Jack the Ripper and Black Magic: Victorian Conspiracy Theories, Secret Societies and

[mklhawley]

Has anyone purchased this book yet? It's on my birthday list.

Jack the Ripper and Black Magic: Victorian Conspiracy Theories, Secret Societies and the Supernatural Mystique of the Whitechapel Murders

by Spiro Dimolianis

Foreword by Stewart P. Evans

Jack the Ripper is a legendary gothic tale of Victorian conspiracies, the supernatural, secret societies and the police. Scotland Yard hunted a serial killer shrouded in politics as the mutilator of East End prostitutes infused pop culture with demonic horror. As the Whitechapel murders of 1888 ceased an authorised mythology had developed that now forms the basis of criminal case studies. But how did these period stories begin and why have they emerged? This book examines historic sources and rare official reports following the evidence through mystery and the mists of time for some credible answers.

[auspirograph]

Hi all,

For those interested, the book will be released sometime in June 2011. Further details can be found on my publisher's website:

http://www.mcfarlandpub.com/book-2.p...-0-7864-4547-9

Cheers
Spiro

[auspirograph]

Update

A brief update since last posting...

There's been some developments on release of the book, Jack the Ripper and Black Magic: Victorian Conspiracy Theories, Secret Societies and the Supernatural Mystique of the Whitechapel Murders.

It is expected that the book will now be available in the US in early August, not sure for those waiting in the UK or elsewhere, but will pass on details as I have them.

[John Savage]

Hi Spiro,

I shall be looking forward to the publishing of your book in the UK, sounds like an interesting read.

Rgds
John

[auspirograph]

You're welcome John, something to pass the time on the Yorkshire timetable.

Cheers
Spiro

[Heinrich]

Promises to be a ripping read.

[auspirograph]

And now for something completely different...

Hi all,

Here is the final cover design for the book which will be available over the coming month. Thanks to Chris Phillips, Stewart Evans, Chris Scott and Stephen Ryder for their support during the course of researching and writing it.

I hope those who read the book will find it enjoyable, informative and of interest for the new details on the Whitechapel murders presented.

[HollyDolly]

Jack the Ripper and Black magic

I can't wait to check this out.I had heard that before, thaqt there were supernatural or occult aspects to the killing.

[auspirograph]

The book, Jack the Ripper and Black Magic: Victorian Conspiracy Theories, Secret Societies and the Supernatural Mystique of the Whitechapel Murders, is released and now available through most online book stores or, ordered through your local bookshop and libraries.

If any would like to sample the contents first, there is now a Google Books preview also available:

http://books.google.com/books?id=p3w...ed=0CCkQ6AEwAA

[ChrisGeorge]

The book, Jack the Ripper and Black Magic: Victorian Conspiracy Theories, Secret Societies and the Supernatural Mystique of the Whitechapel Murders, is released and now available through most online book stores or, ordered through your local bookshop and libraries.

If any would like to sample the contents first, there is now a Google Books preview also available:

http://books.google.com/books?id=p3w...ed=0CCkQ6AEwAA

Good to see, Spiro. I wish you the best of luck with it.

Chris

[Phil H]

It seems very expensive on amazon (new or used) - well over £25 with postage. I'll consider it, but regret that the angle isn't at the heart of my personal interest in the case.

Phil

[auspirograph]

I wouldn't worry too much about it Phil, over on the other site Jeff Leahy is touting Oscar nomination for his suburban affair, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive Story...

I believe that in the UK there are better options, a list of which may be found here:

http://www.abebooks.com/servlet/SearchResults?isbn=0786445475&sortby=0&cm_ven=nl&cm_cat=trg&cm_pla=want&cm_ite=viewlist

Hope that is of some help and thanks for your continued interest in the book. The angle, as you put it, is a bit more encompassing than perhaps the title suggests.

Thanks Chris G for the accolades, I trust and reasonably assume that Ripperologist will in time furnish an objective, fair and unbiased review?

As you might know, it takes more than luck to release a decent book on Jack the Ripper, and as the author, I am reasonably comfortable with the accuracy and the contribution to the subject the book makes.

It is now time for readers to assess and draw their own conclusions based on a close reading of what is actually written and presented, would you not agree?.

[auspirograph]

It's all elementals Watson!

Mike Covell has recently made some premature and fantastic remarks on a minor point discussed in my book, Jack the Ripper: Victorian Conspiracy Theories, Secret Societies and the Supernatural Mystique of the Whitechapel Murders.

Mike has chosen to focus on a sentence regarding a supplementary mention of further works of the suspect Roslyn D’Onston on page 95.

There is a saying that in the land of the blind, the one eyed man is king, however, as Mike has two, he is revered as a god amongst his devotees. For years he and sidekick Howard Brown have advertised themselves as ‘experts’ on the occult and the suspect Roslyn D’Onston. This serves as another example of the false impressions that can be perpetuated on obscure Victorian literary traditions that influence the Ripper case, which the book is a modest attempt at rectifying.

Here first is the paragraph in which the sentence appears in my book that has so offended Mike:

D’Onston’s further literary efforts were mostly with the publishing enterprises of W.T. Stead. In 1892, he wrote “Dead or Alive” for Stead’s Review of Reviews. It was a semiautobiographical short story in the style of period supernatural horror writing, and was reprinted several times, notably in book form in Real Ghost Stories (1897). In the July 1896 issue of the spiritualist periodical Borderland, Stead introduced “A correspondent, signing himself ‘R.D’O.’”. D’Onston’s article, titled “Elementals”, was a response to an 1895 German paper, “Seelenbraute und Vampirismus” (“Soul Brides and Vampirism”), by Franz Hartmann. Hartmann, an associate of Helena Blavatsky and Mabel Collins, founded the German Theosophical Society in 1896. D’Onston’s article, published the same year, was an objective discussion of the topic in which he did not resort to fantasy.

Mike then tells us:

It has been claimed that Robert D’Onston Stephenson was writing in response to the following article, entitled, Seelenbraute und Vampirismus, and was written by Franz Hartmann, featuring in Lotusbluthen, Vol. 6 in the year 1895. It has been claimed that this article was the inspiration behind Robert D’Onston Stephenson’s 1896 article in Borderland entitled Elementals. This is, however, false.

Mike then proceeds to give us an English translation of the German “Seelenbraute und Vampirismus” (“Soul Brides and Vampirism”), by Franz Hartmann. (1895) We are then given a color-coded analysis and textural comparison of D’Onston’s “Elementals” with another Hartmann article on Vampires and told:

But in the article by Hartmann above, there is no mention of these five cases to which Stephenson alludes to, thus making it the wrong article. If we check earlier editions of Borderland, however, we find the following,

Where Mike here gives the reference and the English translation of:

Vampires by Franz Hartmann, M.D.
From Borderland: a quarterly review and index, Volume 3, edited by William Thomas Stead, 1896

This article ends with the added dated attribution to the original German text, Hallein, Austria. Feb. 14th, 1896.

Now the five cases Mike mentions do indeed occur in the second article but, of course they would, as the English translation of Hartmann’s second article on Vampires appeared in the same issue pp. 353-358, as D’Onston’s “Elementals”, Borderland, Vol. III, No. 3, July, 1896, not in previous issues of Borderland as he states.

My reference was not to D’Onston’s response to the second article found in the same issue of Borderland, but rather as a response by Stead and his contributor, Roslyn D’Onston, to the original German text published in Lotusbluthen, Vol. 6, the previous year that started the debate in an English periodical on Vampires in the year 1896.

This surely must show how convoluted Victorian literary traditions were, and when they became entwined with major figures of the press portrayal of the Whitechapel Murders and the theories that developed, facts become merged with literary fictions.

I thank Mike for his interest and observation of the topic to which I refer in my book as it is a sensitive issue on a deeper study of the Whitechapel murders. However, I must say that these aspects of the book were not written to satisfy the curiosities of ‘paranormal investigators’ on the Ripper case, though they may find some of the information of interest.

It was simply outside the scope of the book, which deals primarily with the Whitechapel murders, to go further into the background of why Stead and D’Onston would respond to Hartmann’s articles on Vampires and Soul Brides. I had wondered whether or not this formed a part of a horror literary tradition on Jack the Ripper and his victims but was not able to find any evidence of that.

On another level, Lovecraft and Manchen, both supernatural horror fiction writers, certainly seemed to have been indirectly influenced by period occult theories on Jack the Ripper originating with Arthur Diosy and Roslyn D’Onston. Stories that were actively promoted by the press enterprises of W.T. Stead.

[Nemo]

Hi Spiro

I'm awaiting delivery of your book at the moment but I am familiar with the articles in question

I would say Stephenson is referring to the article Vampires 1896 which, as you state correctly, appears in the same issue as the response

This is a bit obvious because the first line of the article written by Stead states "A correspondent, signing himself “R. D’O.,” to whom I submitted the foregoing paper, writes me as follows:..."

To me that doesn't imply any reference to the "Soul Brides" article of 1895 but I can understand your point that this previous article encouraged the discussion of vampires and the like (incubi and succubi) in 1896, but it's your explanation of that that seems a little convoluted

Now the five cases Mike mentions do indeed occur in the second article but, of course they would, as the English translation of Hartmann’s second article on Vampires appeared in the same issue pp. 353-358, as D’Onston’s “Elementals”, Borderland, Vol. III, No. 3, July, 1896, not in previous issues of Borderland as he states

I'm not sure I understand that Spiro - the article contains the five cases because it appears in the same issue?

Regards

Nemo

[auspirograph]

Special Branch Index Ledgers

Where would a book on Jack the Ripper conspiracies be without mention and an adequate assessment of the Metropolitan Police Special Branch Index Ledgers?

For those who do have a personal interest in these developments on the case, details on their existence and relevance was first published in the foundational reference work on the Whitechapel murders in 2006, Jack the Ripper: Scotland Yard Investigates pp. 241-242. Evans and Rumbelow.

In 2002, Dr. Lindsey Clutterbuck was granted access to the ledgers, though their existence was known before, to research a thesis on pre-WW1 foundations of the Metropolitan Police Special Branch in reference to Irish Republican extreme active campaigns. The title of the thesis, An Accident of History?, was in reference to a House of Commons debate where it was assumed that the early formation of British secret service had developed accidentally and in rapid response to mainland threats. Clutterbuck essentially argued, based on his sighting of the ledgers, that that position was historically and for reasons relevant to the Victorian period not complete. Indeed, the early and permanent Special Branch, sanctioned in 1887 and established in 1888, was an organized response founded by Monro, Williamson and Littlechild.

For reasons relevant to the period, the Whitechapel murders were brought to the attention of and investigated by Special Branch detectives in co-ordination with Scotland Yard's CID.

This latest crusade to stonewall the citadel of officialdom to gain exclusive entry to the holy grail of Victorian Scotland Yard practices, has only served to entrench reticence on the part of custodians of these historic primary sources and police index ledgers. Which I might add, have already been assessed by academics previously.

My new book, Jack the Ripper and Black Magic: Victorian Conspiracy Theories Secret Societies and the Supernatural Mystique of the Whitechapel Murders, I believe is the first to fully examine the context and relevance of these sources on the Whitechapel murders as far as is reasonably possible and appropriate to an understanding of their sensitive nature in regards other matters political to the late Victorian and subsequent periods.