Oh ho HO let’s see what villainy is afoot today *opens up the 1891 London Illustrated Police News*
Ah yes, “The Illustrated Police News”, Daily Mail / Express * (or possibly Sunday Sport / National Enquirer) of its day
* Mail & Express are famous notorious for, when at a loose end, publishing Madeline McCann / Lady Diana stories despite their increasing lack of currency.
In much the same way, IPN published nearly 200 Jack the Ripper front-page stories in the four years after those murders ended. Illustrated stories, of course. Also like them, IPN featured many anti-immigrant “here to take your jobs” stories.
IPN got good mileage from murder (mostly horrible, sometimes ghastly, occasionally just shocking), violent or scandalous goings-on (with illustrations to show how violently scandalous) and things to be outraged at (with illustrations to assist in being outraged…)
It was also partial to the adjective “fair”…
…and I was quite surprised that this one missed out on “fair somnambulist”.
The captions didn’t miss out on much else.
Stuff like these:
Or indeed these:
Has there ever been a compilation of The Best / Worst Of Illustrated Police News?
