Author: Chips & Selena

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On June 8th…

According to A Day by Day Chronology of Mr Sherlock Holmes, According to Zeisler and Christ, compiled and edited by William S Dorn, BSI and DWNP, on June 8, 1889: Hall Pycroft took a train to Birmingham to meet Harry Pinner. [STOC]

Lickey Incline 5 geograph-2180870

You can imagine, Dr. Watson, how pleased I was at such an extraordinary piece of good fortune. I sat up half the night hugging myself over it, and next day I was off to Birmingham in a train that would take me in plenty of time for my appointment. I took my things to an hotel in New Street, and then I made my way to the address which had been given me[…]

Illustration by WH Hyde for Harper’s Weekly (1893)

[…]I followed him to the top of a very lofty stair, and there right under the slates were a couple of empty and dusty little rooms, uncarpeted and uncurtained, into which he led me. I had thought of a great office with shining tables and rows of clerks such as I was used to, and I daresay I stared rather straight at the two deal chairs and one little table, which, with a ledger and a wastepaper basket, made up the whole furniture.

Every time I read this story, I often wonder just how with it Hall Prycroft was. The old expression keeps popping into my mind: If it seems too good to be true…! –Chips

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On June 7th…

Another day with two cases in two years on the same day. Confused yet? Here we go.

June 7 1889: Arthur Pinner offered Hall Pycroft a job with Franco-Midland Hardware Company [STOC]

Illustration by WH Hyde for Harper’s Weekly (1893)

Well, I was sitting doing a smoke that very evening after I had been promised the appointment, when up came my landlady with a card which had `Arthur Pinner, financial agent,’ printed upon it. I had never heard the name before, and could not imagine what he wanted with me, but of course I asked her to show him up. In he walked – a middle-sized, dark-haired, dark-eyed, black-bearded man, with a touch of the sheeny about his nose. He had a brisk kind of way with him and spoke sharply, like a man that knew the value of time.

[The description of Pinner includes an offensive slang term for a Jewish person. I always disliked comments like that even if those descriptions were in common use at the time. -Chips]

June 7, 1900: Beppo destroyed the first bust of Napoleon. [SIXN]

“The first case reported was four days ago,” said he. “It was at the shop of Morse Hudson, who has a place for the sale of pictures and statues in the Kennington Road. The assistant had left the front shop for an instant when he heard a crash, and, hurrying in, found a plaster bust of Napoleon, which stood with several other works of art upon the counter, lying shivered into fragments.

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On June 6th…

A Day by Day Chronology of Mr Sherlock Holmes, According to Zeisler and Christ, compiled and edited by William S Dorn, BSI and DWNP, gives us two entries for Sherlockian events in two different years. So here we go.

June 6, 1889: Hall Pycroft received a letter offering him a berth with Mawson and Williams. [STOC]

Illustration by Sidney Paget for The Strand Magazine (1893)

“At last I saw a vacancy at Mawson and Williams’, the great stockbroking firm in Lombard Street. I daresay E.C. is not much in your line, but I can tell you that this is about the richest house in London. The advertisement was to be answered by letter only. I sent in my testimonial and application, but without the least hope of getting it. Back came an answer by return saying that if I would appear next Monday I might take over my new duties at once, provided that my appearance was satisfactory. No one knows how these things are worked. Some people say the manager just plunges his hand into the heap and takes the first that comes. Anyhow, it was my innings that time, and I don’t ever wish to feel better pleased. The screw was a pound a week rise, and the duties just about the same as at Coxon’s.

Question from Chips: In the last sentence of the quote above, a rise in pay is referred to as “a screw”. Why?

Answer from the English Oxford Living Dictionaries:

British – dated, informal [in singular]
An amount of salary or wages.
‘he’s offered me the job with a jolly good screw’

June 6, 1890: Busts of Napoleon were sold to Morse Hudson and the Harding Brothers. [SIXN]

Busts of Napoleon on display at the Sherlock Holmes Museum, London

“Now, Watson, let us make for Gelder and Co., of Stepney, the source and origin of busts. I shall be surprised if we don’t get some help down there.”
[…] A reference to his books showed that hundreds of casts had been taken from a marble copy of Devine’s head of Napoleon, but that the three which had been sent to Morse Hudson a year or so before had been half of a batch of six, the other three being sent to Harding Brothers, of Kensington.

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On June 3rd…

Edward Hardwicke as Watson and Jeremy Brett as Holmes (1994)

According to A Day by Day Chronology of Mr Sherlock Holmes, According to Zeisler and Christ, compiled and edited by William S Dorn, BSI and DWNP, on June 3, 1902, Holmes visited Mrs Maberly at Three Gables. [3GAB]

We found The Three Gables a very different establishment to the orderly household of the previous day. A small group of idlers had assembled at the garden gate, while a couple of constables were examining the windows and the geranium beds. Within we met a gray old gentleman, who introduced himself as the lawyer, together with a bustling, rubicund Inspector, who greeted Holmes as an old friend.
“Well, Mr. Holmes, no chance for you in this case, I’m afraid. Just a common, ordinary burglary, and well within the capacity of the poor old police. No experts need apply.”
“I am sure the case is in very good hands,” said Holmes. “Merely a common burglary, you say?”

[PS: In two days you will read a song dedicated (Maybe not the right word) to the female villain of this tale!!! -Chips]

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The “Best” Sherlock Holmes Stories

A Curious Collection of Dates: Through the Year with Sherlock Holmes by Leah Guinn (JHWS “Amber”) and Jaime N Mahoney (JHWS “Tressa”), reminds us that the June 1927 issue of The Strand Magazine included the results of a contest in the preceding March issue: “Which are the best Sherlock Holmes Stories?”

The winner of the contest was the one who came the closest to matching a list compiled by Arthur Conan Doyle. An accompanying article gave Doyle’s reasons for choosing each story, though he evidently couldn’t resist “grousing a bit that he had had to reread them all.”

The contest winner, RT Norman, matched 10 of the 12 titles, receiving a copy of Doyle’s Memories and Adventures and £100. (Eric W Nye’s Pounds Sterling to Dollars: Historical Conversion of Currency, tells us that would be worth $8,714.79 USD today, which our friends at Google say equals £6,771.40 GBP.)

Arthur Conan Doyle’s List of the Best Sherlock Holmes Stories

  1. The Specked Band
  2. The Red Headed League
  3. The Dancing Men
  4. The Final Problem
  5. A Scandal in Bohemia
  6. The Empty House
  7. The Five Orange Pips
  8. The Second Stain
  9. The Devils Foot
  10. The Priory School
  11. The Musgrave Ritual
  12. The Reigate Squires

A Curious Collection of Dates summarizes the reasoning behind the selections. For those interested in more on the subject, there’s The Baker Street Dozen, edited by Pj Doyle and EW McDiarmid, a collection of essays on the stories (plus “Silver Blaze”) from authors including Isaac Asimov, Richard Lancelyn Green, and our friend over at Sherlock Peoria, Brad Keefauver.

For even more consideration of which story is the best, and why, look no further than About Sixty: Why Every Sherlock Holmes Story is the Best, edited by Christopher Redmond (JHWS “Buster”) and including contributions from a number of our members. (Don’t miss our interview with “Buster” about the book!)

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On May 31st…

According to A Day by Day Chronology of Mr Sherlock Holmes, according to Zeisler and Christ, compiled and edited by William S Dorn, BSI and DWNP, on May 31, 1902, a house agent agreed to Mrs Maberly’s terms for sale of Three Gables. [3GAB]

Three days ago I had a call from a man who said that he was a house agent. He said that this house would exactly suit a client of his, and that if I would part with it money would be no object. It seemed to me very strange, as there are several empty houses on the market which appear to be equally eligible, but naturally I was interested in what he said. I therefore named a price which was five hundred pounds more than I gave. He at once closed with the offer, but added that his client desired to buy the furniture as well, and would I put a price upon it. Some of this furniture is from my old home, and it is, as you see, very good, so that I named a good round sum. To this also he at once agreed. I had always wanted to travel, and the bargain was so good a one that it really seemed that I should be my own mistress for the rest of my life.

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Dr Watson’s Finest Moment

[Note from Chips: I have the author’s permission to use this for our membership to enjoy. For a society that honors the contributions of Dr Watson, I think it is a fitting tribute to the Good Doctor.]

WATSON’S FINEST MOMENT

by Carl L Heifetz

Prepared for The Formulary, The Journal of the Friends of Doctor Watson

April 17, 2006

The “sacred” Canon reveals many excellent instances that may fulfill the object of this essay – to describe the finest moment in the life and career of John H. Watson, M.D.

Could it be the time that he stood bravely on the deck of the Aurora, revolver in hand, facing down the dangerous Tonga and his poisoned dart in The Sign of Four, or, in the same adventure, when he walked, alone and unprotected, late at night through a dangerous part of London seeking Toby? How about the time that he steadfastly acted as a British jury in “The Adventure of the Abbey Grange?” The list is virtually endless.

Although many other episodes could be cited as exemplifying the subject of this discourse, I maintain that the best exemplar was the occasion in which Dr. Watson agreed to shares Baker Street quarters with Mr. Sherlock Holmes.

Look at the circumstances that would have mitigated against this decision. Watson was weak and weary from his horrible experiences. His leg and shoulder ached constantly, forcing him towards excessive drink. His constitution had been weakened by a case of enteric fever. He was probably also suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. And, no doubt, his nerves were very highly susceptible to anxiety, admitting later to “keeping a bull pup.” Yet, he agreed to share a suite with a man described as a very sinister companion; a man who greeted him with a mysterious statement concerning the fact that he had been in Afghanistan, a statement which could put most men’s nerve on edge, and then ran around yelling about some test for blood. It is indeed a tribute to Dr. Watson that he must have seen some very positive outcomes associated with a future relationship with the “mad scientist” whom he had just met.

Let us consider the serious consequences had Dr. Watson not decided that it would be in his best interests to share rooms with this eccentric gentleman. Just imagine, we might never have heard of Sherlock Holmes.

His personal reticence would have dimmed whatever other records there were of his accomplishment. Think of it: The world would never have been the same; we would all have been deprived of the main focus of our scholarly pursuits.

Let us all sing the praises of Dr. Watson, and his finest moment – the beginning of an adventurous life for Dr. Watson and all of us who relish Dr. Watson’s accounts.

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From Limerick Corner

I have the author’s permission to publish this limerick, and I felt that there is such a great description here I wanted my fellow members to see and appreciate the quality. Tomorrow I have an article about Dr Watson’s finest moment by this same author that I think you will really
enjoy. My first love in Sherlockian research is limericks so this one is first. I hope you understand and allow me my passion. -Chips

SHERLOCK HOLMES LIMERICK
by Carl & Sandie Heifetz

(Presented at the Pleasant Places of Florida Sherlock Holmes Birthday Bash, January 17, 1998; Cité Grill: Dundin, Florida), Published in The Hounds Collection Vol. 4, p 70, Bill Barnes 1999.

Sherlock Holmes, a detective from London,
Could not tolerate puzzles too humdrum.
He looked at all trifles,
Butts, tracks, and air rifles,
And used Science to solve each conundrum.
He was the best London detective,
Who thought police methods defective,
He placed his reliance,
On methods of Science,
And used logic that was quite objective.
On all of the clues he would meditate,
While smoking his pipe would eliminate,
All items impossible,
But not the improbable,
And then his hypotheses validate.

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Stephen Fry and Sherlock Holmes

If any fictional character can be said to be immortal, it is Sherlock Holmes.


So begins Simon Callow’s review of the new audio version of (most of) the Canon from Audible, read by Stephen Fry, in the New York Times Book Review: The Sound of Sherlock: Stephen Fry Voices the Master Sleuth.

After recounting a few of the many adaptations and pastiches that have appeared over the years – including The Seven-Per-Cent Solution, Private Life of Sherlock Holmes, and House – he returns to the ongoing interest in the Canon since its original publication.

The reasons for Holmes’s enduring fascination are easy to understand. He restores logic to an unruly, disturbingly incomprehensible world. Initial chaos — the crime — appears to be without meaning. The great detective, inhumanly brilliant, makes sense of things again. […] We come to him like frightened children, in search of explanations. He will never fail us. At least in the realm of crime — though not in the territory of the human heart — he sheds light where there has previously only been darkness. He is clever Daddy, who leaves us reassured, able to sleep at night. But he is by no means perfect. Conan Doyle’s coup de maître, as Watson might say, is to make his hero a flawed man, prone to deep melancholia, liable to escape into cocaine- or opium-induced oblivion. He has the soul of an artist, as demonstrated in his violin playing: He is prepared to please Watson by knocking off some Mendelssohn or Wagner, but when left to himself, he “scrapes carelessly” at the fiddle thrown across his knee. Sometimes, Watson tells us, the chords were sonorous and melancholy, sometimes fantastic and cheery: obviously an avant-gardist at work. Holmes’s behavior, tut-tuts Watson, is bohemian: His papers are piled up higgledy-piggledy all over his rooms, he is entirely disorganized domestically, he is given to long bouts of brooding silence. Nothing that is not germane to his work as a consulting detective is allowed to clutter up his mind. He is indifferent to literature, knows little of history, and cosmology has no part in his intellectual framework. This, too, has endeared Holmes to his readers: The genius is vulnerable, his mental prowess bought at a cost.

“12 Scenes from Holmes’s Career” by Sidney Paget

The audio recording also includes some forewords from Fry himself, which Callow says “constitute one of the set’s major pleasures, illuminated by informed enthusiasm and personal revelation: In one he rather touchingly recounts how his first encounter with Holmes, at a very early age, changed his life, leading him on to truancy, expulsion from school and, finally, briefly, prison.” For Fry’s vocal performance, Callow has nothing but praise:

In the Holmes books, he reads just under a thousand pages in his wonderfully even and infallibly intelligent voice, touching the characters in deftly — the books field a very large number of well-educated middle-aged men, and it must have been difficult to differentiate one from another. Otherwise, he finds a variety of accents and tones for the many foreigners Holmes encounters; his American accents are lightly done, without attempting, for example, a Utah accent in “A Study in Scarlet.”

Callow concludes, “There are other complete recorded Holmeses (as it happens, the current collection omits the last book of all, presumably on copyright grounds), but none that sustains the course so buoyantly, and none with the added pleasure of the reader’s pithy commentary on each book.”

There is a “Definitive Edition” available in the UK that includes The Case-Book, but it is not available in the United States. Maybe that edition will be released this side of the pond when those stories (finally) roll into the US public domain.

Have you listened to the Stephen Fry audiobook, or any other audio version of the Canon?

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On May 26th…

eter Cushing as Holmes and Nigel Stock as Watson (1964)

“Chips” writes that today marks the birth of his favorite actor to play Sherlock Holmes: he put an emotion into Holmes as one who could be aloof, standoffish because of his knowledge but underneath a warm caring human who loved Watson as a brother and cared for his clients.

Peter Wilton Cushing was born on May 26, 1913, in Kenley, Surrey, England. He played Sherlock Holmes many times, beginning with Hammer Films’ The Hound of the Baskervilles in 1959, which was the first Holmes adaptation filmed in color. He went on to play Holmes in 16 episodes of the BBC’s Sherlock Holmes series, though only six episodes have survived. Twenty years later, he portrayed an older Holmes in the television movie, Sherlock Holmes and the Masks of Death.

Cushing was a Sherlockian, and as such insisted on including lines from the stories into the TV episodes. He also included actions such as writing on his sleeve cuff in Study in Scarlet. Unfortunately, the series was underfunded and given no time to film quality episodes, so Cushing and the BBC parted company.

In Starring Sherlock Holmes: A Century of the Master Detective on Screen, film historian David Stuart Davies notes:

Cushing requested that the costumes for the series replicated those shown in the Paget illustrations. The BBC agreed, and in doing so exploded the myth of Holmes’s Inverness cape…

 

Sources:  A Curious Collection of Dates: Through the Year with Sherlock Holmes by Leah Guinn (JHWS “Amber”) and Jaime N Mahoney (JHWS “Tressa”), IMDB.com, and the Peter Cushing Appreciation Society UK.

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On May 25th…

Readers all over the world endured the death of the great Sherlock Holmes, who had become so loved and popular to fans, in the last story in the Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, published in 1893. A storm of protest could not change the mind of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Even his Mother, according to stories passed around, could not bring Holmes back.

Advertising broadsheet for The Hound of the BaskervillesThen, on May 25th, 1901, Newnes’s weekly publication, Tit-Bits (sister publication to The Strand) announced, “Revival of Sherlock Holmes”.

Never mind that the story being published was to be an earlier case of Holmes’s before his fatal encounter at the Falls.

Holmes was coming back.

His most exciting case yet, The Hound of The Baskervilles began appearing in The Strand in August of 1901 and was published as a novel in 1902.

The hope of Holmes was back and hopefully would never go away.

This information comes from A Curious Collection of Dates: Through the Year with Sherlock Holmes by Leah Guinn (JHWS “Amber”) and Jaime N Mahoney (JHWS “Tressa”).

We’ll close with the dedication that appeared in the original book. [Interesting that now there are those scholars who do not believe that this was true in the creation of this tale. -Chips]

This story owes its inception to my friend, Mr. Fletcher Robinson, who has helped me both in the general plot and in the local details.

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On May 23rd…

From A Day by Day Chronology of Mr. Sherlock Holmes according to Zeisler and Christ compiled and edited by William S Dorn:

On May 23, 1889, the Naval Treaty was stolen. [NAVA]

Illustration by Sidney Paget for The Strand Magazine (1893)

The chamber into which we were shown was on the same floor as the drawing-room. It was furnished partly as a sitting and partly as a bedroom, with flowers arranged daintily in every nook and corner. A young man, very pale and worn, was lying upon a sofa near the open window, through which came the rich scent of the garden and the balmy summer air. A woman was sitting beside him, and rose as we entered.
“Shall I leave, Percy?” she asked.
He clutched her hand to detain her. “How are you, Watson?” said he, cordially, “I should never have known you under that moustache, and I daresay you would not be prepared to swear to me. This I presume is your celebrated friend, Mr. Sherlock Holmes?”

This is one of the rare instances of a physical description of Watson in the Canon, and the one scholars use as proof that Watson had a moustache.

“A cold hand seemed to close round my heart. Someone, then, was in that room where my precious treaty lay upon the table. I ran frantically up the stairs and along the passage. There was no one in the corridors, Mr. Holmes. There was no one in the room. All was exactly as I left it, save only that the papers committed to my care had been taken from the desk on which they lay. The copy was there and the original was gone.”

Since Phelps was warned strongly about the need to keep the treaty safe, why did he leave it on the table in the first place? Why did he not put the original in his desk drawer and lock it up or lock the room before leaving the floor?

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On May 22nd…

Photograph of Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle by Herbert Rose Barraud (1893)

We have no Canonical happening for today, but we celebrate a rather important event!

Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle was born May 22, 1859 at Picardy Place, Edinburgh, to Charles Altamont Doyle and Mary Doyle (née Foley).

In honor of Dr Doyle’s 158th birthday, we’d like to share some fascinating facts from A Curious Collection of Dates: Through the Year with Sherlock Holmes by Leah Guinn (JHWS “Amber”) and Jaime N Mahoney (JHWS “Tressa”). We rely on this excellent volume for inspiration for many of our non-chronology entries. As a rule, we avoid posting such long extracts from published works; we hope that this small taste will inspire you to grab a copy of the book from Wessex Press for yourself!

Ten Facts about Sir Arthur Conan Doyle You Might not Know

from A Curious Collection of Dates: Through the Year with Sherlock Holmes by Leah Guinn and Jaime N Mahoney

  1. He was six years old when he wrote his first story. An adventure story about a hunting party’s encounter with a Bengal tiger, it was, as is typical for little boys’ tales, realistic about its protagonist’s fate: the tiger went away filled.
  2. He had a miniature monorail train built at Undershaw for his children and their friends.
  3. He could be musical. In the early spring of 1898, he wrote to his mother that he was learning the banjo: “To hunt and to play a musical instrument would 2 years ago have been picked out as the two things in the world that I was least likely to do.” (We cannot tell if he stuck with it.)
  4. He did not like corn on the cob. During his 1894 tour of the States, the Cincinnati Enquirer reported that he “does not seem to be infatuated with ear corn.” Sweet potatoes and eggplant were apparently more palatable.
  5. He seems to have been asked to join The Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, whose alleged members included William Butler Yeats, Arthur Machen, and Sax Rohmer. He declined the invitation, from a “Dr. Brown,” claiming that he simply did not have the time. A month later, he encountered “Dr. Brown” again at a social gathering, and heard him and a friend discussing their experiences with astral projection. “…I remain under the impression that I brushed against something strange,” he wrote later, “and something which I am not sorry that I avoided.”
  6. He could be a bit of a thrill seeker. In 1901, he excitedly reported to his mother that he had taken a ride in a hot air balloon, flying 25 miles from the Crystal Palace to Sevenoaks, “We went 1½ miles high,” he exulted, “It was a most extraordinary sensation and experience… […] I have always wanted to do this & am glad I have done it.”
  7. If he were shipwrecked on a deserted island and could choose only one book to have with him, it would be Edward Gibbon’s History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. This is, in fact, a multi-volume work, which might be considered cheating.
  8. He showed remarkably poor judgment… when, on Christmas morning in 1892, he decided to dress as a monster and jump out to scare his family. Four year-old Mary was traumatized, and biographer Daniel Stashower tells us that Arthur was give nighttime comfort duty, a just and fitting punishment.
  9. His name was valuable. In October of 1895, Conan Doyle felt obligated to write to a New York paper, The Critic, to alert readers that someone was publishing an anthology of stories under his name. He had only one story in Strange Secrets, he wrote, “a short one in the middle of the book.”
  10. He owned property in Canada. During his trip to Canada with Jean in 1914, he bought land in Fort William, Ontario, as an investment, paying $15,000. In 1965, his heirs sold the lot at a loss for $14,000.
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On May 21st…

From A Day by Day Chronology of Mr. Sherlock Holmes according to Zeisler and Christ by William S Dorn:

Harrington Bird’s “Isinglass Winning the Derby”, from The Encyclopedia of Sport (1897)

On May 21, 1902, Shoscombe Prince won the Derby at Epsom. [SHOS]

It is generally known now that this singular episode ended upon a happier note than Sir Robert’s actions deserved. Shoscombe Prince did win the Derby, the sporting owner did net eighty thousand pounds in bets, and the creditors did hold their hand until the race was over, when they were paid in full, and enough was left to re-establish Sir Robert in a fair position in life. Both police and coroner took a lenient view of the transaction, and beyond a mild censure for the delay in registering the lady’s decease, the lucky owner got away scatheless from this strange incident in a career which has now outlived its shadows and ended in an honoured old age.

[Some of the prize money must’ve gone to grease some wheels, so Sir Robert got away with it. What a Cad and Bounder! –Chips]

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On May 20th…

From A Day by Day Chronology of Mr. Sherlock Holmes according to Zeisler and Christ by William S Dorn:

May 20, 1900, was Beppo’s last pay day at Gelder & Co. [SIXN]

Andreas Markos as Beppo (BBC, 1965)

“No, no,” cried Holmes, “not a word to the cousin – not a word, I beg you. The matter is very important, and the farther I go with it the more important it seems to grow. When you referred in your ledger to the sale of those casts I observed that the date was June 3rd of last year. Could you give me the date when Beppo was arrested?”
“I could tell you roughly by the pay-list,” the manager answered. “Yes,” he continued, after some turning over of pages, “he was paid last on May 20th.”

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On May 19th…

From A Day by Day Chronology of Mr. Sherlock Holmes according to Zeisler and Christ by William S Dorn:

Nissar Modi as Lord Arthur Saltire (Granada, 1986)

On May 19, 1900, Lord Saltire was rescued. [PRIO]

[Holmes said,] “I will help you, but on one condition only. It is that you ring for the footman and let me give such orders as I like.”
Without a word the Duke pressed the electric bell. A servant entered.
“You will be glad to hear,” said Holmes, “that your young master is found. It is the Duke’s desire that the carriage shall go at once to the Fighting Cock Inn to bring Lord Saltire home.”

Illustration by Sidney Paget for The Strand Magazine (1904)

Also on May 19, 1900, the Duke of Holdernesse wrote a cheque for £12,000 to Holmes. [PRIO]

The Duke took a pen in his quivering fingers and opened his cheque-book.”I shall be as good as my word, Mr. Holmes. I am about to write your cheque, however unwelcome the information which you have gained may be to me. When the offer was first made I little thought the turn which events might take. But you and your friend are men of discretion, Mr. Holmes?”

According to Nicolas Utechin’s Coin of the Canonical Realm, in 2013, that £12,000 would have been worth approximately £1,065,600 GBP ($1,715,616 USD). Small wonder Holmes said that cheque was the most interesting thing he had seen in the North!

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On May 18th…

From A Day by Day Chronology of Mr. Sherlock Holmes according to Zeisler and Christ by William S Dorn:

May 18, 1900: Heidegger’s body was discovered on lower Gil Moor. [PRIO]

Illustration by Sidney Paget for The Strand Magazine (1904)

Our search was not a very long one. The tracks of the tyre began to curve fantastically upon the wet and shining path. Suddenly, as I looked ahead, the gleam of metal caught my eye from amid the thick gorse bushes. Out of them we dragged a bicycle, Palmer-tyred, one pedal bent, and the whole front of it horribly smeared and slobbered with blood. On the other side of the bushes a shoe was projecting. We ran round, and there lay the unfortunate rider. He was a tall man, full bearded, with spectacles, one glass of which had been knocked out. The cause of his death was a frightful blow upon the head, which had crushed in part of his skull. That he could have gone on after receiving such an injury said much for the vitality and courage of the man. He wore shoes, but no socks, and his open coat disclosed a night-shirt beneath it. It was undoubtedly the German master.
Holmes turned the body over reverently, and examined it with great attention. He then sat in deep thought for a time, and I could see by his ruffled brow that this grim discovery had not, in his opinion, advanced us much in our inquiry.

May 18, 1900: Rueben Hayes was arrested in Chesterfield for murdering Heidegger. [PRIO]
Birmingham Parks Police photo

As to Hayes I say nothing. The gallows awaits him, and I would do nothing to save him from it. What he will divulge I cannot tell, but I have no doubt that your Grace could make him understand that it is to his interest to be silent. From the police point of view he will have kidnapped the boy for the purpose of ransom.

 

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On May 17th…

From A Day by Day Chronology of Mr. Sherlock Holmes according to Zeisler and Christ by William S Dorn:

May 17, 1900: Dr Thorneycroft Huxtable fainted on the hearth rug at 221B Baker Street. [PRIO]

Illustration by Sidney Paget for The Strand Magazine (1904)

We have had some dramatic entrances and exits upon our small stage at Baker Street, but I cannot recollect anything more sudden and startling than the first appearance of Dr. Thorneycroft Huxtable, M.A., Ph.D., etc. His card, which seemed too small to carry the weight of his academic distinctions, preceded him by a few seconds, and then he entered himself – so large, so pompous, and so dignified that he was the very embodiment of self-possession and solidity. And yet his first action when the door had closed behind him was to stagger against the table, whence he slipped down upon the floor, and there was that majestic figure prostrate and insensible upon our bearskin hearthrug.
We had sprung to our feet, and for a few moments we stared in silent amazement at this ponderous piece of wreckage, which told of some sudden and fatal storm far out on the ocean of life. Then Holmes hurried with a cushion for his head and I with brandy for his lips.

Now here we have a sample of the famous Watson’s remedy. I think, in this case, from a non-medical point of view, the best medicine for the situation.

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Msgr Knox and the Sherlock Holmes Story

Since there no points of interest listed in our Sherlockian Calendar for today, I had an idea for a change of pace. I have a friend, a retired teacher of special education, who made a presentation to a class of middle schoolers who were studying Sherlock Holmes in their literature class. Larry made his own copy of the points that Reverend Ronald Knox wrote up as being parts of a Sherlock Holmes story. Larry took out the Latin translations that were part of the fanciful article that Reverend Knox wrote as a basis for creating Sherlockian Scholarship. Larry listed the parts in such a clear way I wanted to pass it along to our group.

We hope you enjoy.

The Eleven Essential Parts of a Sherlock Holmes Story by Reverend Ronald Knox

As compiled by Larry Feldman, a retired Special Education teacher and Sherlockian Scholar

Part 1 – The Homely Baker Street Scene – implicit introductions.
a) “invaluable personal touches”
b) a lecture/demonstration by the detective.

Part 2 – Statement of the Case
a) Client’s statement
b) Newspaper account

Part 3 – Personal investigation
a) Scene of the crime
b) Famous “floor walk”

Part 4 – Refutation of Scotland Yard’s Theory of the Crime

Part 5 – Holmes gives a few stray hints to the police (and the reader)
that the police dismiss.

Part 6 – A partial sketch of the true course of the investigation –usually to Watson alone.

Part 7 – Further follow-up of the investigation
a) Cross questioning of witnesses/suspects/family
b) Examination of the corpse
c) Visit to the record office
d) Holmes assumes a character, disguise.

Part 8 – Criminal is caught, exposed revealed

Part 9 – Criminal’s confession or story

Part 10 – Holmes describes clues, his thought process, how he solved the case

Part 11 – Final thought
a) Quotation
b) Ironic observation
c) Sum up of experience

Note: Most Sherlock Holmes stories do not have all eleven sections, or necessarily in this order. Most have 5 to 6 parts. It is a list of the structural pieces of a Sherlock Holmes story.

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On May 15th…

According to A Day-by-Day Chronology of Mr. Sherlock Holmes, according to Zeisler and Christ, compiled and edited by William S Dorn, the “gipsies” left the moor near the Priory School on May 15, 1900.

Francis William Topham, “Spanish Gypsies”

There was an agitated knock at the door, and an instant afterwards Dr. Huxtable was in the room. In his hand he held a blue cricket-cap, with a white chevron on the peak.
“At last we have a clue!” he cried. “Thank heaven, at last we are on the dear boy’s track! It is his cap.”
“Where was it found?”
“In the van of the gipsies who camped on the moor. They left on Tuesday. Today the police traced them down and examined their caravan. This was found.”
“How do they account for it?”
“They shuffled and lied – said that they found it on the moor on Tuesday morning. They know where he is, the rascals! Thank goodness, they are all safe under lock and key. Either the fear of the law or the Duke’s purse will certainly get out of them all that they know.”