“Let the bitch burn!” Joseph Tucker, a 32-year-old shoemaker, shouted as neighbours tried desperately to put out the fire in his home in Trumpet Street, Nottingham. “The bitch” was his girl friend, Elizabeth Williams, 32, over whom he had just poured paraffin before setting her alight.

Tucker and Elizabeth had lived together for nine years and both were alcoholics who were violent when drunk. After their usual Saturday night binge on May 9th, 1885, they returned home to Trumpet Street, where Tucker kicked and punched her before setting her on fire.

The neighbours failed to save Elizabeth, who died in hospital six days later, and Tucker was hanged on Monday, August 3rd, 1885.