The Hound of the Baskervilles

Template:Holmes infobox The Hound of the Baskervilles is a crime novel by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle featuring the detective Sherlock Holmes. Originally serialized in the Strand Magazine from August 1901 to April 1902, it is set largely on Dartmoor in Devon in England's West Country and tells the story of an attempted murder inspired by the legend of a fearsome, diabolical hound.

Origins

Arthur Conan Doyle

Conan Doyle wrote this story shortly after returning from South Africa where he had worked as a volunteer physician at the Langman Field Hospital in Bloemfontein. He was assisted with the plot by a 30-year-old Daily Express journalist called Bertram Fletcher Robinson (1870-1907). His ideas came from the legend of Richard Cabell, who was the inspiration of the Baskerville legend. His tomb can be seen in the Devon town of Buckfastleigh. Squire Richard Cabell lived during the 1600s and was the local squire at Buckfastleigh. He had a passion for hunting and was what in those days described as a 'monstrously evil man'. He gained this reputation for, amongst other things, immorality and having sold his soul to the Devil. There was also a rumour that he had murdered his wife. On the 5th of July 1677, he died and was laid to rest in 'the sepulchre,' but that was only the beginning of the story. The night of his interment saw a phantom pack of hounds come baying across the moor to howl at his tomb. From that night onwards, he could be found leading the phantom pack across the moor, usually on the anniversary of his death. If the pack were not out hunting, they could be found ranging around his grave howling and shrieking. In an attempt to lay the soul to rest, the villagers built a large building around the tomb, and to be doubly sure a huge slab was placed on top of the grave to stop the ghost of the squire escaping.

Conan Doyle's description of Baskerville Hall was inspired by a visit to Cromer Hall in Norfolk. Some elements of the story were inspired by a stay at the Royal Links Hotel in West Runton, where Conan Doyle first heard the story of Black Shuck, the ghost dog from the Cromer area, which is said to run between Overstrand in the east and East Runton in the West. It is authoritatively noted that Baskerville Hall as first seen by Watson closely resembles the view of Stonyhurst College from its driveway during its first century (founded 1794).

Plot

Aune Mire, a typical Dartmoor bog

The rich landowner Sir Charles Baskerville is found dead in the park of his manor, surrounded by the moorland of Dartmoor, in the county of Devon. He appears to have died from heart attack, but the victim's close friend, James Mortimer, is convinced that the death was due to a supernatural creature, which haunts the moor in the shape of an enormous hound with blazing eyes and jaws. Fearing for the safety of Baskerville's heir, his nephew Sir Henry, who is coming to London from Canada, Mortimer appeals for help from Sherlock Holmes. The doctor also reveals that he found the footprints of a gigantic hound near Sir Charles' dead body, but did not report it knowing that no one would have believed him.

Mortimer tells Holmes and Watson of the so-called Baskerville curse that has, he believes, been killing the Baskerville heirs for centuries, in revenge for the misdeeds of one Sir Hugo Baskerville, who lived at the time of Oliver Cromwell. According to the legend, Hugo Baskerville was an evil man with a sadistic streak. He became infatuated with a yeoman's daughter and one evening kidnapped her and imprisoned her in his bedchamber. The maiden managed to escape while he was carousing with his friends. A drunken and furious Hugo cried that he would give his body and soul to the Powers of Evil if he could only overtake her. He rode after her onto the Moor, his hunting hounds upon her scent and his friends in pursuit. Some hours later his friends heard bloodcurdling screams and followed the sound to the bodies of Hugo and the girl. She had died from fear and fatigue, while a giant spectral hound stood over Sir Hugo's body. With his friends watching, the hound ripped out Hugo's throat and disappeared into the night.

Holmes soon discovers that Sir Charles had been waiting for someone at the time of his death. He was found with his face contorted into a ghastly expression. His footprints suggested that he was desperately running away from something. It was known that elderly Sir Charles' heart was not strong, and that he planned to go to London the next day. Intrigued by the case, Holmes meets with Sir Henry, who has arrived from Canada and is visibly upset to have received a cryptic note delivered to his hotel room, where no one knew he would be staying, warning him to stay away from the moor. Holmes recognizes the cut-out letters from the previous day’s Times, suggesting that the sender was a person of education. Only the word "moor" is handwritten. He marks the sputtering of the pen and the lack of ink, suggesting that the pen and ink were from a hotel. The fact that the letters were cut with small nail scissors suggests a woman, as does the scent of perfume. The latter detail Holmes keeps to himself. Sir Henry has also had a new boot stolen.

The ghostly black dog of British folklore.

Holmes asked if there were any other relatives besides Henry. Mortimer tells him that Charles had two brothers. Henry was the son of the elder Sir Henry who settled in Canada and raised him in both Canada and the USA. Another brother, Roger, was known to be the family black sheep. A blackguard, wastrel, and inverterate gambler, he had left for South America to avoid creditors and died there alone.

Despite the note's warning, Sir Henry insists on visiting Baskerville Hall. As Sir Henry leaves Holmes' Baker Street apartment, Holmes and Dr Watson follow him and spy a man with a fake-looking black beard in a cab also following him. He escapes when chased but Holmes catches the cab number. Holmes then stops in at the messenger office and employs a young boy, Cartwright, to go around to the hotels and look through the wastepaper in search of a cut-up copy of the Times.

By the time they return to the hotel, Sir Henry has had another boot stolen, an old one now. When the first missing boot is discovered before the meeting is over, Holmes begins to realize they must be dealing with a real hound (hence the emphasis on the scent of the used boot). When conversation turns to the man in the cab, Mortimer says that Barrymore, the servant at Baskerville Hall, has a beard, and a telegram is sent to check on his whereabouts. The inheritance is also discussed–while it is a sizable amount, the next in line is James Desmond, an older man with few interests in wealth.

At the end of the meeting, it is decided that, Holmes being tied up in London with other cases, Watson will accompany Sir Henry to the Hall and report back in detail. Later that evening, telegrams from Cartwright (who was unable to find the newspaper) and Baskerville Hall (where Barrymore apparently is) bring an end to those leads. Also, a visit from John Clayton, who was driving the cab with the black-bearded man, is of little help. He does say that the man told him that he was the detective Holmes, much to the surprise and amusement of the actual Holmes.

Watson takes charge

The Great Bittern

Mortimer , Watson, and Sir Henry set off for Baskerville Hall the next day. The baronet is excited to see it and his connection with the land is clear, but the mood is soon dampened. Soldiers are about the area, on the lookout for the escaped convict Selden. Barrymore and his wife tell the baronet that they want to depart from the area as soon as is convenient, and the Hall is, in general, a somber place. Watson has trouble sleeping that night, and hears a woman crying, though the next morning Barrymore denies that could have happened.

Watson checks with the landmark and learns that the telegram was not actually delivered into the hands of Barrymore, so it is no longer certain that he was at the Hall, and not in London. On his way back, Watson meets Jack Stapleton, a naturalist familiar with the moor even though he has only been in the area for two years. They hear a moan that the peasants attribute to the hound, but Stapleton attributes it to the cry of a bittern, or possibly the bog settling. He then runs off after a specimen, but Watson is not alone for long before Beryl Stapleton, Jack's sister, approaches him. Mistaking him for Sir Henry, she urgently warns him to leave the area, but drops the subject when her brother returns. The three walk to Merripit House (the Stapleton’s home), and during the discussion, Watson learns that Stapleton used to run a school. Though he is offered lunch and a look at Stapleton’s collections, Watson departs for the Hall. Before he gets far along the path, Miss Stapleton overtakes him and retracts her warning. Watson notices that the brother and sister don't look very much alike.

Sir Henry soon meets Miss Stapleton and becomes romantically interested, despite her brother’s intrusions. Watson meets another neighbor, Mr. Frankland, a harmless eccentric whose primary pastime is initiating lawsuits. Barrymore draws increasing suspicion, as Watson sees him walk with a candle into an empty room, hold it up to the window, and then leave. Realizing that the room’s has a view out on the moor, Watson and Sir Henry are determined to figure out what is going on.

Meanwhile, during the day, Sir Henry continues to pursue Miss Stapleton until her brother runs up on them and yells angrily. He later explains to the disappointed baronet that it was not personal, he was just afraid of losing his only companion so quickly. To show there are no hard feelings, he invites Sir Henry to dine with him and his sister on Friday.

Photograph of prisoners at the Dartmoor Prison tied together carrying a cart out the gates, circa 1900.

Escaped convict

Sir Henry then becomes the person doing the surprising, when he and Watson walk in on Barrymore, catching him at night in the room with the candle. Barrymore refuses to answer their questions, since it is not his secret to tell, but Mrs. Barrymore’s. She tells them that the runaway convict Selden is her brother and the candle is a signal to allow him to get food. When the couple return to their room, Sir Henry and Watson go off to find the convict, despite the poor weather and frightening sound of the hound. They see Selden by another candle, but are unable to catch him. Watson notices the outlined figure of another man standing on top of a tor with the moon behind him, but he likewise gets away.

Barrymore is upset when he finds out that they tried to capture Selden, but when an agreement is reached to allow Selden to escape out of the country, he is willing to repay the favor. He tells them about a mostly-burnt letter asking Sir Charles to be at the gate at the time of his death. It was signed with the initials L.L. Mortimer tells Watson the next day that it could be Laura Lyons, Frankland’s daughter who lives in Coombe Tracey. When Watson goes to talk to her, she admits to writing the letter after Stapleton told her Sir Charles would be willing to help her, but says she never kept the appointment.

Frankland has just won two law cases and invites Watson in, as his carriage passes by, to help him celebrate. Barrymore had previously told Watson that another man lived out on the moor besides Selden, and Frankland unwittingly confirms this, when he shows Watson through his telescope the figure of a boy carrying food. Watson departs the house and goes in that direction. He finds the dwelling where the unknown man has been staying, goes in, sees a message reporting on his own activities, and waits.

Holmes reappears

Holmes turns out to be the unknown man, keeping his location a secret so that Watson would not be tempted to come out and so he would be able to appear on the scene of action at the critical moment. Watson’s reports have been of much help to him, and he then tells his friend some of the information he’s uncovered–Stapleton is actually married to the woman passing as Miss Stapleton, and was also promising marriage to Laura Lyons to get her cooperation. As they bring their conversation to an end, they hear a scream and the sounds of a man being pursued by the hound.

One of Grimspound's hut circles where Holmes might have sought shelter

They ran towards the sound and when they see a body, they mistake it for Sir Henry. As their misery and regret grow, they realize it is actually the escaped convict Selden, the brother of Mrs Barrymore, dressed in the baronet’s old clothes (which had been given to Barrymore by way of further apology for distrusting him). Then Stapleton appears, and while he makes excuses for his presence, Holmes pretends to be returning to London.

Holmes and Watson return to Baskerville Hall, where over dinner, the detective stares at Hugo Baskerville's portrait and then it hits him. Calling Watson over after dinner he covers the hair to show the face to reveal none other than Jack Stapleton. This provides the motive in the crime–with Sir Henry gone, Stapleton could lay claim to the Baskerville fortune. When they return to Mrs. Lyons’s place, they get her to admit Stapleton’s role in the letter setup, and then they go to meet Det. Inspector Lestrade at the station, whom Holmes has called in by a telegram .

Under the threat of advancing fog, Watson, Holmes, and Lestrade lie in wait outside Merripit House, where Sir Henry has been dining. When the baronet leaves and sets off across the moor, the hound is soon let loose. It really is a terrible beast, but Holmes and Watson manage to shoot it before it can hurt Sir Henry seriously, as well as discovering that its hellish appearance was acquired by means of phosphorus. They discover the beaten Mrs. Stapleton bound and gagged in the bedroom, and when she is freed, she tells them of Stapleton’s hideout deep in the Great Grimpen Mire. When they look for him next day, they are not able to find him, as he is dead, having lost his footing and being sucked down into the foul and bottomless depths of the mire. Holmes and Watson are only able find and recover Sir Henry's boot used by Stapleton to give the hound Sir Henry's scent.

Epilogue

An epilogue between Holmes and Watson tells that Stapleton is a son of Roger Baskerville, the younger brother of Sir Charles and with the same name as his father. Although everyone had believed that Roger had died unmarried, the fact was that he was married and had a son. The son John Roger Baskerville, after embezzling public money in South America, took the name Jack Stapleton and fled to England where he used the money to fund a Yorkshire school. Unfortunately for Stapleton the tutor he had hired died of consumption, and after an epidemic killed three students the School went from being reputable to infamous and had to be closed down. He fled with his wife to Dartmoor. He apparently supported himself by burglary, engaging in four large robberies and pistolling a page that had surprised him.

Having found out the story of the hound, he resolved to kill off the remaining Baskervilles so that he could come into the inheritance as the last of the Baskervilles. He purchased the hound and hid it in the mire.

On the night of his death, Sir Charles had been waiting for Laura Lyons. The cigar ash at the scene ("the ash had twice dropped from his cigar") showed he had waited for some time. Instead he met the hound, that had been trained by Stapleton and covered with phosphorous to set it on Sir Charles. Sir Charles ran for his life, but then had the fatal heart attack which killed him. Since dogs do not eat or bite dead bodies, it left him there untouched.

Stapleton followed Sir Henry in London, and also stole his new boot but later returned it, since it did not have the scent and stole an old boot of Henry's instead. The hound killed Selden because he was wearing Sir Henry's old clothes.

On the night the hound attacked Sir Henry, Stapleton's wife had no intention of going along with the plot any further, but her abusive husband beat and tied her to a pole to prevent her from warning him.

In Holmes' words: "..he has for years been a desperate and dangerous man.." His one trait he cannot control is a taste for entomology; in fact he turns the second floor of his house into an insect museum.

Film Adaptations

As of 2006, there are at least 24 film versions of The Hound of the Baskervilles. Some remain very close to the text of the original book, while others are notable for differences in plot or execution. Among these are some pastiches and one parody.

Year	Title	Country	Director	Holmes	Watson
1914	Der Hund von Baskerville, 1. Teil	Germany	Rudolf Meinert	Alwin Neuß	None
1914	Der Hund von Baskerville, 2. Teil — Das einsame Haus
1914	Der Hund von Baskerville, 3. Teil — Das unheimliche Zimmer		Richard Oswald
1915	Der Hund von Baskerville, 4. Teil
1920	Das dunkle Schloß	Germany	Willy Zeyn	Eugen Burg	None
1920	Das Haus ohne Fenster			Erich Kaiser-Titz
1920	Dr. MacDonalds Sanatorium
1921	The Hound of the Baskervilles	United Kingdom	Maurice Elvey	Eille Norwood	Hubert Willis
1929	Der Hund von Baskerville	Germany	Richard Oswald	Carlyle Blackwell	George Seroff
1932	The Hound of the Baskervilles (According to IMDB, the soundtrack has apparently been lost, but the film's visuals still exist)	United Kingdom	Gareth Gundrey	Robert Rendel	Frederick Lloyd
1936	Der Hund von Baskerville	Nazi Germany	Carl Lamac	Bruno Güttner	Fritz Odemar
1939	The Hound of the Baskervilles	United States	Sidney Lanfield	Basil Rathbone	Nigel Bruce
1955	Der Hund von Baskerville	Germany	Fritz Umgelter	Wolf Ackva	Arnulf Schröder
1959	The Hound of the Baskervilles	United Kingdom	Terence Fisher	Peter Cushing	André Morell
1962	Bees Saal Baad (After 20 years)	India	Hemant Kumar	-	-
1968	L'Ultimo dei Baskerville	Italy	Guglielmo Morandi	Nando Gazzolo	Gianni Bonagura
1968	The Hound of the Baskervilles Part 1 + 2 (from the Sherlock Holmes 1965 TV Series)	United Kingdom	Graham Evans	Peter Cushing	Nigel Stock
1972	The Hound of the Baskervilles	United States	Barry Crane	Stewart Granger	Bernard Fox
1978	The Hound of the Baskervilles	United Kingdom	Paul Morrissey	Peter Cook	Dudley Moore
1981	The Hound of the Baskervilles (Собака Баскервилей)	Soviet Union	Igor Maslennikov	Vasilij Livanov	Vitali Solomin
1982	The Hound of the Baskervilles	United Kingdom	Peter Duguid	Tom Baker	Terence Rigby
1983	The Hound of the Baskervilles	United Kingdom	Douglas Hickox	Ian Richardson	Donald Churchill
1983	Sherlock Holmes and the Baskerville Curse	Australia	Ian McKenzie & Alex Nicholas	Peter O'Toole (voice)	[Earl Cross] (voice)
1988	The Hound of the Baskervilles	United Kingdom	Brian Mills	Jeremy Brett	Edward Hardwicke
1998	The Hound of the Baskervilles (BBC Radio Broadcasting)	United Kingdom	Enyd Williams	Clive Merrison	Michael Williams
2000	The Hound of the Baskervilles	Canada	Rodney Gibbons	Matt Frewer	Kenneth Welsh
2002	The Hound of the Baskervilles	United Kingdom	David Attwood	Richard Roxburgh	Ian Hart

Related works

• Pierre Bayard's 2008 book Sherlock Holmes was Wrong re-opens the case and, by careful re-examination of all the clues, clears the hound of all wrong-doing and argues that the actual murderer got away with the crime completely unsuspected by Holmes, countless readers of the book over the past century—and even, in a sense, the author himself.
• In 1997, Spike Milligan satirised the novel in his book, The Hound of the Baskervilles According to Spike Milligan, combining elements of the original novel with the Basil Rathbone serials.
• Composer Jon Deak adapted the novel for solo double bass in 1984, complete with narration and sound effects to mimic radio plays of the 1920s.
• In the 1990s, Don Rosa used the dog in The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck, in which the Whiskervilles used a dog called "the hound of the Whiskervilles" to scare members of the clan McDuck from the McDuck Castle.
• A 1965 issue of Walt Disney's Comics and Stories (comic book) featured "The Hound of Basketville," starring Mickey Mouse, Goofy, Gladstone Gander, and Pluto, as Sherlock Mouse, Doctor Goofy, Sir Gladstone Basketville, and the hound.
• Clive Nolan and Oliver Wakeman composed and recorded in 2002 a progressive rock opera The Hound of the Baskervilles.
• Mad Magazine published the parody "Shermlock Shomes in The Hound of the Basketballs!" in 1954.
• Humour magazine Cracked did a spoof of the story.
• PBS series Wishbone (TV series) did a short child's version of the story-"The Slobbery Hound".
• Gary Larson parodied The Hound of the Baskervilles in a Far side cartoon where a parakeet imagined himself as The Parakeet of the Baskervilles.
• There is a type of monster in certain Monster Rancher games of late known as a 'Baskerville'.
• The main character in Hellsing has a hellhound named Baskerville.
• The plot of episodes 7 and 8 of the anime series Kuroshitsuji closely resemble the plot of this novel.

See also

• Baskerville effect

External links

• Read the The Hound of the Baskervilles at Sir Arthur Conan Doyle - His Life, All His Works and More
• The Hound of the Baskervilles at Project Gutenberg
• The Hound of the Baskervilles - in easy to read HTML format.
• The Hound of the Baskervilles (Part I) at BFRonline.biz.
• The Hound of the Baskervilles (Part II) at BFRonline.biz.
• The Hound of the Baskervilles (Conclusion) at BFRonline.biz.