RipperCon-Baltimore 2016

[jmenges]

I thought I had read somewhere that Doyle was a signatory on the appeal(or made a public pronouncement) on the Ameer Ben Ali case, but for the life of me I couldn't locate a source. Does that sound familiar to anyone?

And thanks for the 'thanks', Chris. It my pleasure to release these. I saw that you've also shared the show over at Howard's site and I appreciate that as well.

All the best,

JM

[Pcdunn]

I thought I had read somewhere that Doyle was a signatory on the appeal(or made a public pronouncement) on the Ameer Ben Ali case, but for the life of me I couldn't locate a source. Does that sound familiar to anyone?
JM

http://britishheritage.com/sir-arthur-conan-doyle-and-the-case-of-george-edalji/

I saw a recent drama about Doyle investigating on behalf of this young man, though he is not Ameer Ben Ali. Still, he is a young man of foreign extraction living in England, and Doyle did assist him.

I do know, of course, that Ameer Ben Ali was the man apparently arrested wrongly in the Carrie Brown murder. When I searched for his name with Arthur Conan Doyle, I found only this:

https://books.google.com/books?id=1Oc_CgAAQBAJ&pg=PT123&lpg=PT123&dq=ameer+ben+ali+arthur+conan+doyle&source=bl&ots=Edm12wkHz9&sig=JG9aJT5DmNc79H1jGDsmO4Uu-Dc&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjutp3zoqjNAhVLXlIKHShOBwEQ6AEIHjAA#v=onepage&q=ameer%20ben%20ali%20arthur%20conan%20doyle&f=false

A novel called Holmes and Watson: An American Adventure by David Ruffle-- this excerpt from the e-book has Holmes discussing the Carrie Brown case with Watson, and includes his opinions on the unfortunate Ameer Ben Ali.

[Mayerling]

http://britishheritage.com/sir-arthu...george-edalji/
I saw a recent drama about Doyle investigating on behalf of this young man, though he is not Ameer Ben Ali. Still, he is a young man of foreign extraction living in England, and Doyle did assist him.

I do know, of course, that Ameer Ben Ali was the man apparently arrested wrongly in the Carrie Brown murder. When I searched for his name with Arthur Conan Doyle, I found only this:

https://books.google.com/books?id=1Oc_CgAAQBAJ&pg=PT123&lpg=PT123&dq=ameer+ben+ali+arthur+conan+doyle&source=bl&ots=Edm12wkHz9&sig=JG9aJT5DmNc79H1jGDsmO4Uu-Dc&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjutp3zoqjNAhVLXlIKHShOBwEQ6AEIHjAA#v=onepage&q=ameer%20ben%20ali%20arthur%20conan%20doyle&f=false

A novel called Holmes and Watson: An American Adventure by David Ruffle-- this excerpt from the e-book has Holmes discussing the Carrie Brown case with Watson, and includes his opinions on the unfortunate Ameer Ben Ali.

Hi Pat,

The drama you saw (I believe) was based on the George Edalji Case (the "Great Wyrlie" Cattle Mutilation Case of 1905), but it was fictionalized to become a series of murders as well.

Jeff

[jmenges]

I know that Doyle and Dr. Joseph Bell both lobbied on the behalf of Albert Patrick, the convicted murderer of William Rice, who finally won his freedom (deservedly or not) in 1912. This case was at the time considered "one of America's most remarkable murder cases" but is practically forgotten today.

http://murderpedia.org/male.P/p/patrick-albert.htm

JM

[Mayerling]

I know that Doyle and Dr. Joseph Bell both lobbied on the behalf of Albert Patrick, the convicted murderer of William Rice, who finally won his freedom (deservedly or not) in 1912. This case was at the time considered "one of America's most remarkable murder cases" but is practically forgotten today.

http://murderpedia.org/male.P/p/patrick-albert.htm

JM

There is a complete account of the murder of Rice (probably by Patrick) written about fifteen years ago by the Canadian Judge Martin Freidman, who also wrote the book "The Trials of Israel Lipski" in the 1980s. Rice, by the way, was the founder of Rice University in Texas (in fact the murder plot was to help disqualify a will setting up the endowment for the university). Rice was a wealthy speculator in cotton future.

Jeff

[Pcdunn]

Hi Pat,

The drama you saw (I believe) was based on the George Edalji Case (the "Great Wyrlie" Cattle Mutilation Case of 1905), but it was fictionalized to become a series of murders as well.

Jeff

Hi, Jeff,

Thanks for the information. I enjoyed that drama, but guessed it was rather dressed up for television.

Arthur Conan Doyle and Harry Houdini are currently teamed up in a Fox TV show called "Houdini & Doyle" which I've also been enjoying, despite some uneven episodes. Based loosely on their real-life acquaintance, the program gets its conflict from the skepticism of the escapologist and the open-minded attitude of the author to the "supernatural". Don't expect too much attention to be paid to history, just go with it.

[Shaggyrand]

Arthur Conan Doyle and Harry Houdini are currently teamed up in a Fox TV show called "Houdini & Doyle" which I've also been enjoying, despite some uneven episodes. Based loosely on their real-life acquaintance, the program gets its conflict from the skepticism of the escapologist and the open-minded attitude of the author to the "supernatural". Don't expect too much attention to be paid to history, just go with it.

Show would be so much better of they had cast a different Houdini... And hired some better writers. Guy who plays Doyle is solid though.

[Ozzy]

Thanks again Jonathan for the Rippercast.
I did notice that the URL for the pdf for the Doyle podcast has been typed with a space (%20) before "mp3". I use Firefox browser and it gives me a "Not Found".

Here's your URL/link

http://www.rippercast.com/%20mp3/Doyle.pdf

With the space removed the URL resolves correctly.

http://www.rippercast.com/mp3/Doyle.pdf

Thanks also to Janis Wilson and Christopher T. George.

[jmenges]

Thanks a lot, Ozzy!

I fixed it.



JM

[ChrisGeorge]

Hi Pat,

The drama you saw (I believe) was based on the George Edalji Case (the "Great Wyrlie" Cattle Mutilation Case of 1905), but it was fictionalized to become a series of murders as well.

Jeff

Hi Jeff and Pat --

Here is an article excerpted from John Dickson Carr's The Life of Sir Conan Doyle (Harper and Brothers, 1949) in which the author covers the Great Wyrlie Cattle Mutilation Case that we discuss briefly during the podcast. Seemingly the only time Doyle himself had active involvement in solving a true-crime "Ripper" case to the extent of helping to secure the release from prison of the accused man, George Edalji. See also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Edalji.

From the Boston Daily Globe, February 13, 1949.

[jmenges]

Rippercast brings you Prof. Charles Tumosa's presentation from Rippercon-Baltimore entitled 'The Forensic Time Machine-Looking Backwards'. Tumosa discusses modern day forensic document examination and how those techniques could (or could not) be applied to such items as the letters from 'Jack the Ripper' and the Maybrick Diary. He also touches on Patricia Cornwell's work on her preferred suspect, the artist Walter Sickert, during the Q&A portion of his talk.




FREE to stream or download from the following link:

http://www.casebook.org/podcast/listen.html?id=132

Thank you for listening!



JM

[GUT]

Thanks JM.

[Mayerling]

Hi Jeff and Pat --

Here is an article excerpted from John Dickson Carr's The Life of Sir Conan Doyle (Harper and Brothers, 1949) in which the author covers the Great Wyrlie Cattle Mutilation Case that we discuss briefly during the podcast. Seemingly the only time Doyle himself had active involvement in solving a true-crime "Ripper" case to the extent of helping to secure the release from prison of the accused man, George Edalji. See also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Edalji.

From the Boston Daily Globe, February 13, 1949.

Hi Chris,

Dickson Carr, by calling the person "Peter Hudson" was following a sense of care regarding not leaving himself up for a slander suit (similar to Jonathan Goodman not naming Richard Gordon Parry as his suspect for the murder of Julia Wallace, in his 1969 book on that killing, because Parry was still alive). Conan Doyle never named the perpetrator he fingered - his name was Royden Sharp, and his brother was John Sharp. If you can get a copy of Peter Costello's "The Real World of Sherlock Holmes; the True Crimes Investigated by Arthur Conan Doyle" (New York: Carroll & Graf, 1991), there is a good account of the Edalji Affair in Chapter IX (p. 70 - 93). While Mr. Costello supports Doyle's work on the case, he mentions that in recent years there has been a small fly in the ointment - the behavior of George Edalji's brother (also a solicitor) Horace Edalji, who apparently kept supplying information to the authorities that undercut George's claims of innocence. This behavior seems rather odd, and suggests a family squabble of some sort might be tied up to the background.

The effect of the Edalji Case in helping to set up the Office of Criminal Appeals (I think that is the name of it), it had some of the impetus for that reform, but the Edalji Case was timed with the more notorious Adolf Beck/William Thompson Affair in the British law courts from 1903 to 1907, wherein Mr Beck kept being arrested for breach of promise, and thefts actually committed by Thompson. Both men happened to bear reamarkably similar appearances. The only physical difference really was that Thompson was circumsized (something none of his female robbery victims ever had an opportunity to notice - one wonders if it would have been brought at a trial). Edalji did not get any money for his travails, but he was readmitted to practice law as a solicitor. Beck did get money for his prison sentence.

Given the story of the Edalji Case, one wonders if Sharp and his brother happened, when they were young boys, to read a story called "Silver Blaize" by Arthur Conan Doyle. One of the best of the Sherlock Holmes stories (and found in the second collection, "The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes") it is about a plot to destroy a champion race horse by laming it with a knife set to cut it's tendons. Instead the horse demonstrates it can protect itself.

Oddly enough, while the Edalji Case did not involve any murders, the follow-up big case that Conan Doyle got involved in was the murder of Marion Gilchrist in Glasgow, Scotland in 1908, for which a Jewish German named Oscar Slater was arrested, tried, and convicted. Eventually Doyle and others, including Lt. Trench of the Glasgow Police, and William Roughead (the criminal historian and Scottish law court official) managed to get the release of Slater and compensation for him. However, Mrs. Gilchrist was battered to death (probably by an associate of a relative of her's), not slashed and cut up.

Jeff

[ChrisGeorge]

Hi Jeff

All good stuff. Many thanks for your correctives as to how the Edalji Case went down and Conan Doyle's involvement -- or should we say, very selective involvement?

Best regards

Chris

[Steadmund Brand]

Thank you again Jonathan, was great to be able to hear this once again, I was lucky enough to be there in person, and couldn't wait till this came out as a Rippercast....excellent work!!

Steadmund Brand