- Synopsis of the story
- Another synopsis from the point of the view of the criminal
- Reasoning Backward – How Holmes solved the crime
- The Art of Detection – lessons for real-life investigators and investigations
- Recurring Characters
- History Accuracy
- Timeline
And here is our video about the story:
Synopsis (by Allison Lee)
Dr. Watson was a medical doctor working for the war in Afghanistan. When he returns to London due to a war injury, he has no place to live, but a friend introduces him to Sherlock Holmes, who decides to board with Watson. While they live together, Dr. Watson begins to suspect something of Holmes and starts observing his unusual habits. Finally, Holmes informs Watson of his occupation as a consulting detective.
One day, a man named Inspector Gregson arrives at their home, asking for Holmes’ help in solving a case on the murder of Enoch Drebber. Holmes and Watson rush to the crime scene with Inspectors Lestrade and Gregson from Scotland Yard. When they arrive, Holmes analyzes the body and notes several things, choosing to share only a few with Scotland Yard. At the crime scene, they discover a ring by the victim’s body that Holmes takes as well as the German word RACHE written in blood, meaning revenge. Holmes and Watson put up advertisements for the missing ring, hoping to catch the culprit. However, instead of the culprit they meet an old woman who takes the ring and leaves. Holmes follows the woman, but she throws him off by seeming to have jumped off the cab in motion. This led Holmes to believe it was actually not an old woman but an accomplice.
Afterwards, Inspector Gregson arrives, claiming to have figured out and arrested the culprit, a man named Arthur Charpentier. He explained how he got to that point, but as he finished, Lestrade came and told them that Drebber’s secretary, Joseph Stangerson, who Lestrade had believed was the culprit, had been killed with the German word RACHE written above his body, like how it had been written above Drebber’s. Lestrade finally told them of some pills he had found lying by Stangerson’s body.
When he heard that, Holmes jumped up and announced his case was complete. He told Watson to get an old, dying dog and put a piece of one pill with water into its mouth. When it didn’t do anything, he tried the other pill, which killed the dog immediately. At this point, the Baker Street Irregulars came in and told Holmes they had the cab. Holmes invited the cabman up and handcuffed him, introducing him as Jefferson Hope, the murderer of Drebber and Stangerson.
Another Point of View (“Let us put ourselves in the place of [the criminal]. Let us look at it from his point of view”)
We read the Sherlock Holmes stories primarily from the point of view of Dr. John Watson, but Holmes and Watson are typically coming to the story late in the game, after crimes and other events have already been put into motion. Turning the stories around, and looking at them from another point of view, may make things clearer.
Here, Jefferson Hope had been a prospector, a pioneer, a scout, a trapper, a silver explorer, and a ranchman. But his life changed forever in 1859 when he fell in love with and became engaged to Lucy Ferrier, the 17-year-old daughter of a prosperous farmer named John Ferrier in Utah.
Jefferson Hope left to work a mine, intent to come back with his own fortune and to marry Lucy upon his return. Unfortunately, what he did not know was that while he was away, John Ferrier was facing pressure to have Lucy wed someone else: either Enoch Drebber or Joseph Stangerson. John Ferrier sent word to Jefferson Hope, and Hope came back just in time.
The three fled and thought they had escaped. Unfortunately, they were wrong.
One day, Drebber and Stangerson found the Ferriers by themselves while Hope was away hunting. Stangerson shot and killed John Ferrier, leaving Ferrier’s body in a shallow grave.
Lucy Ferrier may have had it worse. She was forced to choose between Stangerson, the man who had killed her father, and Drebber, the man who had only participated in the killing of her father. She chose the lesser of two evils and married Drebber. Heartbroken, she died just weeks later.
Jefferson Hope had lost the love of his life, and he sought revenge, a slow, torturous process that took years and years. To support himself on his quest, he worked mines and worked odd jobs, including being a janitor at a college where he gained a poison that he planned to use to seek his own form of justice. Jefferson Hope got closest to Drebber and Stangerson in Cleveland, but they had him arrested and fled to Europe while he was in jail.
Finally, about 20 or so years after the death of John Ferrier and Lucy Ferrier, Jefferson Hope tracked Drebber and Stangerson to London and then worked as a cab driver while following them. He was running out of time, as his heart had become weaker, and he knew that he did not have much more time to bring Drebber and Stangerson to justice.
Finally, one night, Hope picked up Drebber and brought him to an abandoned house, where he gave Drebber a chance. Two pills – one benign, and the other filled with poison. Fate would decide. Hope and Drebber each took a pill, and Drebber died.
Hope left Drebber’s body behind but accidentally dropped Lucy’s wedding ring in the house. Hope tried to return for the ring but was too late – a police officer had noticed lights in the house and had found Drebber’s body. Hope abandoned the ring. He had more work to do.
Hope then tried to find Stangerson, who was staying at a private hotel. While staking Stangerson out, he saw a newspaper announcement about a wedding ring found near the house. Jefferson Hope feared a trap, and sent a friend in his place to get the ring. The friend went to 221B Baker Street in disguise as an old woman, got the ring back, and managed to escape the detective who tried to follow him. The friend brought the ring back to Hope. Hope then broke into Stangerson’s hotel room, intending to offer Stangerson the same 50/50 chance that he had offered Drebber. Stangerson fought back, and Hope ended up stabbing him in the heart.
Hope had finally managed his own form of justice. Lucy and John Ferrier could rest in peace.
Reasoning Backward (“In solving a problem of this sort, the grand thing is to be able to reason backwards”)
Holmes begins his investigation by closely observing the crime scene, which led to him deducing some details about his suspect, the most important being that the suspect was a cabbie.
- The murderer was a cabby who had driven the victim to the scene in a horse-driven cab. Holmes saw that the murderer and the victim had walked into the house together, and that the horse had been left unattended, as indicated by the marks which Holmes found in the ground. “It is absurd to suppose that any sane man would carry out a deliberate crime under the very eyes, as it were, of a third person who was sure to betray him,” Holmes reasoned. The cabby, therefore, was the murderer.
- More than six feet high. Based on the length of his stride.
- Small feet for his height, wearing square-toed boots. Holmes measured foots outside.
- Smoked a Trichinopoly cigar. Based on ash from the floor. Holmes had made a special study of cigar ashes and had written a monograph on the subject.
- Fingernails of right hand were remarkably long. Scratches in the wall where he had written Rache in blood
Holmes then figured out that the murder was committed by poison. He then found out some information about the victim, which established a motive and the name of a possible suspect, Jefferson Hope (Holmes also could have found this out based on the telegram found at the second murder scene, Joseph Stangerson’s hotel room).
Holmes then combined the information and sent out his Baker Street Irregulars to ask for Jefferson Hope to pick him up and to set up a situation where he could get Hope to confess.
The Art of Detection
Holmes said in the Adventure of the Abbey Grange that someday he would compose a “text-book which shall focus the whole art of detection into one volume.” Unfortunately, he never got around to doing this, but this story offers some useful advice for real-life investigations.
- Know a lot about other cases. Holmes knows what to look for when he gets to a murder scene because he knows a lot about other murder scenes. This is the thing that distinguishes Holmes from other detectives, and this is what I found myself as I did more and more cases. The first time you investigate a bank robbery, everything is new. The 10th time, you know what to look for.
- Holmes: “I’m a consulting detective, if you can understand what that is. Here in London we have lots of Government detectives and lots of private ones. When these fellows are at fault they come to me, and I manage to put them on the right scent. They lay all the evidence before me, and I am generally able, by the help of my knowledge of the history of crime, to set them straight. There is a strong family resemblance about misdeeds, and if you have all the details of a thousand at your finger ends, it is odd if you can’t unravel the thousand and first.”
- Get out there and talk to people directly. Holmes did not just rely on what he was told about the crime scene, but went directly to the constable who found Drebber’s body, John Rance (evidentiary rules similarly favor firsthand observations, rather than “hearsay”). By doing so, Holmes was able to get details that confirmed his theories about what had happened, and he learned about the man who happened to be outside the house shortly afterwards.
- Holmes: “There is nothing like first-hand evidence … We may as well learn all that is to be learned.”
- Look closely at the unusual fact, the facts that stand out, the unintended mistakes. Holmes looked closely at the evidence that was unusual – the cab that was left unattended during the murder, the wedding ring that was found on the scene – and those unusual facts led him to Jefferson Hope. Similarly, when I try to investigate a case, I look for mistakes or flaws in the pattern.
- Holmes: “What is out of the common is usually a guide rather than a hindrance. In solving a problem of this sort, the grand thing is to be able to reason backward.”
- Holmes: “When a fact appears to be opposed to a long train of deductions, it invariably proves to be capable of bearing some other interpretation.”
- Holmes: “It is a mistake to confound strangeness with mystery. The most commonplace crime is often the most mysterious because it presents no new or special features from which deductions may be drawn. This murder would have been infinitely more difficult to unravel had the body of the victim been simply found lying in the roadway without any of those outré and sensational accompaniments which have rendered it remarkable. These strange details, far from making the case more difficult, have really had the effect of making it less so.”
- Focus on who benefits. Motive helps identify a suspect and it can help develop evidence. Here, Holmes knew that the killer had some motive tied to a wedding ring, asked for information specifically about Drebber’s marriage, and then learned about Jefferson Hope and about Hope’s presence in Europe. When I was a young prosecutor, I was taught to consider two benefits – profit and passion. Most of the crimes I prosecuted were for profit, money. This is a crime based on passion, specifically, revenge.
- Test your theory. Holmes suspected that the wedding ring was important, but did not know why. He tested his theory by placing an advertisement in the newspaper to see who would show up looking for it. Holmes suspected that the murder had been committed by poison. He tested his theory by conducting an experiment with the two pills Lestrade found at the scene of Stangerson’s death – giving part of each pill to an old dog, which died quickly after trying the second pill.
Recurring Characters
This is the first Sherlock Holmes story, the first John Watson story, the first story featuring Inspectors Gregson and Lestrade, and the first story with the Baker Street Irregulars. We will see all of these characters again in future stories.
Holmes compliments Gregson and Lestrade, but with lots of qualifications. He says that they “are the pick of a bad lot. They are both quick and energetic, but conventional – shockingly so. They have their knives into one another, too. They are as jealous as a pair of professional beauties.” He refers to Lestrade as “that fool” “who thinks himself so smart.”
All that being said, while both investigators miss the signs pointing to a cabby being the murderer, both do a decent job pursuing leads. Gregson investigated the victim and found someone else who might have a motive to kill Hope, even though that suspect did not fit all of the information available and was arrested by mistake. Lestrade investigated the victim’s associate (Stangerson), discovered that Stangerson had also been killed, and discovered a telegram that might have led to Jefferson Hope. Even if Holmes had not been involved, Lestrade might have identified Hope as the murderer eventually.
Regarding the Baker Street Irregulars, the young “ragged street Arabs” who assist Holmes in his investigations and who manage to lure Jefferson Hope to 221B Baker Street. Only one is named – Wiggins, who also appears in the Sign of the Four. Holmes says that these “little beggars” are helpful because they are so often ignored. “The mere sight of an official-looking person seals men’s lips. These youngsters, however, go everywhere and hear everything. They are as sharp as needles, too; all they want is organization.”
Historical Accuracy
This is one of the few Sherlock Holmes stories to involve a real-life person: Brigham Young, a leader of the Church of Latter-Day Saints, who later became the governor of Utah and the namesake for Brigham Young University. The story praises Young as a “skilful administrator as well as a resolute chief” and acknowledges the “persecution” that Mormons suffered, but then grounds Jefferson Hope’s motives in what the Church of Latter-Day Saints has called “a longstanding and much-embellished myth about a secret society of Mormon vigilantes.”
According to the story, John Ferrier and Lucy were the only survivors of a disastrous group of Western settlers, originally 21 in number. On May 4, 1847, they were found and saved by a group of Mormon settlers led by Brigham Young.
In fact, Brigham Young was leading a company of Mormons in May 1847 as they left the Midwest because of religious persecution that they had faced. According to the Mormon Overland Travel Database, the company consisted of 142 men, 3 women, 2 children and 72 wagons. The database lists the members of the company – not surprisingly, no Drebber, no Stangerson, and no Ferrier are listed.
The story picks up again around 1859 or 1860, when Lucy is about 17 or 18 years old. At this time, Brigham Young confronts John Ferrier, telling him that Lucy must marry Enoch Drebber or Joseph Stangerson. Young supposedly invokes an alleged rule proclaiming that a woman marrying a “Gentile” would be committing a “grievous sin.” There is no such explicit rule, but the Mormon religion does encourage marrying within one’s faith, similar to other. Mormons believe in “celestial marriage,” which continues into the afterlife and is essential for exaltation in the afterlife, and which depends on both husband and wife being members in good standing of the Mormon faith. Perhaps similarly, Deuteronomy 7:3 commands the Jewish people “do not intermarry” with the peoples in the land of Canaan, and Paul writes in 2 Corinthians that Christians should “not be mismatched with unbelievers.”
When John Ferrier refuses to force Lucy to marry Drebber or Stangerson, the Ferriers become targets of what the story describes as the “Avenging Angels.” The story says that the Avenging Angels, or the “Danite Band,” were “gangs of armed men, masked, stealthy, and noiseless” who kidnapped women, murdered immigrants, and rifled camps. The story describes the Avenging Angels as a “ruthless society” whose members were secret and whose “deeds of blood violence” were “done under the name of religion.”
The Danites did exist, but not at the scale described in A Study in Scarlet. According to the Church of Latter-Day Saints, the Danites were a “paramilitary group” “whose objective was to defend the community against dissident and excommunicated Latter-day Saints as well as other Missourians.” Similar to what was described with John Ferrier, Danites “intimidated Church dissenters.” They also “raided two towns believed to be centers of anti-Mormon activity, burning homes and stealing goods.” However, their existence was “short-lived” and focused on Missouri in the 1830s, not in Utah decades later.
Overall, the story of Lucy Ferrier and Jefferson Hope is an example of anti-Mormon literature from the 19th century. As described by Leonard Arrington and John Haupt in a 1968 article, many of these books “attack Mormonism” in part by depicting women who are threatened in some way by Mormons. A Study in Scarlet includes two motifs that were common in such books: “a lovely and high-principled woman [who] becomes associated in some way with the Mormons, and relates various experiences with the sect, all of which are designed to demonstrate that the Mormons were cruel, treacherous, and depraved,” and “a vengeance motif, in which the narrative features encounters with the Danites, and thrilling escapes as the Destroying Angels pursue the pure-hearted heroine.”
These and other stories about Mormonism have not aged well, especially as the religion has become more widely accepted. Arrington and Haupt listed 50 novels and “tales of adventure” from the 19th century about Mormons. All but one are out of print and largely forgotten, and the one that endures, A Study in Scarlet, endures not because of its depiction of Mormons but probably in spite of it. And of course, it endures because of its true contribution to English literature – Sherlock Holmes.
Timeline
When the story takes place is a bit unclear. From what Jefferson Hope says, the story should take place around 1879, which is 20 years after the death of Lucy Ferrier. But from what Watson says, the story seems to be set in 1881 or 1882, because it is set while Watson is recovering from the Battle of Maiwand in Afghanistan, which occurred in July 1880. I’m going with Watson on this – Jefferson Hope probably was just rounding when he said 20 years.
In any event, the story establishes that this is the first case that Watson assists Sherlock Holmes with, and is the beginning of their long partnership.
By this time, Holmes is already a success as a detective. He already has clients seeking him out, as well as the police. He has already published the article Book of Life and he had written a monograph about cigar ashes. He already has developed a network of agents who work for him, particularly the Baker Street Irregulars led by Wiggins.
These are some of the things that make me suspect the accuracy of Watson’s account especially given contradictions in later stories. Holmes is a detective – was he really going to just start rooming with a person he happens to meet? And more importantly why does Watson say some things about Holmes that make Holmes look bad and that are contradicted by later stories, such as Holmes being unaware that the earth goes around the sun?
I have a whole theory about this that I call the Silent Contest. Based on this theory, Watson deliberately made some mistakes or deceptions in his accounts of Holmes’ adventures for the same reason that I and other investigators sometimes misled people – to make people not realize that we were onto them. But we can talk about that more next time, when we discuss the Sign of the Four.
Study in Sherlock: A Holmes Re-Read 