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Sweeney Todd Research Paper

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Sweeney Todd is a name known far and wide throughout 1785, London. He is referred to as a monster by many people, though how many know the history behind his mass murder spree? Sweeney was born on October 26, 1756, in East London. His parents were both silk weavers, his father, however, was an abusive drunk. He would often come home under the influence and would beat both his wife and his only child. His mother, however, would kiss him and call him a pretty boy. Though Todd didn’t quite like that, as he’d later said, “I used to wish I was strong enough to throttle her. What the devil did she bring me into this world for, unless she had plenty of money to give me so that I might enjoy myself in it?” Sweeney would escape his parents to …show more content…

It is unknown how he had survived, being only twelve years old. Though the following year, he’d gotten a job as an apprentice cutler to a man named John Crook. His apprenticeship didn’t last long, for in 1770 he was sentenced to five years in prison for petty theft, where he had become the assistant of the prison barber, called Plummer. Though even now, Sweeney hadn’t escaped the beatings as the older prison boys wasn’t too nice to him. When Sweeney exited the prison at age 19, he used his skills to become a street corner barber and, after five years, opened his own shop near Hyde Park Corner. Then, he was helped by a woman, whom he was supposedly married, despite the lack of an actual marraige. Sweeney’s first blood was in December of 1784, when an intoxicated man had stumbled in for a shaving, saying how he had had favors from a young woman, whom Todd had concluded to be his wife. He then cut the man’s throat ear to ear. I believe Mr. Todd wasn’t a “monster”, but a man who wanted justice. He had grown with a twisted home life and hadn’t had the best role models to show him how he was supposed to act. Call him what you will, but I believe him to be a hero of

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