 |
|
|
 | |
1870s, Dudley Street, Wolverhampton
© Wolverhampton Archives & Local Studies
|
| |  |
Spring-Heeled Jack |
 |
If we accept that such a creature never actually existed, it’s interesting to speculate what is going on here; figures called Jack are common in rural, and urban, folklore. In May processions, the Queen is often accompanied by an anti-hero, a Green Man who feigns death and then springs unexpectedly to life; his name is Jack-in-the Green. Welsh border tradition tells of a character called Jack o’ Kentchurch, who made a pact with the Devil.
Another Jack jumping out
© The Jack in the Box Company |
There was also the legendary individual who paid flying visits to his neighbours, and then was off again before they could say...’Jack Robinson’. There are countless other examples of these mischievous little Jacks, including the disturbing little toy we call a ‘Jack-in-the-Box’. And of course there was one real one, the serial killer who haunted the East End of London, also in the 1880s, and who was also popularly christened Jack. There is no proven reason why Jack should be the catch-all name of these creatures, real or imaginary, and as far as I can tell, no one before has suggested a link between them.
Our Jack, the rather less dangerous one, has adopted many of the peculiarities of the other Jacks. He is unpredictable, elusive and frightening without being life-threatening. His appearance from the 1830s is almost always in urban areas, but that in itself means little; Victorian Britain had urbanized at a remarkable speed and those moving into the towns from the countryside inevitably brought their old superstitions with them. The historian, Charles Phythian-Adams calls this phenomenon ‘prior culture’, the survival of the previous age into the Victorian system of belief.
Victorian intrigue |
What is surprising is how quickly panic could set in. This seems to have happened in Netherton in 1877. A terrifying creature with one flashing eye had been spotted by a number of witnesses leaping hither and thither near the canal. The police were summoned to the spot, surrounded the creature and detained it. It did not take long to realize that Jack was in fact Joseph Darby, later to be the World Spring Jumping Champion, who had been practising at night in a pit helmet.
We are, of course, much more sensible and rational in the 21st Century, and likely to treat such stories with a large pinch of salt, but I’d like to bet that you’ll be drawing the curtains in your bedroom tonight.
Words: Chris Upton
Your comments
| |
 Print this page |
|
Archive
Look back into the past using the Legacies' archives. Find nearly 200 tales from around the country in our collection.
Read more > |
| | |
 |
|
|
|
|
|
| The 大象传媒 is not responsible for the content of external Web sites. |
| | | |
| | |
| |
|
