A fascinating insight into an old miscarriage of justice.

Highly enjoyable and absorbing reading.

Great true crime book, very informative and well researched. Had me intrigued fom the start, highly recommend

A really interesting read, although a lot to take in. It follows real life events that Arthur Conan Doyle was involved in, with parallels to his own fiction books.

A great read. Conan Doyle was an extraordinary character, and deserves to be remembered for far more than Sherlock Holmes.

Fox's book is based around a notorious real-life crime of early 20th Century Britain - the Scottish Dreyfus Affair - which consumed Arthur Conan Doyle in the last decades of his life.

It was essentially the murder of a Glasgow widow in 1908 which saw German Jew Oscar Slater accused and imprisoned - an obvious frame up. Slater spent 18 years behind bars, and when released in 1927, the "case for the defence" began in earnest (Slater managed to smuggle a please out of prison to Conan Doyle two years previous).

However, Slater was not the "unimpeachable character" that we would expect but an "affable rascal", who was already known to police. This was not a case of proving who did it rather than who didn't. It was a very real lesson in bigotry versus reason, for Slater proved the perfect patsy for a high profile crime that needed an immediate resolution.

The book is broken down into four parts: the narrative of the murder; the diagnostic methods of ACD's investigation; Slater's trial, conviction and imprisonment; and ACD's meticulous analysis of Slater's case and his liberation.

It is a compelling tale of the evolution of the judicial system in Scotland, and a stark reminder of how the justice system could quite easily make guilty an innocent man as Slater was " ... too guilty to be released yet not guilty enough to be hanged ...". It is also a tale of a very real travesty of justice - regardless of how despicable the man.

Well researched and annotated - a lengthy read.

Conan Doyle for the Defence

by Margalit Fox

As a lover of mysteries, I enjoyed reading Conan Doyle for the Defense. Be forewarned, however, that this book is not light reading. It is the recounting of Arthur Conan Doyle’s application of Holmesian deductive skills to the real case of Oscar Slater, wrongfully found guilty of the murder of an elderly lady.

In the process of relating the details of the case, the author Margalit Fox puts the events in context. She discusses the Victorian era and the development of crime fiction, including, of course, the Sherlock Holmes mystery series. She also addresses the life and character of Arthur Conan Doyle as well as Scottish politics, police, and the penal system. Fox presents an in-depth discussion of the different types of reasoning that might be used in trying to solve crimes.

If you are looking for a beach read, Conan Doyle for the Defence is not it. If you are interested in learning more about true crime detection, and how its principles apply to fiction, then this is the right book for you.

I would like to extend my thanks to netgalley.com and to Profile Books/Serpent’s Tail for giving me the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review.

Rating: 5/5

Category: History, True Crime

Notes: Includes a complete list of references, footnotes, and bibliography to support the information contained in the book.

Publication: June 28, 2018—Profile Books/Serpent’s Tail

Memorable Lines:

First joining the case in 1912, he turned his formidable powers to the effort to free him, dissecting the conduct of police and prosecution with Holmesian acumen. But despite his influence and energy, Conan Doyle discovered, he wrote, that “I was up against a ring of political lawyers who could not give away the police without also giving away themselves.”

Holmes quickly became a global sensation, not only for his investigative prowess, unimpeachable morals and ultrarational cast of mind, but also for his exquisite embodiment of an age of Victorian gentility, and Victorian certainties, that was already imperiled.

Detection, at bottom, is a diagnostic enterprise, and the late 19th century was where the shared diagnostic concerns of medicine, criminalistics and literary detection first truly converged in public life.

“...however improbable, must be the truth...”

In 1908, an elderly lady, Miss Gilchrist, was bludgeoned to death in her Glasgow home and a brooch was stolen. Shortly afterwards, Oscar Slater pawned a brooch and boarded a ship bound for America. These two facts were enough for the police to decide that he was the guilty man and, sure enough, they arrested and charged him, and he was convicted and condemned to death – a sentence that was swiftly commuted to life imprisonment in response to a growing feeling of doubt over the verdict among some sectors of the public. This book sets out to tell the story of the case and specifically of Arthur Conan Doyle’s involvement in the campaign to have the verdict overturned.

Quite often with this kind of book I avoid mentioning the eventual outcome as, even though it’s a true crime, it can be fun for people who don’t know the story to read it as a kind of suspense thriller. However, Fox reveals all in her introductory chapter, so I shall say now that Slater’s conviction was finally quashed, but not until he had spent nearly twenty years in Peterhead, Scotland’s most notorious prison. As the book shows, there is no doubt about his innocence, and Fox makes no attempt to pin the crime on the real culprit – that’s not her purpose. Instead, she uses the case to examine the social factors that led to the false conviction, together with the state of the science of detection and ACD’s influence on it.

Fox starts with a description of the murder and the vague and contradictory eyewitness accounts of a man, or perhaps two men, seen near the scene. The police were immediately under pressure to find the murderer, so they were delighted when they were told that Slater had pawned a brooch similar to the one which had been stolen. Slater was perfect as a villain – German, Jewish, a man who made his living from gambling and who lived with a woman suspected of loose morals, possibly a prostitute. So even although they quickly discovered that the brooch he had pawned was not the one stolen from Miss Gilchrist, they decided not to let this little fact get in the way. Instead, they carefully selected all evidence that made Slater look guilty and suppressed anything that proved his innocence – and there was plenty, including an eyewitness account from a respectable neighbour who saw him elsewhere at the time.

Fox discusses the growing anti-Semitism of the period in Scotland, and the more general fear of foreigners. While Scotland hadn’t been quite as anti-Semitic as England in the past, massively increased immigration was leading to an upsurge, especially since many of the Jews arriving were poor, thus existing on the margins. They became associated in the public mind with crime. Also, new modes of transport and the requirements of an industrialised economy meant that people were more mobile than in the past, so that people didn’t necessarily know who their neighbours were, leading to a kind of fear of the stranger. So Slater was an ideal scapegoat, given that the police had no idea of the identity of the real murderer.

Conan Doyle became interested in the case early on. Fox runs through those parts of his biography that are relevant to him becoming a kind of consultant on cases of wrongful conviction, such as his early exposure to the work of Dr Joseph Bell, the man who inspired Sherlock Holmes. Much of this was already known to me, but Fox keeps it tightly focused so that it never feels like padding. She coins the phrase “diagnostic imagination” to describe ACD’s methods, suggesting that his early medical training of conjecturing from symptom back to diagnosis was the basis for his technique of what we would now think of as forensic detection – using physical clues to work backwards to the crime. Fox discusses very interestingly how at this period the pseudoscience of “criminal anthropology” was still influencing detection in Scotland and elsewhere: a belief that one could determine criminal tendencies by certain physical hallmarks – a system “that sought to cloak racial, ethnic and class stereotypes in turn-of-the-20th-century scientific garb”. This was giving way to the more forensic methods promoted by ACD, but not quickly enough to save Slater.

Fox continues the stories of both men turn and turn about, along the way providing a pretty damning indictment of the Scottish police and criminal justice system of the time. She personalises it by allowing us to read some of Slater’s correspondence with his loving parents and family, some of which is quite moving as they gradually age and his expectations of ever seeing them again grow fainter. During the war, no communication was allowed with Germany, so for years he went with no news of family at all. He wasn’t a particularly pleasant man, Slater, but the punishment he underwent for a crime of which he was innocent was cruel indeed.

I found this a fascinating read, especially since rather to my surprise I learned quite a lot that I didn’t know about my own city and country. All the stuff about Glasgow – the class divisions, the way people lived, the prejudices and culture – feels authentic and still recognisable to this Glaswegian, and the wider picture of policing and justice in Scotland feels very well researched. The story of Conan Doyle’s involvement is also told well with lots of interesting digressions into the art and science of detection, and plenty of referencing to the world of Sherlock Holmes. One that I think true crime fans will thoroughly enjoy – highly recommended!

NB This book was provided for review by the publisher, Profile Books.

Conan Doyle for the Defence was a real treat for someone who loves historical true crime and into the bargain I got to know a little more about the creator of Sherlock Holmes.

The true crime is the brutal murder of Marion Gilchrist. A wealthy elderly spinster who lived in a secure apartment, almost paranoid about her precious jewels being stolen. She was pretty much estranged from most of her family and lived with her maid Helen Lambie in a tightly organised fashion as you’d expect from a woman of her class. On 21 December 1908 Helen Lambie left the house to buy the paper and by the time she returned a little more than ten minutes later, her employer was dead. Fortunately Helen, along with the downstairs neighbour had caught a passing glimpse of the murderer and she was also able to identify a missing diamond crescent-shaped brooch.

The police were involved and from the passing of time it is clear to see that the man they pursued, a Jewish man called Oscar Slater, was done for all the wrong reasons. Margalit Fox takes us through the anti-Semitic sentiment of the times and the fear of those immoral trades which Oscar also seemed to be caught up in.
The author also treats us to an explanation of how easy it is to identify the wrong man, especially if the police kindly give some clues as to who they think is the perpetrator of a crime.

To cut a long, but interesting story short, Oscar Slater is convicted of murder and Conan Doyle became interested in the case, but equally interestingly, he didn’t rate the man himself. The author then draws parallels between Conan Doyle’s work as a doctor and the skills needed to solve a crime. Working back from what is known, the symptoms or the body through the absolute facts. Something that didn’t happen with the police work carried out in Glasgow when Marion Gilchrist’s body was found! There are also parallels between Conon Doyle’s deductive skills (I’m not going to mention the lengthy explanation on how he actually practiced abduction) and those of his fictional detective which the author ascribes to his mentor at medical school who used his own keen observations to work out a person’s profession, address and other details from the mud on his shoe or the amount of lint on his hat.

I was absolutely fascinated by this read, there was a lot of information and one couldn’t help but wonder how Oscar coped with nearly two decades of being in Petershead prison with his family far away in Germany. When you consider he had no correspondence with them for the entirety of the WWI his fortitude is even more astounding.
Of course any book of this nature can if care is not taken to take an incredulous tone, it is after all easy to be wise at this distance of time, but the author did keep any such observations relevant to the time of the crime, relaying the disquiet of the wider public once the initial hysteria had died down. All in all this was a sad episode in criminal justice and it is thanks to Conan Doyle that the case was re-examined. Interestingly Oscar Slater was one of the reasons that the appeals court was set up. One of many, many interesting facts I learnt from Margalit Fox!

I’d like to thank the publishers Profile Books for allowing me to read an advance copy of Conan Doyle for the Defence which was published on 21 June 2018.

First Published UK: 21 June 2018
Publisher: Profile Books
No of Pages: 344
Genre: Non-Fiction
Amazon UK
Amazon US

Conan Doyle for the DefenceIn 1908, an 82-year-old spinster, Marion Gilchrist, was found bludgeoned to death in her own Glasgow home. The police soon had who they believed was the culprit – a German Jew called Oscar Slater. Despite having an alibi, Slater was convicted and sentenced to death before having his sentence commuted to life imprisonment in Peterhead Prison. Seventeen years later, William Gordon, a fellow inmate, was released, taking with him a smuggled message from Slater to someone who he thought could help him to clear his name – the writer Arthur Conan Doyle. This is the story of how the Sherlock Holmes writer helped to free the man who had become the subject of a huge miscarriage of justice.

In recent years, mainly thanks to the BBC Sherlock series, there has been a renewed interest in the work of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The TV adaptation of Arthur and George by Julian Barnes also introduced the public to how, although Sherlock Holmes was a fictional character, Conan Doyle was certainly not and, he too, dabbled in detection.

Conan Doyle for the Defence has police corruption, ineptitude and racial prejudice at its core. Shortly after the elderly woman’s murder, those responsible for finding the culprit had their sights firmly set on Oscar Slater. Despite him having an alibi, having no knowledge of the dead woman and there being no evidence whatsoever, Slater was arrested, tried for her murder and subsequently sentenced to death. This was commuted to life imprisonment and he would spend the following decades incarcerated in one of the toughest prisons in Scotland. Conan Doyle would spend many years trying to help to free him and even published The Case of Oscar Slater in 1912.

It is clear that the author has done much research into the case and, as a result, has provided a comprehensive overview of the trial, incarceration and release of Slater. The transcriptions of correspondence between himself and his family were particularly moving and really brought home how his family, themselves suffering due to the First World War, never gave up hope that, one day, justice would finally prevail.

I found Conan Doyle for the Defence a fascinating read, leaving me with a sense of despair that the justice system allowed this to happen. Highly recommended to those who enjoy reading true crime and any Sherlock Holmes fans.

What a fascinating book. It delivers a true crime “mystery “ solved by the great Conan Doyle (creator of the famous Sherlock Holmes) presented within the social context of Victorian England. I enjoyed this very much - it was engrossing and certainly well-written.
My thanks to NetGalley for providing me with an arc in exchange for my honest review.

Arthur Conan Doyle takes on the mantle of his own fictional detective, Sherlock Holmes, in the true crime case of an innocent man, German Jew Oscar Slater, convicted of the murder of the rich, elderly, unlikeable 82 year old woman, Marion Gilchrist in 1908, in Glasgow. Margalit Fox gives us a dense study of the true crime with her impeccable research, concentrating on giving us a social and political commentary of the era that allowed such a damning miscarriage of justice to take place. It is a time of baseless, offensive theories claiming that criminals were born, not made. As such, they make the unfounded assumption that foreigners, the poor, the working class, all outsiders, and Jews are all criminals, ironic given that evidence suggests the real killer is none of these. Conan Doyle challenges such bigotry with the more rational and forensic approach to ensure that almost 20 years later, Oscar Slater is freed from Peterhead prison.

The police barely carried out an investigation, they had found a likely culprit in Oscar Slate, he indulged in gambling, lived with a prostitute, and travelled to New York within days of the murder. The fact that he had an alibi, bore no likeness to the man seen outside of Gilchrist's home, cuts no ice with the police. The policeman who queried his guilt loses his job as the police engage in outright deception and lies that ensures Slater is found guilty. Slater asks Conan Doyle for help in a message smuggled by William Gordon, a convict released in 1925. Despite not liking Slater, Conan Doyle continued to campaign until he was released. Slater displays little in the way of gratitude as he entered into a public spat with Conan Doyle on leaving prison. The police never pursued the real killer, despite evidence suggesting it was someone close to Gilchrist.

Fox does not dwell in length on Conan Doyle, giving us his personal history and his campaign to free Slater. She is much more interested in the anti-semitism, racism and demonisation of the poor in the period, encapsulated in the credence given to quack theories that justified this appalling state of affairs. I found this a compelling and interesting read of this true crime and the depiction of a corrupt police force is forcefully related. It is to his credit that Conan Doyle had an interest in justice and prepared to fight the establishment when it came to Slater. Many thanks to Serpent's Tail for an ARC.

Potential not entirely played out in this one, the old news that Conan Doyle was influenced by mentor analyst Bell, of Edinburgh, and other well known events left me flat .. the case was already solved .. therefore it lacks a bit of suspense, and the crook Conan Doyle helped to establish his innocence after nearly 20.years is perhaps not most upstanding character , inevitably it starts to read like recounting of dry case material ..

I enjoyed this book - a real insight into the mind and non-literary life of Arthur Conan Doyle, creator of Sherlock Holmes. Conan Doyle follows a number of miscarriages of justice and works methodically through the evidence to assist the wronged; this book concentrates on the story of Oscar Slater, a German Jew, wrongly jailed to hard labour for nigh on twenty years. Conan Doyle persists his case and eventually justice prevails. Fascinating.

Arthur Conan Doyle is, of course, best known for writing Sherlock Holmes, but he was also a man of many interests. By the time of the events of this book, Conan Doyle was well known as a crusader for justice; although he was also somewhat derided for his passion for Spiritualism. However, if you are reading this book solely for your interest in Conan Doyle, then please be aware that this is largely about the historical true crime case, which occurred in Glasgow, 1908, and the events which followed it. The book does include Conan Doyle’s part in these events, but there is much more besides.

The case of Oscar Slater, a German Jew, who was cosmopolitan and well travelled, was certainly to regret his visit to Glasgow. In what was later termed, “the Scottish Dreyfus Affair,” Slater was arrested for the murder of an elderly widow, Marion Gilchrist, just before Christmas in 1908. This miscarriage of justice is more interesting, in part, because Slater himself is not a particularly sympathetic character. He was, in fact, a rogue, or ‘blackguard,’ in Conan Doyle’s opinion. However, the evidence against him was circumstantial and when he was sentenced to life ,with hard labour ,at the notorious Peterhead Prison, he began to lose hope.

Conan Doyle was interested in the case from the beginning, but a smuggled message from Slater in 1925, led to him becoming involved in trying to gain Slater’s release. It is more commendable that Conan Doyle worked on Slater’s behalf, considering his original low opinion of the man – it was justice that mattered and he threw himself into the investigation of the crime. This is a fascinating account of the crime, the background, original investigation and Conan Doyle’s own investigation. It is somewhat shocking to realise how long Oscar Slater spent in prison before his release; which may never have happened without Conan Doyle’s help.

At times, it seems the author wanted to put in every piece of research. However, this is still a fascinating account of a historical true crime and the outcome for the man convicted of it. I received a copy of this book from the publisher, via NetGalley, for review.

A clear and easy to read narrative of the case surrounding Oscar Slater and Conan Doyle's involvement and efforts to fight a miscarriage of justice. The book gives readers an insight into the pervading prejudices of the time, the men involved, and to some extent the great fictional detective himself.

What a fascinating book! Whilst reading it, I realised I had vaguely heard of the murder case but was unaware of the miscarriage of justice that had prevailed. It is truly shocking how this case was handled.

The book itself was a thorough examination of the case within the surrounding minutiae of late Victorian/early twentieth century society in Scotland. It allows the reader to get a feel for the paradox that was Conan Doyle, and of course, it wouldn't be complete without reference to his greatest creation, Sherlock Holmes. I would recommend this to anyone who likes historical true crime reads which explore the wider ramifications within society.

Thank you to Netgalley and publishers, Serpent's Tail / Profile Books, for the opportunity to review an ARC.

You can tell from the first page to the last page that the author thoroughly researched the story of Oscar Slater and Arthur Conan Doyle I find book to be very informative. I would definitely recommend this book to anyone who is a fan of the true crime genre or Conan Doyle .

'Conan Doyle for the Defence' by Margalit Fox relates the tale of a clear miscarriage of justice. Oscar Slater, a Jewish immigrant, was convicted of the murder of Marion Gilchrist, a wealthy 82 year old spinster, who was found bludgeoned to death in her Glasgow home on 21 December 1908.

An objective review of the evidence clearly demonstrates Oscar Slater’s innocence however, as Margalit Fox explains, ineffectual police techniques, police corruption, racial prejudice, and class stereotypes, all conspired to convict Oscar Slater in May 1909. Slater’s initial death penalty was commuted to penal servitude for life which he served at the harsh Peterhead prison.

Arthur Conan Doyle was one of many who criticised the guilty verdict and the weak evidence against Slater. In August 1912, Conan Doyle published a booklet entitled The Case of Oscar Slater, where he suggested that some document, such as a will, and not the jewels, was the real object of the murderer’s quest.

A Glasgow policeman named John Thomson Trench was also convinced that Slater had been wrongly accused. Trench was dismissed from the Glasgow police for his efforts to clear Slater, and he died a few years later.

In 1927, supported by Conan Doyle, William Park published a book called The Truth About Oscar Slater. Slater's conviction was quashed in July 1928. Oscar Slater was finally released from Peterhead in 1927 after serving 19 years for a murder he almost certainly did not commit. He died in 1948.

'Conan Doyle for the Defence' contains a lot of background information about the case, attitudes to foreigners and criminality, police procedure, the penal system and much more. Occasionally this felt like too information, as though Margalit Fox wanted to include all her research, and from time to time I lost interest in what I was reading. With a good edit, this book could be a page turner, as it is it’s a generally interesting and exhaustive look at a case that allows exploration of era when such an obvious miscarriage of justice could occur by virtue of the prevalent early 20th century attitudes. It also contains extensive biographical information on both Oscar Slater and Arthur Conan Doyle.