The Whitechapel Murders-Solved?

[Mike Covell]

Author John Plimmer has spent 31 years in the West Midlands Police, he was the Lead Investigations officer on over 30 murders, so this should be a good book.

I quickly began to read it but was disapointed to find that he had "Tried" to apply modern policing techniques to the investigation, and proves nothing!

It is easy to look back in hindsight and say "We should have done this..." but it does nothing for the case, and his investigation is full of errors.

The Location of the body on Bucks Row....is placed on the wrong side of the street, and as far as his forensic evidence goes, he has named the 25th Sept letter the "Lusk Letter"!!

And it goes down hill from there,

The second to last chapter is written like an interview between Jack the Ripper and Abberline, it is awful!!

And yes he does name a suspect, but I will let you read this one to find out who!!!

Amazon UK has copies on sale for £15.00!! Even the cover price is only £7.99!!

I managed to get my copy for just 1 Pence!!!! plus postage and package, but I feel robbed!!

[Tom_Wescott]

This is one of the few relatively recent books I didn't bother to buy. Actually, many years ago, I ordered it, but the order kept getting delayed so I just cancelled it. I'm glad I did because every review I've read since has said the same thing - it sucks.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Mike Covell]

In the chapter on Nichols it mentions tha "wineglass" found at the scene, and questions why no one took this away for forensic examination!!!

[The Grave Maurice]

In the Footsteps of the Whitechapel Murders

I re-read this book just a few months ago. It really is quite dreadful. Plimmer must hold the record for the most factual errors in one publication. I believe that, on one page, I counted four of them.

For some unknown reason he calls the second C5 victim Annie May Chapman; he insists that a wine glass was found near Polly's body in Buck's Row; he says semen samples were retrieved from one murder site. The errors go on and on. In addition, the literary device of placing Abberline in the present and the past at the same time makes the narrative difficult to follow.

I do remember finding some of his descriptions of forensic investigation techniques interesting ten years ago, when the CSI programmes were not quite so common, otherwise the book had, and has, little to recommend it. Despite all that, for collectors, the first edition remains a remarkably hard one to find in decent condition.

[Dan Norder]

Yeah, while the doctor said there was a wine glass and a half of blood at the scene, it's pretty ridiculous to think that the blood was actually sitting there in a glass.

And with that extra half of a glass mentioned, would that'd be two glasses, one full and with one only half full (half empty?) or, since he's being so literal, an actual half of a wineglass?

Oh, hey, there's an idea for yet another eBay item ostensibly related to the Ripper murders that people seem to keep manufacturing for gullible buyers...

[Mike Covell]

Mines the 2003 softback edition, full of mad maps, and crazy letters!!

If anyone is intrested I have an Official Jack the Ripper Wineglass!!

[Ash]

Yes, I have long cited this as positively the worst book ever written on the subject of the Ripper. Most books, even by the most respected authors, let one or two of the hoary old errors slip in somewhere. Plimmer managed to include every single last one of them, and then add a few extra all of his own. It is, however, a book I thoroughly recommend to everyone with an interest in the case because it is so wonderfully entertaining spotting all the mistakes. I honestly don't think there is a single page in the entire book which doesn't contain at least one.

[Jana Oliver]

Mines the 2003 softback edition, full of mad maps, and crazy letters!!

If anyone is intrested I have an Official Jack the Ripper Wineglass!!

Hey, who can pass up on the Official Jack the Ripper Wineglass? A must have for every Ripperologist.

I'm guessing you'll be making more of them. There has to be a market for them on eBay...

Jana

[Mike Covell]

Hi Jana,

That was a tongue in cheek remark regarding a chapter were the author believes there was a wine glass left at the murder scene!!!!

I do have an engraver, but don't think the wife would like it if I began destroying our glassware!!!

[Doctor X]

Yeah! But when you show her all that money you will make!

Look, some cow put up two frozen fishsticks because . . . they made . . . a cross on Ebay.

Got a lot of bids.

--J.D.

[Mike Covell]

I have been looking for a cornflake that looks like Robert D'Onston Stephenson, there are loads of Druitt's and Maybricks but Stephenson is proving elusive!!

I saw a lady sell a cornflake for almost £1K!!! Just because it looked like some state in the USA!!

[Doctor X]

Illinois.

A very difficult state to find in your cornflakes.

Clearly there are darker forces at work. Imagine if this woman bought the cornflakes with the map of Swansea inside. She would have no way of knowing! Think of all of the Little Miracles of Life [Tm.--Ed.] that are being eaten and excreted every day through ignorance! Why, just now, I may have devour'd a chunck of turkey sausage that contained the visage of the One True Ripper suspect . . . or maybe Gary Glitter.

Damn!

DAMN!

--J.D.

[Sam Flynn]

Imagine if this woman bought the cornflakes with the map of Swansea inside. She would have no way of knowing!

She'd more likely mistake Swansea for Europe:



...albeit as drawn by Herodotus.

[Graham]

I read that Plimmer book quite a few years ago and thought it was so bad as to be almost good! But then there was Cornwell.....

Cheers,

Graham

[Mike Covell]

I would advise anyone wishing to purchase the book, to read this thread, its hell of a lot more intresting!