Essex Murders


Book Description

The county of Essex has rolling arable farmland, Epping Forest, sleepy villages, busy market towns and secluded backwaters - a wide variety of settings for murder. This selection of crimes uncovers not only famous cases, but also previously unpublished dramatic and tragic tales. The accounts included here come from a time when murder was a capital offence, carrying the ultimate penalty for the perpetrator, and when the difference between a verdict of innocence or guilt rested on a single piece of evidence, or the skill of the barrister in defence. Linda Stratmann has used original trial transcripts, material from local and national archives, contemporary accounts and the memoirs of pathologists, police and those in the legal profession in the course of her extensive research into crimes that have shocked the county. The killings explored date from as far back as the eighteenth century when the smuggler 'Colchester Jack' shot a confederate in the stomach in a row over stolen goods. They also include the case of a nineteenth-century female poisoner from Clavering and the brutal murder of a taxi driver in 1943 by two US servicemen at Birch. Supported by contemporary illustrations, Essex Murders reveals that behind the county's peaceful facade lies a murky criminal heritage.




Foul Deeds & Suspicious Deaths in Barking, Dagenham & Chadwell Heath


Book Description

Foul Deeds and Suspicious Deaths in Barking, Dagenham and Chadwell Heath takes the reader on a sinister journey through centuries of local crime and conspiracy, meeting villains of all sorts along the way murderous husbands and lovers, cut-throats, police-killers, highwaymen, Gunpowder Plotters and even a Nazi collaborator sentenced to death for High Treason. Luckless individuals who came to cruel or unjust ends are also recalled, from martyrs and witches to the fishermen who perished in the Great Storm of 1863 and the passengers who lost their lives when the pleasure steamer the Princess Alice sank in the Thames in 1878. There is no shortage of harrowing and revealing tales of accident and evil to recount from the history of this part of Essex to the east of London. The human dramas the authors describe are often played out in the most commonplace of circumstances, but others are so odd as to be stranger than fiction. Their grisly chronicle of the hidden history of Barking, Dagenham and Chadwell Heath will be compelling reading for anyone interested in the dark side of human nature.




Greater London Murders


Book Description

This compendium brings together thirty-three murderous tales — one from each of the capital's boroughs — that not only shocked the City but made headline news across the country. Throughout its history the great urban sprawl of Greater London has been home to some of the most shocking murders in England, many of which have made legal history. Contained within the pages of this book are the stories behind these heinous crimes. They include George Chapman, who was hanged in 1903 for poisoning three women, and whom is widely suspected of having been the notorious serial killer Jack the Ripper; lovers Edith Thompson and Frederick Bywaters, executed for stabbing to death Thompson's husband Percy in 1922; and Donald Hume, who was found not guilty of the murder of wealthy businessman Stanley Setty in 1949, but later confessed to killing him, chopping up his body and disposing of it by aeroplane. Linda Stratmann also reveals previously unpublished information that sheds a whole new light on the infamous Craig and Bentley case. This carefully researched, well-illustrated and enthralling text will appeal to those interested in the history of Greater London's history and true-crime fans alike.




The Dagenham Murder


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The Devil Shook My Hand - I've Been Shot, Stabbed and Accused of Murder. People Call Me Britain's Deadliest Bare-Knuckle Fighter. This is My Story


Book Description

Meet Micky Gluckstad. You'll like him. Bare-knuckle boxer, East End face, playboy and underworld 'corner merchant', Micky's conned money off the best of them - and he's got the scars to prove it. A happy-go-lucky conman who fleeced hundreds of thousands of pounds from the rich, the stupid, the crooked and the shameless, Micky's one of the nicest men you'll ever meet - unless you cross him. Then beware. There are properly hard men and there is Micky Gluckstad. Whether on the cobbles or in the ring, Micky beat them all. Roy 'Pretty Boy' Shaw, Donny 'The Bull' Adams and even Lenny McLean, The Guv'nor himself, fell before Micky's onslaught. He never started a fight, but he never walked away from one either and he hated bullies and braggarts. Reggie Kray said Micky could have been one of the boxing greats, but he never trained and fought for kicks and cash. Despite his incredible story, you won't catch him boasting about his exploits or cashing in as a rent-a-villain. Repeatedly accused of murder but never charged, shot, stabbed and glassed, beaten by the police and locked up in juvenile detention, borstal and prison, he came back laughing from everything the world threw at him.For the first time, Micky tells his explosive story - from his early days in the East End to the millionaire lifestyle his criminal activities afforded him. Micky earned, enjoyed and spent more than a million quid - but never regretted a single day.




Crime and Corruption at the Yard


Book Description

A Scotland Yard insider blows the whistle on police corruption in “a book . . . that everyone concerned with law and order should read” (Crime Review). During David Woodland’s nineteen years of service with the United Kingdom’s Metropolitan Police, the ‘thin blue line’ came under intense pressure. In addition to the routine caseload of gang crime, murder, and armed robbery, Irish terrorist groups launched a vicious and prolonged campaign of violence. Also, then-Police Commissioner Sir Robert Marks described the Criminal Intelligence Department as ‘the most routinely corrupt organization in London’, it may have been an exaggeration made out of anger—but it devastated the public’s faith in the CID. New Scotland Yard Det. Inspector David Woodland was witness to a series of major scandals and now reveals why many otherwise honest detectives strove to bend the law to their own devices. Using his own cases and experience, he demonstrates the difficulties working in a depleted, demoralized police force—not to mention fighting to overcome ‘the enemy within’. Crime and Corruption at The Yard is a gripping, shocking, and instructive insider’s account of the darker side of police work.




The Complete Deeck on Corbett


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The Examiner


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Murder Houses of Greater London


Book Description

Which of Greater London’s most gruesome murders happened in your street? And were they committed by Graham Frederick Young, the Poisoner of the North Circular Road, by the murderous Donald Hume, or by that monster Dennis Nilsen? Armed with this book and a good London map, you will be able to do some murder house detection work of your own.