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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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Mademoiselle Jabirouska

The Modern Messalina

The archives of the police of Paris furnish us with the details of a most extraordinary narrative, the authenticity of which is unquestioned, and which we think will somewhat startle our numerous readers. For many years M. de la Reynie had discharged to the satisfaction of the public, the duties of lieutenant-general of the police, when suddenly a most remarkable panic was produced throughout Paris, by the unaccountable disappearance of several individuals.—During a period of four months, 26 young men of from 17 to 20 years of age had disappeared, leaving their families inconsolable for their loss. Mysterious and contradictory rumors were circulated in regard to the matter in the Faubourg St. Antione, which had been deprived in this manner of four or five young men, the sons of respectable citizens.

The Duke of Gevres communicated the circumstance to the king, who, when the lieutenant of police had been ordered into his presence, expressed his indignation and regret in the strongest terms at the continued repetitions of a practice which was undoubtedly followed by the violent death of the victims, as none of them afterwards reappeared. LaReynie in despair at the rebuke and distress of his sovereign, returned with a desponding heart to Paris. On arriving there, he sent for one of the officers of his establishment, named Lecoq, a man of considerable adroitness and address, and one who had been of service to his superior, on many difficult and trying occasions.—Lecoq appeared, and M. de la Reynie explained to him his embarrassment, described the dissatisfaction of the king and made such promises of recompense, that Lecoq, elated at the prospect, and sympathizing with the general anxiety to discover a clue to the mystery, exclaimed, “Enough, sir. I see that, in order to get you out of this scrape, I must not shrink from the example of… 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?