Sometimes "Spring Heeled Jack" pops up in literature sometimes as a villain, sometimes as a hero erhaps even an early ancestor of modern superheroes. The strange bit is the fact that Spring Heeled Jack is based on real events and a real person from Victorian era England who purportedly leapt over walls and onto rooftops easily, assaulted men, accosted women, blew gouts of flame from his mouth, and always eluded capture while laughing with mad mirth.

The first confirmed sightings of old Spring Heel were in London of September 1837 though there is speculation that he was in action some twenty years previous. A man walking home late one night reported a muscular male with devilishly pointed ears and glowing red eyes had leapt over the tall cemetery fence with ease and landed right in front of him. This witness did not report being attacked or harassed by Jack, making him one of the lucky few.

Shortly later a barmaid named Polly Adams was found laying in the street in a state of semi undress. She reported that she’d been attacked by a man of the same evil features who has ripped off the top of her blouse, grabbed her naked breasts with his corpse-cold hands, and deeply scratched her belly with his claws.

Who or what Spring Heeled Jack really was are things we may never know. We’ll just have to make due with the dozens of police reports that attest that he has, indeed, haunted the streets of London