June & Jennifer Gibbons (The 'Silent Twins')

[Spookdaddy]

I remember them getting off the bus at Lower Clapton road, and all the passengers would sigh with relief lol.

The Chaplin sisters look disconcertingly like my late Irish grandmother did at their age.

But she was terrifying, rather than just a bit odd.

 

[Spookdaddy]

Not the best quality, but there's a full version of the documentary here (and it was Channel 4):

 

[Mythopoeika]

I remember seeing twins who looked like these ladies, back in 1981 or 1982 in Bracknell town centre.
They were gabbling to each other (in sync) and looked odd. A friend said she'd seen them around town a few times and referred to them as 'The Twins'.
So it seems that there was a similar pair in Bracknell.

 

[Eyespy]

Reference elective mutism. This was back in the 90's .Our younger so rarely spoke before his third birthday. Communication was via signs or through his older brother. We were living in the Statesat the time so there was quite a of of medical interest is apparently bright infant who couldn't talk. shiny, new doctor spotted that the apparent silence was part of a game, rather than a defect. He came to this conclusion after askin Joe to put the re car in the garage, Joe promptly put a blue car in the house and fell about laughing.

Once he was rumbled we couldn't get Joe to shut up!

 

[hunck]

I remember them getting off the bus at Lower Clapton road, and all the passengers would sigh with relief lol.

Can’t imagine they were very threatening though. Odd yes but didn’t they pretty much keep themselves to themselves?

 

[Spookdaddy]

Can’t imagine they were very threatening though. Odd yes but didn’t they pretty much keep themselves to themselves?

Although, it's worth remembering that the Chaplin sisters did actually both serve time for breach of the peace. (I think it's possible that what we now think of as stalking and harassment would then have fallen under the 'breach of the peace' umbrella; whether the charge was specifically in relation to the harassment charges, or their behaviour in court, is difficult to work out from the meagre reports available.)

A custodial sentence (albeit a short one) smacks of aggravating factors - I'm not totally convinced it's something that would be handed out in the first instance in a case like this unless other factors were at play, and it might indicate behaviour a little more serious and sustained than just being a bit disconcerting. (Their psychiatrist apparently believed that they suffered from erotomania, a delusional disorder connected to some of the more severe cases of what we now define as stalking - so not a negligible condition.)

I kind of doubt that they were actually dangerous, but it is quite easy to see how the kind of behaviour evident at around 18:14 in the full documentary could be psychologically very intimidating. In this case, the subject of their attention is their parents (who were allegedly reclusive themselves), but if they behaved in a similar way with a stranger, like the lorry driver who took them to court, then you can see how and why he might have felt at best somewhat put upon, at worst, quite distressed. I mean, I'm generally pretty robust - but having two identical twins stare at me over the garden hedge for hours on end might well bring on a dose of the heebie-jeebies.

 

[catseye]

I had a job in the rag trade in Hackney early 80s which involved visiting various factories in the area which was at the time a hotbed of clothing factories & remember seeing the sisters occasionally. They were local ‘celebrities’ of a sort.

From this yorkpress article, when they were growing up in York,



And how kind of

Tang Hall still has a reputation for being 'somewhere you don't really want to go'.

 

[Floyd]

Although, it's worth remembering that the Chaplin sisters did actually both serve time for breach of the peace. (I think it's possible that what we now think of as stalking and harassment would then have fallen under the 'breach of the peace' umbrella; whether the charge was specifically in relation to the harassment charges, or their behaviour in court, is difficult to work out from the meagre reports available.)

A custodial sentence (albeit a short one) smacks of aggravating factors - I'm not totally convinced it's something that would be handed out in the first instance in a case like this unless other factors were at play, and it might indicate behaviour a little more serious and sustained than just being a bit disconcerting. (Their psychiatrist apparently believed that they suffered from erotomania, a delusional disorder connected to some of the more severe cases of what we now define as stalking - so not a negligible condition.)

I kind of doubt that they were actually dangerous, but it is quite easy to see how the kind of behaviour evident at around 18:14 in the full documentary could be psychologically very intimidating. In this case, the subject of their attention is their parents (who were allegedly reclusive themselves), but if they behaved in a similar way with a stranger, like the lorry driver who took them to court, then you can see how and why he might have felt at best somewhat put upon, at worst, quite distressed. I mean, I'm generally pretty robust - but having two identical twins stare at me over the garden hedge for hours on end might well bring on a dose of the heebie-jeebies.

'Aged 38 and residing at Howe Hill Hostel in York, the twins were prosecuted at the local magistrates' court for breach of the peace against Ken Iveson, a 56-year-old truck driver. It was said the twins had a crush on him and "accosted, harassed and abused" him until he was at the "end of his tether" with it'.

https://www.yorkpress.co.uk/news/18791775.obituary-freda-chaplin-yorks-famous-twin-dies-aged-77/

 

[Who me]

Yup I remember them two.I was working for a company putting new gas mains/pipes past the rowntree chocolate factory I think it was very very strange girls

 

[PeteS]

Although, it's worth remembering that the Chaplin sisters did actually both serve time for breach of the peace. (I think it's possible that what we now think of as stalking and harassment would then have fallen under the 'breach of the peace' umbrella; whether the charge was specifically in relation to the harassment charges, or their behaviour in court, is difficult to work out from the meagre reports available.)

A custodial sentence (albeit a short one) smacks of aggravating factors - I'm not totally convinced it's something that would be handed out in the first instance in a case like this unless other factors were at play, and it might indicate behaviour a little more serious and sustained than just being a bit disconcerting. (Their psychiatrist apparently believed that they suffered from erotomania, a delusional disorder connected to some of the more severe cases of what we now define as stalking - so not a negligible condition.)

I kind of doubt that they were actually dangerous, but it is quite easy to see how the kind of behaviour evident at around 18:14 in the full documentary could be psychologically very intimidating. In this case, the subject of their attention is their parents (who were allegedly reclusive themselves), but if they behaved in a similar way with a stranger, like the lorry driver who took them to court, then you can see how and why he might have felt at best somewhat put upon, at worst, quite distressed. I mean, I'm generally pretty robust - but having two identical twins stare at me over the garden hedge for hours on end might well bring on a dose of the heebie-jeebies.

As we now know it's proposed that staring at someone in that manner will become a criminal offence. How that will be treated where people do not have full capacity remains to be seen.