Martha Tabram (née White; 10 May 1849 – 7 August 1888) was an English woman killed in a spate of violent murders in and around the Whitechapel district of East London between 1888 and 1891. She may have been the first victim of the still-unidentified Jack the Ripper. Although not one of the canonical five Ripper victims who historians have broadly acknowledged, she is considered the next most likely candidate. Early life Tabram was born Martha White in Southwark, London, on 10 May 1849. She was the youngest of five children born to Charles Samuel White, a warehouseman, and his wife, Elisabeth Dowsett. Her older siblings (in order of birth) included Henry White, Stephen White, Esther White and Mary Ann White. She was 5 feet 3 inches tall and had dark hair. In May 1865, her parents separated; six months later her father died suddenly. Later she went to live with Henry Samuel Tabram, a foreman packer at a furniture warehouse. The two married on 25 December 1869. In 1871 the couple moved to a house close to Martha's childhood home. She and Henry had two sons: Frederick John Tabram (born February 1871) and Charles Henry Tabram (born December 1872). The marriage was troubled, due to Martha's drinking, which was heavy enough to cause alcoholic fits, and her husband left her in 1875. For about three years he paid her an allowance of 12 shillings a week, then reduced this to two shillings and sixpence when he heard she was living with another man. Tabram lived on and off with Henry Turner, a carpenter, from about 1876 until three weeks before her death. This relationship was also troubled by Martha's drinking and occasionally staying out all night. She, and her sons, were listed as being overnight inmates at the Whitechapel Union workhouse's casual ward at Thomas Street on the census night of 1881. By 1888 Turner was out of regular employment and the couple earned income by selling trinkets and other small articles on the streets, while lodging for about four months at 4 Star Place, off Commercial Road in Whitechapel. Around the beginning of July, they left abruptly, owing rent, and separated for the last time about the middle of that month. Tabram moved to a common lodging house at 19 George Street, Spitalfields. By the time of her death, Tabram's economic situation had become so desperate that she