THE ORIGIN OF SHERLOCK HOLMES

Evening Star, Issue 21748, 16 June 1934, Page 21

THE ORIGIN OF SHERLOCK HOLMES

“ Never have I so known and loved a man whom I had never seen,” wrote Dr Conan Doyle of that other physician and writer, Dr Oliver Wendell Holmes, by whose shrewd observations lie was much impressed. So it was settled, that the surname of his hero would be “ Holmes.” But the full name was first conceived as “ Sherringford Holmes ” and that of Dr Watson as “ Ormond Sacker.” Oh, what a narrow escape! But more than Dr Holmes it was his former teacher at Edinburgh, Dr Joseph Bell, who dedicated the pattern of the famous detective.. The pleasant facts are recorded in a book which digs deep into the career of the great “ unfathomer ” and which will furnish votaries of detective fiction with a most enjoyable evening—‘ The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes,’ by Vincent Starrett (New York: The Macmillan Company). Many will be surprised to hear of Conan Doyle’s difficulty in launching his hero on the publishing world, his first effort, ‘ A Study in Scarlet,’ subsequently a great success, having been sold for £25. with no rights reserved, and then not published until the following year, “as the market at the present time is flooded with cheap fiction.”