S2 E6: "The Lady" of Gosfield Street

Bad Women: The Blackout Ripper

Pushkin Industries

History, True Crime

4.6 • 1.7K Ratings

🗓️ 8 November 2022

⏱️ 50 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Around Piccadilly she's known as "The Lady" - a quiet, rather remote figure. Widow Margaret Lowe tries to keep herself to herself and stay out of trouble - but trouble is never far away.

The other residents of her building on Gosfield Street are used to hearing crashes and cries in the dead of night. Margaret sells sex in her flat, and with the coming of war that's an increasingly dangerous business. But when her clients turn violent, "The Lady" can't turn to the police and her neighbours seldom lift a finger to help.

One night the man she brings the up stairs to her door is... the Blackout Ripper.

Sources:

Laite, Julia. Common Prostitutes and Ordinary Citizens: Commercial Sex in London, 1885 - 1960 (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012).

Laite, Julia. The Disappearance of Lydia Harvey: A True Story of Sex, Crime and the Meaning of Justice (London: Profile Books, 2021).

Philips, Jock. ‘History of Immigration - Depression: 1885 - 1900’, Te Ara - The Encyclopedia of New Zealand.

Philips, Jock. ‘History of Immigration - The Great Migration: 1871 - 1885’, Te Ara - The Encyclopedia of New Zealand.

Philips, Jock. ‘History of Immigration - Migration: 1900 to 1914’, Te Ara - The Encyclopedia of New Zealand.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Transcript

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0:00.0	A 34-year-old man was found bleeding to death on the street.
0:03.6	This man was Anthony Virgilio, Tony, to his friends.
0:07.3	Calvin Jones would spend 30 years in prison for Tony's murder.
0:11.0	And for 30 years, Calvin Jones would call my house and speak to my father.
0:15.7	What did my dad have to say to a convicted murderer?
0:19.2	When my dad died, he left behind a question.
0:22.2	Was he responsible for killing Tony Virgilio from Sonoro and Tenorfoot TV, the estate?
0:28.0	Listen to the estate wherever you get your podcasts.
0:36.8	Pushkin.
0:42.1	The other residents of Nine Gossfield Street are growing accustomed to
0:46.9	crashes and cries in the dead of night.
0:50.0	Help! Help! Help!
0:54.8	Commotion can be heard at Margaret Lowe's flat quite regularly.
0:58.5	Help! Please! Help!
0:59.8	This particular altercation has spilled out into the street.
1:04.4	The man who smashed through Margaret's door thinks better of lingering and flees into the night.
1:10.4	She puts up a spirited pursuit. Help! Please! Help! Help!
1:17.0	Look at this mess.
1:19.0	The next morning when a bruised and battered Margaret shows
1:22.2	neighbours for shattered door and ransacked apartment,
1:25.1	look at it, the lamp's broken.
1:27.4	She explains that a young Canadian soldier, a complete stranger,
	...

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