Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #74729 in Books
• Published on: 1992-02-21
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 224 pages

Synopsis
In the 1960s Charlie Richardson's "manor" was a profitable empire stretching from South London scrapyards and West End drinking clubs to mining in South Africa. Then, on the brink of the most lucrative deal of his career, Richardson was arrested. After a trial where the press labelled him the "torture gang boss", he was sentenced to 25 years in prison. This autobiography begins with his humble childhood and start in crime - stealing, escape form reform school, discharge from the army, his brushes with the Mafia and the Kray Twins and about the years when he was known as the hardest man in London.

Customer Reviews

The worst book i have ever read
Absolutely appalling even for a genre not known for a high level of writing this one really takes the biscuit. Reading the first couple of lines i immediately suspected Richardson had done without the services of a ghost writer, the cliches, puns, bile and sentiment coming at a quite dizzying pace.

It gives no insight into his activities, a likeable rogue brought down by the nobs and the toffs seems to be his theme.

Other memoirs of villains from this period are better written and also prove some real insight into the subjects activities ( Freddie Foremans bio. for example).

My advice don't waste your money you'll learn little of Richardson real life and save yourself a lot of cringing at the appalling writing.

A book that needed to be written.
Charlie Richardson is an immensely intelligent if somewhat cynical person. That is EXACTLY what hits you between the eyes when you read this book.

In many respects, Charlie needed to write this account of his life, as it plugs that empty slot in the jigsaw of Sixties crime. The Richardsons were undoubtedly a major force, but Charlie does not dwell overly on the seedier side of his activities. Instead a previously unreported version of events unfolds here of a man who could have been the Branson of the 1960s. Entrepreneurial, workaholic, a driven man who would have been in the billionaire league by now had his 'honest' businesses progressed in the manner they had until his arrest.

For someone who took the punishment he received a lack of humour can be excused in this book. A must read for Sixties crime students, but don't expect a Freddie Foreman type story. Charlie shoots from the hip.

Uplifting, violent, pure brillance.
A very good book but not as good The Guv'nor or 'Stop the Ride I want to get off'. Interesting to read about his fights with the Krays and his associates such as Mad Frankie Frazer.