[Low-Tech/High-Tech] Looting and Improvising arms and armour in Victorian London

[Icelander]

As noted in other threads about one of my current campaigns, my PCs are trapped in a section of London's East End in 1888. They were attending a wake at a fairly substantial town house on Whitechapel High Street, an island of quiet luxury just a minute's walk from squalid misery in the side streets around, when everything changed and strangeness reigned.

Some unimaginable catastrophe took place on the afternoon of Friday of 2nd November, 1888. First, the streets were enveloped in choking, thick fog, excessive even for Victorian London. Strange creatures roamed the fog and many things, living and unliving, were twisted all out of recognition. When night fell, the fog abated for a short time around midnight, showing that the very stars were altered, with most of them blinked out of existence and only a few constellations shining brightly. All who saw them were disquieted, but those savvy to occult significance were even more worried, as the stars formed clear symbols for all the worst decans of Hermetic astrology.

The strange creatures and twisted survivors out on the streets do not seem to be eager to penetrate the sanctums of home and hearth, where families inhabit a dwelling they have made their own. Houses of worship and holy ground seem to give them pause as well, particularly if the faithful and their ministers are around to add their prayers to the sanctity of the ground. Anyone walking the streets or staying in inns, doss houses, taverns or other ground not counting as home, however, is prey to the monsters outside.

The worst gangs of armed criminals roam fairly freely, the dangers of monsters and mutation of their bodies being outweighed by the chance of loot. Some of the less reckless or more civil-minded among East End's criminal fraternity have banded together with other survivors for mutual protection, however, even taking refuge in churches and subjecting to the discipline of priests and churchwardens.

It has now been around 36 hours since the catastrophe. There are no news of anywhere to the north of Bethnal Green Road and the survivors that the PCs have spoken with have rarely any direct knowledge of what is happening even a block north of Whitechapel and Aldgate High Street. The PCs themselves have scouted south, to find that the Thames is not the Thames and that whatever is beyond the dark and terrifying waters of this new river, it is not London. In any case, strange grey men patrol around the railways around the defunct Minories Stations and beyond that, there is a ragged army of criminals and foreigners who have taken over the Royal Mint and are besieging the London Tower.

Walking west Aldgate High Street seems to cause some misdirection or memory loss, with a few survivors who have gone there having come back from the east, claiming that they found themselves coming down Whitechapel Road. The stories they tell of the London Hospital add to the terror every survivor feels at the thought of going further east than where Whitechapel High Street turns into Whitechapel Road.

This means that the PCs and whatever survivors they have collected together in the St. Botolph's church by Aldgate station (near Mitre Square and Butchers' Row), at the corner where Houndsditch and the Minories meet Aldgate High Street, now live in a section of the East End which is for all practical purposes bounded in all directions:

• By a two to three block zone north of Aldgate and Whitechapel High.
• By Fenchurch Street Terminal/Station to the west.
• By the ruins of the burned St. Mary's Church on Whitechapel High Street / Whitechapel Road to the east.
• By the railway tracks at that run past the closed Minories Station (currently Victoria Rail Depot / Royal Mint Street Depot).

PCs being PCs, the party has determined to sally out of their island of (relative) safety at the church to prevent a mass human sacrifice by whatever mysterious occult overlords appear to be in control of the army of criminals by the Royal Mint and the Tower of London.

One of the PCs, Col. H.E. Wilkinson, has rooms near the Royal Mint where he keeps his expedition gear and is confident that his gun cabinet will furnish adequate means to tackle any foe. The others have some captured weapons, melee and ranged, and they have managed to arm a few refugees from a gun cabinet in the town house, as well as shotguns and pistols that an armed band of kidnappers working for the villains was carrying.

More arms are urgently needed, however. The citizens' militias that are springing up among such groups as the allegiance of patriotic and civic minded criminals with the Anglican churchwardens of St. Botolph's church, Jews of the Great Synagogue, the German Catholics in Whitechapel and the Irish Catholics of Father MacManus' congregation cannot go unarmed as they patrol the streets and send out foraging expeditions to bring back supplies.

Also, the player of Father MacManus has asked Reza Aisenstadt, the wife of Jacob Aisenstadt, the respected kosher butcher of Butchers' Row in Aldgate, to sew him some armour out of butcher's aprons. He wants a thick inner layer of tough leather and then he wants to protect his chest and back with something metal, wrapping the final product in another layer of leather.

I had thought that finding some iron or steel chains, wrapping them tightly around the Chest hit location and linking them together with some small metal links or even nails that are bent for the purpose could answer.

The total weight of the armour can be around 60 lbs. It does not need to cover the legs, other than the very top of the thighs that will naturally be covered if some protection for the Abdomen and Groin is provided with an apron that hangs down below groin level. Wrapped chains around the forearms would be good too, in order to be able to parry knives and swords.

I expect that as layered armour, it will result in a DX penalty, but the player does not want more than -1 DX. The outer layer of leather might therefore be Light Leather or perhaps count as integral in the layer of metal, as it is merely meant to provide a material to sew the metal reinforcing into place.

Here is what armament the four PCs are currently carrying. There are about a dozen survivors at St. Botolph's church who wouldn't be completely useless with a firearm, but haven't got one yet. Among the congregation of the Great Synagogue, who are also the people who live around Aldgate, there are also several dozens who could use firearms if some were acquired. The PCs and teams of survivors in foraging parties must therefore scour the area for weapons, armour and shields as well as food, water, medical supplies and other supplies. This post discusses the kind of threats that foraging parties most often face, along with what that means for their armour requirements.

This post is about what self-defence weapons one could expect to find lying around. I also had some thoughts on nearby police stations.

1) What weapons can I expect to be found in this area of London's East End in 1888?

--- 1a) Where would one find them?

---- 1b) Would immigrants from Germany, Russia, Ukraine or Poland be likely to own any firearms? What about those of them who are veterans of a European military?

--- 1c) Is there any place near Aldgate High Street where you could expect to find ammunition? Are there gun stores in the East End?

2) Are there any blacksmith shops or foundries within the area specified in 1888?*

--- 2a) Assuming there are, what is the nearest area with one to the St. Botolph's Church in Aldgate?

--- 2b) How much could be done to improvise weapons and armour from the typical contents of a foundry or blacksmith's shop in 2-3 hours?

3) What are reasonable GURPS stats for Father MacManus' proposed armour, assuming that he finds chain of various thickness and something to link the chains together and that Reza Aisenstadt is a fine seamstress who has a lot of leather and protective leather aprons available to her?

--- 3a) Could the sewing be done in an hour, two or three or would it inevitably take longer? She'd be starting from clothing that already counts as armour; leather butcher's aprons, layering them and together to make armour and then sewing an outside covering on to keep the chains in place.

*I have period maps, but they do not specify types of shops. Someone who lives in London or is familiar with its history, particularly East End's history, might know where there is a street where blacksmiths traditionally worked there or about any foundries that might have been founded in the Victorian era, but survived into the 20th century.