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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 Libertine’s Victim

by A Retired Member of the Detective Police [William Russell]

Chapter I

many years ago, at the time when the old Watch system was in operation, and when I filled the office of Runner, as the office was then termed, it was my practice to wander about the streets at night, generally in such disguise as would enable me, undiscovered, to penetrate into the mysterious and hidden haunts of crime, and many a rogue owed his detection and arrest to the successful manner in which my identity was cloaked.

One evening I found myself in the vicinity of the Park, then as now a favorite resort for parties who had made secret appointments. It was a lovely evening in September, and the trees and shrubbery being in full foliage, the place was really inviting, even for those who had no other expectation or desire than the enjoyment of the lovely night.

As I crossed from Broadway, I noticed a carriage standing about halfway between the Park and the head of Spruce Street, and as the driver had not lighted his lamp, I thought possibly there might be some deviltry on foot, and determined, as I had nothing special on hand, that I would watch what might be going on

Entering the Park, I noticed a well dressed young man pacing to and fro with impatient strides, ever and anon casting his eyes around in all directions, evidently looking for some one whose arrival he expected.

Pulling my slouched hat over my face, I advanced towards him, and a single glance revealed to me the features of a young man named Edward Hargrave, of whom more hereafter.

Satisfied now that something wrong was going on, I resolved, coûte qui coûte, to see the dénouement, and watching my opportunity, I crossed over to the shrubbery which lined the… 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?