of the School of History, Classics, and Archaeology, Birkbeck College, London

_{Illustration by Jonty Clark}
Oswald Mosley (1896–1980) was the founder of the British Union of Fascists (BUF) in 1932. He remains an inspiration for far-right groups in Britain and thus continues to have a pernicious impact on our society. His authoritarian politics relied on anti-Semitism and anti-immigration, and the party’s willingness to use violence was most notoriously exhibited at the Fascist rally at Olympia in 1934.
His most evil act was inciting anti-Semitic feeling and in 1934, the BUF launched an anti-Semitic campaign in the East End of London, home to one-third of British Jews. He attacked the “big Jews” for threatening the economy and the “little Jews” for “swamping” British cultural identity. While he never succeeded in turning Britain Fascist, 70 per cent of respondents under 30 chose Fascism, when asked to choose between it and Communism, in a Gallup Poll in 1937.
He was handsome and charming, and his early career – in the Conservative and then Labour Party – showed him to be a man of ideas and energy. In the early 1920s, his opposition to the “Old Men” who supervised the carnage of the First World War won him many supporters. However he was vain, megalomaniac, and had delusions of grandeur, although Attlee observed that his theatrical displays were routinely derided (at one meeting, when Mosley strode on stage with his arm uplifted, a voice called out, “Yes, Oswald dear, you may go to the lavatory”).

It would be difficult to find a more unpopular politician than Mosley in 1945: he was widely regarded as a traitor and a symbol of Fascism. On his death in 1980 his son Nicholas concluded that his father was a man whose “right hand dealt with grandiose ideas and glory” while his left hand “let the rat out of the sewer”.
Joanna Bourke is the author of An Intimate History of Killing: Face-to-Face Killing in Twentieth Century Warfare (Granta, 2000).

31 August 1888 – Mary Ann Nichols becomes the first victim of ‘Jack the Ripper’

History Extra

The discovery of the mutilated body of Mary Ann Nichols, shown in an illustration from the sensationalist newspaper ‘Famous Crimes’. (Mary Evans Picture Library)

As London’s bells rang in the last day of August 1888, rain was falling. It had been one of the wettest summers in living memory, and there was thunder in the air. On the horizon a fierce red glow seared the sky above Shadwell, where a huge fire had broken out in the dry dock.
Some time between one and two o’clock that morning, a woman called Mary Ann Nichols, known to her friends as ‘Polly’, was thrown out of the kitchen of the shabby lodging house at 18 Thrawl Street, Spitalfields. Fate had dealt Polly a rough hand. A 43-year-old mother of five children, she was separated from her husband and now drifted from one workhouse to another, scratching a meagre existence from handouts and casual prostitution.
Short of the four pence she needed to pay for a bed in the lodging house, Polly once more found herself on the street. “Never mind,” she said, gesturing at the velvet-trimmed straw bonnet she was wearing. “I’ll soon get my doss money. See what a jolly bonnet I’ve got now.” The implication was clear: she was heading back out to find a punter.
An hour or so later, Polly was seen by one of her roommates on the corner of Whitechapel Road, clearly drunk. She had made her doss money three times over, she boasted, but had already spent it on gin and was off to make some more.

That was the last time Mary Ann Nichols was seen alive. At 3.40am, a carter found her lying in the darkened doorway of a stable. Her throat had been slit and her body horribly mutilated. The murderer who would later be dubbed ‘Jack the Ripper’ had claimed his first victim.
Dominic Sandbrook is a historian and presenter.

9 unsolved historical mysteries

History Extra

Who was Jack the Ripper, what happened to the Mary Celeste, and did Richard III really murder the princes in the Tower? These are some of the biggest historical mysteries of all time. Here, after scouring 1,000 years of public records at the National Archives in search of answers, Dr David Clarke, the author of Britain’s X-traordinary Files, charts nine of the greatest unsolved puzzles of modern times

1) The Mary Celeste

What became of the crew and passengers of this British-American brigantine remains one of the greatest unsolved mysteries of the sea. The name has since become synonymous worldwide with derelict ‘ghost ships’.
The Mary Celeste was found drifting 400 miles east of the Azores by the crew of another cargo-carrying vessel, the Dei Gratia, on 5 December 1872. The leader of the boarding party told a British board of inquiry at Gibraltar he found the ship was “a thoroughly wet mess”, with possessions left behind and the lifeboat missing.
No trace of Captain Benjamin Spooner Briggs, his wife and their young daughter or the seven experienced crew members has ever been found. Many ingenious theories have been put forward by writers such as Arthur Conan Doyle to explain what happened to them. My favourite comes from a 1965 episode of the BBC series Dr Who, where the frightened crew jump overboard when the Daleks materialise on the ship while chasing the occupants of the TARDIS.

 

2) Jack the Ripper

The true identity of this Victorian serial killer continues to elude us 126 years after the gruesome killing spree in London’s East End in 1888. In the latest development, an ‘armchair detective’ claims DNA evidence from the shawl of one of the five known victims has identified Polish émigré Aaron Kosminski – one of a list of key suspects – as the man also known as ‘Leather Apron’, or ‘the Whitechapel Murderer’.
A small cottage industry, Ripperology has grown up around the murders with investigators such as Patricia Cornwell and Russell Edwards sifting through surviving evidence in search of a ‘prime suspect.’ Among the wild theories that have become legends is one that depicts Jack as a deranged surgeon who killed the women as part of a conspiracy to protect a member of the royal family.
Professor William Rubinstein describes this story as “palpable nonsense from beginning to end”. He believes it is the very elusiveness of the solution that continues to make the Ripper mystery so attractive to writers and historians.

 

3) Kenneth Arnold’s ‘flying saucers’

The birth of the modern UFO phenomenon can be traced to a sighting by private pilot Ken Arnold of nine peculiar-shaped flying objects over the Cascade Mountains of Washington on the afternoon of 24 June 1947. Arnold told newsmen the bat-wing shaped objects moved like a saucer would “if you skipped it across the water”. He calculated their speed as faster than the most advanced jet aircraft of that time.
A sub-editor came up with the phrase ‘flying saucers’, and the media coverage that followed triggered off an epidemic for seeing things in the sky that continues to this day. Two weeks after Arnold’s sighting, the US Army Air Force announced that wreckage from a ‘flying disc’ had been recovered from a ranch near Roswell, New Mexico.
A modern myth was born, but ever since controversy has raged about what it was that Arnold actually saw. In my opinion, the most likely explanation is a flock of American white pelicans flying in echelon formation. But no one will ever know for sure.

4) The Devil’s Footprints

Early on the morning of 9 February 1855, people in towns across southern Devon awoke to find a single line of hoof-like marks in the deep snow as if they had been branded with a hot iron. The Times said the marks were found over a distance of 40 miles on both sides of the Exe, as if “some strange and mysterious animal endowed with the power of ubiquity” had created them during the night.
Explanations ranged from an escaped kangaroo, badgers and mice, to a balloon trailing a horseshoe-shaped grappling rope. Superstitious people preferred to believe they were the work of the devil himself. In its summary of the popular theories at the time, a writer in The Illustrated London News said “no satisfactory solution” had been found, and “no known animal could have traversed this extent of country in one night… neither does any known animal walk in a line of single footsteps, not even a man”.

5) The Shroud of Turin

This piece of linen cloth kept in the Cathedral of St John the Baptist in Turin, northern Italy, is one of the most closely investigated objects in human history, yet it retains its secrets. The sacred relic is believed by many Christians to be the shroud in which Jesus of Nazareth was buried.
There is no doubt that it bears a negative imprint of the face and outline of the body of a man who has suffered injuries consistent with crucifixion, but scientists have been unable to reach a consensus about how it was created. Radiocarbon testing by three laboratories in 1988 dated the cloth to the Middle Ages, and this was proclaimed by some as proof it was a medieval fake. But this interpretation remains the subject of intense debate, leading a former editor of Nature, Philip Ball, to declare that the relic remains shrouded in mystery.

6) Richard III and the princes in the Tower

In 2012 the skeleton of the last Plantagenet king of England, Richard III, was unearthed from beneath a council car park on the site of Greyfriars in Leicester city centre. The dig that unearthed his remains was instigated by Philippa Langley of the Richard III Society as a direct result of a “strange feeling” she had when visiting the site.
This apparent example of psychic archaeology is not the only mystery that surrounds Richard’s life and death. His precise role in the fate of his two nephews – popularly known as ‘The princes in the Tower’ – remains a subject of enduring mystery. The 12-year-old Edward and his nine-year-old brother, Richard of Shrewsbury, the sons of King Edward IV, were lodged in the Tower of London by their uncle, Richard, at the time of their disappearance in 1483.
No one knows exactly what happened to them, but a box containing two small human skeletons was found near the White Tower in the 17th century and, at the time, was widely believed to be the remains of the princes.

7) The Solway Spaceman

On the afternoon of 23 May 1964, an employee of the Cumbrian fire service, Jim Templeton, took photographs of his wife and daughter during a day out at a local beauty spot on the Solway Firth. When he collected the photographs from a chemist, the assistant told him it was a shame one was “spoiled by the man in the background wearing a space suit”.
Sure enough, one image of his youngest daughter Elizabeth clearly shows an enigmatic ‘figure’ floating behind her head. The ‘spaceman’ is dressed in a white suit that resembles those worn by NASA astronauts at the time.
The photograph was examined by Kodak and scrutinised by detectives from the Cumbrian police, who were unable to explain it. Jim Templeton died in 2011 without learning the true identity of the ‘Solway spaceman’. The image remains one of the most perplexing in the history of anomalous photography.

 

8) Mothman

One dark night in November 1966, four American teenagers claimed they saw a huge bird-like monster with glowing red eyes while cruising along a back road near Point Pleasant in rural West Virginia. They claimed it rose into the air, unfolded its bat-like wings, and pursued them as they sped away in terror. The next morning the sheriff’s office held a press conference, and the media dubbed the creature ‘Mothman’ after the Batman series that was showing on TV.
Encounters with the demonic ‘bird’ inspired the 2002 movie The Mothman Prophecies, directed by Mark Pellington. The film was based upon journalist John Keel’s book that chronicled an outbreak of uncanny experiences in the Ohio Valley. He believed the creature was linked in some mysterious way with the collapse of the Silver Bridge in Point Pleasant in December 1967 that killed 46 people, including some mothman witnesses.

 

9) Monsters of the Deep

Do the depths of our oceans hide undiscovered species of animal such as the great ‘sea serpent’ that was sighted by the captain and crew of HMS Daedalus near the island of St Helena in 1848?
Among the files at the National Archives and the Natural History Museum I found first-hand reports of similar creatures in records from the late 19th to the early 20th century, including one by Arthur Conan Doyle, author of The Lost World. Could it be that, as the museum’s former keeper of zoology, William Calman, told a puzzled witness in 1929: “…we are not so rash as to suppose that we yet know all of the inhabitants of the sea and it is within the bounds of possibility that you saw some animal that has never been captured or described”.
If so, where have they all gone?
Dr David Clarke is the author of Britain’s X-traordinary Files, published by Bloomsbury on 25 September. To find out more, click here.
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