Seize Inspector Oldfield And The Black Hand Society: Americas Original Gangsters And The U.S. Postal Detective Who Brought Them To Justice Developed By William Oldfield Conveyed As Physical Book

was an enjoyable read about a little known aspect of American history, Inspector Oldfields' early years took place near where I live, and the local history was very interesting indeed, Who knew that postal detectives wielded so much authority at the end of theth century, before the establishment of the FBI, Oldfield was quite a character and obsessed with ferreting out and bringing to justice an Italian cabal that shook down and extorted its selected victims, You probably would not have liked Inspector Oldfield, but reading about him and his era was a lot of fun, Fascinated with the whole concept of the postal department and its development in its work into a criminal justice investigation operation, The author has incredible history told as a story and it works I haven't read a true crime book in ages but the synopsis of this book just piqued my curiosity.
First of all, my grandfather and his twin came to Ellis Island at the age offrom Sicily in, Second, my father was a postal worker in Cleveland, Ohio, and third, The Godfather is my alltime favorite movie, With all that, I eagerly dug into this book, This is a font of information here and is one of the most informative books I have read, Meticulously researched about a period of history that I had no clue about, I heartily recommend this book no my father wasn't a Post Office Inspector or in the mafia.
If you love history, true crime and/or mafia stories, please pick up this book, I hope you enjoy it as much as I did, I received an ebook from NetGalley in return for an unbiased review "The incredible true story of the U, S. Post Office Inspector who took down the deadly Black Hand, a turnofthecentury ItalianAmerican secret society that preyed on immigrants across America's industrial heartland, "

I happened upon this book at the library, It looked like an interesting read and boy was I right, I had no idea that US postal inspectors in the earlys were the most powerful federal law enforcers in the country, Frank Oldfield was one of these inspectors and he got entangled in trying to solve who was behind The Black Hand Society threats, It really was a fascinating read and I would recommend it to anyone wanting to learn more about that time period, Before the beginning of prohibition era gangsters such as Al Capone, There was the Black Handthe prelude to the Mafia, a secret Sicilian criminal organization, The Black Hand began its reign of terror and their victims kept quite, Before the FBI, there was the U, S. Post Office who had a group of inspectors led by Frank Oldfield, In, Oldfield became America'sth Post Office Inspector and joined the ranking of the most powerful law enforcement agencies in the United States, Oldfield was responsible for bringing down the Black Hand, capturing sixteen from the group in a case that spanned four states and two continents and put an end in the first international organized crime ring.
This was a good true crime book set in the earlyth century dealing with a group of Sicilians who sent out letters to other Italians threatening them with harm if they didnt pay protection money.
The letters were called Black Hand letters and if ignored for very long, usually led to the death of the recipient or their family members, This eventually led to an investigation by a postal inspector, since the crime involved the US mail, Luckily, it drew the attention of Inspector Oldfield who happened to be a very good and creative detective, and he stuck with the case until managed to make headway, where others had failed for years.
My thanks for the advance electronic copy provided by Netgalley, authors William Oldfield amp Victoria Bruce, and the publisher for my fair review,

Touchstone
Pub: Augst,

My Bookzone blog: sitelink wordpress. com/ This true crime book follows the life of Inspector Frank Oldfield, a post office inspector, and his pursuit of of a dangerous mafia ring in the earlys.
He may not be wellknown but the story is a fascinating one, While a well researched nonfiction book, this one often reads like a novel, I was continuously curious what would happen next, Inspector Oldfield and the Black Hand Society by William Oldfield amp Victoria Bruce is a free NetGalley ebook that I read in early August,

Oldfield is the titled Frank Oldfields greatgreatgrandson, who presents his granddad as a US post office inspector who brought down the Sicilian mob at the start of theth century with talents being required when a murder victim is found to be carrying letters written to him in Italian.
While reading this, I experienced a sudden flashback to watching Saturday morning tv and coming across the USPS inspector show, The Inspectors, This book, however, is written in a dense, journalismstyle storytelling from so many perspectives with the factors surrounding the main plot the postal service, Pinkerton police, mafia, confiscating letters, making arrests, and court proceedings that its easy to lose track.
I received a review copy free and early, thanks to Net Galley and Simon and Schuster/Touchtone, This book is for sale now,

Who knew that the U, S. Postmaster has the authority to commandeer an entire ship, train, or airplane in pursuit of justice Needless to say, it doesnt happen often think of the press if that were to happen today! But Inspector Frank Oldfield was a man on a mission.


Once the introduction is over, I find an uneven quality to the narrative, The aspect that describes the gangsters and the formation of the Black Hand is fascinating after the buildup, however, I find the inspector himself less riveting and the writing not as tight as Id prefer.
The research is a little spotty and the sources are not well integrated,

However, if true crime is your wheelhouse, you may want to get a copy of this oneofakind biography, The genre is mystery, detective story and biography, all rolled into one story, An added feature is that one of the authors is related to the hero of our story,
While the reader will not recognize the standard attributes of a detective mystery, the good guys versus the bad guys are easily distinguishable, The topic authors present is not fictional because at the turn of theth century, Italian immigrants were terrorized by Black Hand gangs,
The description of the US Postal Inspector is interesting because the authors state that this branch of the Postal service had very broad powers, enabling them to assert jurisdiction over most other law enforcement agencies and to investigate with no boundaries.
These broad powers dont seem present currently, so one wonders if they did exist as stated by the authors,
Frank Oldfield, the postal inspector recognized as the primary person to bring the Black Hand to justice seems not to be recognized by the US Postal Inspection Service.
The authors attempt a justification by attributing this disfavor to his rough style of investigation, his failure to properly report to superiors and his propensity to spend agency funds exorbitantly.
This explanation seems inadequate because a postal inspector is not an independent agent, they work in a bureaucracy subject to multi layers of supervision and sever budgetary restraints, So why didnt the Postal Inspection Service recognize Oldfield as a hero
While performing their research the authors got little to no help from the Postal Inspection Service.
The authors state, “there was no detailed history of Frank Oldfield in the U, S. Post Office archives. ” “Purposely or not, the U, S. Post Office Department took a giant eraser to Fran Oldfields life and his merits, ” The why is never adequately explained in this narrative, The authors acknowledge that they relied on family folklore and the contents of Frank Oldfields trunks, that survived decades of storage to document their story,
The case for our hero and the story of the capture and indictment of the bad guys is well done by the authors the narrative moves swiftly and is entertaining.
Yet, as stated above, some things dont seem to be historical fact, and possibly, the authors have had to revert into the realm of fiction in order to paint their picture, in any case, the story provided a pleasurable experience.

My thanks to Simon and Schuster for this free eBook,

This is a true crime story and biography of a postal inspector, Frank Oldfield, who brought down the Black Hand society a mafia forerunner, It was cowritten by one of Inspector Oldfield's greatgrandchildren from artifacts and documents within the family,

This certainly was an interesting read, and historically it was fascinating to see the evolution of the postal service and investigation branch, However, I found the writing to be a bit uneven and I wasn't initially sure what the beginning of the book had to do with the Inspector and the investigation into the extortion and murder that the Black Hand society was perpetrating.
It became clear eventually.

Despite the uneven writing style, it was an interesting book and a look back at the history of both postal inspections and early organized crime, Fascinating chapter in the history of the mafia in the US and very engagingly told, Once upon a time in the late nineteenth century postal inspectors were the most powerful arm of the law, Frank Oldfield, when appointed to that position, used his power courageously, treading where American law enforcement had not gone before, He discovered that a group of Sicilian immigrants had banded together under the unlikely moniker, Society of the Banana, They were actually the Black Hand Society, formed to extract money from other Italian immigrants under penalty of death, They were bloodsuckers. Vile. People who had come to this country to escape a corrupt society and had done well financially were being bled dry, Frank Oldfield never got much credit for organizing a network of inspectors with a long reach to expose these varmints, It is a story that needed to be told, and his greatgrandson proudly relates the details, Who knew the history of the USPS could be so interesting While I've come across some historical nonfiction that gets bogged down with extraneous detail, this book had just enough historical backstory to set the story in perspective.
An interesting look at one forgotten man and the forgotten fact that the post office played an important role in criminal justice in the early years, Inspector Oldfield and the Black Hand Society: America's Original Gangsters and the U, S. Postal Detective who Brought Them to Justice was a remarkable tribute to author William Oldfield's greatgrandfather as well as a fascinating look at the history of organized crime in the United States and the role that the U.
S. Post Office played in the ultimate conviction of many key members of the Black Hand Society at the turn of the twentieth century, Largely because of fear of retaliation from the Black Hand Society, documents in the Oldfield family pertaining to Postal Inspector Frank Oldfield's investigation leading to the prosecution of Sam and Salvatore Lima were kept secret and locked away for generations until William Oldfield went through a surviving trunk of documents and photographs which are shared throughout this book.
This was an exciting, wellwritten and meticulously researched book a fine tribute to the author's greatgrandfather,

"We have silently removed emperors, kings and princes and have been as fearless of apprehension as if we were the wind sighing in the trees at night.
We revel in bloodshed, we smile at tears and pleadings and our field of operation is bounded only by the universe, We scoff at the police, We push them

aside as we would a child, " Sam Lima, Black Hand Society
Historical nonfiction is a genre I greatly enjoy, I tend towards the civil war era when picking historical nonfiction, but I really enjoyed this caper set in the earlys, I had no idea how much investigative power the Post Office Inspector has, Oldfield is quite the character and I found myself really rooting for him to bring the Black Hand Society to justice,

Something I liked about this book is that its set in a time just long enough ago to feel like some aspects of life were different, but still recent enough that it was only a few generations ago.
The mafia storyline is also fascinating and kept me on my toes, Inspector Oldfield and the Black Hand Society comes out August! I received an ARC of this book via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review, Interesting read about something I never even heard of, After hearing stories of his grandfather for years, when his mother was near death, William Oldfield questioned her about the contents his grandfathers locked trunk, With her admonition to tell the story accurately, he meticulously examined the records in the trunk, and then researched his grandfathers accomplishments, and presented them in this book, It's a fantastic history lesson, well told, in the style of a great lecturer, The book does read a bit more like a history lecture than a standard historical novel, but I enjoyed it nonetheless!,