Interlude: The Further Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - The Whitechappel Horrors

So, I'm still mulling over Mary Ann Nichols death. There are a couple of interesting points that I'm still considering, and I'm trying to get a better copy of Nichols' mortuary photo to get a better view of the bruises because if everything that Dr. Llewellyn says is true, then there's a bit of an oddity about the murder.

None the less, while I'm still pondering that, I picked up The Further Adventures of Sherlock Holmes- The Whitechapel Horrors by Edward B Hannah.

As the title suggests this is a paring of this blogs two focuses, Sherlock Holmes and Jack the Ripper. It's been released as part of a recent line of books by independent authors which appear to pit Holmes against other major Victorian figures such as the Phantom of the Opera and Harry Houdini.

The book itself picks up at the very beginning of the murders and follows Holmes until after the Great Hiatus, nearly 7 years after the murder of Mary Jane Kelly. Given that Holmes has other cases during this time period, most famously the Hound of the Baskervilles is supposed to take place concurrently with a large portion of the Autumn of Terror, the book alludes to and overlaps with canon events written by Doyle. This lets the book fit into what we know about Holmes quite well, and even explains what Holmes is doing when Watson is away in Dartmoor.

As a Holmes book, I feel the book succeeded. Hannah captures Sherlock and Watson quite well, and lets Holmes stay a step ahead of the reader, unless the reader is a Ripper fan as well... but more on that in a moment. It's especially interesting and commendable that Holmes deals directly with the actual police who investigated the Ripper killings unlike in the various film versions (which I'll discuss during a later interlude) where Aberline is most commonly replaced with Inspector Lestrade.

As a Ripper book, The Whitechapel Horrors is marred with glaring inaccuracies. Hannah has Holmes stick to the conclusion that the killer is left handed, and makes asserts the baseless claim that Mary Kelly was pregnant at the time of her murder. While errors that serve the plot of the book can largely be forgiven because it is a work of fiction and the author decidedly wants the story to serve his intended killer, it becomes obvious that Hannah was either working with severely outdated information, or was merely sloppy with his research

What is most interesting about the book is that while it points it's finger toward a real suspect, it literally runs away from that assertion in the last chapter.

I'll deal with spoilers after the cut....


From very early on, the Annie Chapman murder to be precise, Hannah very clearly points the finger of suspicion at Prince Albert Victor Christian Edward, most often referred to as Prince Eddy. Hannah drops multiple clues that Eddy is the Ripper, both physical clues, and observed clues during the brief encounter of Holmes and the Ripper. Every conclusion Holmes makes, and every step he takes on his investigation drawn him toward Eddy as the prime suspect (JK Stephens is mentioned, but is never given any serious scrutiny). It comes down to Holmes even talking to the Prince of Wales after the Kelly murder about having the Eddy removed from the public.

What's bizarre, then, is that in the novels final chapter, Hannah and Holmes completely back off of Eddy. Holmes tells Watson in their finally scene that  Eddy was not the Ripper and that he has no real knowledge of who the Ripper is. Whether this is a genuine assertion or merely Holmes trying to bury once and for all the real identity of the killer is unclear. It seems bizarre, however, that Sherlock Holmes, who has his own sense of morality and justice would somehow hide the identity of the Ripper from Watson who he constantly tells everyone is as trustworthy as himself.

Perhaps between writing the last two chapters Hannah realized that Eddy was essrntially ruled out as a viable suspect by Ripperologists. Perhaps he didn't want to be held as the author who had Holmes reach a wrong conclusion should the day ever come that the real Ripper was outed. Either way, Hannah's decision makes the final chapter of the book a bit unfulfilling, especially since Holmes is a detective who always gets his man in the Doyle canon.

Despite it's faults though, The Whitechapel Horrors is a compelling and swift read. It deftly mixes the truth of the case with the fiction of Holmes, and provides enough endnotes to show that at the very least a solid amount of research on the Ripper, Holmes and Victorian London was done during the books creation.

If you at all like the principle components of this blog (Holmes and Jack the Ripper) this is definitely a book to pick up (available at Amazon, Barnes and Noble and numerous other places)