Teaching Historical Fiction with "A Whitechapel Night."

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A foggy London alley. Blood soaked fingers. Is he the killer? Or a vigilante?

My students like me because I’m pretty.
Okay, not true. I have been teaching for seven and a half years, and I almost quit after year one, but that is a story for another time. God is in it, for sure.
But, this story is about why my students like me, kind of. When I first began my teaching career, most students didn’t like me. My sarcasm hit wrong, and I was still trying to teach the way I had been taught. A few students did get me, and I always seem to have a small crazy fan club for some strange reason, but it took a while for my English classes to be liked by the majority instead of the minority.
I owe a lot of the change in popularity to my writing. Don’t get me wrong, very few of the students ever read my books. It is not really about my writing; I have just learned to teach differently because I am a writer, and the students responded. Also, my sarcasm finally wormed its way into their stone cold hearts. Go figure.
I teach to help them understand the power of words. My entire class is devoted to showing them that, if they work at it, they can be a good writer, and that makes them a good thinker. They don’t have to be right the first time. Writing is about trial and error; you just have to get something on the page and then figure out how to alter and manipulate the words until it works. Learning is often the same, especially at the high school level. I show them that words have power, and they appreciate that.
There is one unit that I always teach: writing a historical fiction. To be able to write a historical fiction short story, not only do they have to learn writing technique, they first have to figure out what they think is interesting from history and then research it. They get to interact with history in an authentic way, with curiosity. Then, they get the chance to change the world or just one person’s life. Students complain because that is their way, but I can tell they enjoy the assignment. It is nothing like anything they have ever done before. Also, I get to have a little fun.
I prime the lesson by having them read a short story called “A Whitechapel Night.” It takes them on a journey through Jack the Ripper’s London and forces them to ask if the main character’s actions make him a monster or a hero.
We read the story, define vocabulary, and argue about whether the main character is Jack the Ripper or if he is hunting Jack. They bring up evidence for both sides without being able to completely decide. I love this conversation because that is exactly how I designed it. I wrote the story specifically to be their example for the assignment. I give it to them without my name on it, so they read it cold. About the point they start getting frustrated about who the main character really is, I tell them that if they will go through the story and figure out through research what parts I changed from history and what I kept accurate, maybe we can figure out who the main character is meant to be.
Most of them don’t notice what I said. But someone always does. “Wait, you wrote this?” I don’t teach much of my own writing, but I have my books at the front of my room all year. Still, they are surprised I wrote something that was actually good. Thanks guys.
It is a good story, albeit a bit dark, and the students like it, but I have noticed a trend in the stories they write for the unit. Multiple students write about serial killers. I have been asking myself, “Is my story acting like a primer?” Probably. So, in comes my experiment.
After five years of using “A Whitechapel Night” to teach the unit, I am changing things up. I wrote a brand new short story for the unit. No serial killers involved. Still a bit dark, though. I will get to that story in another post, but I wrote it to see if a new type of example story would prime my students away from serial killers. I am curious to see what happens.
So, here is what we, you and I, are going to do. I have two stories that I like. I am going to share the serial killer one in this post (it is dark with some blood but safe) and the other story in my next post. Then maybe one day I can get back to you the results.
Now, I am just going to share my writing, because that is what I like to do. The story I am about to share has always been well received by my students, so I hope you enjoy it as well.
A Whitechapel Night
Mist curled around Thomas Bond’s grime spattered boots, but it shied away from his hands, smeared with sticky red as they were. The London vapors also avoided the two misshapen piles on the street in front of him. It was like the restless souls of the city had coalesced in the air to watch and rebuke him. He would call it an ill omen, but those thoughts were reserved for folk who still cared, who still saw the gap between sin and salvation. Thomas couldn’t see that gap… not anymore. His hands trembled as he watched the blood drip from the tips of his fingers.
… will find my observations, concerning the connections between the three cases you assigned me, on the other papers contained herein. All three of the victims in question sustained eerily similar mutilations. My conclusions are disturbing at best. I do not wish to imagine the agony these women undoubtedly suffered as they expired. 
The parallels to the other two cases I brought to your attention earlier are more tenuous. Although I see alarming correlations, I cannot give a definitive answer at this time. I give further explanation in my reports. 
Thomas paused in his letter to the inspector. How much more information could he give without becoming too involved? He wanted his name left out of this, at least for now. He glanced over his notes and observations once more and nodded in satisfaction. After scribbling an injunction for the inspector to keep him in the loop, he signed the letter and rolled it together with the reports. He stood, grabbed his coat and bag, and checked his pocket watch. The ticking hands read 8:15; time was running short. With hurried strides, he left his office for the front desk. 
Once in the atrium, he left his papers on the desk with a note for the clerk to have a runner dispatched with the papers in the morning. He exited the building quickly then and hailed a passing cab as it trundled along the cobbles outside. The carriage slowed to a stop nearby as the driver tightened the reins and set the brake. 
“I’m almost off me shift. Ho’ far ya going?” the coachman asked angrily.
“Corner of Mansell and Leadenhal.”
The coachman spit onto the street and gave Thomas an open glare. “I can’t take ya tha’ far. Tha’s all the way over by Whitechapel, tha’ is. Me shift is nearly done. ‘Sides, nothing goods been happenin’ over there of late. Some say there’s a Ripper taken ‘em righ’ off the street.”
Thomas ignored the warning. He produced a wad of rolled bills and held it up.
The man’s eyes widened ever so slightly at the money. He glanced around then snatched the payment and shoved it deep into his coat pocket. “All righ’ then, in ya go.”
He climbed into the coach, which leapt immediately into motion as the door shut. Thomas watched the gas lamps flicker in the growing mist as the coach swayed and bounced along the uneven London streets. Midnight. He must be in position before midnight, or the entire day would be wasted.
The coach stopped at the corner of Mansell and Leadenhall long enough for Thomas to clamber out and shut the door behind him. The coachman tipped his hat and snapped the reins to get the horses moving again. They clopped loudly down the street as Thomas began walking into Whitechapel. He checked his watch again: 10:15. Good. He had time to disappear.
Whitechapel lay in a grim twilight. The flickering light from the gas lamps barely managed to cut through the thick smog. On other streets, more important streets, arc lights seemed to all but ignore the vapor as their industrial bulbs nearly burned the mist out of the air. But Jack the Ripper did not hunt near the arc lights, and Jack was why Thomas was in Whitechapel.
Near the center of the district, he spotted an alley between two tall buildings. It was long and dark. Perfect. He glanced around, and, spotting no curious eyes, he merged into the dank darkness, moving quietly. Just inside the mouth of the alley, but far enough to be out of reach of the weak light from the gas lamps, Thomas found a deep recess in the architecture of one of the buildings. He ducked into it and leaned back out to check his view of the rest of the alley. Satisfied, he settled in for a long wait in the dark. 
As the cold finally numbed Thomas’s toes and threatened to begin eating through his coat, a muffled giggle echoed off the smooth walls. He started and moved to watch the opening to the street. Indistinct voices reached his ears through the darkness. His heart pulsed in his neck as he waited, muscles tense. Three brutal murders in Whitechapel, five if you listened to the papers, over the last three months. But that didn’t stop the usuals from walking the streets at night. It probably should. 
Two figures, arm in arm, passed the mouth of the alley. Thomas reached for the knife in his bag, but the figures did not turn into the darkness of the unlit side passage. He relaxed and leaned back against the wall, calming his heart with slow steady breaths. The air around him felt charged with energy. Something was going to change tonight; he could feel it.
A shadow passed silently by him in the alley. He nearly yelled out but caught himself. Soft footfalls and the swish of loose cloth came to him now. He smelled a strawberry perfume mingling with the musty smell of mold and mildew from the alley. She was still too close, so he waited for her to move farther into the darkness. More footfalls, heavier this time, warned him of another approaching body. He willed the night to enclose him, not that it listened, as the newcomer slunk past. Thomas saw the man’s broad shoulders and top hat even in the gloom. The stranger held a long, slim object in front of him. 
Thomas slipped his hand into his bag and gripped the knife as he waited for the two figures to move just far enough into the alley. He wondered idly how much blood the alleys of London had seen through the ages. Probably more than enough; how much more would it take before the city broke? The alley refused to answer his thoughts, so he held the knife tightly in his hand and crept out to follow a fresh trail. 
Too late. Thomas lowered his quaking hands and looked at the bodies. He was a surgeon, this shouldn’t bother him. But it did. He had tried to prevent this. Hadn’t he? Tried to fix Whitechapel. In the end, his efforts didn’t matter. He was too late. Too late for the girl with the strawberry perfume, too late for the man in the Top Hat, and too late to help Thomas Bond. He turned away from the bodies and quickly vanished in the mists as he hurried home. He realized now that it had always been too late to help anyone.
End.
See the mystery? After my students take the night to research and analyze the structure of the thing, we come back to class and discuss what they found. They really get into the research, and it is always fun to see what they found out about this event in history. At the end of our discussion, we come back around to who is Thomas Bond? The killer or a vigilante?
Short pause for dramatic effect.
“I don’t know,” I say. They stare at me. I explain that I wrote it with the intent to be ambiguous and that I told myself not to decide if he was Jack the Ripper or not. General chaos ensues for a moment, I regain control of the class, and we move on.
Okay, you got me. There is no chaos after my announcement. A few students give me angry looks, but that is about all. I take what I can get.
So, next time I will post my new story: “Vermintide.”
Hope you you enjoyed a foray into foggy, bloody London.
Happy reading!

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