Jack the Ripper: The Facts
RRP £20.00
Hardcover, 550 pages
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Reviews
(Rated 5 out of 5)
Because this book is for some reason unaviable in Canada, I ordered it from amazon.co.uk and was not in the least disappointed. The book contains much less detail on the social conditions than his "Definitive History" in favour of a complete history of the case. While in some ways, this book contains less detail on certain aspects than Sugden does, it still, in my opinion, deserves to be ranked with it as the best comprehensive account of the case because it deals with much of the more recent research on the case and still provides a wealth detail, not all of which is in Sugden. The book provides an overview of the case, and covers the expected ground, with chapters on each of the canonical victims (including Tabram), Leather Apron, the letters (with significant detail on the Dear Boss and Lusk letters), the police, the reactions/climate in Whitechapel and London, and the Macnaghten Memorandum. All the chapters contain references to primary sources, mostly quotes from newspapers and police reports.
The suspect oriented chapters on the case include Druitt, Ostrog, Kosminski and Tumbelty. There is also a small section in the Kosminski chapter on Fido's "David Cohen" theory, which in my opinion, despite the dificulties, is the best one out there (I think the confusion of suspects and Anderson's veracity cannot be so easily dismissed). A final chapter briefly discusses, and refutes, various other suspect theories, including the royal theory, Sickert and Maybrick. There are also a few pages of Chapman/Klosowski in chapter 8. There are also the standard victim pictures in the book and pictures of the murder sites. There are also pictures of many of the notable police officers involved in the case as well as two photos of the Swanson marginalia.
Begg's account is, in many respects, as conservative as Sugden's, correctly I think. For example, they both express agnosticism about authenticity of the Lusk kidney, and deem Packer completely unreliable.
There are also differences between Begg's account and Sugden's, giving the book a certain enjoyable idiosyncratic flavour. Sugden and Begg both add Tabram as a probable sixth canonical victim (in my opinion quite rightly), and plausibly discount Smith, Coles and Mackenzie. However, while Sugden includes Millwood and excludes Wilson, Begg discounts Millwood and makes a case Wilson. One final, and perhaps the biggest, difference between the two is that Sugden argued that George Chapman/Klosowski is the only known suspect who could have been, and perhaps was, the killer, Begg all but discounts Chapman seems to tacitly favour Kosminski, although he rightly acknowledges a lack any definitive evidence. While Ripperologists will probably have to die not knowing anything for certain, one cannot help but obssessively keep working at it and Begg's work is basically the best we can do.