The Life and Times of Sherlock Holmes by Liese Anne Sherwood-Fabre

Author:Liese Anne Sherwood-Fabre [Sherwood-Fabre, Liese Anne]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction & Literature, Literary Theory & Criticism, British, Essays & Letters, Essays, Nonfiction, History
ISBN: 9780998411248
Publisher: Little Elm Press
Published: 2018-05-13T04:00:00+00:00

A Traveler’s Guide to Victorian England

Two of the cases in the Canon make a reference to Bradshaw’s: “The Valley of Fear” and “The Adventure of the Copper Breeches.” While Victorians would have been intimately familiar with this railway timetable and guidebook, its usefulness and full complement of features is lost on most modern readers. The first hint of the book’s ubiquitous nature was Holmes’s observation in “The Valley of Fear” that a clue to a ciphered message would be within a set of “standardized books which anyone may be supposed to possess.” (1) Far from a dry listing of departure and arrival times, the book includes a myriad of information on each destination listed, making it a “must have” for travelers of the era and a possible source of the words needed to crack the code.

George Bradshaw first published his railway timetable in 1839, following the introduction of railways in Britain. (2) As described by Michael Portillo (more about him later), the system was “higgledy-piggledy; free-enterprise rampant, lines everywhere, no planning or co-ordination.” The timetable, then, was a must for Victorians to get around in a time before cars, or in some cases, even roads.” (3) Originally titled Bradshaw’s Railway Time Tables, the second edition, Bradshaw’s Railway Companion, in 1840 was renamed and re-priced, but was changed back to the original title and price in 1841. Beginning with the second year, supplemental material was sold to keep the timetables up to date. In 1847, Bradshaw published a companion volume for European railways, Bradshaw’s Continental Railway Guide. The original timetables were expanded to include maps, illustrations, and other descriptions of towns serviced by the railways and became Bradshaw’s Descriptive Railway Handbook, and by 1898, the original eight-page edition had grown to 946 pages. (4)

The guide’s creator, George Bradshaw (1801-1853) was an engraver and publisher in Manchester and had already established his reputation with his publication Bradshaw’s Maps of Inland Navigation. (5) Although he contracted cholera while on a trip to Norway and died before leaving that country, (6) his guides continued to be published until 1961 when the nationalization of the railways, the rise in automobiles, and the creation of a modern highway system led to a decline in rail travel. (7)

In 2010, a BBC series by Michael Portillo re-ignited interest in Bradshaw’s guides. Using the 1863 guide, Portillo travelled across Britain, visiting points of interest and hotels mentioned in that edition, making the book an unexpected bestseller in 2012. (8)

Portillo would most likely disagree with Holmes’ assessment of the guide’s vocabulary being “nervous and terse,” (9) He notes that “some of the descriptions of industrial towns have imagery that almost recalls Dante's Inferno, with the red glow of all the furnaces in the ironworks.” Given the details the book provided, few Victorians were likely to “not leave home without it.”® (10)

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Doyle, Arthur Conan. The Complete Sherlock Holmes: with an introduction from Robert Ryan (Kindle Locations 7273-7274). Simon & Schuster UK. Kindle Edition.

https://bradshawsguide.org/about

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/rail-journeys/Great-Continental-Railway-Journeys-Michael-Portillo-gets-back-on-track/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bradshaw%27s_Guide

https://bradshawsguide.org/about

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Bradshaw

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bradshaw%27s_Guide

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Bradshaw

Doyle, Arthur Conan. The Complete Sherlock Holmes: with an introduction from Robert Ryan (Kindle Location 7275).

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