The Gloria Scott.
The case begins Saturday, July 3, 1880.
Why?
SEASON OF THE TELLING:
"I have some papers here," said my friend Sherlock Holmes as we sat one winter’s night on either side of the fire."
"I had often endeavoured to elicit from my companion what had first turned his mind in the direction of criminal research, but had never caught him before in a communicative humour."
"Those are the facts of the case, Doctor, and if they are of any use to your collection, I am sure that they are very heartily at your service."
"I have some papers here," said my friend Sherlock Holmes as we sat one winter’s night on either side of the fire."
"I had often endeavoured to elicit from my companion what had first turned his mind in the direction of criminal research, but had never caught him before in a communicative humour."
"Those are the facts of the case, Doctor, and if they are of any use to your collection, I am sure that they are very heartily at your service."
POINT IN HOLMES’S CAREER:
"But why did you say just now that there were very particular reasons why I should study this case?"
"Because it was the first in which I was ever engaged."
"But why did you say just now that there were very particular reasons why I should study this case?"
"Because it was the first in which I was ever engaged."
POINT IN HOLMES’S EDUCATION:
"You never heard me talk of Victor Trevor? He was the only friend I made during the two years I was at college . . . and that only through the accident of his bull terrier freezing on to my ankle one morning as I went down to chapel.
"I was laid by the heels for ten days."
"Before the end of the term we were close friends."
"Finally he invited me down to his father’s place at Donnithorpe, in Norfolk, and I accepted his hospitality for a month of the long vacation."
"You never heard me talk of Victor Trevor? He was the only friend I made during the two years I was at college . . . and that only through the accident of his bull terrier freezing on to my ankle one morning as I went down to chapel.
"I was laid by the heels for ten days."
"Before the end of the term we were close friends."
"Finally he invited me down to his father’s place at Donnithorpe, in Norfolk, and I accepted his hospitality for a month of the long vacation."
SPORTING OPPORTUNITIES AVAILABLE:
"There was excellent wild-duck shooting in the fens, remarkably good fishing . . ."
"There was excellent wild-duck shooting in the fens, remarkably good fishing . . ."
HOLMES’S DEPARTURE FROM DONNITHORPE:
"At last I became so convinced that I was causing him uneasiness that I drew my visit to a close."
"All this occurred during the first month of the long vacation. I went up to my London rooms, where I spent seven weeks working out a few experiments in organic chemistry. One day, however, when the autumn was far advanced and the vacation drawing to a close, I received a telegram from my friend imploring me to return to Donnithorpe . . ."
"He met me with the dog-cart at the station, and I saw at a glance that
the last two months had been very trying ones for him.
"At last I became so convinced that I was causing him uneasiness that I drew my visit to a close."
"All this occurred during the first month of the long vacation. I went up to my London rooms, where I spent seven weeks working out a few experiments in organic chemistry. One day, however, when the autumn was far advanced and the vacation drawing to a close, I received a telegram from my friend imploring me to return to Donnithorpe . . ."
"He met me with the dog-cart at the station, and I saw at a glance that
the last two months had been very trying ones for him.
THE DATING OF THE GLORIA SCOTT:
"Some particulars of the voyage of the bark Gloria Scott, from her leaving Falmouth on the 8th October, 1855, to her destruction in N. Lat. 15 degrees 20’, W. Long. 25 degrees 14’, on Nov. 6th."
"It was the year ‘55, when the Crimean War was at its height, and the old convict ships had been largely used as transports in the Black Sea."
"Some particulars of the voyage of the bark Gloria Scott, from her leaving Falmouth on the 8th October, 1855, to her destruction in N. Lat. 15 degrees 20’, W. Long. 25 degrees 14’, on Nov. 6th."
"It was the year ‘55, when the Crimean War was at its height, and the old convict ships had been largely used as transports in the Black Sea."
YEARS PAST SINCE THE SHIP’S DESTRUCTION:
"Why, it’s thirty year and more since I saw you last."
"The case might have been dealt leniently with, but the laws were more harshly administered thirty years ago than now, and on my twenty-third birthday I found myself chained as a felon with thirty-seven other convicts in the ‘tween-decks of the bark Gloria Scott, bound for Australia."
"We prospered, we travelled, we came back as rich colonials to England, and we bought country estates. For more than twenty years we have led peaceful and useful lives, and we hoped that our past was forever buried."
"Why, it’s thirty year and more since I saw you last."
"The case might have been dealt leniently with, but the laws were more harshly administered thirty years ago than now, and on my twenty-third birthday I found myself chained as a felon with thirty-seven other convicts in the ‘tween-decks of the bark Gloria Scott, bound for Australia."
"We prospered, we travelled, we came back as rich colonials to England, and we bought country estates. For more than twenty years we have led peaceful and useful lives, and we hoped that our past was forever buried."
WHAT THE BARING-GOULD ANNOTATED SAYS:
July 12, 1874.
July 12, 1874.
WHAT ZEISLER, THE KING OF CHRONOLOGY, SAYS:
Summer 1876.
Summer 1876.
THE BIRLSTONE RAILWAY’S TIMETABLE:
Here’s a fascinating little problem. Trevor distinctly dates the destruction of the Gloria Scott on November 6, 1855. He backs up the general period with the statement that the Crimean War was at its height, which it was in 1855. Yet both he and Hudson refer to that experience as being thirty years ago, which means this case would occur in 1885 . . . while Holmes and Watson were together.
Previous chronologers have dismissed the thirty years as a mutual mistake on the parts of Hudson and Trevor, but what about young Trevor, the physical evidence of those twenty peaceful years in England? The elder Trevor needed more than a few years to find fortune, travel, and eventually feel changed enough to head back to England as a colonial. He thought his past was well behind him, and that means his wife and son were certainly additions to his life after the return to England.
But what if the "thirty years" was not a mistake, but a simple rounding up of a number like twenty-seven or twenty-eight? Sound reasonable enough. In fact, any comparison between the 1850s and the 1880s would seem a bit like three decades, wouldn’t it? Of course, that would make Sherlock Holmes a college student when he first met Dr. Watson . . . but what was it Watson wrote in A Study in Scarlet?
Here’s a fascinating little problem. Trevor distinctly dates the destruction of the Gloria Scott on November 6, 1855. He backs up the general period with the statement that the Crimean War was at its height, which it was in 1855. Yet both he and Hudson refer to that experience as being thirty years ago, which means this case would occur in 1885 . . . while Holmes and Watson were together.
Previous chronologers have dismissed the thirty years as a mutual mistake on the parts of Hudson and Trevor, but what about young Trevor, the physical evidence of those twenty peaceful years in England? The elder Trevor needed more than a few years to find fortune, travel, and eventually feel changed enough to head back to England as a colonial. He thought his past was well behind him, and that means his wife and son were certainly additions to his life after the return to England.
But what if the "thirty years" was not a mistake, but a simple rounding up of a number like twenty-seven or twenty-eight? Sound reasonable enough. In fact, any comparison between the 1850s and the 1880s would seem a bit like three decades, wouldn’t it? Of course, that would make Sherlock Holmes a college student when he first met Dr. Watson . . . but what was it Watson wrote in A Study in Scarlet?
"There was only one student in the room . . ."
Holmes speaks of coming back to his London rooms from Donnithorpe, most probably his Montague Street rooms (which we’ll later learn he had when he "first came up to London"), where he works on organic chemistry, much as he was doing when Watson first met him. Back when we were discussing A Study in Scarlet, I became convinced that Holmes and Watson first met in the summer of 1881. Would it be so impossible, then, that Holmes’s vacation in Donnithorpe took place in the summer of 1880?
Since Holmes’s trip to Donnithorpe begins with the traditional English university long vacation, I’m going to place both the trip and this case on Saturday, July 3, 1880.
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