|
 |
 |
|
|
|
** This is an archived, static copy of the Casebook messages boards dating from 1998 to 2003. These threads cannot be replied to here. If you want to participate in our current forums please go to https://forum.casebook.org **
Mystery of Jack the Ripper, The (Matters 1929)
Casebook Message Boards: Ripper Media: Specific Titles:
Non-Fiction:
Mystery of Jack the Ripper, The (Matters 1929)
Author: Stephen P. Ryder
Monday, 04 December 2000 - 09:07 pm |        | Just thought I'd post if anyone is interested - I've put a copy of Leonard Matters' book up on eBay, just in time for the Holidays! 
The auction may be found at:
http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=518755789 |
Author: Christopher T George
Tuesday, 05 December 2000 - 12:36 am | | Let the Bidding begin! I have plunked my two pence down on the Barrel, no doubt others will wish to also! All going to a Good Cause, eh, Spry? 
Chirs |
Author: Wolf Vanderlinden
Tuesday, 05 December 2000 - 01:52 pm | | A very nice addition to any Ripper library, this is the 1948 reprint with a new introduction by Matters. I would highly recomend it to any serious collector.
Wolf. |
Author: Brenda L. Conklin
Sunday, 03 November 2002 - 03:58 pm | | I saw a first edition copy of Matter's book on Ebay. There's no way I can afford to get it. Apparently no one else can either, because there are no bids on it. There is a scanned picture of the book, opened to the photograph section. There is a picture of 29 Hanbury Street, and it appears to be occupied! At least, the windows are open. I have never seen this photograph before.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=1574312391
Please copy and paste as I don't know how to post links. I wrote an email to the person offering the book and asked about paying them for some scanned photographs from the book, but apparently they aren't interested as I never got a reply. What other pictures were there featured in this book? Are there later editions of this book that aren't so expensive?
I would be interested in reading someone's synopsis of this book....what is covered in it, does Matters name a suspect, and just who is Matters anyway? Just how many dead presidents is it worth parting with to own? |
Author: Wolf Vanderlinden
Monday, 04 November 2002 - 07:05 pm | | Brenda, the copy of the Leonard Matters' book, The Mystery of Jack the Ripper, that was on sale on e-bay appears to be a rare first edition of the book, emphasis on rare. As such, it can garner a high price but just how many dead presidents is it worth parting with to own? That would depend on how badly you would want to own it. A price of $200 + US dollars isn't an unreasonable price for a first edition copy of this book but, as with all collecting, dependant on the condition. There were several reprints of this book with the 1964 Arrow paperback being the most common but these can still set you back roughly $70 + US dollars.
Matters was an Australian journalist who later became a Labour MP in Britain. This book is considered to be the first serious look at the Whitechapel murders and so has some importance in the field. The first edition, Hutchinson and Co., was published in either late 1928 or early 1929, there is no date of publication in the first edition, with second and third editions published in 1929. These copies contain ten photographs and five poorly hand drawn maps, (the 1948 W.H. Allen and CO. reprint did not use all the ten photographs while the paperbacks, at least the 1964 Arrow, had no photographs at all).
The photographs are:
1) The entrance way to Miller's Court taken from Dorset street.
2) A view looking down Flower and Dean street.
3) A view of a tenement building on Thrawl street.
4) The front of 29 Hanbury street, (which was indeed still occupied).
5)A view of the north-east corner of Berner and Fairclough street.
6) A view looking down Berner street.
7) A shot of Mitre Square showing the entrance to Church passage
8) A shot of Mitre Square showing the entrance to St. James Place.
9) A shot looking west down Bucks Row.
10) A shot of Mitre Square showing the south-west corner, the spot where Catherine Eddowes was found.
Matters divided his book into two parts; Part One: FACT, Part Two THEORY, although it might have well been called FICTION. Part one is a straight forward look at the facts of the case, the most in-depth look at it the murders up to that point in time. Outside of a few errors this section is well researched and well presented. It is with part two that the trouble with the book becomes apparent.
Matters' suspect is a Dr Stanley a brilliant surgeon who commits the murders in order to avenge the death of his only son who had contracted Syphilis from a prostitute named Mary Kelly. Stanley prowls the East End looking for Kelly and kills the prostitutes that he interrogates in order to cover his tracks. When he finally finds Mary Kelly he vents his hatred and frustration out on her body and then, satiated, travels the world ending up dying in a Buenos Aires hospital but not before confessing all to an old student of his who lived in that city.
The story is pure melodrama, the facts, for the most part, wrong. Also, Matters himself states that he could find no record of Dr Stanley but because he had come up with what he thought was a plausible theory about the murders he felt that, "he must have lived-even if never under that name. To me there is no alternative consistent with the theory which I am developing but to be believed that such a man as Dr. Stanley was a resident of the West End of London when ‘Jack the Ripper' amazed the world..." Matters obviously invented Dr Stanley in-order to put a name to his fanciful theoretical killer.
Wolf. |
Author: Timsta
Monday, 04 November 2002 - 07:42 pm | | Brenda:
I just got a copy of the '64 Arrow paperback for $37 on ebay. It doesn't have the photos in it, though. Wolf's commentary is absolutely spot-on, btw.
Wolf:
Do you own a copy that contains these photographs? I am sure we'd all like to see these if you or someone else could scan them.
Regards
Timsta |
Author: Wolf Vanderlinden
Tuesday, 05 November 2002 - 04:40 pm | | Timsta, I do indeed own a 1929 first edition copy of Matters as well as a copy of the 1964 Arrow paperback but I'm sorry to say that I do not own a scanner. Some of these photographs, notably the shot of the entrance to Miller's Court taken from Dorset Street, have been reproduced in other books, (Interestingly this photo was taken only days before the building was pulled down). Some, like the tenement building in Thrawl Street, are, I believe, of minimal interest.
Wolf. |
Author: Brenda L. Conklin
Friday, 08 November 2002 - 07:21 pm | | Wolf - your review of this book rocked. I couldn't have asked for anything more comprehensive. Too bad I can't assign you an "A" in real life but this is an "A" review.
Hey in that Hanbury Street photo, is the famous "Brylcreem" sign up yet? I couldn't tell from the Ebay photo. And do we know who was responsible for the Miller's Court photo? If it was taken just days before the building was torn down, obviously someone was thinking to take the picture for historical reasons. May God bless all those people through the years who have thought to preserve things on film. As far as the Dr. Stanley theory, it does seem made up but I bet Matters probably wasn't too far from the actual truth of the Ripper's reasons for his rage. Just an everyday guy with a rage problem.... |
Author: Timsta
Friday, 08 November 2002 - 07:25 pm | | Wolf:
I am almost tempted to get you a scanner on ebay just for the chance to see these pics, however mundane.
Anyone else own this edition and have a scanner? Or does anyone own a scanner and *live near Wolf*? ;)
Regards
Timsta |
Author: Wolf Vanderlinden
Saturday, 09 November 2002 - 05:17 pm | | Brenda, thank you very much for the kind words. The photo of the front of 29 Hanbury street in Leonard Matters book does not show any indication of the Brylcreem sign. You can, however, see part of a word on a large sign with the letters BRI visible before they are cut off. It is probable that this is part of the name of the man, N. Brill, who owned the shop and ran it as a "Hairdresser, Perfumer", (we might call it a run down barbershop, hence the Brylcreem sign), as he was certainly the owner eleven years later when William Stewart visited and took photographs in 1939. The building was torn down in the late 60's, (1967/68).
It was Matters himself who took all the photographs in the book. Here is his description of Miller's Court seen in 1928:
"What Dorset Street was like forty years ago can only be imagined from an inspection of the district to-day and a walk through similar narrow lanes and byways leading off Commercial Street and Brick Lane. Duval, (originally Dorset), Street itself is undergoing a rapid change, and the buildings on the left-hand side going east have nearly all been torn down to make room for extensions of Spitalfields Market.
At the time of my first visit to the neighbourhood most of the houses on the left-hand side of the street were unoccupied, and some were being demolished. The house in which Kelly was murdered was closed, save for one front room still occupied by a dreadful-looking slattern who came out of Miller's Court into the sunlight and blinked at me.
When she saw me focus my camera to get a picture of the front of the house, the old hag swore at me, and shuffled away down the passage.
I took what was probably the last photograph of the house to be secured by anybody, for three days later Miller's Court and the dilapidated buildings on either side of it were nothing but a heap of bricks and mortar."
Timsta, perhaps Santa will be good to me this Christmas so we will just have to wait and see, (I can certainly use one and in fact need one as I have a couple of interesting little surprises for my next article in Ripper Notes). As I said, some of Matters' photos have been reproduced in other books. Peter Fisher's An Illustrated Guide To Jack The Ripper has four of them; the view looking down Flower and Dean street, the front of 29 Hanbury street, one of the Mitre Square pictures showing the entrance to Church passage and the shot looking west down Bucks Row.
Fisher also includes Matters' second photograph of the front of Miller's Court taken from the opposite angle as the one in the book. If you have seen a picture of the arched passage of Miller's Court then you have seen one of Matters' two photos. Fisher also has a larger version of what seems to be the earliest photograph of the backyard of 29 Hanbury Street. This photograph first appeared in Robin Odell's book Jack the Ripper In Fact And Fiction and it shows the small wooden roof that once covered the backdoor. William Stewart also took a very rarely seen picture of the backyard of 29 Hanbury Street in 1939 and this appears to show the small roof already missing, (hard to tell as there are some tree branches in the way), so the photo in Odell and Fisher pre-dates 1939.
Wolf. |
Author: Spryder
Saturday, 09 November 2002 - 05:26 pm | | Photographs from Leonard Matters (1st edition):
(Sorry if any are blurry - testing out a new digicam.) |
Author: Lisa Jane Turner
Saturday, 09 November 2002 - 07:29 pm | | | Great! Thanks for that, any chance of having the first one again?? It was a bit blurry. |
Author: Brenda L. Conklin
Sunday, 10 November 2002 - 01:15 am | | Thanks so much for posting these! I had never seen these particular Mitre Square pictures. Catherine Eddowes' corner looks very dark and lonely. Look how very close windows are! Do you know if that house was occupied at the time of the murder? (I know at least one Mitre Square house was unoccupied).
Berner St. - already the school was there at the site of the murder. The photo I have seen of Berner Street that shows the entrance to Dutfield's yard (wagon wheel on the wall of the Club) must be very old indeed.
As usual, Hanbury St. is positively spooky. I don't know what it is about this building that scares me but IMHO it is the scariest Ripper site. Maybe because other people were so very near.
Did Leonard Matters include Martha Tabram as a Ripper victim? Or Frances Coles, Alice McKenzie? I truly believe Martha was a Ripper victim...the murders escalated in violence and I think her injuries was Ripper work, pre-ripping. But that's another thread.
Wolf, I will be waiting for your next article in Ripper Notes. I am a new subscriber, nothing compares to coming home after a long day at work, opening the mailbox, and seeing RN or Ripperologist waiting there. |
Author: Chris Jd
Sunday, 10 November 2002 - 11:07 am | | Spry,
I don't believe you haven't got a scanner!
Are there any copyright reasons for being so shy?
;-))
Any chance for including them into the "Whitechapel Then and Now" - section here?
Or for posting real scans?
best regards
Christian |
Author: Wolf Vanderlinden
Monday, 11 November 2002 - 04:45 pm | | Brenda, Matters did indeed include Martha Tabram as one of the victims. He wrote:
"Four months later, on another Bank Holiday night, what I am convinced was the first of the ‘Ripper' murders occurred – that of Martha Turner, who's dead and mutilated body was found lying on the landing of George Yard Buildings."
Matters does not include any possible victim after the Kelly murder for the simple fact that according to his theory Dr. Stanley was desperately searching for Mary Kelly, the woman who had caused the ruin and eventual death of his son. Once he had killed her his vengeance was complete and so had no motive to continue killing.
Timsta, I guess I can kiss that scanner that you were going to buy me goodbye. Thanks a lot Spry.
Wolf. |
|
|
|
|
