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Edward 'The Boy' Jones

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The Resume

    (1824-December 26, 1893)
    Resided in Bell Yard, London
    Son of a Westminster tailor
    Dubbed 'The Boy Jones' by British Victorian-era newspapers
    Notorious (repeat offender) intruder onto the Buckingham Palace grounds, between 1838 and 1841
    First apprehended, at the age of 14, disguised as a chimney sweep, with Queen Victoria's underwear stuffed down his trousers (1838)
    Inspired the popular children's book, Thodore Bonnett's 'The Mudlark' (1949)
    Details of his activities profiled in Jan Bondeson's 'Queen Victoria's Stalker' (2010)

Why he might be annoying:

    He was the original 'celebrity stalker.'
    He made several attempts to go AWOL from the Navy and was brought back each time.
    He spent his final years as a drunk and a burglar.
    His memorial plaque inaccurately printed that he snuck into Windsor Castle (by all common accounts, it was Buckingham).
    He shares a name with a prominent Investment Brokerage company (which, in itself, sounds like the name of a one-hit wonder music synthesizer).
    The 'Mudlark' made him into an innocent 7-year old waif 'in search of for a mother' who motivates the recently-widowed Queen to return to public life (it wasn't that glamorous...)
    After his initial capture, he falsely gave his name as Edward Cotton and claimed to have been born in the palace (later claiming to have been living there for only a year, after having come from Hertfordshire).
    In addition to the Queen's underwear, he reportedly had stolen a regimental sword from the palace, but he was acquitted by the jury anyway.
    It isn't known how many times he actually did sneak in and out of the palace undetected, but it is known that he scaled a Buckingham Palace Wall shortly after the Queen gave birth (leaving later that night).
    He was apprehended again, this time found by a nurse hiding underneath a sofa in the Queen's dressing room. What was mainly thought to be cute at the age of 14 was considered a felony at the age of 16; he was sentenced to three months in the House of Corrections (Dec. 1, 1840).
    Efforts to persuade him to join the Navy after his release failed. Soon after, he was arrested again on the Buckingham Palace grounds shortly after leaving one of the Royal apartments; neither funny nor cute anymore, he was this time sentenced to three months' hard labor (Mar. 2, 1841).
    He died in Australia while serving as a local town crier, after falling off the parapet of the east side of the Mitchell River bridge while drunk and landing on his head (autopsies showing that he slowly bled to death).

Why he might not be annoying:

    He was a master of disguise.
    He inspired a criminally underrated Irene Dunne-Alec Guinness movie.
    His first break-in followed his father turning him out into the street. He was an avid sketch artist.
    He had reportedly made his intentions to break into the palace loud and clear to anyone who would listen, but they didn't take him seriously.
    His story was a tabloid journalist's dream come true (or the Victorian equivalent to that anyway).
    He tried to change his name, in his adulthood, to Thomas Jones to avoid negative attention, but it generally didn't work.
    He was buried in an unmarked grave that was never located.
    The negative publicity surrounding the series of break-ins brought about increased security and reform in the Royal Guard's protocol.
    It was jokingly suggested that he was 'a descendant of In-I-Go Jones,' the famed London architect of the Renaissance, which would explain his knowledge of the structure of the royal palace.
    He serves as a reminder that Queen Victoria didn't always look like an overgrown chipmunk with walnuts in her mouth; although its funnier to believe that this is the Queen he was stalking (available portraiture indicates that she was truly stunning during the period he broke in).

Credit: BoyWiththeGreenHair


Featured in the following Annoying Collections:

Year In Review:

    In 2023, Out of 3 Votes: 0% Annoying
    In 2022, Out of 2 Votes: 50.0% Annoying
    In 2021, Out of 5 Votes: 60.0% Annoying
    In 2020, Out of 9 Votes: 33.33% Annoying
    In 2019, Out of 445 Votes: 61.80% Annoying
    In 2018, Out of 7 Votes: 42.86% Annoying
    In 2017, Out of 2 Votes: 100% Annoying
    In 2016, Out of 24 Votes: 50.0% Annoying
    In 2015, Out of 22 Votes: 54.55% Annoying