The Napoleon of Crime: The Life and Times of Adam Worth, Master Thief - Paperback

by Ben MacIntyre (Author)

From the New York Times bestselling author of Prisoners in the Castle, a dramatic portrait of the master thief of the nineteenth century: Adam Worth

"Fascinating . . . a brisk, lively, colorful biography of an amazing criminal."--The New York Times (Best Books of the Year)

The Victorian era's most infamous and iconic thief, the inspiration for Sherlock Holmes's Professor Moriarty, Adam Worth was known as the Napoleon of crime. Suave, cunning, and fearless, Worth learned early that the best way to succeed was to steal. And steal he did.

Following a strict code of honor, Worth won the respect of Victorian society. He also aroused its fear by becoming a chilling phantom, mingling undetected with the upper classes, whose valuables he brazenly stole. His most celebrated heist: Gainsborough's grand portrait of the Duchess of Devonshire--ancestor of Diana, Princess of Wales--a painting Worth adored and often slept with for twenty years.

With a brilliant gang that included "Piano" Charley, a jewel thief, train robber, and playboy, and "the Scratch" Becker, master forger, Worth secretly ran operations from New York to London, Paris, and South Africa--until betrayal and a Pinkerton man finally brought him down.

The Napoleon of Crime is a grand, dazzling tour into the gaslit underworld of the nineteenth century, and into the doomed genius of a criminal mastermind.

Author Biography

Ben Macintyre is a writer-at-large for The Times (UK) and the bestselling author of Agent Sonya, The Spy and the Traitor, A Spy Among Friends, Double Cross, Operation Mincemeat, Agent Zigzag, Rogue Heroes, and Prisoners of the Castle, among other books. Macintyre has also written and presented BBC documentaries of his work.