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Web Site Showcases
American Detective Fiction

Posting all Detective Fiction
Prior to Conan Doyle

Fully Searchable

The mission of the Westminster Detective Library to catalog and make available online all the short fiction dealing with detectives and detection published in the United States before Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s “A Scandal in Bohemia” (1891).

This site grew out of research for the anthology Early American Detective Stories (McFarland 2008) that I edited with my mentor and colleague LeRoy Lad Panek (1943-2021), winner of two Edgar awards for his contributions to the scholarly field of detective criticism. We uncovered a treasure-trove of forgotten and previously unavailable detective stories, many more than could be included in a single anthology. And so this on-going project was born.

The site includes a working bibliography; full-text copy of entries are added as they are prepared. A few stories that were published in Britain but which appear to have been previously published in America have also been included and are indicated by an asterisk in the bibliography. I welcome comments and solicit both additional bibliographical entries and texts.

Mary M. Bendel-Simso, editor

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A Hanged Man’s Story

by “Delta”

There are few routes on which the pleasure-seeking tourist can meet with grander and more picturesque scenery than in the trans-continental trip from New York to San Francisco. So varied is the landscape, that every taste may be gratified; and the constant alternation and great diversity of the different views, add to the many charms of the journey from the Atlantic to the Pacific coast.

The train one day was late, for it had been snowed up in the Rocky Mountains, and was pushing forward at a great speed to make up for lost time. The passengers—a curious medley—formed a merry party, and were passing the hours pleasantly in various ways. Though recent acquaintances, they were as sociable as if they had known each other for years. Conspicuous among them were a week-old bride and a good-natured seafaring man—somewhat of a character—who went under the sobriquet of “Captain.”

As the cars wound round the lofty slope called “Cape Horn,” a dissipated-looking individual, who had been in a state of chronic intoxication ever since he boarded the train, gave a yell, and before [anyone] could divine his purpose or prevent its execution, suddenly sprang from the platform, alighted on the edge of the track, and rolled from thence over the steep, and was speedily out of sight in the deep valley below.

The train was stopped, and a party returned to find the missing man or his body; but no trace was seen. The slope was too dangerous to descend hurriedly, and there was no near route. So, after dispatching a messenger to the nearest station to have him looked after from below, the train moved on. The accident was a fresh topic of conversation.

“Poor fellow! He’s certain to be killed—is he not, Captain?” asked the bride.

“I’m not so sure of that,” said the captain. “I’ve had greater escapes myself. You wouldn’t… Read More

Miscellany

The Detective of the Present -- Finn and Jourdan

Time was when a detective was a man who detected things. A detective is still that in some European countries; and he still detects things—in novels. There's Buckett in “Bleak House” who detects Lady Dedlook, and there's that detective in Collin’s story of the “Moon Stone,” quite a detector. New York used to have Old Hayes, who could detect a thing or two; Paris has had Vidocq, and Bow street has had Forster.* But the race has died out entirely in America, and is dying out in England.

Commissioner Jourdan, of Brooklyn, has been making an effort to raise up a detective or two and has actually produced Corr and Bill. Corr and Bill were raised to the Vidocquian task of tracing a mystic murder. Finnan is a hatter; and Finnan has been in States Prison. That ought to be enough for any detective such as Corr to concluded that Finnan did the deed. Edgar A. Poe could not reason out a conclusion clearer than that. So Corr went to where Finnan was making hats.

Is Finnan here? Yes—want to see him?