Oliver Twist · Chapter
The Pursuit and Escape explained
Bill Sikes hides in Jacob's Island, a squalid slum, after murdering Nancy.
What happens
Bill Sikes hides in Jacob's Island, a squalid slum, after murdering Nancy. He is confronted by Charley Bates, who denounces him and tries to raise the alarm. A mob surrounds the house, and during the chaos, Sikes attempts to escape by rope but accidentally hangs himself. His dog falls into the ditch and dies.
Themes in this chapter
Crime and Punishment
Sikes's violent death by hanging serves as a form of poetic justice for his murder of Nancy, highlighting the theme of retribution.
Innocence and Corruption
Charley Bates, once a corrupted child thief, shows a moral awakening by denouncing Sikes, contrasting his earlier innocence with the corruption of the criminal world.
Social Injustice and Poverty
The vivid depiction of Jacob's Island underscores the extreme poverty and decay that drive characters to crime and desperation.
Characters to notice
- Bill Sikes
The murderer, hiding in Jacob's Island, is confronted by Charley Bates and later accidentally hangs himself while trying to escape the mob.
- Charley Bates
Horrified by Sikes's crime, he denounces him and tries to alert the crowd, even physically attacking Sikes.
- Toby Crackit
One of the men hiding with Sikes in Jacob's Island, he is present during the confrontation and the mob's attack.
- Tom Chitling
Another of the men hiding with Sikes, referred to as Mr. Chitling in the chapter.
- Kags
A returned transport and robber, also hiding with Sikes in Jacob's Island.
Key passages
“Near to that part of the Thames on which the church at Rotherhithe abuts, where the buildings on the banks are dirtiest and the vessels on the river blackest with the dust of colliers and the smoke of close-built low-roofed houses, there exists the filthiest, the strangest, the most extraordinary of the many localities that are hidden in London, wholly unknown, even by name, to the great mass of its inhabitants.”
Near the Rotherhithe church on the Thames, where the riverside is dirtiest and the ships are blackened by coal dust and smoke, lies a hidden, filthy, and strange area unknown to most Londoners.
The narrator introduces Jacob's Island as a squalid, obscure slum.
“Witness you three—I'm not afraid of him—if they come here after him, I'll give him up; I will. I tell you out at once. He may kill me for it if he likes, or if he dares, but if I am here I'll give him up. I'd give him up if he was to be boiled alive. Murder! Help! If there's the pluck of a man among you three, you'll help me. Murder! Help! Down with him!”
Charley Bates declares he will betray Sikes to the authorities, even at the risk of being killed, and calls for help to bring him down.
Charley Bates confronts Sikes and tries to rally the others to capture him.
“The eyes again! he cried in an unearthly screech. Staggering as if struck by lightning, he lost his balance and tumbled over the parapet. The noose was on his neck. It ran up with his weight, tight as a bowstring, and swift as the arrow it speeds. He fell for five-and-thirty feet. There was a sudden jerk, a terrific convulsion of the limbs; and there he hung, with the open knife clenched in his stiffening hand.”
Sikes, terrified by a vision of Nancy's eyes, loses his balance and falls, accidentally hanging himself with the rope he had prepared for escape.
Sikes's accidental death by hanging is described in vivid, dramatic detail.