author
Ike Matthews
1857–1913
A working rat-catcher who turned years of practical experience into a lively, unusually specific guide to one of city life’s oldest problems. His surviving book offers a rare ground-level look at pest control, ferreting, and everyday labor in late Victorian England.
1 Audiobook
About the author
Very little biographical information about Ike Matthews appears to be widely documented online beyond the dates commonly attached to his name and the evidence of his writing. He is best known for Full Revelations of a Professional Rat-catcher After 25 Years' Experience, a practical firsthand account drawn from his work catching rats and handling ferrets.
The book is part memoir, part manual. Rather than writing from a distance, Matthews describes the trade from lived experience, sharing methods, observations, and stories from urban rat-catching. That gives his work an unusual value today: it preserves the voice of a skilled working specialist whose subject was rarely treated in such direct detail.
Because reliable sources on his personal life are scarce, it is safest to remember him through that surviving work and the world it captures. Even in a small volume, Matthews comes across as observant, confident, and deeply familiar with the rough practical knowledge his readers wanted.