On January 1st… The Beginning

On January 1, 1881, Dr John H Watson, recently returned to London and living in “a private hotel in the Strand,” realized he had been “spending such money as [he] had, considerably more freely than [he] ought.” He decided “to leave the hotel, and to take up [his] quarters in some less pretentious and less expensive domicile.”

At the Criterion Bar, he was surprised by an old acquaintance, young Stamford, who just happened to know of another young man in search of someone with whom to share the expense of living in London. And so off to Barts they went….

Illustration by George Hutchinson (1891)

There was only one student in the room, who was bending over a distant table absorbed in his work. At the sound of our steps he glanced round and sprang to his feet with a cry of pleasure. ‘I’ve found it! I’ve found it,’ he shouted to my companion, running towards us with a test-tube in his hand. ‘I have found a re-agent which is precipitated by haemoglobin, and by nothing else.’ Had he discovered a gold mine, greater delight could not have shone upon his features.

‘Dr Watson, Mr Sherlock Holmes,’ said Stamford, introducing us.

‘How are you?’ he said cordially, gripping my hand with a strength for which I should hardly have given him credit. ‘You have been in Afghanistan, I perceive.’

A very happy new year, dear Watsonians!

On March 3rd… The Americans Take Their Leave

“Poor Alice was so frightened that she shrunk away from him, but he caught her by the wrist and endeavoured to draw her towards the door.”

March 3, 1881: Businessmen Drebber and Stangerson bid adieu to Madame Charpentier. [STUD]
This according to one version.

The illustration at right is by George Wylie Hutchinson from the Ward, Lock, Bowden, & Co 1891 edition of A Study in Scarlet.

Intriguing way to say good-bye. If the reader does not remember the details, It could be a good time to reread the story.

Source
A Day by Day Chronology of Mr. Sherlock Holmes by William S Dorn DWNP, BSI

Posted by Chips aka Ron for whom the Game is always Afoot and Selena Buttons, Co-Columnists