Whitechapel 1888The evidence, and its limits

The Whitechapel Murders file · 13 February 1891

Frances Coles

Swallow Gardens railway arch (between Chamber Street and Royal Mint Street)

← All cases · This case is in the police file but outside the conventional "canonical five".

The case

Born
not recorded
Died
1891-02-13
Also known as
Frances Coleman; Frances Hawkins; 'Carroty Nell'

Editorial summaryCompiled by the research team from the sources listed below. It summarises those sources and is not itself evidence.

Found with her throat cut, still alive, under the railway arch at Swallow Gardens by PC Thompson, 240 H, at 2.20 am on 13 February 1891 (Times, 14 Feb 1891). James Thomas Sadler was charged and discharged. Inquest verdict: wilful murder by person or persons unknown.

Timeline

  1. "At 20 minutes past 2"02:20

    PC Thompson finds Frances Coles, throat cut and still alive, under the Swallow Gardens arch; hears retreating footsteps.

    Evidence and interpretation
    Time interpretation
    13 February 1891, 02:20. London local time = GMT (no summer time in this period). Press report of the constable's time.
    Cited by this site's research
    none recorded
    Related testimony
    none linked yetLinked by matching names in the entry. This does not mean the testimony has been assessed as supporting it.
  2. "yesterday" (3 March 1891)

    Sadler discharged at Thames Police-court; no further evidence offered.

    Evidence and interpretation
    Time interpretation
    . Court sitting; no clock time - not placed.
    Cited by this site's research
    none recorded
    Related testimony
    none linked yetLinked by matching names in the entry. This does not mean the testimony has been assessed as supporting it.

Inquest

Editorial summary of the verdict

Adjourned inquest (Baxter): wilfully murdered by person or persons unknown; police did their duty in detaining Sadler.

Reported: reported 28 February 1891.

Open this case on the timeline

On the map

Base map: Booth's poverty map, published 1889 (a year after the murders), georeferenced by this site to about ±10–15 m. Colours are Booth's social classes, not crime data. Details and limits

Charles Booth, Descriptive Map of London Poverty 1889, North-Eastern sheet (Whitechapel and Spitalfields extract). Wellcome Collection (L0074439), via Wikimedia Commons. Charles Booth, Life and Labour of the People. Licence: CC BY 4.0. Source file.

Derived image Georeferenced by this site: the 1889 scan was warped to fit modern coordinates using 9 surviving street junctions (RMS error about 10 m, worst 15 m).

Published 1889, the year after the murders, and drawn on an Ordnance Survey base: details may differ from August 1888. Colours show Booth's 1889 classification of each street's inhabitants (his own, now-dated categories, from black 'lowest class' to gold 'wealthy'); they are not records of the murders. Location markers are positioned from this site's readings of the 1891-5 OS 1:1,056 plan, not from this image, so marker and image can disagree by 10-30 m.

Marker: Swallow Gardens railway arch (between Chamber Street and Royal Mint Street). Open on the full map

Claims

Each claim links to the passages it rests on, with its status (accepted, disputed, etc.).

Content notice: medical evidence

2 claims describing injuries or medical findings

This testimony contains clinical descriptions of injuries and post-mortem findings.

Your choice applies to this kind of material for the rest of this browser session.

Linkage debate: was this the same killer?

Nothing on this site assumes an answer. The claims below are those that bear on linking this case to the others; they are presented with their status, for and against.

Content notice: medical evidence

1 claim describing injuries or medical findings

This testimony contains clinical descriptions of injuries and post-mortem findings.

Your choice applies to this kind of material for the rest of this browser session.

In the workbench

The "which murders are linked" assumption offers these groupings. Frances Coles is:

  • Not included under “Canonical five: Nichols, Chapman, Stride, Eddowes, Kelly”
  • Not included under “Four: Nichols, Chapman, Eddowes, Kelly (Stride excluded)”
  • Not included under “Four: Nichols, Chapman, Stride, Eddowes (Kelly excluded)”
  • Not included under “Three core: Nichols, Chapman, Eddowes”
  • Not included under “Six: Tabram + canonical five”
  • Not included under “Extended: Tabram + canonical five + McKenzie”
  • Not included under “Agnostic: each case analysed separately (unknown offender per case)”

No grouping offered in the workbench includes this case, so it cannot yet be tested there.

Sources for this case (6)

Your notes on this case