I Hear of Sherlock Everywhere

Sherlockian Activities During the San Francisco Silent Film Festival

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"those weekend parties" [SOLI]</h4>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVjlnseP-WAtjkDkF8mv5J3GkFOM-J8-F0AUxvFLFxsrt0K6OhoGvsPJg-3QwtFTM5IGs8OXEIw1XKl36QuKVvMBV3K4Ghk05zFteIC763uAaTiZyucohpat5QcFxrL666TEErxxjw4exF/s1600/Gillette+sunglasses.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="William Gillette - Mr. Hollywood, 1916" border="0" height="504" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVjlnseP-WAtjkDkF8mv5J3GkFOM-J8-F0AUxvFLFxsrt0K6OhoGvsPJg-3QwtFTM5IGs8OXEIw1XKl36QuKVvMBV3K4Ghk05zFteIC763uAaTiZyucohpat5QcFxrL666TEErxxjw4exF/s1600/Gillette+sunglasses.jpg" title="William Gillette in sunglasses on the soundstage" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />As you may have heard, <a href="http://www.ihearofsherlock.com/2014/10/breaking-long-lost-william-gillette.html" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">the long-lost 1916 William Gillette film <i>Sherlock Holmes</i> was found</a>, restored and will be having its premiere in the United States at the <a href="http://www.silentfilm.org/" target="_blank">San Francisco Silent Film Festival</a> on May 31, 2015.<div>
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The festival itself runs from May 28 - June 1 and there are opportunities available to become part of <a href="http://www.silentfilm.org/homepage/whats-new/join-the-baker-street-circle" target="_blank">the Baker Street Circle</a> of supporters. Such generous donors receive recognition in the program as well as admission for two with reserved seating and a special reception with Baker Street Irregulars and the restoration team.</div>
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If that seems beyond your ability, you can always stop by for just the film itself, where ti<a href="http://prod3.agileticketing.net/websales/pages/info.aspx?evtinfo=124514~d9133282-4896-49aa-be18-b053ee8cefc3&epguid=9b9aa81f-61d7-4293-afdc-ddf4e632d0f8&" target="_blank">ckets are just $22 for the 7:00 pm showing on May 31</a>.<br /><br /><br />If you're in town for the weekend, you'll have ample opportunities to join fellow Sherlockians to celebrate the US premiere of the restored Sherlock Holmes starring William Gillette.</div>
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Saturday, May 30, 3-5 PM</h4>
Price: Free (reservation required)<br /></div>
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The Scowrers and Molly Maguires of San Francisco will host a reception. Join them for some complimentary Italian food and some good conversation. Toasts are especially welcome. No host bar.<br /><br />Please RSVP Cade Deverell at <<a href="mailto:hattydoran221@gmail.com">hattydoran221@gmail.com</a>> by Friday, May 22nd. Reservations are required in order to attend.<br /><br />Location: The Firewood Café, 4248 18th St., San Francisco, CA 94114<br /><a href="https://goo.gl/maps/Cu7iR">Google Maps for The Firewood Café</a><br /><br /> <br /><br /><h4>
Sunday, May 31 at noon</h4>
Fortify yourself with lunch and good company at historic Catch Restaurant just around the corner from the Castro Theater. The group will order off the menu [roughly $14-$20 not counting drinks].<br /><br />Seating limited: if you can join, RSVP Marsha Pollak at <<a href="mailto:mlpollak@icloud.com">mlpollak@icloud.com</a>> by Thursday, May 28.<br /><br />Location: Catch Restaurant, 2362 Market St., San Francisco, CA 94114<br /><a href="https://goo.gl/maps/WnSp7">Google Maps for Catch Restaurant</a><br /><br /> <br /><h3>
Bonus Content</h3>
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If you'd like to learn a bit more about William Gillette, we have <a href="http://www.ihearofsherlock.com/search/label/William%20Gillette#.VUrJ1_lVikr" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">a series of posts about him</a>. Just click through to read more. And if you'd like to hear an interview with Henry Zecher, a biographer of Gillette, <a href="http://ihose.co/ihose34" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">we interviewed him on Episode 34</a>.</div>
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Sherlockian Activities During the San Francisco Silent Film Festival

"those weekend parties" [SOLI] As you may have heard, the long-lost 1916 William Gillette film Sherlock Holmes was found , re...

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by Scott Monty

The Sherlockian Origins of a Massive Jewel Heist

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"All London was interested, and the fashionable world dismayed" [EMPT] </h4>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4EYedR6AsvRQ7FOyBFJ6bA1xQuCQKOU64Iu7qzaXitenrDX94-pKKNQ2AfPgE9SH3-TYWVBLfF7YO37sKHqQyx76uWgkmKFTY8lKRSXhaaYBfrklTIYRRhkPbrmz-jvgsJkRdI33PxgHy/s1600/Hatton+Garden.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="The Red-Headed League is alive and well" border="0" height="358" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4EYedR6AsvRQ7FOyBFJ6bA1xQuCQKOU64Iu7qzaXitenrDX94-pKKNQ2AfPgE9SH3-TYWVBLfF7YO37sKHqQyx76uWgkmKFTY8lKRSXhaaYBfrklTIYRRhkPbrmz-jvgsJkRdI33PxgHy/s1600/Hatton+Garden.jpg" title="Hatton Garden bank" width="640" /></a></div>
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Last month's spectacular diamond robbery in London's Hatton Garden was historic in more ways than one, and, while it's still unclear how much loot the thieves made off with, experts estimate the haul's value may exceed £200 million. No arrests have yet been made, but as police disclose more details of the crime, a sense of déjà vu seems inescapable.<br />
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Hatton Garden Safe Deposit, Ltd., has been a leading secure facility for 60 years in the district which has been the hub of London's gold and diamond trade since medieval times. Yet on April 2, 2015, a six-man team entered the building after hours, rappelled down an elevator shaft into the basement, and drilled a six-foot tunnel into the vault, where they plundered 72 safe deposit boxes before absconding, <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2015/04/09/europe/london-hatton-garden-heist/" target="_blank">according to DCI Paul Johnson of the Met's Flying Squad</a>.<br />
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"very willing to have a holiday" [REDH]</h4>
The thieves struck during the Easter holiday weekend, a stratagem which gave them as long as four days to complete the robbery. According to ex-Flying Squad chief Roy Ramm, the affair had "a sort of old-fashioned audacity about it." Police have confirmed that the gang exited the building, only to return at least once during the long bank holiday weekend before escaping again. Investigators have called the Hatton Garden heist "sophisticated" and suggest that only a few individuals in the UK might be capable of pulling it off.<br />
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For students of the Canon, it's a case of life imitating art: A daring weekend robbery via tunnelling into a secure vault must instantly evoke John Clay's raid on the City and Suburban Bank in Conan Doyle's "The Adventure of the Red-Headed League," a scheme that was foiled by Victorian action heroes Sherlock "Hunting-Crop" Holmes and John "Quick-Draw" Watson.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhnw5IZO-xZw8xB9OpYSIigp2wLKy2s0EER9bTXPq_jfHmuqv4aBNUzNMgLEd5JXliMCA1B-pNM1aaiHQb7McJMBOeOS6rchLXqhAtI9qxYpCzRZ1MAI4RBu_pQUQDJwzB5I6s7Iio_eFI6/s1600/Holmes+with+hunting+crop.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Can I crop that for you?" border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhnw5IZO-xZw8xB9OpYSIigp2wLKy2s0EER9bTXPq_jfHmuqv4aBNUzNMgLEd5JXliMCA1B-pNM1aaiHQb7McJMBOeOS6rchLXqhAtI9qxYpCzRZ1MAI4RBu_pQUQDJwzB5I6s7Iio_eFI6/s1600/Holmes+with+hunting+crop.jpg" title="Holmes with hunting crop" width="400" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpE0hm8kTAewIIS-pDoql76fugSy_O25IhK4eXZUJcnaL_ixQvLhgGoX5_htnkHb3b0XaH48MHIsmqBWxSWZ-bK-Y-m8pY1wdc9Ur-J-vu8uDDP_JolD3vHwyShjWC6JCGN9Zyx2Tbj3QO/s1600/Quick+Draw+Watson.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Quick Draw Watson" border="0" height="298" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpE0hm8kTAewIIS-pDoql76fugSy_O25IhK4eXZUJcnaL_ixQvLhgGoX5_htnkHb3b0XaH48MHIsmqBWxSWZ-bK-Y-m8pY1wdc9Ur-J-vu8uDDP_JolD3vHwyShjWC6JCGN9Zyx2Tbj3QO/s1600/Quick+Draw+Watson.jpg" title="Watson with pistol in REDH" width="400" /></a></div>
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Jewelry industry expert James Riley told the BBC that the Easter weekend job was "highly organized and very cleverly masterminded." Indeed it was, in a more profound way than Mr. Riley may realize. For as surely as the Hatton Garden caper was life imitating art, the John Clay gang is art imitating life, in the form of the great Boylston National Bank Robbery of 1869, planned and executed by <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_Worth" target="_blank">Adam Worth</a>, whom <a href="http://www.vincentstarrett.com/" target="_blank">Vincent Starrett</a> called, "the original of Professor Moriarty."<br />
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"the Napoleon of crime" [FINA]</h4>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwtMHwrbb3pEL24Y8dRL6epY4XyTY3xHQ_WJkVHQUclQupT0xy5gM71NtMrwWw2E0o18nPP34orZTc1N_NvD6kLpDUS5YWMKOpfJkAuUCU_wxVZp5sBi8B3NEffxNP1AS8WFStYNu9lOeV/s1600/WorthBankJobNYT11231869.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="Original Worth bank robbery article - New York Times" border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwtMHwrbb3pEL24Y8dRL6epY4XyTY3xHQ_WJkVHQUclQupT0xy5gM71NtMrwWw2E0o18nPP34orZTc1N_NvD6kLpDUS5YWMKOpfJkAuUCU_wxVZp5sBi8B3NEffxNP1AS8WFStYNu9lOeV/s1600/WorthBankJobNYT11231869.jpg" title="Worth bank robbery article" width="166" /></a></div>
Worth, who rose from pickpocket to international master criminal, had a long career marked by audacity and an aversion to violence; his first big score was the Boylston job. In November of 1869, having chosen the Boylston National Bank in Boston as his target, Worth bought the premises next door and opened a shop selling a patent bitters that he claimed would run all others out of the market. The shop window was filled with bottles, preventing passersby from seeing inside, and a new interior wall was added, reducing the sales floor to a tiny area. One member of Worth's four-man team was always on duty dressed as a clerk, while the other three were in the back, tunnelling into the bank and piling the dirt behind the newly added partition. One week later, on a Saturday, the employees of the New Patent Bitters Co. cracked three safes inside the Boylston bank and made off with nearly one million dollars. Worth took his share to England, where he parlayed it into a criminal empire.<br />
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"Everything comes in circles – even Professor Moriarty," said Sherlock Holmes to Inspector MacDonald in <i>The Valley of Fear</i>. <br />
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The most practical thing that you ever did in your life would be to shut yourself up for three months and read twelve hours a day at the annals of crime."</blockquote>
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To that end, you can learn more about Adam Worth in <i><a href="http://amzn.to/1PpPjgV" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Remarkable Rogues:The Careers of Some Notable Criminals of Europe and America</a></i> by Charles Kingston, and in <i><a href="http://amzn.to/1EYHAVM" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">The Napoleon of Crime: The Life and Times of Adam Worth, Master Thief</a></i> by Ben Macintyre.<br />
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We would hope that police forces and bankers around the world would do the same.<br />
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The Sherlockian Origins of a Massive Jewel Heist

"All London was interested, and the fashionable world dismayed" [EMPT] Last month's spectacular diamond robbery in Lond...

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by Tim Greer

Sherlock Holmes and Middle East Conflicts

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<span style="text-align: start;">"All hell was loose in the country" [CROO]</span></h4>
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The year was 1895, and Islamic terrorism was much in the news. <br />
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Long before the 21st-century skirmishes in Iraq and Syria and Yemen, long before the "9/11" attacks in 2001 drew certain kinds of extremism to the attention of most North Americans, there were terrorist incidents and guerrilla battles in parts of the Muslim world, and it will be no surprise that Sherlock Holmes was involved.<br />
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Then as now, events grew from a combination of theological differences, economic forces, tribal rivalry, and resentment of western imperialism. From a western point of view, as Holmes might have read them in <i>The Times</i> any morning in the 1880s or 1890s, events unfolded something like this.<br />
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The Muslims of the Sudan region, south of Egypt, were watching for a messiah. In June 1881, Muhammad Ahmad bin Abd Allah, a boat-builder who traced his ancestry to the prophet Muhammad, announced that he was the man, and quickly proclaimed jihad. Four years later his followers had defeated the Turkish and Egyptian rulers of the region and captured Khartoum. Britain had interests in the area too, and Charles George "Chinese" Gordon — the man whose portrait hung on Watson's wall at 221B Baker Street — led an army to rescue foreigners from Khartoum and, if possible, reestablish order. Instead he was hacked to pieces, and his army turned back, at a battle in January 1885.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOd4hDDIfhTOLR-YRknAUOqdeIf_Cfd2z5l2SCEcJwIu5PFoC3O3kiwfl-vO-25dOt0omLzrtggZhrTT0ARaG1EaY1vxargiccOOO7ISABBx54AOvYSwxHWph8_Rbpjr3nALmFTsrOAjng/s1600/General+Chinese+Gin+Gordon.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="General Gordon" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOd4hDDIfhTOLR-YRknAUOqdeIf_Cfd2z5l2SCEcJwIu5PFoC3O3kiwfl-vO-25dOt0omLzrtggZhrTT0ARaG1EaY1vxargiccOOO7ISABBx54AOvYSwxHWph8_Rbpjr3nALmFTsrOAjng/s1600/General+Chinese+Gin+Gordon.jpg" title="General Chinese Gordon" /></a></div>
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Muhammad Ahmad died a few months later, though not before establishing sharia law in his domain. His right-hand man, Abdallahi ibn Muhammad, succeeded him, with the title of Khalifa, or caliph — a word still used today for the leader of an Islamic state such as ISIS. This must have been the Khalifa whom Holmes visited "at Khartoum" — in effect, behind enemy lines — after his equally daring visit to Mecca, as Holmes narrates his movements in "The Empty House". Abdallahi was eventually defeated in 1898 by forces led by Horatio Kitchener, who would become Britain's great general in the early months of World War I (and whose face was well known from recruitment posters).<br />
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Within this broad narrative there were many incidents to catch the attention of western newspaper readers. Arthur Conan Doyle heard of such things during his own visit to Egypt in 1895. Conflict flared up just then, and ACD got himself appointed "honorary" war correspondent for the <i>Westminster Gazette</i> — an excuse to get as close to the excitement as possible. Later, he turned some events and rumours into the plot for a novella, <i>The Tragedy of the Korosko</i>, published in 1898. <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhjTWjV2eBvppg-TkCqMGmxhkFTFcx3BDDm5wJ8Ah3UsFkjwFtxthcjyK084J7_LiO-p5RsVmpgcGEcll_XXVFdQVW7CAcjd_a59SlwEuFQk-rpo-eem83w8Zd6NaQfpk8Op7KUtV6n1AJL/s1600/Tragedy+of+the+Korosko.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Tragedy of the Korosko, 1898" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhjTWjV2eBvppg-TkCqMGmxhkFTFcx3BDDm5wJ8Ah3UsFkjwFtxthcjyK084J7_LiO-p5RsVmpgcGEcll_XXVFdQVW7CAcjd_a59SlwEuFQk-rpo-eem83w8Zd6NaQfpk8Op7KUtV6n1AJL/s1600/Tragedy+of+the+Korosko.jpg" title="Tragedy of the Korosko" /></a></div>
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"There is nothing new under the sun," said Sherlock Holmes. Nothing new about confict between Islamic elements and western state power, at any rate.<br />
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<i>Image credit: <a href="http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_war_in_the_Soudan.jpg" target="_blank">Wikimedia Commons</a></i><br />
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Sherlock Holmes and Middle East Conflicts

"All hell was loose in the country" [CROO] The year was 1895, and Islamic terrorism was much in the news. Long before the...

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by Chris Redmond

May 4, 1891

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"It is with a heavy heart that I take up my pen" [FINA]</h4>
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The date of May 4 typically means melancholy for anyone who has read "The Final Problem," the short story in which Sherlock Holmes confronts his archenemy Professor Moriarty (who we've inexplicably never heard of up until this point in the Canon) and both of them tumble off the cliff into the Reichenbach Falls.<br />
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As you may recall, after Holmes appeared in Watson's consulting-room and recounted his interaction with Moriarty, the two fled to the Continent, eventually landing in Switzerland:<br />
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It was upon the 3rd of May that we reached the little village of Meiringen, where we put up at the Englischer Hof, then kept by Peter Steiler the elder. Our landlord was an intelligent man, and spoke excellent English, having served for three years as waiter at the Grosvenor Hotel in London. At his advice, upon the afternoon of the 4th we set off together with the intention of crossing the hills and spending the night at the hamlet of Rosenlaui. We had strict injunctions, however, on no account to pass the falls of Reichenbach, which are about half-way up the hill, without making a small d‚tour to see them.</blockquote>
It was here that Conan Doyle chose the final resting place for Sherlock Holmes - a rest that was intended to be eternal but that we now know lasted nearly a decade. The description of the Reichenbach Falls is a fitting one for the epic struggle of good versus evil that took place later in the story:<br />
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It is, indeed, a fearful place. The torrent, swollen by the melting snow, plunges into a tremendous abyss, from which the spray rolls up like the smoke from a burning house. The shaft into which the river hurls itself is an immense chasm, lined by glistening, coal-black rock, and narrowing into a creaming, boiling pit of incalculable depth, which brims over and shoots the stream onward over its jagged lip. The long sweep of green water roaring for ever down, and the thick flickering curtain of spray hissing for ever upwards, turn a man giddy with their constant whirl and clamour. We stood near the edge peering down at the gleam of the breaking water far below us against the black rocks, and listening to the half-human shout which came booming up with the spray out of the abyss.</blockquote>
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And after Watson was lured back to the Englischer Hof with the story of a patient in need (good old Watson!), he returned to the falls to find a note from Sherlock Holmes along with his alpenstock and silver cigarette case. He was led to conclude that that inevitable happened:<br />
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An examination by experts leaves little doubt that a personal contest between the two men ended, as it could hardly fail to end in such a situation, in their reeling over, locked in each other's arms. Any attempt at recovering the bodies was absolutely hopeless, and there, deep down in that dreadful cauldron of swirling water and seething foam, will lie for all time the most dangerous criminal and the foremost champion of the law of their generation.</blockquote>
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But aside from the colorful descriptions of both the setting and the action, this story above many others shows Watson's emotional side. Over the course of two short years, readers had gotten to know Holmes and Watson through 12 stories that made up <i>The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes</i> and 11 stories that comprised <i>The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes</i> (as well as the previously published <i>A Study in Scarlet</i> and <i>The Sign of Four</i>). That's less than half of what would eventually become the entire Canon of 60 stories - stories that would be published over the course of the following 35 or so years.<br />
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For Watson as well as for the readers, that's an intense run of stories - tales which fill us with wonder as we've been learning about the habits, eccentricities, limits and capabilities of the most intriguing detective that the world has ever known. Is it any wonder then that his sudden and tragic loss affected us so deeply?<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkV5sKiNw_bJrVOh1VsGNp8IxfQpX79BEHh_JGTDTb70ep2HnKupNEYweW4K3DB8YMQYpo0ZGjaU9x-9BA84it5lP_UUlTa8haDM34CE9XqKUwKsUNjrANy4EGSt0HLnF_JslYGfbWVqjp/s1600/Watson+sad+%5BFINA%5D.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Watson realizing what happened to Holmes" border="0" height="290" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkV5sKiNw_bJrVOh1VsGNp8IxfQpX79BEHh_JGTDTb70ep2HnKupNEYweW4K3DB8YMQYpo0ZGjaU9x-9BA84it5lP_UUlTa8haDM34CE9XqKUwKsUNjrANy4EGSt0HLnF_JslYGfbWVqjp/s400/Watson+sad+%5BFINA%5D.PNG" title="Dr. Watson, realizing the outcome at the Reichenbach Falls" width="400" /></a></div>
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Watson opens the story with the fateful line, "It is with a heavy heart that I take up my pen to write these the last words in which I shall ever record the singular gifts by which my friend Mr. Sherlock Holmes was distinguished." We'll never forget reading that line for the first time and feeling a little stab in the gut. The modern equivalent would be exclaiming, "Wait, <b><i>what</i></b>?"<br />
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He went on to describe how the scene affected him: "It was the sight of that alpenstock which turned me cold and sick...I stood for a minute or two to collect myself, for I was dazed with the horror of the thing."<br />
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Even Holmes understood how his untimely departure would affect his friend, writing in his farewell note, "I fear that it is at a cost which will give pain to my friends, and especially, my dear Watson, to you."<br />
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The pain was palpable to readers at the time. There is an apocryphal legend that grown men in London wore black armbands in a demonstration of mourning. We have yet to see any definitive evidence of this occurrence (and the <i><a href="http://bakerstreetjournal.com/" target="_blank">Baker Street Journal</a></i> once offered a bounty for anyone who could prove it). But it rings true to the spirit of what happened at the time, which was an outpouring of grief over the loss of a literary character. Letters flowed to <i>The Strand Magazine</i> and to Arthur Conan Doyle himself, one even beginning "You brute!"<br />
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At least modern readers don't have to wait eight years for Holmes to reappear in <i>The Hound of the Baskervilles</i> or ten years for the first of the stories that would make up <i>The Return of Sherlock Holmes</i>. Can you imagine what it must have been like to have to put Holmes to rest in one's mind and to blindly wait to see if he would ever reappear?<br />
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We're fortunate that the public outcry (and, let's face it, a hefty payday) convinced Sir Arthur to take up his pen once more to provide us with such rich and wonderful stories to fill our desires, fuel our imagination and enrich our friendships. While May 4 may seem one for us to mourn, we're fortunate that, as Watson observed upon Holmes's return in "The Empty House,"<br />
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...once again Mr. Sherlock Holmes is free to devote his life to examining those interesting little problems which the complex life of London so plentifully presents.</blockquote>
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