On the Trail of Sherlock Holmes

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On the Trail of Sherlock Holmes
History and myth merge in London, the home of the world's most famous detective.

By Tom Huntington


	Sherlock Holme's London was a mysterious, fog-filled metropolis.

Some people say Sherlock Holmes never existed. According to their version of history, the great detective was really the fictional creation of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, who wrote his first Holmes story, A Study in Scarlet, in 1886. At best Holmes belongs to the world of myth, not history.

That may be. But in the century or so since his first appearance, Holmes has become more real than many historical figures. His profile, with the deerstalker cap and curved meerschaum pipe that Doyle never mentioned, is recognized around the world. Over the years Sherlockians have published countless works dissecting the Canon, as they call the 56 short stories and four long ones featuring Holmes. In 1993 Great Britain even honored Holmes on a series of postage stamps. Six years later a statue of the Great Detective was unveiled at the Baker Street Underground station. Doyle, no doubt, would be flabbergasted by the attention paid to his creation, which he felt took his attention away from more important work.

I've been hooked by the Canon ever since I first read The Hound of the Baskervilles when I was 12. For me, a great part of the appeal is London, the vast, fog-filled metropolis where Holmes and his chronicler, Dr. John H. Watson, lived and worked. It is a London where horse-drawn hansom cabs—"the gondola of London" in the words of Victorian prime minister Benjamin Disraeli—scrape against the curbs and thick yellow fog swirls in the gaslight glow outside the windows. Much has changed since Holmes' time; the British Empire is a shadow of its former self, and the legendary London fog was banished to history by the Clean Air Act of 1956. Two world wars have also eliminated many landmarks. But just as Holmes could piece together a crime scene from footprints and cigarette ashes, a modern traveler can find traces of the great detective throughout London—and discover some real history in the process.

...just as Holmes could piece together a crime scene from footprints and cigarette ashes, a modern traveler can find traces of the great detective throughout London

For the Sherlockian, the first London stop has to be Baker Street, for it was at 221b (the b denoted the upstairs apartment) that Holmes set up shop as the world's first consulting detective. Located on the north side of the Thames River and running from Regent's Park to Oxford Street, Baker Street today is a busy commercial avenue, and its one-way traffic gives no quarter to the unwary pedestrian. The best way to get there is on the Underground, London's subway system. Baker Street Station is a busy terminus, with five lines passing through it and a warren of tunnels connecting them. The whole station has a Sherlockian motif, with the detective's profile decorating walls and large panels illustrating scenes from his adventures on platforms seven and nine, used by the Jubilee Line. Outside, on Marylebone Street, is the Sherlock Holmes statue that was finally placed here in September 1999.

The Underground opened for business in January 1863 as the world's first urban underground railway. The Baker Street Station opened later that year, and today the Metropolitan Line still uses the original platform. In Holmes' day natural light, shining down shafts from the street overhead, provided illumination. The shafts have long since been filled in, but the openings above the platform are intact. Sodium lights inside give the illusion that sunlight still spills out of them.

Until the introduction of the first electric locomotives in 1890, the trains were steam-powered, making for rather unpleasant trips. "[T]he choking, sulphurous fumes from the steam-engines were—unlike the tainted air above-ground—unmodified by the least breeze," wrote Michael Harrison, who chronicled Holmes' London in a number of books. "People travelled on the Underground when—and only when—they were forced to do so." No wonder Holmes preferred the hansom cab.

Emerging from the Underground on the west side of Baker Street, you'll see the Abbey National Building Society, a large, fortress-like structure across and up the street. The building opened in 1932 and has little to recommend it except for its address, for it stands on the site of 221. In 1985 the Abbey company (the equivalent of an American building and loan) added a bronze marker to commemorate its connection with Holmes, and even has an employee to answer letters that arrive addressed to the detective. For the past two and a half years the task has been handled by Gug Kyriacou, 30. "I'm officially Sherlock Holmes' secretary," says Kyriacou, who receives 25-35 letters addressed to Holmes each week. "The vast majority of them are from children around the world," he says. "Holmes is extremely popular in Japan and the States." Kyriacou himself admits to having had only a mild interest in Holmes before becoming his secretary, but has since improved his knowledge. "Sometimes the letters ask questions about the stories so you have to know the answers." He is helped by the company's "extensive" library of Holmesian materials.

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Tom Huntington is the editor and publisher of HistoricTraveler.com. An ardent Sherlockian, he believes no trip to London is complete without a stop at Baker Street.