On October 2nd…

Illustration by Sidney Paget for The Strand Magazine (May, 1893)

October 2, 1879: Holmes discovered the body of Brunton and identified the crown of Charles I. [MUSG]

A small chamber about seven feet deep and four feet square lay open to us. At one side of this was a squat, brass-bound wooden box, the lid of which was hinged upwards, with this curious old-fashioned key projecting from the lock. It was furred outside by a thick layer of dust, and damp and worms had eaten through the wood, so that a crop of livid fungi was growing on the inside of it. Several discs of metal, old coins apparently, such as I hold here, were scattered over the bottom of the box, but it contained nothing else.

At the moment, however, we had no thought for the old chest, for our eyes were riveted upon that which crouched beside it. It was the figure of a man, clad in a suit of black, who squatted down upon him hams with his forehead sunk upon the edge of the box and his two arms thrown out on each side of it. The attitude had drawn all the stagnant blood to the face, and no man could have recognised that distorted liver-coloured countenance; but his height, his dress, and his hair were all sufficient to show my client, when we had drawn the body up, that it was indeed his missing butler. He had been dead some days, but there was no wound or bruise upon his person to show how he had met his dreadful end. When his body had been carried from the cellar we found ourselves still confronted with a problem which was almost as formidable as that with which we had started.

October 2, 1900 (per Zeisler): Stapleton showed Watson and Sir Henry the site of the legend. [HOUN]

Illustration by Sidney Paget for The Strand Magazine (August, 1901 – April, 1902)

He came over to call upon Baskerville on that first day, and the very next morning he took us both to show us the spot where the legend of the wicked Hugo is supposed to have had its origin. It was an excursion of some miles across the moor to a place which is so dismal that it might have suggested the story. We found a short valley between rugged tors which led to an open, grassy space flecked over with the white cotton grass. In the middle of it rose two great stones, worn and sharpened at the upper end, until they looked like the huge corroding fangs of some monstrous beast.

In every way it corresponded with the scene of the old tragedy. Sir Henry was much interested and asked Stapleton more than once whether he did really believe in the possibility of the interference of the supernatural in the affairs of men. He spoke lightly, but it was evident that he was very much in earnest. Stapleton was guarded in his replies, but it was easy to see that he said less than he might, and that he would not express his whole opinion out of consideration for the feelings of the baronet. He told us of similar cases, where families had suffered from some evil influence, and he left us with the impression that he shared the popular view upon the matter.

On October 1st…

October 1, 1879: Rachel Howells disappeared. [MUSG]

Johanna Kirby as Rachel Howells in “The Musgrave Ritual” (Granada, 1986)

For two days Rachel Howells had been so ill, sometimes delirious, sometimes hysterical, that a nurse had been employed to sit up with her at night. On the third night after Brunton’s disappearance, the nurse, finding her patient sleeping nicely, had dropped into a nap in the arm-chair, when shoe woke in the early morning to find the bed empty, the window open, and no signs of the invalid. I was instantly aroused, and, with the two footmen, started off at once in search of the missing girl. It was not difficult to tell the direction which she had taken, for, starting from under her window, we could follow her footmarks easily across the lawn to the edge of the mere, where they vanished close to the gravel path which leads out of the grounds. The lake there is eight feet deep, and you can imagine our feelings when we saw that the trail of the poor demented girl came to an end at the edge of it.

October 1, 1900 (according to Zeisler): Stapleton visited Baskerville Hall. [HOUN]

William Shatner as Stapleton (Universal, 1972)

He came over to call upon Baskerville on that first day, and the very next morning he took us both to show us the spot where the legend of the wicked Hugo is supposed to have had its origin. It was an excursion of some miles across the moor to a place which is so dismal that it might have suggested the story. We found a short valley between rugged tors which led to an open, grassy space flecked over with the white cotton grass. In the middle of it rose two great stones, worn and sharpened at the upper end, until they looked like the huge corroding fangs of some monstrous beast.

On September 28th…

September 28, 1879: Brunton did not appear at breakfast. [MUSG]

For two days after this Brunton was most assiduous in his attention to his duties. I made no allusion to what had passed, and waited with some curiosity to see how he would cover his disgrace. On the third morning, however he did not appear, as was his custom, after breakfast to receive my instructions for the day.

September 28, 1889: Hosmer Angel proposed that he and Mary Sutherland should marry within the next week. [IDEN]

“Were you engaged to the gentleman at this time?”

“Oh, yes, Mr. Holmes. We were engaged after the first walk that we took. Hosmer—Mr. Angel—was a cashier in an office in Leadenhall Street—and—”

“What office?”

“That’s the worst of it, Mr. Holmes, I don’t know.”

On September 27th…

Illustration by Sidney Paget for The Strand Magazine (May, 1893)

September 27, 1879: Brunton found the treasure box. [MUSG]

You know my methods in such cases, Watson. I put myself in the man’s place and, having first gauged his intelligence, I try to imagine how I should myself have proceeded under the same circumstances. In this case the matter was simplified by Brunton’s intelligence being quite first-rate, so that it was unnecessary to make any allowance for the personal equation, as the astronomers have dubbed it. He know that something valuable was concealed. He had spotted the place. He found that the stone which covered it was just too heavy for a man to move unaided. What would he do next? He could not get help from outside, even if he had some one whom he could trust, without the unbarring of doors and considerable risk of detection. It was better, if he could, to have his helpmate inside the house. But whom could he ask? This girl had been devoted to him. A man always finds it hard to realise that he may have finally lost a woman’s love, however badly he may have treated her. He would try by a few attentions to make his peace with the girl Howells, and then would engage her as his accomplice. Together they would come at night to the cellar, and their united force would suffice to raise the stone.

Illustration by Sidney Paget for The Strand Magazine (September, 1891)

September 27, 1889: James Windibank left for his second trip to France. [IDEN]”But how about Mr. Hosmer Angel? Did he make no attempt to see you?”

Well, father was going off to France again in a week, and Hosmer wrote and said that it would be safer and better not to see each other until he had gone. We could write in the meantime, and he used to write every day. I took the letters in in the morning, so there was no need for father to know.

On September 26th…

Illustration by Sidney Paget for The Strand Magazine (May, 1893)

September 26, 1879: At 2:00 am, Reginald Musgrave found Brunton reading the family ritual. [MUSG]
[This is one of my favorite cases. I love the family ritual. It appeals to me, “the man who is half a boy”. -Chips]

Brunton, the butler, was in the library. He was sitting, fully dressed, in an easy-chair, with a slip of paper which looked lake a map upon his knee, and his forehead sunk forward upon his hand in deep thought. I stood dumb with astonishment, watching him from the darkness. A small taper on the edge of the table shed a feeble light which sufficed to show me that he was fully dressed. Suddenly, as I looked, he rose from his chair, and walking over to a bureau at the side, he unlocked it and drew out one of the drawers. From this he took a paper, and returning to his seat he flattened it out beside the taper on the edge of the table, and began to study it with minute attention.

Illustration by Sidney Paget for The Strand Magazine (August 1901 – April 1902)

 

September 26, 1900: An anonymous warning letter to Sir Henry Baskerville arrived at the Northumberland Hotel. [HOUN]

Out of the envelope he took a half-sheet of foolscap paper folded into four. This he opened and spread flat upon the table. Across the middle of it a single sentence had been formed by the expedient of pasting printed words upon it. It ran: “As you value your life or your reason keep away from the moor.” The word “moor” only was printed in ink.

“Now,” said Sir Henry Baskerville, “perhaps you will tell me, Mr. Holmes, what in thunder is the meaning of that, and who it is that takes so much interest in my affairs?”

 

September 26, 1902: The Morning Post announced the de Merville-Gruner marriage would not take place. [ILLU]

I do not know how the incriminating book was used. Sir James may have managed it. Or it is more probable that so delicate a task was entrusted to the young lady’s father. The effect, at any rate, was all that could be desired.

Three days later appeared a paragraph in The Morning Post to say that the marriage between Baron Adelbert Gruner and Miss Violet de Merville would not take place.

On March 19th… Vamberry, the Wine Merchant

“First Edition Wines” from 221B Cellars (photo courtesy Ashley Polasek)

“They are not all successes, Watson,” said he, “but there are some pretty little problems among them. Here’s the record of the Tarleton murders, and the case of Vamberry, the wine merchant, and the adventure of the old Russian woman, and the singular affair of the aluminium crutch, as well as a full account of Ricoletti of the club foot and his abominable wife.” [MUSG]

In A Curious Collection of Dates, Leah Guinn (JHWS “Amber”) and Jaime N Mahoney (JHWS “Tressa”), dedicate this day to Arminius Vamberry, born March 19, 1832 (possibly). They write:

“According to Leslie Klinger’s New Annotated Sherlock Holmes, Arminius Vamberry (German: Hermann Bamberger) was a wine collector. But the Hungarian language professor, who may or may not have been born on this date in 1832, was so much more.”

Their concise account of his adventurous life (including the reason he is featured on the day that might not have been his actual birthday) ends with this interesting speculation:

“In 2005, the British National Archives released a collection of late 19th-century secret service documents. There were several revelations, one being that Vamberry had served for over a decade as a foreign agent, providing information about the Turkish government and its relations with Austria-Hungary and Russia. Records reveal that he frequently asked for cash and was known for being ‘alarmist.’ One has to wonder if it was in this capacity that he ended up as one of Holmes’s ‘pretty little problems,’ sent to 221B by way of the Diogenes Club and a particular minor government official.”

Source:
Information provided by A Curious Collection of Dates by Leah Guinn (JHWS “Amber”) and Jaime N Mahoney (JHWS “Tressa”)
Posted by The Dynamic Duo Ron (JHWS Chips) and Beth (JHWS Selena)

On February 3rd…

Sherlock Holmes Museum Study 4

February 3, 1825: The birth of General Edward Mounier Boxer, Inventor of the Boxer Cartridge which by all sources was a definite improvement in 19th Century ammunition.

The cartridges were used by Holmes when he “in one of his queer humours would sit in an armchair, with his hair-trigger and a hundred Boxer cartridges, and proceed to adorn the opposite wall with a patriotic V.R. done in bullet-pocks” [MUSG].

This information as well as the previous two days’ posts came from a new and great informational book, A CURIOUS COLLECTION OF DATES by Leah Guinn, JHWS “Amber”, and Jaime Mahoney, JHWS “Tressa”, two talented and dedicated researchers who have created a great reference material volume that all will enjoy. Leah has graciously given me permission to reprint information from this volume for our enjoyment.

Posted by The Game is Afoot.

On October 2nd…

October 2, 1879: Holmes discovered the body of Brunton and identified the crown of Charles I. [MUSG]
October 2, 1900: Stapleton showed Watson and Sir Henry the site of the legend. [HOUN]

On September 26th…

September 26, 1879: At 2:00 am, Reginald Musgrave found Brunton reading the family ritual. [MUSG]

This is one of my favorite cases. I love the family ritual. It appeals to me, “the man who is half a boy”.

September 26, 1900: An anonymous warning letter to Sir Henry Baskerville arrived at the Northumberland Hotel. [HOUN]

September 26, 1902: The Morning Post announced the de Merville-Gruner marriage would not take place. [ILLU]

On October 2nd…

October 2, 1900: Stapleton showed Watson and Sir Henry the site of the legend. (HOUN)

October 2, 1879: Holmes discovered the body of Brunton and identified the crown of Charles the first. (MUSG)

On September 26th…

September 26, 1900: A warning letter from Beryl Stapleton to Sir Henry Baskerville arrived. (HOUN)

Sir Henry’s boot was missing. (HOUN)

John Clayton, the cab driver who drove Jack Stapleton, called at 221B St. (HOUN)

September 26, 1902: The Morning Post announced the de Merville-Gruner marriage would not take place. (ILLU)

September 26, 1879: At 2 AM, Reginald Musgrave found Brunton reading the family ritual. (MUSG)