Whipping Tom

"Whipping Tom" was the nickname given to attackers involved in three episodes of sexual assaults in London and the nearby village of Hackney. In all three, women walking alone were attacked and their buttocks thrashed, sometimes leading to serious injuries and—in one case—miscarriage and death.

While there is some evidence that the first attacker in around 1672 was nicknamed "Whipping Tom" and carried out such attacks on women, only scant details are seen in one contemporary record. For the Whipping Tom of 1681 there are more complete records. He would approach unaccompanied women in alleys and courtyards at the east side of the city, bend them over his knee, lift their dress and spank them on the buttocks before fleeing. The speed of his attacks and disappearances led many to think he had supernatural powers. The inability of the authorities to apprehend the offender caused complaints about the ineffectiveness of London's watchmen, and prompted vigilante patrols in the affected areas. Two men were captured and imprisoned for the attacks, one of whom was a local haberdasher.

A third attacker nicknamed "Whipping Tom" was active in late 1712 in Hackney, then a village outside London. This attacker would approach lone women and beat them on their buttocks with a birch rod, violently enough to draw blood. Around 70 attacks were carried out before a local man named Thomas Wallis was captured and confessed to the attacks. He was sentenced to imprisonment for one year, during which he was to be birched twice a week by two maids. He was also to be stood in the pillory five times during the year and on his release made to run the gauntlet through two hundred women.