Victorian 221b

I was researching for a 1920s fic, wishing to find a place as famous as the Criterion, but with the jazz flavour, and came across The 43 Club. It turned out to be the very thing I was looking for: a notorious haunt with vibrant nightlife, unlicensed alchohol, aristocrats, naval and army officers, easy women, and criminals. It was located in Soho, at 43 Gerard Street, and its proprietor, Kate Meyrick, was jailed five times until the club was finally closed.

Kate Meyrick used to be married to a doctor, but separated from her husband when she was 43 and found herself in the need to provide for her eight children. She ran a string of nightclubs, the most famous of which was The 43.


Kate Meyrick with four of her eight children

Below are some of the juciest quotes from Wikipedia:

- "A raid at these places was always an exciting affair", it was reported in the press, "whistles would be blown and glasses knocked off the tables in a vain effort to conceal the fact that illegal drinking was taking place".

- The police would have to undertake surveillance before a raid and this involved dressing in plain clothes and attending the club as a customer. During these visits, police officers would join in with the dances and buy alcoholic drinks to gather their evidence.

- Sometimes officers disguised themselves with one constable posing as a Russian duke with the unlikely name of Maxton Hagel.

- Meyrick claimed that the Egyptian aristocrat Ali Kamel Fahmy Bey had been a regular customer before he was murdered by his wife at the Savoy Hotel.

I got curious about that Savoy Hotel murder and found a very interesting documentary on youtube. The murderess was an elite courtesan named Marguerite Alibert. Before meeting Prince Ali, she had Edward, Prince of Wales, among her lovers. That basically helped her to get away with the murder: she was fully acquitted and even sued Ali's family for compensation. I highly recommend the documentary. It's one of those cases when life is stranger than fiction. You know, looks like it's this woman, and not Irene Adler, who was the Dominatrix.


Marguerite Alibert

Recently, whiling away time in airports, I watched a mini-series which popped up in recommendations. Created by a Sherlock writer Stephen Thompson, Vienna Blood has many familiar traits. There's a duo of protagonists, one of them tall, dark, wearing a funny hat, and having unusual investigation methods whereas the other is heavily built, more down-to-earth, and can defend himself and his companion.





The series is set in 1907 in Vienna, where a young doctor Max Liebermann (Matthew Beard) becomes an assistant to a police detective Oskar Rheinhardt (Jürgen Maurer). At first the policeman is not glad at all that some snotty youth with connections now follows him around and is being clever, but when Liebermann's insightful suggestions based on his studies of psychology prove pivotal in solving crime cases, Rheinhardt grows more appreciative of Liebermann's company. These two definitely have the Dynamic, one being an observer of human nature and the other a man of action, one of middle class and the other of working class, and both stubborn and determined. 

Max's fiancee Clara Weiss (Luise von Finckh) deserves a special note. In the beginning she seems to be somewhat vacuous in comparison with Max the intellectual. He has little interest in her and often runs off to investigate while she, long-suffering and good-natured, lets him—a kind of a shout-out to the canon Mary. Later on, her character has a significant development. She voices her displeasure about being constantly neglected by Max, she tries to understand him and his fascination with crime, she even sets out to help him with an investigation by bravely risking her safety and posing as a bait for a suspect.



Eventually (SPOILER ALERT!), she has the courage to break off their engagement, having realised that Max is infatuated with someone else. Max, on the other hand, is good at analysing others, but when it comes to his own feelings and motivations, he is a mumbling mess. Rheinhardt teases him about it in a kind, friendly way.

Watching this series, it's easy to imagine young Holmes and his first acquiantance with Lestrade, and how Holmes gradually makes a reputation for himself while at first no one takes him seriously. It's interesting that Liebermann and Rheinhardt are on first name terms which is unusual for the time period.

There are only three episodes, but each is one and a half hour long. The cases are complex and multilayered, a real treat even if they lack the edge just a tiny bit (imo). Anyway, I'm looking forward to season 2!

Recently I watched this ITV mini-series and thoroughly enjoyed it. It is based on the novel by Julian Barnes. I haven’t read it, so I cannot say how closely to the book it was written, but I did read ACD’s autobiography Memories and Adventures, a collection of his correspondence Arthur Conan Doyle: A Life in Letters, and a biography by Daniel Stashower Teller of Tales: The Life of Arthur Conan Doyle.

Judging by what I gathered from these three sources, the mini-series is quite historically accurate, describing the period of ACD’s life when he suffered depression after the passing of his first wife and how the Edalji case helped him to cope by giving him a purpose. In the series, just as in real life, ACD dedicated a lot of energy to investigating the case of a wrongly accused half-Parsi half-English solicitor George Edalji and launched a high-profile media campaign to clear Edalji’s name. And while the series has a fictional side to it, with pursuits and fights, it was great to see the real life aspects covered, like Arthur’s relationship with Jean Leckie, his wife-to-be, and the disapproval from his sister Connie and her husband E. W. Hornung (albeit this aspect was somewhat different in real life). The series even includes the small detail that George Edalji was invited to Arthur and Jean’s wedding.

There is a distinct Holmes-Watson dynamic between ACD and his secretary major Alfred H. Wood as they run around investigating, which was an endearing touch. All in all, I think the series is a nice blend of fact and fiction. Even though Martin Clunes seems a bit long in the tooth for the role, it doesn’t matter much. He bears a striking resemblance to ACD in Doyle’s older years. I wonder why, though, the series turns the Edalji case into a story of personal feud rather than racial prejudice as it was in real life. Otherwise it’s a very well-made period drama.

A Study in Emerald, very naturally, made me think of this film. Andrei Panin plays there the main character, so for everyone who likes New Russian Holmes this might be of interest. I came across this film by chance, just happened to see it on TV. At that time I was in the process of writing my own Holmes fic which features anarchists, and of course I was drawn to it at once. Besides, seeing Panin in the familiar setting of the early 20th century was rather evoking memories of his Watson. Only this time Panin’s Watson plans to kill a member of the royal family, just like in A Study in Emerald.



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I’ve started an online course The Living Picture Craze: An Introduction to Victorian Film which has recently begun and which smallhobbit recommended back in May. The course is fun and very informative! If you’re interested in the early days of motion picture, especially in Britain, and would like to know more about its pioneers and what kind of experience it was for the audience at the turn of the century one hundred years ago, please sign up by all means, it’s free.

While the course introduces numerous authentic clips from over a century ago, it also mentions a 2017 TV series called Quacks. The show was produced by BBC2 and portrays life of doctors in 1840s, the age of rapid development of medicine, when the antiseptic principle and anaesthesia were brand new steps not yet accepted universally. It is also the time when Holmes and Watson’s parents would have been young. Another decade, and the doctor and the detective would be born.



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Just finished watching the Victorian Farm series. In episode 5 there is a section about how beekeeping was done back in the day.



The modern bee-hive was created in 1851 by an American called Lorenzo Langstroth. He based his design on an amazing observation that the bees always construct their combs with an 8 mm gap. This 8 mm gap became known as bee space, and replicating it was the basis of Langstroth's invention.



Once the combs are full of honey, the process of extraction is done as follows:

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