Generous Maggie Mason sent me Margalit Fox’s Conan Doyle for the Defense: THE TRUE STORY OF A SENSATIONAL BRITISH MURDER, A QUEST FOR JUSTICE, AND THE WORLD’S MOST FAMOUS DETECTIVE WRITER and reading it brightened up my day. I vaguely remembered this case mentioned in a couple of the A. Conan Doyle biographies I’ve read over the years, but Margalit Fox sharpens up the details and presents a compelling story of the years of struggle Doyle undertook to clear an innocent man.
In 1908, a wealthy woman was found murdered in her Glasgow home. As usual, the police pinned the crime on a convenient suspect: Oscar Slater, an immigrant Jew. Despite Oscar Slater’s obvious innocence, he was tried, convicted, and sentenced to life at hard labor in a harsh Scottish prison for a crime he didn’t commit.
Already world famous as a best selling author and the creator of Sherlock Holmes, A. Conan Doyle–outraged by the injustice of this case–became obsessed with proving Slater’s innocence. Doyle used the methods of Sherlock Holmes when he analyzed the trial transcripts, interviewed eyewitnesses, and identified the many inconsistencies and fabrications invented by the police and the prosecutors to frame an innocent man. It should come as no surprise that in 1927 A. Conan Doyle’s years of work on this case resulted in Slater’s freedom. If you’re a fan of true crime, you’ll enjoy Conan Doyle for the Defense. If you’re a Sherlockian, this is a must-read! Thanks again, Maggie, for sending this excellent book my way! GRADE: A
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
Author’s Note
Introduction
Prologue: Prisoner 2988
Book one: Diamonds
A footfall on the stair
The mysterious Mr. Anderson
The knight-errant
The man in the Donegal Cap
Book two: Blood
Traces
The original Sherlock Holmes
The art of reasoning backward
A case of identity
Book three: Granite
The trap door
“Until he be dead”
The cold cruel sea
Arthur Conan Doyle, consulting detective
The strange case of George Edalji
Prisoner 1992
Book four: Paper
“You know my method”
The ruin of John Thomson Trench
Cannibals included
The purloined brooch
The gates of Peterhead
More light, more justice
The knight and the knave
Epilogue: What became of them
Acknowledgements
Cast of Characters
Glossary
References
Notes
Index
Sounds interesting. I will have to check and see if I can get it from my library although my hold list is awfully long right now. I am a fan of true crime that’s well written. Not the cheesy pb originals. Just read The Real Lolita by Sarah Weinman which I liked.
Steve, CONAN DOYLE FOR THE DEFENSE is first-rate. You would enjoy it.
I’ve always been amazed that even though this was such an obvious miscarriage of justice, and even though one of the most famous men in Britain was on the case, it took years to free Slater. I guess he was still better off than Timothy Evans and other victims of British injustice.
Jeff, legal systems hate to admit they’re wrong. We just had a guy in Buffalo who was cleared of a murder after he served 23 years in prison. The guy insisted he was innocent all those years until another guy admitted he committed the murder.
“If you’re a fan of true crime, you’ll enjoy Conan Doyle for the Defense. If you’re a Sherlockian, this is a must-read!”
I don’t think so. Neither Holmes nor Watson are present.
Rick, but Conan Doyle employs the same investigative techniques that Sherlock and Watson used to solve their fictional cases. I would think Sherlockians would be intrigued by the Real-World application of analytical procedures. I know I was.