A descendant of one of the real-life Peaky Blinders has shared his thoughts on the cult phenomenon linked to the show, revealing a dangerous truth about the gang that's left out of the show.
Professor Carl Chinn is a rare combination: someone who is not only directly related to the real-life Peaky Blinders but is also an expert social historian with a particular interest in the gangs of Birmingham - having spent 40 years researching them.
Essentially, he is as close to an expert on the real story behind Peaky Blinders as you are ever likely to get.
Carl’s father and his grandfather were both illegal bookmakers and his great grandfather, Edward Derrick, was in one of the ‘Peaky Blinders’ gangs that existed in late 19th and early 20th Century in Birmingham.
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Speaking exclusively to LADbible, Carl acknowledged the great things Peaky Blinders but expressed serious trepidation about one aspect of the cultural phenomenon the TV show has created.
Peaky Blinders has now become a worldwide brand, with groups of Peaky Blinders impersonators walking round in expensive suits and Peaky hats all over the world.
Carl said: “Because of the cultural approach so many people have taken, that they're ignoring the violence, the racism, the bullying, the sexual assaults of the real Peaky Blinders which I've studied in detail.
“[Fans] turn it into something that is just a fashion and ‘we're dressing like the real Peaky Blinders, we've got the hat, we've got the suits.’
“The real Peaky Blinders were poor men, overwhelmingly they were street traders trying to make a few bob or unskilled labourers in irregular work. They couldn't afford fine clothes.”
The Peaky Blinders expert issued caution about how the gangs are being glorified, questioning whether the gangs of today would be ‘admired’ in the same way, calling it a ‘worrying cultural phenomenon’.
He added: “The series has been a phenomenal international success, it's brought a lot of positive attention to Birmingham. It's, I think, drawn a lot of young people into wanting to understand the past more.
“If the Digbeth Lock Studios in Birmingham [Steven Knight’s newly created production studio] takes off, then Stephen Knight deserves a huge amount of congratulations.
“But bear this in mind, the drama is not reality. There wasn't an Aunt Polly figure in 1920s Birmingham.
“It is worrying because you can see in a lot of young men, there is this attraction towards glamorized gangsterism, which is not a reality.”
“I’m not proud to be the great grandson of a real Peaky Blinder"
Carl found out that his great-grandfather was a former Peaky Blinder whilst researching the gangs, however there is no love lost between the History professor and his link to the past.
Talking about discovering the connection, he said: “I grew up knowing that my great-grandfather, Edward Derrick, my grandmother's father on my dad's side, was a violent, abusive, wife-beating, petty thief.
“I'd been told about his wife beating and his violence, his thieving by my great uncle Bill born in 1893 and by older people who grew up in the same street.”
He said that David Cross from the West Midlands Police Museum called him up to inform him that he’d found a picture of Derrick, in which it was clear he was a Peaky Blinder based on his style and haircut.
He added: “I’m not proud to be the great grandson of a real Peaky Blinder but I'll tell you what I am proud of. I'm proud to be the son, the grandson, and the great-grandson of backstreet Birmingham women and they are the true heroes of the backstreets, not the Peaky Blinders, not the organised crime gangs of the 1920s.”
Carl also features in an upcoming documentary on the real Peaky Blinders gangs and the true history behind the now iconic show Peaky Blinders: The Real Story, and also wrote a book Peaky Blinders The Real Gangs and Gangsters.
Peaky Blinders: The Real Story is available on UK digital now from Reel2Reel Films.
Topics: Peaky Blinders, History, TV, True Crime, TV and Film, Documentaries, UK News
Michael Slavin