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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 Curious Companion

“Wanted, by a young married lady, a companion to reside with her during her husband’s absence in India. A liberal salary will be given, with every home comfort, to any one suitable. Apply, personally, if possible, at No. 240 Upper Berkeley street, W.”

The foregoing advertisement was dispatched by me after considerable cogitation, and I awaited the result of it with some anxiety. My husband, Major Conyers, had been suddenly ordered to India; and having no sister or any available cousin whom I could invite to stay with me during his absence, I thought a companion would be the best thing with which I could provide myself; accordingly, I indited my small paragraph, which I had the satisfaction of seeing placed in a very conspicuous part of the paper on the morning after I sent it. I lived in London, consequently felt certain that the personal interview would be easily managed; but I had committed an error in not naming any particular hour, as, from eleven in the forenoon until quite late in the day, the applications for a personal interview with my unfortunate self never ceased.

Visitors in answer to the advertisement came frequently, but none of them suited me.

Just as it was getting dusk, my servant came up to the drawing-room and informed me that such a nice-looking young lady was in the dining-room; quite the nicest that had been yet.

“Ask her to come up-stairs, then, Ellis; but do not admit any one else,” I replied; and the next minute the drawing-room door was thrown open by Ellis, and “Miss Burke” announced. … 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?