The Five: The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper

by Hallie Rubenhold

The Victorian double standard was enshrined in law, permitting a man to enjoy as many sexual dalliances as he wished, so long as he did not also rape the servants, have sex with his sister and beat his wife too severely.

A drunken man was just as likely to beat his wife as was a sober husband who disapproved of his wife’s intoxication.

Not only were most of them born into working-class families, but they were born female.

They were women. They were human beings, and surely that, in itself, is enough.