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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 Tragedy in Judd Street, New Road

by Inspector F.

I once lodged for a few months with Mrs. George, an elderly widow, in one of the roomiest houses in Judd-street, New-road. Mrs. George gained her living by letting furnished apartments. She and her maid-of-all-work dwelt in the under-ground rooms; Mr. and Mrs. Fordyce—a gouty old gentleman and amazingly corpulent wife—occupied the parlours; Mr. Faulkner, a youthful member of the Royal College of Surgeons, the first floor; Mr. Richard Bellingham, a native of Worcester, and articled clerk to Mr. Parkes, solicitor, of Mitre-court, Temple, the second; and myself, apartments on the third floor. The name of “Mr. Faulkner, Surgeon,” was inscribed on a brass plate fixed to the door, and “Surgery Bell” was neatly painted under one of the brightly-polished brass bell-knobs.

We were quite a friendly community, notwithstanding difference in social position. Mr. Fordyce, a retired drysalter, without any other incumbrance than his unwieldy wife, was never happy except he could prevail upon the surgeon, the articled clerk, and myself, to spend the evening at whist with him. When, as frequently happened, I was not able to make one, the landlady was caught and made to do duty in my stead—Mrs. Fordyce’s mind being a complete blank as respected the mysteries of whist or of any other card game. Mr. Fordyce, for his position, was a rich as well as liberal man. The good cheer was consequently abundant—wines, spirits, cigars, first-rate; suppers excellent! Occasionally whist was exchanged for Pope Joan, vingt-un, and other “quiet game”-substitutions for his beloved whist, which greatly fretted Mr. Fordyce, and generally brought on a violent fit of gout; one reason, no doubt, being that at such times he indulged more immoderately than usual in consolatory port. These occasions happened, upon an average, about once a fortnight, when his nieces, Julia and… 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?