Arthur Conan Doyle: A Life in Letters. Daniel Stashower

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Conan Doyle’s sister Annette was apparently considering joining the religious order to which her London aunt belonged, the Society of the Daughters of the Heart of Mary. It was devoted to good works, did not require adherents to wear habits, and allowed them to live in homes of their own.* His aunt Annette Doyle shared one with her bachelor brother, illustrator Richard Doyle, famous for ending his association with Punch in 1850 over its anti-Catholic views.

      Conan Doyle learned that another sibling had arrived, his only brother in a family that included three sisters, with more to come. Perhaps to please his mother, he wrote in French this time to inquire about the baby.

      to Mary Doyle STONYHURST, APRIL 1873

      I’ve been quite busy recently with my lessons, and haven’t had the time to write to you as I would have liked to do. I am very happy to know that I have a little brother, that is charming, write me quickly and tell me what his name is and what he looks like. love to everyone, I am very tired from writing this little letter.

      The boy’s name, he soon learned, was John Francis Innes Hay Doyle, although it would be some time before the family decided what to call him on a daily basis. After ‘Frank’ at first, they eventually settled on Innes, but Arthur first called him Geoff, and then Duff.

      to Mary Doyle STONYHURST

      After dinner it was growing rain, however we determined in spite of the weather to set out at once for Clitheroe the usual place visited on the Academy walk, so we all donned water-proofs and sou’westers. we set off, smoking to keep off the cold. I bought a nice little pipe with an amber mouthpiece, which I enjoyed very much. At last we reached Clitheroe and we all ordered what we wished in the way of drink. I got a bottle of lemonade but some, I am ashamed to say, tossed off whole tumblers of raw brandy. We passed through some curious pits where excavations were being made for fossils. I found there a most curious stone, all covered with petrified worms, whose coils I could see distinctly.

      After a nice walk we reached home, where we found a jolly feast ready for us, in what is called, in the book I sent you, the do-room. Mr Splaine made a new speech, and we made great havoc among the eatables. we had a very jolly day on the whole. next morning I noticed the brandy-drinkers, however, who did not seem at all the better for their do.

      to Mary Doyle STONYHURST, JUNE 1873

      I am glad to hear that my report was a good one. I have got my prize now for certain, and it will be a much more honourable one than any other that I have got yet, as Syntax is one of the hardest schools in the house, and certainly not more than eight in the class will get a prize. I am trying to improve in my French and I have read a great many books in that language lately. I will tell you a few of them to see if you have ever seen them. ‘Vingt milles lieus ses les mers’ by Jules Verne, ‘Don Quixote’ ‘cingt semaines dans un balon’ by Jules Verne, ‘Napoleon et le grande armeé’ ‘Voyage dans soudain’ ‘La Roche des Mouettes’ ‘Voyage d’un Enfant a Paris’ ‘Le Fratricide’ ‘Les Russes et les anglais’ ‘Enfants du Capitaine Grant’ ‘a la lune et de retour’ and a lot more, and I am getting to relish them quite as well as English books.

      Our master, Mr Splaine, has been up at the Tichbourne Trial, he was appointed as librarian to bring up some old charts of the college. he has now returned and told us all his adventures with great gusto.

      I hope you are all well at home, has little Frank got any teeth yet? I suppose he won’t be able to walk by the time I come home.

      Like Scott’s novels, Jules Verne’s visionary work would take root in Conan Doyle’s mind, and Verne’s Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea can be readily felt in Conan Doyle’s 1929 science-fiction novel, The Maracot Deep, in which undersea explorers travel to a kingdom on the ocean floor.

      The Tichborne Claimant, one of England’s most famous legal cases, fascinated Stonyhurst, for it dealt with a mysterious figure who claimed to be the long-missing Sir Roger Tichborne, a Stonyhurst graduate and heir to a fortune, who had been presumed lost at sea in 1854. For twelve years Lady Tichborne refused to believe that her son was dead, and she kept a light in the entrance of Tichborne Hall to enable him to find his way home in the dark. In 1866 she received a letter from a butcher in Wagga Wagga, Australia, a man known locally there as Arthur Orton, who declared—amid apologies for his lax correspondence—that he was her long lost son.

When he arrived in England Lady Tichborne welcomed him, but other members of the family denounced him as an impostor, and his claim turned into the longest and most convoluted proceeding in British legal history. It was finally dismissed in 1871, and now, in 1873, Orton was on trial for perjury. Conan Doyle followed avidly ‘a case of identity’ (to cite the title of an early Sherlock Holmes story) that seemed lifted from the pages of Alexandre Dumas—ending in Orton’s eventual conviction and ten years in prison. The trial was still underway when the 1872-73 school year came to an end.*

      to Mary Doyle STONYHURST, JULY 1873

      I have been to the taylor and I showed him your letter, explaining to him that you wanted something that would wear well, and at the same time look well. he told me that the blue cloth he had was meant especially for coats, but that none of it would suit well as trousers, he showed me a dark sort of cloth, which he said would suit a blue coat better than any other cloth he has, and would wear well as trousers. On his recommendation I took this cloth, I think you will like it, it does not show dirt, and looks very well, it is a sort of black and white very dark cloth. You must write and tell me beforehand if you are going to meet me at the station. I know nothing about the train yet, but I will let you know when I learn. My examen is finished so I have finished all my work for the year, but of course it is kept profoundly secret who has got a prize. I trust I am among the chosen few.

      I have never known a year pass so quickly as the last one, it seems not a month ago since I left you, and I can remember all the minutest articles of furniture in the house, even to the stains on the wall. I suppose I will have to perform for Frank the office I have so often performed for Lottie and Cony, namely, that of rocking her to sleep. I suppose he is out of his long clothes now.

      We are going to have bathing during schools this evening, which is a nice prospect. This is the Golden Time of one’s life at Stonyhurst, the end of the year.

      to Mary Doyle STONYHURST, SEPTEMBER 1873

My things have been taken out of my box, a little of the jam was spilt but no harm done. Ryan has come, and brought the brush with him. the masters all call him ‘gunpowder’ on account of his accident.*

      We have a jolly little school of only 12 fellows, so, with so few, I expect to make great progress. I have taken ‘honours’, that is to say, the ordinary work is considered too short for me, and I have to do an extra hundred lines a day. at the end of the year there is an examination and the best in that gets £5, while any others who do well get prizes. there are seven in our school in honours, while in the next school, 33 in number, there are only four, which shows that we are a clever school. I have quite fallen into the routine of the college, even of being awoken by a policeman’s rattle at 6 o’clock.

      My hair is in capital order, that lime cream is very good indeed.

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