Alston Purvis, son of Melvin Purvis, is coming to his home state to promote his latest book, The Vendetta: FBI Melvin Purvis’ War Against Crime

Contributed by Public Affairs Books

In 1934, SC native Melvin Purvis was the most famous man in America, second only to FDR.  Although only 31 years old, he had just completed a remarkable sweep of the great “Public Enemies” of the Depression: John Dillinger, Pretty Boy Floyd, Baby Face Nelson.  America finally had a hero, and the face of the all–conquering champion of law enforcement was Melvin Purvis’.

Yet every new success and every new appearance of Purvis’ face in the newspapers and magazines added to one man’s bitter, implacable resentment. J. Edgar Hoover’s jealousy was immense, and he determined that Purvis would be brought down.

A vendetta began that would not end—not even with Purvis’ death. After Hoover removed him from his FBI assignment, Purvis returned to Florence, SC, to start a new life. However, he remained haunted by Hoover’s betrayal and died of a self–inflicted gunshot wound in 1960. 

But Hoover’s jealousy lived on; it was only after he had smeared Purvis’ reputation, called his courage and competence into question, and erased his name from all the records of the FBI’s great triumphs did Hoover finally end the pursuit and persecution of Melvin Purvis.  

Alston Purvis began to reinvestigate his father’s story only after his own son was born. With the benefit of a unique family archive of documents and new testimony from Purvis’ colleagues, friends, and witnesses to the events of the ’30s, he has produced a grippingly authentic new telling of the gangster era. The Vendetta , brilliant in its portraits of good and bad guys alike, also eerily foreshadows Hoover’s bitter paranoia throughout the 20th century that would come to overwhelm the bureau he had created.

Alston Purvis is the sole surviving son of Melvin Purvis. He is the head of Boston University’s design department and has published many books on that subject. He lives with his wife and son in Boston.

Alston Purvis will be speaking and signing The Vendetta: FBI Hero Melvin Purvis’ War Against Crime , at the Columbia Museum of Art November 12 at 2 pm, Main and Hampton Streets.