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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

Select Story

[From the Family Journal]

The Tell-Tale Signature

A Detective Story

by John B. Williams, M.D.

One day, while cozily sipping a cup of tea, and talking over our courting days with my wife, a loud ring at the bell informed me that a visitor wished to see me. The servant girl showed into the apartment a young lady of remarkable beauty, who stated that she wished to see me privately on very important business. My wife (God bless her!) who is by no means of a jealous disposition, discreetly withdrew and we were left alone. I offered the young lady a chair, and informed her that I was at her service. After a little hesitation natural to her years, she made a statement to me which I will condense as follows:

Charlotte Melvin (my fair visitor) was the only child of Reuben Melvin, Esq., who had resided on the banks of the Hudson river, about twenty miles from New York. Her father had been devotedly attached to her, and they had lived as happy as it was possible to live together. He had gratified every wish of hers, and for years not a single cloud obscured their calm and peaceful happiness. About a year ago Charlotte had been introduced to the son of a gentleman living in their neighborhood, and mutual love had sprung up between them. Her father had not opposed their union, as it was a very desirable match on all sides, and it was settled they should be married next spring. Things went on this way for some months.… 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?