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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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The Mutineers

a sea sketch

Compiled from the papers of a London Detective Police Officer.

by Austin C. Burdick

It was in the year of our Lord eighteen hundred and twenty-seven, in early spring. I had become sick and tired of catching rogues and villains in the great Babel of London, and I resolved to take a few months’ respite from my disagreeable duties; and in order to do this I knew I should have to leave the island, for, let me be anywhere in England, from Land’s End to the Tweed, and I knew that I should be called upon to catch some wished-for character for the benefit of Mr. Justice. An old friend of mine, Captain Albert Souther, was upon the point of sailing for New Holland, and I made up my mind to take a trip with him, he having generously offered me snug quarters in his cabin.

The ship which he commanded was a heavy Indiaman. On the present occasion he was to take a few convicts for Botany Bay, and he had also quite a number of passengers who had taken passage for Cape Town, where they talked of locating themselves for agricultural purposes. In addition to his cargo, which was mostly stores for the colony at New South Wales, he carried some thousands of pounds in gold, that was consigned to the governor at Sidney.

In due time I was ensconced in my aquatic quarters, and with much promise of pleasure I bade a temporary adieu to Old England. Our ship was a noble craft, and she afforded all the comfort that could reasonably be desired. Captain Souther was an excellent ship-master, being a stout, brave man, and very cool in seasons of danger. His crew consisted of forty men, most of whom had been under him some years. He liked… 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?