Holmes and Watson

by June Thomson

  Holmes and Watson

  JUNE THOMSON

  For Andrew, Lee, Frances and John Paul

  Contents

  Title Page

  Dedication

  PROLOGUE

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  EPILOGUE

  APPENDIX ONE

  APPENDIX TWO

  SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  About the Author

  By June Thomson

  Copyright

  PROLOGUE

  Any attempt to write a biography of Holmes and Watson is fraught with problems. Not only is the canon itself immense, amounting approximately to 700,000 words, but Sherlockian commentators have, over the years, written many thousands more words about it and around it, their contributions ranging from suppositions regarding Holmes’ astronomical sign – was he a Scorpio or a Virgo? – to a full-length novel by Cay Van Ash, Ten Years Beyond Baker Street, in which Holmes, having brought about the downfall of Professor Moriarty, takes on no less a protagonist than Dr Fu Manchu.

  It is impossible to refer to all these writings in detail within the scope of this biography. I have therefore chosen only those which tend to affect the chronology of the subjects’ lives. Rather than hold up the narrative by including these in the main part of the book, I have placed the references to them in two appendices, in which those readers interested in particular areas of Sherlockian research, such as the dating of some of Watson’s accounts or the location of 221B Baker Street, will find the relevant theories set out in condensed form.

  Wherever possible, I have kept to the facts given by Holmes and Watson in the canon and, where there are gaps, have used other sources of information to supply the missing data. When that has been impossible and I have been forced to speculate, I have made this quite clear.

  Because readers might find it tedious, I have also limited the number of attributions to the places in the canon where direct quotations can be found and, with some of the less important data, have given no references at all. However, where any detail is stated as fact, readers may be assured that this is based on given information. Nor have I supplied, except in a few cases, potted accounts of the inquiries in which Holmes and Watson were involved. I have assumed that the readers are already acquainted with the narratives or would prefer to read them for themselves.

  In the course of this biography, I have also put forward some theories of my own, for example, those regarding the identities of the King of Bohemia and the second Mrs Watson, both of which, as far as I know, are original. Some Sherlockian commentators may find these unacceptable, as they may find much else that is in the book.

  But the biography is not intended for the experts. It was written with a very different reader in mind: the ordinary man or woman who, like me, has found much pleasure in Watson’s chronicles of his adventures with Holmes and would like a more detailed account of their lives as well as background information about the period in which they lived.

  My main concern, however, as the title suggests, is to celebrate the friendship between Holmes and Watson, arguably one of the most famous ever recorded, and to chronicle its progress, including the setbacks from which it inevitably suffered.

  It was not, I believe, homosexual, although some evidence in the canon might suggest, on first reading, a homoerotic relationship, such as the fact that Holmes and Watson share a double bedroom during the Man with the Twisted Lip inquiry or that Holmes bundles Watson out of sight in the Dying Detective case with the words ‘Quick, man, if you love me!’ Although on occasions he might have been naïf, Watson possessed a great deal of common sense and, knowing, as he must have done, the penalties of social ostracism should sexual deviation be suspected, or imprisonment should he be found engaging in homosexual activities, he would hardly have risked rousing suspicion by publishing these admissions unless he knew his own and Holmes’ sexual behaviour was beyond reproach.

  Watson also married twice, on both occasions for love. No one who has read his account of his courtship of Mary Morstan and his description of his feelings for her can doubt they are anything other than genuine. Nevertheless, Rohase Piercy in his book My Dearest Holmes has claimed that Watson, who was in love with Holmes, married Mary for convenience only, in order to appear respectable and to cloak his own homosexual practices.

  I consider this a quite erroneous interpretation of his relationships both with Holmes and Mary Morstan. Watson, one of whose most endearing qualities was an inability to lie convincingly, was incapable of carrying through such a sustained deception on his readers.

  His relationship with Holmes was therefore exactly as he describes it: a close friendship and an example of male bonding which, though not unusual in itself, especially in an age of single-sex schools and gentlemen’s clubs, is unique because of the detailed account of it which Watson has given us and also for its strength of endurance, despite the many strains to which it was subjected. It was a friendship which was to last for at least forty-six years.

  CHAPTER ONE

  HOLMES AND WATSON

  Beginnings

  ‘My dear fellow, life is infinitely stranger than anything which the mind of man could invent.’

  Holmes to Watson: ‘A Case of Identity’

  Holmes and Watson: their names are inextricably linked, while their friendship is known throughout the world, a fame which is largely attributable to Watson who, as Holmes’ chronicler, was to write over half a million words about their relationship and their adventures together. These accounts, which have never been out of print, were later translated into most languages and used as the basis for numerous films and plays, as well as television and radio programmes, which have assured their continuing popularity.

  And yet remarkably little is known about their early lives before their celebrated meeting in 1881. Not even their dates of birth can be established with any certainty.

  It is not altogether surprising. Holmes was deliberately reticent about his past for reasons which will be examined in more detail later in the chapter. As for Watson, he was more concerned with recording Holmes’ exploits and publicising his friend’s unique skills as a private consulting detective than with thrusting his own personal reminiscences upon his readers. However, there are clues within the canon and, where evidence is lacking, some of the gaps can be filled from other sources of information.

  Holmes was probably born in 1854.* In His Last Bow: The War Service of Sherlock Holmes, dated August 1914, Holmes is described as a man of sixty. Therefore, he was, like Watson, a Victorian, born within the reign of Queen Victoria, who succeeded to the throne in 1837. The month of his birth is unknown; so, too, is the place, although some commentators have put forward various theories about both.*

  Little is known either about his immediate family apart from the fact that he had one brother, Mycroft, who was seven years his senior. However, his background was what his fellow Victorians, with their fine distinctions over such matters of social status, would have defined as upper middle-class. Holmes himself has provided some information about his antecedents. His ancestors, he tells Watson in ‘The Adventure of the Greek Interpreter’, were country squires ‘who appear to have led much the same life as is natural to th
eir class’. In other words, they were more concerned with running their estates and following such leisure activities as hunting, shooting and fishing than in scholarly or artistic pursuits.

  Holmes ascribes his own and his brother’s quite different interests to his grandmother, the sister of Vernet, the French painter, from whom both had inherited their less conventional natures.

  As Holmes remarks, ‘Art in the blood is liable to take the strangest forms.’

  Holmes does not say whether this Mlle Vernet was a paternal or maternal grandmother nor which Vernet was her brother. There were several Vernets, all artists, but the most likely candidate, as many commentators agree, is Horace Vernet (1789–1863), the son of Carle Vernet (1758–1836), who was awarded the Legion d’Honneur by Napoleon for his painting, Morning of Austerlitz. Horace Vernet was himself a distinguished artist. Holmes’ grandmother was most probably a daughter of this same Carle Vernet and was therefore Horace Vernet’s sister. The dates agree and there is further confirmation in a comment made by the composer Felix Mendelssohn on Horace Vernet’s extraordinary memory, which he compared to a well-stocked bureau. ‘He had but to open a drawer in it to find what was needed,’ he is quoted as saying.

  This gift was inherited by both the Holmes brothers, by Mycroft with his capacity for storing and correlating facts which he was to put to good use in his future career, and by Sherlock in his ability to recall information at will, a talent which is remarkably similar to that of his great-uncle Horace Vernet.

  ‘I hold a vast store of out-of-the-way knowledge, without scientific system, but very available for the needs of my work,’ he was later to say of himself.

  Some commentators have expressed surprise that Mycroft Holmes had apparently not inherited the family estates. But Holmes makes it quite clear that it was his ancestors who were the country squires, possibly as far back as a great grandfather or even a great-great grandfather. If he and Mycroft were descended from a younger son, they would have belonged to the cadet branch of the family and therefore Mycroft would not have been a direct heir. Or they may have descended through the female line, in which case ‘Holmes’ would not have been the ancestral surname.

  Holmes may have inherited more from his French grandmother than his unusual talents. His mercurial temperament suggests the influence of his Gallic genes rather than those of his more stolid and conventional Anglo-Saxon antecedents. Indeed, the extreme swings of mood from which he suffered in his early manhood, and presumably also in childhood and adolescence, suggest some of the symptoms of manic depression without its psychotic features, although whether this should be entirely blamed on his French blood is questionable. He could have inherited this tendency from one of his English fox-hunting forebears. But, whatever its source, this cyclothymic temperament is undoubtedly part of his personality which may have been exacerbated by his upbringing.

  Holmes says nothing at all about his parents. However, his ‘strong aversion to women’, as Watson was later to report, is significant. From various comments Holmes made on the subject, it is possible to form a clear idea of his attitude towards them. They are inscrutable, trivial, illogical and vain. They vacillate, are subject to emotional outbursts and are naturally secretive.

  ‘Woman are never to be entirely trusted – not even the best of them,’ he states in one particularly revealing remark. However, he was always polite to them, the mark of a gentleman, and, when he wished, could have a ‘peculiarly ingratiating way’ with them.

  This mistrust can only have been formed from personal experience and the most likely cause, as many psychiatrists would agree, is found in the mother/child relationship.

  Given Holmes’ remarks, it is possible to build up a credible, if speculative, picture of his mother. She was a vain, shallow and self-centred woman, more interested in her own pleasures than in forming a close and loving bond with her children, whom she handed over to the care of servants, as was usual at that time among women of her class.

  To a small child, who may well have inherited a tendency towards manic depression, such lack of maternal affection would have had serious effects on his subsequent psychological development. At the very least, it would have given rise to anxiety and tension, evident, in Holmes’ case, in such nervous mannerisms as nail-biting, pacing restlessly about, twisting his fingers together or drumming them on the table.

  Even his dislike of chess* may be traced back to those early childhood experiences. As a game, it has all the intellectual and logical challenges which should have appealed to him. However, it is significant that the most dominant piece in chess is the queen, which alone has the ability to move freely about the board, an obvious symbol of the all-powerful mother.

  Such symbolism may also be reflected in Holmes’ interest in later life in bee-keeping, an activity in which a queen again plays an important role. However, in this instance, though forming the nucleus of the hive, she is an inert, passive creature whose only function is to lay eggs. In short, although a sex object, she is rendered harmless. He was to write a Practical Handbook of Bee Culture, with Some Observations upon the Segregation of the Queen. Although Holmes himself may have been unaware of the significance of this title, readers will not need to have their attention drawn to it.

  A child who is deprived of his mother’s love may also find difficulty in forming close relationships. This, too, is true of Holmes who, as a protective shell against further rejection, could have deliberately developed that coldness of temperament which Watson was to criticise on several occasions, unaware that this lack of emotional warmth was a consequence of Holmes’ upbringing.

  Such suppression of the feelings could also have encouraged Holmes to regard logical and rational thought as superior to the emotions, leading in turn to his interest in science, in particular to chemistry with its emphasis on precise analysis. This analytical turn of mind combined with his undoubted intelligence and an unwillingness to suffer fools gladly made him insensitive to other people’s feelings. He was far too quick to see others’ weaknesses and too frank in pointing them out, an outspokenness which led Watson to accuse him, not without justification, of egotism.

  Watson tempered this criticism by adding that, although callous, Holmes was never cruel. Certainly, there were occasions when he was downright rude and his behaviour hurtful, although it should be said in his defence that he was also capable of great kindness.

  Holmes never married and he almost certainly remained celibate all his life. In Victorian times, the opportunities for sex outside marriage were limited either to casual encounters with prostitutes or a more permanent liaison with a mistress. Holmes was too fastidious for the former type of relationship and too wary of women to commit himself to the latter, although he was not entirely asexual. Later, he was to be attracted to one woman in particular and, had events not prevented it, might have married her or at least had an affair with her. But she was exceptional and he was never again to meet anyone who measured up to her beauty, intelligence and strength of personality. Holmes was too much of a perfectionist to settle for second-best. Instead, his sexual energy was channelled into other outlets, principally into an overwhelming need for achievement, the roots of which may also be traced back to his childhood.

  An emotionally deprived child may suffer from low self-esteem, a feeling that, if he is not given love, then it is because he is unworthy of it. This, too, can lead to depression or, as the child grows older, to a strong urge for success in order to prove to himself and other people that he is indeed worthy. He may also look for admiration as a means of boosting his self-esteem. Holmes was certainly ambitious and susceptible to flattery, as Watson was to discover, while Watson’s unfailing admiration was an important factor in maintaining their friendship.

  Another consequence of early emotional deprivation is hostility, even hatred, towards the mother for withholding that affection for which the child naturally craves. Unable to cope with the guilt such violent feelings arouse, the child may sublimate the ag
gression into more acceptable forms. Holmes’ interest in sensational literature, his knowledge of which Watson says was immense, probably originated in childhood. This type of reading matter, with its emphasis on violence and murder, could well have acted as an outlet for the hidden hostility Holmes felt towards his mother. It was to lead eventually to his specialisation in the study and investigation of crime.

  These aggressive urges were later to find a more direct expression in Holmes’ study of anatomy. In the dissecting room at St Bartholomew’s Hospital, it was more or less acceptable for a student, in the name of forensic research, to beat dead bodies with a stick in order to discover to what extent bruises are produced after death. However, even Stamford, Watson’s former dresser, who, as a member of the hospital staff, was surely not over-squeamish, considered such behaviour bizarre and extreme, as indeed it was. Holmes carried out similar research on a dead pig which he stabbed furiously with a huge, barb-headed spear in an attempt to prove that it could not be transfixed with a single blow. Significantly, he returned from this experiment much invigorated and with a hearty appetite.

  This same transferred aggression is seen in his choice of sporting activities: boxing, fencing, singlestick play and baritsu, the latter a Japanese form of self-defence. All are combative sports carried out against one individual opponent, not as part of a team.

  Some sufferers learn to cope with their recurrent bouts of depression by immersing themselves in activity so that their minds are stimulated and fully occupied. This is also true of Holmes. He was to become a workaholic, frequently staying up all night and sometimes working for days at a stretch without proper food or rest. On two occasions, he drove himself to the point of physical and mental breakdown. It was only when he was idle that he became prone to depression, when he would lie on the sofa, hardly speaking or moving, staring vacantly up at the ceiling.