Peaky Blinders: The Real Gangs and Gangsters The real story of Britain's most notorious mid-20th century gangs

by Chinn, Carl

• ISBN13: 9781789467291
• ISBN10: 1789467292
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2026-01-06
• Publisher: Blink Publishing

Summary

Carl Chinn's Sunday Times number 1 best-selling Peaky Blinders. The Real Story adopted a chronological approach and covered the origins of Birmingham's backstreet gangs in the late 1860s through the late 20th century.

This much-awaited fourth book in the bestselling series, Peaky Blinders: The Real Gangsters and Gangs will differ by taking a thematic approach and intends to delve far more deeply into the crimes as well as the political issues at the heart of this pre-war period.

Focusing on the historical backstreet gangs of Birmingham before 1914, it delves more deeply into the worst peaky blinders and the real gangs whose bloody feuds, murders and maiming, baiting of police officers, gendered violence, indiscriminate bullying, blackmailing of publicans and music hall managers, and disturbing roles in political riots and racist attacks made Birmingham infamous as the city of the peaky blinders.

Author Biography

Professor Carl Chinn MBE Ph.D. is a social historian with a national profile, writer, public speaker, and teacher. An off-course bookmaker himself until 1984, he is the son and grandson of illegal bookmakers in Sparkbrook, and the great-grandson of a peaky blinder, whilst his mother's family were factory workers in Aston. His writings are deeply affected by his family's working-class background and life in the back-to-backs of Birmingham and he believes passionately that history must be democratised because each and every person has made their mark upon history and has a story to tell.