Alice McKenzie

Alice McKenzie was born Alice Pitts on March 8th 1845 in the Precincts of Peterborough Minster (Cathedral), Cambridgeshire (England) to Charles, a post office messenger, and Martha, neé Watson. She had four older siblings, William, John, Martha and Jane, and two younger brothers, Charles and Thomas.

Around 1860, when she was 15, Alice worked for Mrs Strickland in her refreshment rooms in St. John Street, Peterborough.

In 1861, aged 17, Alice no longer lived with her family, but in the household of a master brazier named Edward Miller in High Cross Street, Leicester where she was employed as a house servant.

On October 11th 1863 Alice Pitts marries Joseph Kinsey or McKenzie, a 21-year-old chair and cabinet maker at All Saints Church, Leicester.

Three years later, on 21st July 1866 they became parents of Joseph James at Freeman's Common, St Mary.

The following year, on 18th February 1867 Joseph Kinsey died aged 25 of tuberculosis at the same place. Alice was around 22.

From 1883 Alice lived, off and on, with an Irishman named John McCormack (also Bryant) who was in the employ of some Jewish tailors in Hamburg Street as a porter, at various East End common lodging and doss-houses.

On Wednesday 17th July 1889, at 12:45am it began to rain in Whitechapel. Five minutes later, P. C. Andrews returned to Castle Alley on his regular beat, about twenty-seven minutes having passed since he left the area. This time, however, he discovered the body of a woman lying on the pavement, her head angled toward the curb and her feet toward the wall. Blood flowed from two stabs in the left side of her neck and her skirts had been lifted, revealing blood across her abdomen, which had been mutilated. It would be several hours before the body was identified, in the meantime a description was circulated to the newspapers, with one peculiarity: part of the nail on the thumb on the left hand was deficient. The papers also mentioned the clay pipe found near the body.

Sadly, on October 12th of the same year baby Joseph James died of 'marasmus' (a form of malnutrition) at 4 Joseph Street, St. Mary, Leicester.