HAUGHFOOT - Key Persons

Conan Doyle was born in 1859 into a devoutly Roman Catholic family and was educated in a Jesuit school. Entering the medical profession, he turned to writing as a means of supplementing the uncertain income of his fledgling practice. In 1887 he published A Study in Scarlet, which introduced Sherlock Holmes and his inseparable companion, John Watson, like Doyle himself, a struggling physician. A second Holmes novel appeared in 1890. It was not until the following year, however, when Doyle began to write a series of Holmes adventures for The Strand magazine, illustrated by the drawings of Sidney Paget, that his creation became a success. Indeed, he became a sensation. Almost overnight, the tall, gaunt figure in the deerstalker cap and caped overcoat, never without pipe and magnifying glass, became a household word. The admiring public appeared to overlook Holmes' cocaine habit. Eccentric as Doyle created him, many readers were convinced that Holmes was a real person and the storied flat at 221B Baker Street actually existed. Doyle, however, did not share the enthusiasm of the reading public. He tired of Holmes, wishing to devote his literary talents to historical adventures. Thus, at the end of 1893, he rid himself of Holmes, sending him to his apparent death in the Swiss Alps at the hands of his arch-enemy, Professor Moriarity. A Mason himself, Doyle may have been reluctant to reveal secrets of the Order or use his knowledge of Masonry for personal pecuniary gain. Nevertheless, by application of Holmes' own technique of deductive reasoning we can be reasonably certain that the master detective was not a member of the Masonic fraternity. Doyle did not intend for his creation to be the admirable image which most people associate with Sherlock Holmes. He thought Paget's drawings were too idealized. The public reaction always perplexed him. Holmes' life-style was reclusive, his habits eccentric, his manner brusque and often patronizing, his attitude haughty and conceited, if not supercilious, and his interests obsessively preoccupied with but one field of endeavour-criminal investigation.

In The Red-Headed League, the second Holmes story to appear in The Strand, Jabez Wilson has been duped by a transparent scheme to leave his pawnshop each day so that criminals are free to use the premises to stage a robbery of a nearby bank. Wilson is described as being "obese, pompous, and slow," his clothing as frayed, ill-fitting, and "not over clean." He also is identified as a Freemason by a gaudy square and compasses pin. Again writing before his initiation into the craft, Doyle does not leave us with a very high opinion of the fraternity.