Victorian

Dangerous beauty: Madame Anna Ruppert

A version of this article first appeared on the Wellcome Library blog on 3 February 2016. A box of confectionery arrived at the green room of the Princess’s Theatre, Oxford Street, on 6 November 1894 … with no well-wishes attached. The recipient was Anna Ruppert, whose new venture as a theatre manager and actress was […]

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Richard and Edward Chrimes

Notorious Chrimes: The Blackmail Pills

In 1890s London, the ‘Lady Montrose Pills’ blackmail scheme efficiently and heartlessly targeted more than 8,000 victims. In this comprehensive account of the case, Dick Weindling introduces the Chrimes brothers, who manufactured this audacious scam. In April 1896 adverts began to appear in newspapers across the country. Addressed to ‘Ladies Only’, the advertisement promoted ‘Lady Montrose’s […]

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Dr Batty's Asthma Cigarettes

Victorian asthma cigarettes: who was Dr Batty?

While browsing your local newspaper in the 1890s, an asthma-cure advertisement might distract you from tales of the latest sensational crimes. ‘Agreeable to use, certain in their effects, and harmless in their action, they may be safely smoked by ladies and children,’ ran the promotional copy. The product was Cigares de Joy, handy little cigarettes […]

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Antidipso British Monthly Dec 1903

To raise false hopes

‘Tears and prayers are of no use,’ warned the eyecatching pictorial advertisement in the Penny Illustrated Paper. It was perhaps the most truthful statement Arthur Lewis Pointing, proprietor of the anti-drunkenness powder, Antidipso, had ever come up with. Or rather, that the advertiser of a famous American nostrum had ever come up with, for Pointing […]

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Du Brange mentioned in The Times, Sat 30 Oct 1869 (www.newspapers.com)

The mysterious Doctor Du Brange

While researching in the British Newspaper Archive, Kilburn historians Dick Weindling and Marianne Colloms discovered a practitioner with the unusual name of Du Brange. They were intrigued to find that he appeared in court several times. I’m intrigued too, as Du Brange has a lot of similarities with other London medical advertisers I’ve studied – especially […]

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Dr Wheeler and the Bacillus of Death

In May 1895, a low-key but intriguing advertisement appeared in British local newspapers. What could this ‘death microbe’ be? Did it refer to the lethal pathogens such as anthrax and tuberculosis that had been identified within the past two decades? Announcements of newly isolated bacilli regularly reached the general population through the press (in 1889, […]

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The Alleged Bogus Lady Doctor

The bogus lady doctor

In a recent post for the British Newspaper Archive, I mentioned Maria Owen, who posed as a doctor in late Victorian Birmingham. Here’s some more information about her, adapted from my book, The Quack Doctor: ‘I can cure you,’ the representative of the Ladies’ Medical Association told 37-year-old Julia Ann Ralph. ‘If you will trust […]

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Advertisement for the Rev E J Silverton, 1884

Detective Caminada and the quack doctors

Angela Buckley’s book, The Real Sherlock Holmes: The Hidden Story of Jerome Caminada, published in March 2014, tells the story of a real-life Victorian supersleuth. In this guest post, Angela relates Caminada’s encounter with an ecclesiastical con merchant touting a dodgy elixir. . Urban life in Victorian England was precarious enough, but in Manchester it was […]

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A Patent-Medicine Song, 1892

Some of the most famous patent medicine brands of the late Victorian era found their way into this humorous song by John Johnston, MD, in 1892. Originally from Dumfriesshire, Johnston settled in Bolton in the 1870s and worked as a general practitioner, also devoting time to literary pursuits. During the 1880s he became a regular […]

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The New and Delightful Method - Punch vol 45 p175

‘A new sensation’ – hair-brushing by machinery

Among the gems released into the public domain by the British Library last December is an advertisement for Batkin & Kent, Hairdressers and Perfumers of Stafford, (or Staffford – whoever proofread it probably hoped it would disappear with the next edition of the book rather than re-emerge on the internet 128 years later, but c’est […]

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