Author Description

Ripper Murders From Old Photographs is not a standard retelling of the story of the Whitechapel Murders but the tale of historically important photographs connected to the case, discovered by the author in 2007. Half of the book deals with The Whitby Collection. This is a surviving series of 27 images taken by the amateur criminologist John Gordon Whitby in 1961. They show many of the murder locations and related streets as they looked at that time. The book will not only tell the known facts about the photographer, but will - for the first time - reproduce every one of the photographs, along with modern comparison shots in colour. The second half of the book deals with an image that some have described as the most important photographic discovery in the Jack the Ripper case for quarter of a century. Before the discovery of a unique image purchased on eBay for less than $5, no photographic image was known to exist of the murder location of supposed Ripper victim Elizabeth Stride. Not only will this book present the photograph to the world for the first time, it will also discuss in detail the vast amount of research that has been undertaken to authenticate and date the image and, with frequent reference to the photo album it came from, will try to close in on identifying the photographer.