The Feldkirchian Gazette - Conan Doyle's First Publication, by Philipp Schöbi

October issue of The Feldkirchian Gazette (1875). Front page detail.

Bonus episode: The Feldkirchian Gazette, with Philipp Schöbi 

Philipp Schöbi (c) Marion Hofer

Philipp Schöbi, born in 1957 in Altstätten (Switzerland), lives in Feldkirch (Austria). He holds a doctorate in mathematics and is a former high school teacher. He has published works in the fields of advanced geometry, literature, and the history of science. For many years, he was the director and a member of the theater group at the Diogenes Theater Altstätten, as well as the director, a member, and a writer for the cabaret group "Altstätter Schimpfoniker" or “swearphonist” in English. A member of the literary group at the Theater am Saumarkt Feldkirch since 1991, he co-founded and co-organized the Feldkirch Literature Days, which have been held annually since 1994. He is co-editor and co-author of the biography "Rheticus – Pioneer of the Modern Age" (2010, 2014) and author of "Literary Feldkirch" (2018). For his research on Arthur Conan Doyle and Feldkirch, he was awarded the 'Blue Carbuncle 2025' by the German Sherlock Holmes Society (DSHG) in 2026.

Philipp was aided in his research for this article by Burkhard Wüstner. Burkhard Wüstner, born 1958, studied history, German studies, and comparative literature in Innsbruck and supported Philipp in the translation of his article about Arthur Conan Doyle and Feldkirch. From 1985 to 1987, he worked as a theater dramaturg and lecturer in the literature department of the ORF (Austrian national Radio and TV broadcaster) in Innsbruck. From 1987 to 1992, he was a foreign language lecturer and studied contemporary history in London. From 1993 to 1996, he taught at the Waldorf School in Liechtenstein. From 1996 to 2023, he taught German, English, and history at the Business Academy and the Gymnasium (academic high school). Since 2014, he has been a curator at the Franz Michael Felder Museum in Schoppernau, not far away from Feldkirch, where Philipp lives. 

Photograph of Philipp Schöbi, taken 16 February 2026 by Marion Hofer (c). Philipp is sitting in the local Feldkirch Cafe Zanona, with reproductions of the The Feldkirchian Gazette in front of him.

The Feldkirchian Gazette – Conan Doyle’s first publication (1)

by Philipp Schöbi 

This article was translated from the German by the author with subsequent editing by Mark Jones. We apologise for any errors that may have crept in during the translation and editing process - MJ.

Introduction

After completing his education at Stonyhurst in Lancashire, England, Arthur Conan Doyle (1859-1930) spent the 1875-76 school year at the Jesuit grammar school Stella Matutina in Feldkirch, Austria. Here he wrote a school newspaper entitled The Feldkirchian Gazette which he sent to his literary great-uncle, godfather and benefactor Michael Edward Conan (c.1804-1879) in Paris. In a letter to Arthur’s mother Mary (1837-1920), Conan praised young Arthur’s emerging literary talent, an important confirmation of the young man’s development as a writer: “There can be no doubt of his faculty for that accomplishment. In each one of his more serious inspirations I found passages of thoroughly original freshness and imaginative refinement. It seems to me that he is in excellent spirits. His ‘Feldkirch Newspaper’ gives capital promise, and I suspect that it is his own from first to last.” (2)  

ACD with the bombardon in the Stella Matutina brass band.

This extract, with its reference to a ‘Feldkirch Newspaper’, was included in the first authorised biography of ACD, The Life of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle by John Dickson Carr (1906-1977), a friend of the Doyle family. Many later biographies repeated this passage, or at least its core message, without making it clear that the ‘Feldkirch Newspaper’ was not a public newspaper but merely a school newspaper, which led to the myth that ACD had written for the Feldkircher Zeitung or the Feldkircher Anzeiger during his stay in the Montfort town. (3)

This article is dedicated to the school newspaper in question, created in Feldkirch. As the first autonomous publication by one who would become one of the most famous writers in the world, it marks an important milestone in his literary career.

Matriculation no. 1646: Doyle, Artur from the Stella pupil register.

The Manuscript of the Newspaper Fragment

We do not know whether The Feldkirchian Gazette ever appeared in print (see later) but Conan Doyle’s original handwritten manuscript of its first two (and probably only) issues – dated October and November 1875 – was preserved in the author’s estate and was purchased by the British Library at the Christie’s auction in London in 2004. 

ACD wrote in violet ink in two blue-bound exercise books and used light pencil marks to embellish the typeface. While the October issue is complete, only the first 15 pages of the November issue have survived. (4) Fortunately, Conan Doyle wrote his manuscript in an exceptionally beautiful and legible handwriting which made reliable transcription possible. This was prepared, with the utmost care and adopting the ‘six-eyes principle’, by Marcus Geisser and Helen Dorey in London, in co-operation with the author. (5)  

This article represents the first time that substantial extracts from the surviving fragments have been published in the English-speaking world. As the manuscript is 40 pages long, the article focuses only the most interesting extracts. A complete German translation of The Feldkirchian Gazette is also provided here as a pdf download. 

ACDs School Year in Feldkirch

Before we present and analyse the Gazette, we should briefly shed some light on the background. For a complete overview of ACD’s stay at Stella Matutina in Feldkirch, please refer to the German-language publication Das literarische Feldkirch (2018) which contains a wealth of images and detailed information. In particular, it contains German translations of some of ACD’s letters from Feldkirch to his mother Mary. (6)  

The main building of the Stella, 1877

From Stonyhurst to Feldkirch

Before ACD journeyed to Feldkirch, he spent seven years (1868-1875) at the prestigious Stonyhurst in Lancashire, the oldest Jesuit school in the world. For Arthur, who came from a modest family background, these were difficult years. In his autobiography Memories and Adventures (1924), ACD wrote of harsh corporal punishment at Stonyhurst, and said few boys endured the system more than he did: “I went out of my way to do really mischievous and outrageous things simply to show that my spirit was unbroken.” (7)   For Arthur and his fellow students, “it was a point of honour with many of us not to show that we were hurt, and that is one of the best trainings for a hard life.” (8)   He also quoted one of his teachers who “assured me that I would never do any good in the world.” (9)  

Despite these humiliations, the recalcitrant Arthur found a ray of hope in the pleasant world of art and fantasy: “in the latest stage of my Stonyhurst development that I realized that I had some literary streak in me which was not common to all.” (10) Looking back, he felt his writing at this time was “workmanlike though wooden and conventional” - and added in passing that, in his final year, he edited “the College magazine”. (11) At the end of 1875, he succeeded in passing the entrance examination for a medical degree at the University of Edinburgh: “I surprised every one by taking honours, so after all I emerged from Stonyhurst at the age of sixteen with more credit than seemed probable from my rather questionable record.” (12)

However, despite successfully completing his Stonyhurst education, at 16 years old he was still too young to study for medicine. He decided, on the recommendation of his rector, Father Edward Ignatius Purbrick SJ (1830-1914), to spend a gap year in Austria, with the primary goal of improving his German: “There is a great school at Feldkirch, in western Austria, not far from Switzerland.” (13)   

And so, after a brief detour to visit the family of Robert and Karl Rockliffe in Liverpool, two future Stella Matutina schoolmates with whom he would travel to Vorarlberg, the 16 year old Arthur arrived in Feldkirch in September 1875. (14) He diligently wrote to his mother on arrival: “The Alps are beautiful and the place is jolly I think.” (15) Looking back in 1924, he noted: “Here the conditions were much more humane and I met with far more human kindness than at Stonyhurst, with the immediate result that I ceased to be a resentful young rebel and became a pillar of law and order.” (16) ACD would go on to express his positive feelings about the Stella Matutina several more times in his memoirs: “It was a happy year on the whole… I have always had a pleasant memory of the Austrian Jesuits and of the old school… Indeed I have a kindly feeling towards all Jesuits, far as I have strayed from their paths. I see now both their limitations and their virtues.” (17)   

The legacy of ACD’s affection for Feldkirch can be seen in a short story, ‘A Pastoral Horror’ (1890) which he wrote in 1884. The story is set in the neighbourhood of Feldkirch and begins with a declaration of love for the Montfort town and its famous school: “Far above the level of the Lake of Constance, nestling in a little corner of the Tyrolese Alps, lies the quiet town of Feldkirch. It is remarkable for nothing save for the presence of a large and well-conducted Jesuit school and for the extreme beauty of its situation. There is no more lovely spot in the whole of the Vorarlberg.” (18) Quite the compliment! 

The new Stella playing grounds in the Reichenfeld, 1877.

Why Feldkirch?

The question of why ACD spent an additional year of his education at the Stella Matutina in Feldkirch after completing Stonyhurst has not been conclusively proven. In this respect, the role of his last German teacher at Stonyhurst, Father Alexander Baumgartner SJ (1841-1910) from St. Gallen (Switzerland), who was once a pupil and a teacher at the Stella, does not seem to have been sufficiently considered to date. There are several reasons why Father Baumgartner was likely instrumental in persuading ACD to spend a year at his beloved Stella before studying medicine in Edinburgh.

At the time, Baumgartner was on particularly friendly terms with the close family circle of ACD’s admired Scottish author Sir Walter Scott (1771-1832), the author of Ivanhoe, (19) which must have greatly impressed the young Arthur. Scott was already one of his favourite authors back then. Even at the ripe old age of 42, ACD still considered Ivanhoe to be the second greatest historical novel ever written in the English language. (20) When Arthur and Father Baumgartner first met, the latter was already well acquainted not only with German literature, but also with Italian, French and English literature. He seems to have left a lasting impression on his young protégé, judging from the three examples of stories in which a “Baumgarten” appears or is mentioned.

In the years that followed, Father Baumgartner SJ would not only write works of literary-historical significance on German classics such as Lessing, Schiller and Goethe, but would even tackle the Herculean task of writing a ten-volume history of world literature. Baumgartner rose to become the undisputed literary authority of the Jesuit order, the “Catholic Pope of Literature” (21) and was nominated no less than three times for the Nobel Prize for Literature. (22)  

It therefore comes as no surprise that the young ACD sensed a role model and an important personality in his well-read, entertaining, literature- and theatre-loving German teacher. (23) In addition, ACD seems to have had a certain congeniality of souls with Baumgartner, as their reading preferences and biographies show astonishing parallels (see later on Fr Alexander Baumgartner SJ).

The pupils from the English-speaking world

According to the Stella Matutina’s register of pupils,24   at least 18 pupils from English-speaking countries attended the school in the 1875-76 school year. Arranged by ascending register numbers,25   these were:

1121: Bernhard Howell from London, England.

1386-1388: Edmund, Gerhard and Wilfried Howell from London, England.

1391-1392: Josef and Karl Ihmsen from Pittsburg, USA.

1522: Robert Rockliff from Liverpool, England.

1566-1567: Michael and Paul Cullen from Liverpool, England.

1576: Jakob Fitz-Patrik from Dublin, Ireland.

1594: Franz Jves from New York, USA.

1604: Wilfried Lomax from Liverpool, England.

1613: Karl Rockliff from Liverpool, England.

1627: Klemens Adlington from Aberdeen, Scotland.

1646: Artur Doyle from Edinburgh, Scotland.

1687: Andreas Mac Quade from Manchester, England.

1698: Alfons L. Rhomberg from Dubuque, USA.

1718: Wilhelm Walsh from Monkstown, Ireland. (26)  

Of these 18 pupils, 12 are mentioned by name in ACD’s school magazine, and 8 of these were pictured in what is believed to be the only surviving photograph showing ACD during his school year in Feldkirch, namely as members of the Stella brass band. There can be no doubt that the 12 pupils mentioned in the school magazine were some of ACD’s real fellow pupils at the Stella.

According to our count based on the pupil register, the Stella had a total of 270 pupils in the 1875-76 school year. Of these, 193 (71.5%) were in the so-called ‘I. Pensionat’, to which ACD also belonged, most of them from noble families, i.e. counts, barons or at least with a “von” in front of their name. The German-speaking pupils were predominantly from Germany. Only one in 15 of the 270 pupils at the Stella came from an English-speaking country.

Dining room of the Stella, 1888

Billiards room of the Stella, 1888

The contributors of the school newspaper

With three exceptions, all the contributions to ACD’s school magazine were signed with the initials A and D of their editor Arthur (Conan) Doyle in the form of a monogram. The lack of the initial C can be explained by the fact that ACD was only listed as “Artur Doyle” in the Stella’s register of pupils.

The signatures of the contributors to The Feldkirchian Gazette

The three exceptions are all from the October issue. Two contributions are signed with the abbreviation or initials “F.I.”. Of ACD’s English-speaking fellow students, Franz Jves (Ives) from New York is the only one to whom this monogram can be ascribed. ACD wrote Franz’s surname in the Gazette with the initial “I” and not “J” as Jves was listed in the register of pupils.

An article in the October issue providing a report of a September 1875 cricket match is signed with the initials D and H, set in a monogram. However, in the school year 1875-76, there was not a single pupil at the Stella with these two initials, regardless of the language area. The only Stella pupil from the previous eight years who had the initials D and H was David Howell from London, born on 20 May 1856 (matriculation number 1122) who was resident at the Stella between 1869 and 1875 and graduated from the Stella immediately before a cricket match in September 1875. 

In all probability, David Howell was the older brother of Bernhard, Edmund, Gerhard and Wilfried Howell from London who were still at the Stella with ACD in the school year 1875-76. It is entirely conceivable that David Howell attended the cricket match in September 1875 immediately after graduating in the summer and then provided a reported on it in the Gazette, especially as his four brothers were presumably still at the Stella in and took part in the sporting event. 

The Stella buildings between 1898 and 1900.

Prominent schoolmates of ACD

As mentioned, many of ACD’s schoolmates at the ‘I. Pensionat’ were “blue blood” noblemen, and most do not warrant any further discussion, but there were a few exceptions. These include the future priest and holistical medical practitioner Dr Josef Häusle (1860-1939) of Feldkirch, the future railway company operator and brewery owner Alfons L. Rhomberg (1857-1936) from Dubuque, USA, whose father Josef A. Rhomberg (1833-1897) had emigrated from Dornbirn to Dubuque in 1854, (27) and two brothers and future publishers Nikolaus C. Benziger (1859-1925) and Karl Benziger (1860-1941) from Einsiedeln. (28)  

Feldkirch has Josef Häusle to thank for the Antoniushaus, the teacher training college, the St. Josef Institute and the Jesuit retreat centre in the Tisis district. When the well-known herbalist Johann Künzle (1857-1935) also worked and lived in Feldkirch in the 1890s, Häusle worked for Künzle’s Catholic magazine Der Pelikan as editor, administrator and publisher for Austria-Hungary. (29) As parish priest of Tisis, the busy Häusle, who was frequently travelling, was sometimes replaced by his equally restless colleague Künzle. In 1932, Pastor Häusle was made an honorary citizen of the town of Feldkirch.

In the school year 1875-76, the then 15-year-old Josef Häusle held the honourable position of prefect at the Stella. (30) In the following school year, 1876-77, the 17-year-old Nikolaus Benziger from Einsiedeln held this position. In the 1872-73 school year, it was the 15-year-old Bernhard Howell from London.

Sports, games, music and theatre at the Stella

Sport, games, music and theatre played an important role at the Stella right up to its closure in 1979. The Feldkirch Jesuits considered physical training, team games, a solid musical education and the exploration of major historical themes in the school theatre to be important parts of the education they provided. (31)

The multifunctional assembly hall at the Stella. Sports and culture combined (after 1900).

The wide range of sporting activities and games changed with the seasons. In letters to his mother, ACD enthusiastically reported on his sporting activities in Feldkirch such as ice skating, tobogganing, hiking, billiards, rounders and football (a novelty in Austria at the time - football was played at the Feldkirch Stella for the first time in Austria). He also talks about a game of stilts, called “football on stilts” within the school, which was very popular with the pupils at the time. (32) It was played at the Stella mainly due to a lack of space which was remedied shortly afterwards when the school was able to purchase the Reichenfeld on the other side of the River Ill in 1877, after which football as we know it took over and the the injury-inducing game on stilts was banned.

In a letter from 1876 to his mother, (33) which has only survived as a fragment, ACD reported on a tremendous one-day hike up a mountain from whose summit one could see “Baden, Austria, Switzerland, Bavaria, and Würtemburg [Württemberg]”. The monumental trek was “42 miles, and such miles, done in 14 hours.” For a long time, it was believed that ACD’s description was somewhat exaggerated, until the discovery of a Stella publication in 1931 that revealed every year students would complete a one-day excursion from Feldkirch (458m above sea level) on foot to the towering Schesaplana (2,965m above sea level) in the Rätikon, which confirms ACD’s statement. (34) That is more than 2,500m in altitude in one day, which is almost unbelievable. After providing his mother with a photograph of himself in which he looked a bit skinny, ACD concluded his letter with the statement: “There is nothing like alpine excursions for reducing spare flesh.”

Singing in the school choir was another of the long-standing traditions at the Stella. We do not have any report from ACD about this but he wrote several times to his mother about singing with his schoolmates outdoors. He was particularly fond of the Andreas Hofer song, today’s Tyrolean national anthem, which describes the execution of the folk hero after the Tyrolean uprising of 1809 against the Franco-Bavarian occupation: “It is a beautiful mournful air, and narrates the death of the brave old fellow; I don’t think I was ever more pleased than when I heard it, and I have been singing it ever since.” (35) The school’s brass band was a well-known aspect of life at the Stella, and ACD enthusiastically played the bombardon, the giant tuba now known as the helicon, by far the largest instrument in the band, of which more later. (36)  

We are not aware of any reports from ACD about the traditional school theatre at the Stella. However, as a newly arrived 16-year-old pupil with English as his mother tongue, he is unlikely to have been involved in these productions as they were delivered in the German-language.

An untraceable editorial

Russell Miller in his 2008 biography The Adventures of Arthur Conan Doyle wrote about ACD’s school magazine: “It also featured a strong leader protesting at the injustice of the boys’ letters being read by their teachers before being distributed - much too strong for the school, which promptly closed it down.” (37) We do not know where Miller obtained this information. In the manuscript of the school magazine, which the British Library kindly, there is no editorial with such content. It may be true that letters addressed to pupils at the time were opened by a school body for inspection before being handed over, but this may have been due to the strict rule at the Stella that pupils, regardless of their background, were not allowed to receive money from outside during their time at school. Given the considerable differences in their social backgrounds, this measure was intended to equalise the experience of school among the pupils.

Was the school magazine ever printed?

In April 1902, the prestigious British monthly magazine The Bookman published an eight-page overview article entitled ‘Arthur Conan Doyle’ by John Ernest Hodder Williams (1876-1927) which referenced Feldkirch in a survey of ACD’s literary career to that date. The richly illustrated article attracted considerable attention and was published in the American edition of The Bookman the following year. Unfortunately, Williams mistakenly located Feldkirch in Germany, instead of Austria, on several occasions, an error which was widely circulated when the popular article was quoted in later publications. 

Williams’s article makes reference to The Feldkirchian Gazette in the very first sentences: “Twenty-five years ago, a young Scotch-born Irishman, studying at a small German University, founded and edited a newspaper for the benefit of his fellow students. During its short and somewhat chequered existence, the paper fully lived up to the editor’s motto, ´Fear not, and put it in print.´… The paper came to an untimely end; the motto has been the guiding star of the career of Arthur Conan Doyle.” The “German University” can only be the Feldkirchian Stella. Despite this error, the fact that Williams places the Gazette centre stage underlines the importance he attached to this publication in the development of ACD’s career. 

The article contained private information about ACD as well as private photos and quotes from him. It is therefore reasonable to assume that Williams had received them personally from ACD – especially the very specific comments on the Feldkirch school newspaper described therein. The quote given above reveals that ACD only published his student newspaper “for the benefit of his fellow students” and not for the general public, or that it was only given an undesirably short life. However, what seems most significant to us is the motto associated with the publication of the Feldkirch school newspaper, which feels like the guiding star of ACD’s future career: “Fear not, and put it in print.”  

Despite this pithy motto, we have serious doubts as to whether ACD ever printed his Feldkirch newspaper. How could the 16-year-old ACD, who was quite penniless and came from a modest background, have printed a newspaper at the Stella for a small group of just under 20 pupils from the English-speaking world, after barely a month in what he termed “this savage foreign land” (October issue). 

Rather, we suspect that the English-speaking boys at the Stella, most of whom appeared in the Gazette, copied the school newspaper themselves as required and thus “published” it amongst themselves, so to speak. ACD’s godfather, Michael Conan in Paris, likely received a handwritten copy of the newspaper edited by ACD and not a printed copy. In addition, the Gazette contained comic drawings to which the text referred which would have involved considerable effort and cost to be printed. If there had been printed copies back then, it is hard to imagine that ACD would not have mentioned these earliest printed works in his own writings.

Nevertheless, it seems quite conceivable that the Feldkirchian Jesuits, who always kept a close eye on their pupils, discovered one or more copies of the newspaper at the time and banned future editions. As we shall see, this may not have been entirely unfounded from the point of view of the Jesuit order.

To the German translation

Almost all contributions to the school magazine are poems in rhymed form. The German translation did not retain the rhyming form. Instead, emphasis was placed on retaining the inner rhythm of the original whenever possible, in addition to the content. We are indebted to Burkhard Maria Wüstner for valuable advice regarding a coherent translation.

The October issue

October issue: Front page detail.

October issue: Programmatic outlook.

Title Page and Programmatic Outlook

Unfortunately, only the left half of the title page of the October issue has survived, the right half apparently being torn off. However, if one compares the surviving half with the title page of the November issue, there can be little doubt that it read as follows:

The Feldkirchian Gazette

A scientific and literary monthly magazine

Edited by

Arthur C. Doyle

Vol. I. (38)  

In the poem that follows, ACD gives a programmatic outlook, declaring his intention that his school newspaper will from now on be published monthly as a shining light in a bleak year.

    The Feldkirchian Gazette (39)  

    

    October

And on its sails I saw again, 

"Feldkirchian Gazette”.

As the bright light that pierced the cloud 

So may our paper be.

And as the ship, ‘mid surges loud 

Breasted the angry sea. 

So ever through the dreary year, 

When nothing else is bright, 

May the Gazette each month appear 

To cheer us with it’s light.

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The story of the heroic Lomax

The central protagonist in the next poem, ‘Verses’, is the heroic Lomax, a character who appears repeatedly in ACD’s school magazine. In reality, he was a boy who lost his mother to cholera at the age of seven. This was Stella pupil no. 1604, Wilfried Lomax from Liverpool, born on 13 October 1859, who attended the Stella Matutina in the two school years 1874-1876. In his second school year, he was in Class V of the ‘I. Pensionat’ together with ACD, who was the same age. Lomax was a trombonist in the Stella brass band (in the photo that survives, he is he is fourth from the left in the back row).

Four years later, on 7 September 1880, Lomax joined the Jesuit order as Wilfrid Edward Lomax. He was ordained a priest on 21 September 1890 in St. Beuno’s in rural North Wales and took his final vows on 2 February 1894. He died on 22 January 1933 in Blackburn, Lancashire, and was buried in nearby Clitheroe. (40)  

It may just be a happy but marvellous coincidence that the crusader Ivanhoe, created by ACD’s literary idol Sir Walter Scott, shared with Lomax the same first name, Wilfred (Wilfried). Just as Lomax defended his gate, Ivanhoe was seen as a brave defender of law and justice and, alongside the outlawed Lord Locksley (Robin Hood), fought as a tireless servant of his master, Richard the Lionheart.

Father Wilfrid Edward Lomax SJ (1859-1933). Picture from obituary 1933.

Later, in ‘The Adventure of The Illustrious Client’ (1924), ACD wrote of sub-librarian Lomax, the friend of Dr Watson: “Finally I drove to the London Library in St. James’s Square, put the matter to my friend Lomax, the sublibrarian, and departed to my rooms with a goodly volume under my arm.” (41) Since 1967, there has even been a Sherlock Holmes Society with the character Lomax as its namesake and patron. (42)  

The next poem by ACD is a parody of Macaulay’s Lays of Ancient Rome. The 10-line verse begins with the line “No sound of joy or sorrow” which closely corresponds with a verse from ‘Horatius’. (43) Thomas Babington Macaulay (1800-1859) was a British historian, poet, lawyer and politician and was much admired by ACD. John Dickson Carr reports in his biography of ACD that Michael Conan sent Arthur a small, gilt-edged copy of Lays from Paris in 1873, two years before ACD studied at the Stella: “It was called Lays of Ancient Rome, by a certain Lord Macaulay. He opened it; and the sun arose in splendour.” At Christmas 1874, ACD had even made a three-week pilgrimage to visit relatives in London with the main aim, concealed from everyone, of visiting Macaulay’s grave. (44)  

Macaulay's Lays of Ancient Rome, first published 1842. This edition from 1881.

    Verses.

    Written on the imaginary case of a brilliant 

defence of the goals by Lomax. Parody on McCauley.

Alone stood valiant Lomax,

But constant still in mind.

Some thirty yelling chaps before

And the broad goals behind.

"Shall the goal be taken tamely 

"While I am there”? he cried

And he went and shinned a little chap

Who was on his own side.

Then he tightened up his breetches 

Stuck his hat upon his nob, 

And with a brilliant warwhoop

Sprung headlong through the mob.

No sound of joy or sorrow,

No noise of shouting loud. 

But friends and foes in mute surprise 

With parted lips and straining eyes 

Stood gazing at the crowd. 

And when above the squashers 

They saw his nose appear, 

His side set up a joyful cry 

And even the prefect standing bye

Could scarce forbear to cheer.

But he was tired of squashing. 

All pallid was his nose. 

And oft they thought him falling

But yet again he rose.

Never, I wean, did player

Such great misfortunes meet

As he struggled through a raging squash 

With the ball beneath his feet. 

But he heeded not a tumble 

And he heeded not a shin,

While he clove a path before him

With his nose and with his chin.

But now he’s reached the edges 

And now outside he stands

His face was very dirty. 

And filthy were his hands. 

"The goal is saved” he faintly cried

And mid the cheering loud, 

He kicked the heavy ball away

Far from the hostile crowd.

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A horrible Tale

In the following poem, ACD, who let us recall was only 16 years old, let a pinch of his dramatic talent shine through. The poem lures the reader onto the wrong track so as to deliver a surprising twist at the end. The whole thing is mixed with a certain dash of cheeky British humour.

A horrible Tale

All in the midst of the busy crowd

I saw an old man stand.

He heeded not the bustle loud,

a spade was in his hand. 

Though his hair was white & his form was bowed 

Yet he dug through the earth & sand.

I looked upon his face so pale, 

For pale as death was he. 

I said "Alas, what fearful tale, (45)  

"what horror here may be.

"The hidden secret I’ll unveil

"I’ll solve the mystery.”

Perhaps, thought I, he buries here 

Some victim he has slain. 

Perhaps a treasure’s hidden near

Which he expects to gain.

Twice I approached the aged seer

And twice drew back again.

At last I boldly stepped beside.

I saw the old man frown. 

"Why diggest thou so, old man, I cried,

"For the heart of a noble town.”

And the mournful voice of the digger replied 

"I’m a laying a gas pipe down”

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Nothing in particular 

This next poem appears quite melancholy. Something seems to have disturbed the youthful ACD who has been diagnosed with “Nothing in particular”. The phrase weakens his spirit, makes him lose his inner centre and leaves him prey to dispair.

Nothing in particular 

I hear about by day & night

The most acute of maladies

To picture it in black & white

The object of this ballad is

Allow me, gentle reader, please 

to breath in your auricular,

I suffer from that fell disease 

Called “nothing in particular.”

To render it the more intense,

And almost unendurable

My doctor says in confidence

That it is quite incurable. 

My mind thus weakened day by day

must lose its perpendicular 

And fall a melancholy prey

To nothing in particular.

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A children's book of The House That Jack Built from 1878.

A Feldkirch drama

The next poem by ACD is modelled on the popular English nursery rhyme “This Is the House That Jack Built” and accompanied by drawings by the author in the margin. (46)   

 

A Feldkirch drama.

After “This is the house that Jack built”

This is the college of Feldkirch. 

This the bread that was baked in the college of Feldkirch. 

This is the boy who wouldn’t eat bread that was baked in the college of Feldkirch

This [is] the servant surprised at the boy who wouldn’t eat bread that was baked in the college of Feldkirch. 

This is the master who scolded the servant surprised at the boy who wouldn’t eat bread that was baked at the college of Feldkirch.

This is the prefect who ordered the master, that scolded the servant, to send him the boy, that wouldn’t eat bread that was baked in the college of Feldkirch. 

This is the penance he wrote for the prefect, who ordered the master, that scolded the servant, to send him the boy, who wouldn’t eat bread that was baked in the college of Feldkirch.

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Impressions of Feldkirch on a new boy

The next poem mentions a playground as yet unidentified. At the time of ACD’s arrival in Feldkirch, the Stella Matutina lacked a formal playground and only had a very small area where it was possible to play the popular “football on stilts” game previously mentioned. The only suitable playing field available to the Stella in the 1875-76 school year was near her country house Garina, which is today located in the Tisis district of Feldkirch.

Country house Garina of the Stella in Feldkirch-Tisis, 1867.

The stilts game was banned in autumn 1876, shortly after ACD’s departure from Feldkirch, by Father Philipp Löffler SJ (1834-1902), who had just been appointed rector. His action is said to have led to protests and even strikes among the pupils. In the following year, the Stella was able to acquire the Reichenfeld on the other side of the River Ill, which meant that the college suddenly had access to huge playgrounds close to the school building (see illustration of the Reichenfeld from 1877).

‘Impressions of Feldkirch on a new boy’ takes after an unknown work called “The Buckingham dragoon”. Unfortunately, we have not been able to find out which poem or song, or possibly nursery rhyme or children’s book, ACD was referring to. (47) If “The Buckingham dragoon” had been part of the literary canon of Great Britain, one supposes the work would have survived on the internet.

Impressions of Feldkirch on a new boy.

After "The Buckingham dragoon”

When the play ground I first had beheld-held 

With slobbering foreigners full. 

I thought "what a strange place is Feld-Feld

The glorious Feld-kirchian school.

I saw them all in the house then-then, 

And each of them wearing a hat. 

They’re a strange set, I thought, in the pen-pen

The Feldkirchian pen-sionât

Each German I met was a tell-tell

a telltale or else was a fool. 

They are rum ones, I thought, in the Fel-Fel

The famous Fel-kirchian school.

A chap, just as big as most men-men,

Turned out a most terrible brat. 

And the brats were all men in the pen-pen 

The Feldkirchian pen-sionât.

But I’ll sell you no more of the foll-foll,

The folly they always are at.

You may see it yourselves in this coll-coll

This college or pen-sionât.

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College v. Town 

The next contribution is signed with the initials D and H and, as explained above, was most likely written by David Howell from London, who had recently graduated the Stella but still had four younger brothers at the school. 

According to historical documents, the Antoniusplatz, which is mentioned as the site of the cricket match, was located in the St. Antoni area of today’s Tisis district of Feldkirch, near the country house ‘Garina’, which was simply called the ‘Villa’ within the school. (48) In a letter to his mother dated May 1876, ACD wrote about fortnightly trips to the country house after lunch, the so-called “Garina days”: “There is a walk then until we come to a level place where the lazy lie down, and the active can play rounders.” (49)  ‘Rounders’ is a batting ball game originating in England, similar to American baseball, which at the time shared more similarities with cricket than it does today.

ACD with cricket bat in 1873, aged 14.

Baseball championship 1866.

The explicit mention of the venue, the pitch conditions, the weather, the real pupils playing on the college side and the exact dates of the three-day match that ended the cricket season (Tuesday 14 to Thursday 16 September 1875) suggest that this account was not pure fiction, as Andrew Lycett suggested, and that the cricket match actually took place, albeit without the drama described. (50) The fact that ACD loved the game of cricket and had played it at Stonyhurst for years beforehand is well documented.

The six pupils mentioned in this article – Schäffer, Fitzpatrick, Cullen, R. Rockliffe, C. Rockliffe and Ives – were ACD’s fellow pupils at the Stella. More details about them are given in the corresponding notes later. The text of the article is written without paragraphs but, for the sake of readability, we have inserted a few paragraph breaks. Short explanations are given directly in square brackets, with longer explanations as notes.

College v. Town

Contributed by our sparking correspondent. 

This three days match was played on the Antonius place cricket ground on the 14th, 15th and 16th of September, and terminated cricket for the season. (51) The weather and the cricket were alike favourable, and an exciting contest was looked forward to. The green field, like an immense emerald, was adorned further with a brilliant assembly composed of the „elite” of Vorarlberg, who wore dark or light blue badges to show that they were partizans of the college or of the town respectively. 

The college having won the toss were represented by Mr W. Harker, (52) and Schäffer, (53) while Mr Squash and Bubble conducted the attack. Mr Squash began operations from the pavilion end (or rather from that might have been the pavilion end, if there had been any pavilion). The first over was a maiden. (54) Mr Bubble then trundled, and his accuracy may be conceived from the fact that the long leg look a suit against him for damages, owing to a broken leg he received from a wide. (55) Atlast however he succeeded in planting a ball in the Harker’s left eye which rendered him „hors de combat” for a short time. 

The play was then resumed, and the telegraph-board already announced 50 when Mr Schäffer was caught out by the umpire. Mr Fitzpatrick (56) was the next to handle the willow, and these two redoubtable players kept the bowlers at bay until the century was announced, (57) when „Mr Harker was run out by Mr Smallpose, a piece of fielding which was much admired. (58) Mr W. Harker’s batting was on the most scientific principles, and was considered by competent authorities to have been a masterpiece of defence. 

Mr Doyle now appeared and as his thin slender form approached the wickets he was received with loud cheers. (59)   Mr Squash delivered up the ball to Mr Snooks, and the game proceeded. After some hard hitting on both sides Mr Fitzpatrick was given out "bat before wicket”. This gentleman’s 44 was splendidly manipulated. A short stand followed between Mr Cullen (60) and Mr Doyle when the former gentleman was caught at point by Mr Punch-my-nose for a hard hit one. Mr Thinsen succombed to the unerring aim of Mr Squeak, and his place was supplied by R Rockliffe who hit us a couple of byes; when he was dismissed by a shooter, closely followed by C Rockliffe. (61)

The famous american (ball) baseball champion Mr Ives (62) now joined Mr Doyle and a tremendous display of hitting powers ensued. Both batsmen warmed to their work, and the ball was sent flying to every part of the field. Atlast Mr Ives was caught out at a long field, (63) for a finely hit twenty. And now a burst of cheering announced the advent of Mr Lomax, (64) he who had created such a world wide reputation at Liverpool. With modest grace he stepped up to the cricket, and with a firm manly action he gazed round on the terrified fielders. There was such a silence that one might have heard a pin drop (N.B. If the pin was only ten feet long and six thick). 

The bowler deliverered the ball and Oh! wonder of wonders! The champions midde stump was seen playing leap frog with the two bails at the other side of the field. It is asserted that three of the fielders ruptured blood-vessels cheering on this occasion. At first it was supposed the ball passed through the bat, but no hole was discovered; but one of Mr Lomax’s supporters affirms yet that the ball went through so quickly that it hadn’t time to make a hole. Mr Lomax however afterwards had the satisfaction of cutting up the ball, and proving it was not bewitched. We may mention that Mr Lomax being a favorite of the fair sex, his duck (65) was easily pardoned. 

The rest of the side failed to score and Mr Doyle carried his bat for a splendid 79. The whole innings realising 282. Surrounded as it is by a halo of shame and disgrace few would care to hear of the miserable innings of the Feldkirch team. How before the well-diverted „expresses” of Mr Fitzpatrick and Doyle, even Bubble and Squeak sunk into obscurity. How the bowling (66) became so fast that the last Feldkirchian refused to go in, on the grounds that he had a wife and three small children, and how as none would face the peril, they sent in a gibbering maniac, who did not know the danger. He was lucky enough to escape with his leg and collarbone broken, and three ribs dislocated. No! rather let such remin-iscences be buried in oblivion, and thus ended the match between town and school. The school being victorious by 240 runs.

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About a mule

The following contribution is signed with the initials F.I. and was likely contributed by Franz Ives (Jves) from New York. As F.I. notes, ‘About a mule’ was not written by Ives himself but taken from another publication, as yet unidentified. In any case, the poem is a parody of ‘Casabianca – The Heroic Boy’ by the British author Felicia Hemans (1793-1835), first published in 1826, which has the famous first line “The boy stood on the burning deck”. (67) A comic parody with the opening line “The mule stood on the steamboat deck” appeared in various American newspapers as early as 1871 in a slightly different form to that which appeared in The Feldkirchian Gazette. (68) A song version of the parody composed by G. Operti was published in 1879 under the title “A Mulish Idea”. (69)  

The moral attached to the poem, on the other hand, was undoubtedly written by Ives. It doubtless displeased the Stella’s headmaster as an encouragement to all the stubborn and rebellious boys to continue to resist the orders handed down to them. The parody was originally titled “The Heroic Boy” which would have further underscored the moral. Perhaps this blunt appeal may be one reason why Franz Ives left the Stella after just two years at school in 1876.

    About a mule.

    From an ancient document in possession of a member of our staff.

The mule stood on the steamer’s deck,

The land he would not tread 

They pulled the haltar round his head [neck] (70)  

And cracked him o’er the head. 

Yet fine and steadfast there he stood, 

As stiff as any rule.

A critter of heroic blood, 

Was that’ere cussed mule. 

The cussed and swore - He would not go 

Until he felt inclined. 

And though they showered blow on blow 

He wouldn’t change his mind.

The deck hand to the captain cried

"This here mule’s bound to stay”

And still upon the asses hide

With lash they fired away. 

The captain from the shore replied 

"The boat’s about to sail

"As every other means we’ve tried 

"Suppose you twist his tail.”

"It’s likely that will make him land” 

The deckman brave but pale,

Approached him with extended hand 

to twist that damned mule’s tail.

Then came a sudden kick behind 

The man "Oh! where was he”?

Ask of the softly blowing winds,

or fishes in the sea.

For a moment there was not a sound, 

As that mule winked his eye.

As though to hint to those around 

"I’ve sent him precious high”

"Cut that ere mule’s throat, right away”

the captain did command.

But the noblest critter died that day,

Was the fearless, brave deck hand.

Moral by F.

My gentle readers old and young, 

Take heed and do not fail, 

to bear in mind the valiant man 

Who pulled the donkey’s tale. 

And should temptation ever seek,

to draw you in it’s snares.

Don’t let your angry passions rise

And take you unawares. 

And let all asses have their way, (71)   

who disobey command.

And perish not so foolishly

As that ere brave deck hand.

    Signature F.I.

The reading of the notes

The following contribution, which is characterised by fear of the school authorities but ends with a gentle threat to them, is also signed with the initials F.I. and was presumably written by Ives. The Father Löffel mentioned undoubtedly refers to Father Philipp Löffler SJ, who was not only a teacher at the Stella in the 1875-76 school year, but also general prefect and director of studies under the popular rector, Father Alois Urban Piscalar SJ (1817-1892). Löffler had previously been a highly respected cathedral preacher in Regensburg from 1866 to 1872, but was expelled from Germany after the Jesuit Law of 4 July 1872 came into force. Immediately after ACD’s departure from Feldkirch in 1876, Fr Löffler became rector of the Stella for the years 1876-1882. 

We have not been able to ascertain the identity of the person referred to as "Pipes”, or whether this was a proper name, a corruption of a name or, for example, a person who carried a whistle or a tobacco pipe in a managerial capacity. In any case, it seems piquant that the German translation “Pfeife” is used as a synonym for “failure” in German-speaking countries. In any case, there was never a Father named Pipe, Pipes, Pfeifer, Pfeiffer or similar at the Stella.

The reading of the notes. 

The study door is opened

And anxious are the looks

Which hastily and stealthily

Are cast from off the books

Then in strides Father Löffel.

His ponderous book he gripes 

And in the rear one saw with fear

The stately form of Pipes. 

The book he opened with a look, 

And something in his eye, 

As if to say "Hello my boy, 

"You’ve got an ein bis zwei”

Then one by one the names are called, 

And at the solemn sound, 

So many hearts, though brave enough,

With apprehension bound.

In "andstand” (72) and "aufmerksamkeit”

How many meet their fate!

And in "betragen” and in "fleiss”

repentance comes too late. 

The rules forbid us strictly

With many fearful threats 

Whilst in the refectory, 

To look at little brats.

And also in the play–ground

On morning’s raw and cold.

Within our breetches pockets, 

our freezing hands to hold. 

The English are forbidden, 

to speak or play together.

Especially in the "Billiards”

When it is rainy weather.

Then Pipes with peace upon his face

to this expressed his Joy.

And then he winks, as if he thinks, 

"I’ve got you there old boy”

But then you’ll find my dear friend Pipes

Such rules we all defy;

For pipes are very smoky things

The smoke may reach your eye. (73)  

    Monogram .F.I.

October issue: Closing words to the contributors "in this savage foreign land."

To Contributers (sic)

In the following poem, ACD knowingly thanks his contributors to the October issue for helpgin to uphold English civilisation overseas. Having only just arrived in Feldkirch in September 1875, he evidently felt that he was still in a “savage foreign land”. However, judging by the surviving letters to his mother, this was soon to change. (74)  

To Contributers.

October’s paper kindly greets you. 

Thanking you with all its heart. 

It’s the first time that it meets you,

May you never, never part. 

While it meets such approbation 

Ever will its column stand, 

Proof of English civilisation 

In this savage foreign land. 

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               ~ FINIS ~

The November issue

November issue: Front page detail.

Front page of the November issue with third binomial formula, top right.

Title page

In contrast to the October issue, where half of the front page was torn away, the November issue of the Gazette retains its title page in its entirety. Its text reads: 

The Feldkirchian Gazette

A scientific and literary monthly magazine

Edited by

Arthur C. Doyle

Vol. II

It is noteworthy that ACD has scribbled the equation '(a + b) (a – b) = a2 – b2' at the top right corner, probably as a mental aid. This is the “third binomial formula” or the “third binomial” for short, with which calculations can sometimes be simplified considerably.

It is well known that ACD struggled with mathematics throughout his school years. In May 1976, for example, he wrote home about his struggle with the exasperatingly defiant conic sections: “I conquered the parabola but the ellipse is a terrible fellow.” (75) It is striking then that Professor Moriarty, the arch-enemy of Sherlock Holmes, was a maths teacher with an expertise in binomial formulae. In ‘The Final Problem’, Sherlock Holmes says that “At the age of twenty-one [Moriarty] wrote a treatise upon the binomial theorem, which has had a European vogue.” 

By the end of his time in Feldkirch, Arthur seems to have reconciled himself to mathematics but a letter dated June 1876 seems to playfully suggest the task was a difficult one: “I am getting on very well with my work, to which the twelve labours of Hercules were child’s play”. (76) Nevertheless, ACD would go on to create in Sherlock Holmes a detective who made extensive use of his gift for robust logical reasoning.

Introduction

The following introduction in poem form is a paean to the importance and power of freedom of the press and an encouragement to use it against those in power. This appeal in a school newspaper, in which most of the articles centred on the school, might well have been interpreted by the school management and teachers as a call for rebellion and resistance.

           Introduction

Where the seething waves of ocean 

In their fierce contention roll,  

From the rockbound northern limits

To the frozen southern pole,

There is one great power that sways us

Agent mighty and sublime, 

One dread weapon that dismays us

Reverenced in every clime.

Tyrant kings have oft denied it, 

Soon their fears they must confess,

None, who ever yet have tried it, 

Faced "the freedom of the press”.  

Misused it is a fearful demon, 

Used well, the blessing of mankind.

Sure protection every freeman

`Neath it’s friendly shade may find. 

May we justly use our powers,

May the weak our pages bless,

And the mighty dread our paper,

And the freedom of the press.

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Brought to Austria by Stella pupils around 1865: The game of football.
Photo from 1904 in the Reichenfeld.

Sir Walter Scott's Marmion. First edition 1808. Title page from 1809 edition.

A Feldkirch Football match

The following poem by ACD proves that football was played at the Stella Matutina in Feldkirch as early as 1875, and thus for the first time ever in Austria. The new sport had been brought to Austria by the English pupils. For reasons of space, proper football matches could not be played near the school building in the town at that time, but only on a pitch at the ‘Garina’. In a letter to his mother in May 1876, ACD described such a football match at the country house as “a terribly savage and wild affair, as everybody is in a state of excitement from the beer”. (77)  

The poem skilfully pastiches the 1808 historical verse novel Marmion - A Tale of Flodden Field by ACD’s great literary hero, Sir Walter Scott. (78) In this poem, ACD takes various rhyming words, and in some cases entire lines and passages from Marmion, and places them in a new context, demonstrating a level of literary awareness and imagination that is impressive for a 16-year-old boy.

Several of the figures mentioned in the poem correspond to real people in ACD’s circle at the Stella. The “Mire”, who reappears later in the November issue, is Father Johann Meyer SJ (1819-1905) who worked at the Stella as an administrator in the eleven years from 1870 to 1881. By adopting the spelling “Mire” – meaning ‘bog’ or ‘swamp’ – ACD was likely conveying his view of the individual. (79)   

The eight pupils mentioned in this article – Fitz, Howell, Spee, Valderdoff, Lomax, Quadt and the Cullen brothers – are real-life classmates of ACD at the Stella. ACD later reused the names Spee, Valderdoff and Lomax in his fiction. More details on all eight pupils can be found in the footnotes.

A Feldkirch Football match.

Partly parodied from „Marmion”

At last the clouds of drizzling rain

Passed slowly o’er our heads again.

And first beside the "billiard” door,

A gloomy lot of brats appear.

The sun breaks out - and many more 

Come squashing hard to get before

All scorning to be in the rear. 

Until at last they all are there,

and Mire shakes his bell in air

     ________________

Hark to the mingled yells and roars

As high the heavy football soars.

Floating like foam upon the wave (80)   

Is seen the caps of players brave.

But none can rightly see. 

Wild raged the match o’er all the plain

Some yelled from joy, and some from pain,

Some tumbled into pools of rain,

And then they rose and fell again,

Wild and disorderly. (81)  

Amid this scene of tumult high (82)  

Full many a kick did Fitz (83) let fly

While towering like a great colossus,

Above the rest was famed "proboscis”. (84)  

There met them in the fray

Both Michael Cullen and his brother, (85)  

Howell (86) too, and many another 

With Montford (87) or with Spee. (88)  

_______________

Down near the goals unseen the while

Old Valderdoff (89) was shinned by Doyle.

Though there the chaps on Montford’s side,

Played like the roaring ocean tide,

And freely fists, and feet they plied

Around the goals there pressed a squash,

Bravely did Montford through it dash,

Till valiant Lomax (90) fell.

Quickly from out the crowd Quadt (91) flew

With trembling flight, while fiercer grew

The eager players yell. 

The roars and screaming rent the sky, 

An "ein” a "zweier” is the cry. 

Fierce changed the angry foes.

Advanced, forced back, now low, now high

Was seen "Proboscis’” nose. 

As bends the bark’s mast in the gale

When rent are rigging, (92) shrouds, and sail, 

And angry Boreas blows. (93)  

* * * * *

Though still they played the squash was o’er 

When from the ground a boy they bore

With breetches split and bleeding hand

His coat all torn, and figure bowed.

His face begrimed with mud and sand

Could this be Lomax, once so proud. 

They propped him up against the wall,

    And held him tight lest he should fall.

He waved above his head like mad

    a dirty handkerchief he had. 

He saw the traitor Quadt to fly, 

    Fire gleamed from his extended eye.

"By George, I’ll punch that Quadt’ses head”

    Were the last words that Lomax said

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Feldkirchian Notes

In the subtitle of the following poem, ACD describes himself as “an emaciated victim of a tyrannical despot”. The content of the contribution suggests that the despot was either the mysterious “Pipes” or the school administrator Father Mire (Meyer), both of whom were likely members of the school management. Describing a Father as a despot would undoubtedly have been received very poorly by school management which is why the November 1875 issue of The Feldkirchian Gazette was probably the last. At any rate, to our knowledge, no further issue has survived.

          Feldkirchian Notes.

By an emaciated victim of a tyrannical despot.

As down the passage I did go, 

A fellow trod upon my toe.

By George, I loudly bellowed "Oh!” 

And hopped about most actively 

Old "Pipes” he giggled at the sight,

"I think, said he, it serves you right. 

And gave me zwei for "aufmerksamkeit”

which vexed me most infernally 

_______________

One day the man who serves the food 

Came round much later than he should.

I eat as hard as ‘ere I could,

And that is somewhat rapidly.94  

I suffered on my plate to lie, 

A piece that wouldn’t choke a fly. 

That week they gave me „ein bis zwei”

For „anstatt” in the refectory.95    

_______________

Immerged in some deep contemplation, 

Solving a difficult equation

Forgetful of my situation,

I slept till Mire awakened me 

Old Father Mire was very nice,

He gave me capital advice,

And also gave me "zwei” for "fleiss”

Which wasn’t so acceptable

Thus on it goes from week to week. 

Though I’m a quiet boy and meek, 

I study hard my horrid Greek,

In silence time I never speak,

Behaving with propriety 

Yet Prefects ever at me frowned, 

And when the sunday night comes round

I always hear that hated sound,

of zwei and zwei and ein bis zwei.

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The Stella brass band with fellow pupils from the English-speaking world: 1. ACD (bombardon); 2. Wilfrid Lomax (valve trombone); 3. Paul Cullen (euphonium); 4. Leopold Walderdorff (euphonium); 5. Jakob Fitz-Patrik (marching drum); 6. Robert Rockliff (marching drum); 7. Franz Jves (alto horn in euphonium form); 8. Wilderich Walderdorff (flugelhorn). 

The song of the Bombarden

One of ACD’s favourite memories of his time in Feldkirch was his performances with the school brass band in which he played the bombardon or, as they also called it, the “Bombenhorn” (bomb horn). (96) In his autobiography, ACD wrote: “for the boy who played the big brass bass instrument in the fine school band had not returned, and, as a well-grown lad was needed, I was at once enlisted in the service… the Bombardon, as it was called, only comes in on a measured rhythm with an occasional run, which sounds like a hippopotamus doing a step-dance.” (97) In a letter to his mother in May 1876, ACD reported on all kinds of mischief that he and others played with his bombardon. With enthusiasm and astonishing openness, Arthur described to his parents the the fortnightly Garina days, led by flying banners and the brass band, which regularly involved a lot of drinking and singing. (98) ACD’s enthusiasm for his huge brass instrument is particularly evident in the following poem.

The surviving photo of the Stella brass band shows ACD standing with his giant instrument as the second from the left. On the photograph’s reverse are listed 28 pupils of whom 8 are mentioned in ACD’s school magazine: ACD, Wilfried Lomax, Paul Cullen, Leopold and Wilderich Walderdorff, Jakob Fitz-Patrik, Robert Rockliff and Franz Jves. Since there were only 28 English-speaking pupils in the Stella, we know that just over a quarter of them were involved in the Gazette.

The song of the Bombarden. (99)  

There is an instrument whose power, 

Does all the others far surpass.

Far o’er the rest one sees him tower. 

A mighty monument of brass.

The soundest sleeper, far or near, 

I think would scarcely slumber on,

If close to his unconscious ear,

You played upon the Bombarden. (100)  

Some scoff at its enormous size,

And mock at its immensity. 

But none can hear without surprise 

It’s notes and their intensity

Some say it’s weight is quite absurd,

It only does encumber one.

The sweetest tunes I ever heard

Were played upon the Bombarden. 

So ever to the end of time,

All must, to love its tones, consent 

In every band, and foreign clime,

They play the glorious instrument

And when on the last judgement day,

Of angels a great number come, 

The one who must a trumpet play, 

Will blow upon a Bombarden.

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The Roundabout Papers 

As noted at the beginning of this article, the manuscript of the November issue of ACD’s school magazine is incomplete. The fragment breaks off within the following article, which is why there is no conclusive information about its authorship. In any case, according to the note after its title, the article was not originally written by ACD anyway, but was simply taken from another publication, as was the case with ‘About a mule’ in the October issue. Since part of the article is missing, the meaning of the title ‘The Roundabout Papers’ is not clear to us. (101)  

In any case, it is a testament to the courage, indeed the audacity, of the 16-year-old Arthur that he dared to include such a bizarre text in his school newspaper. The piece talks about an Indian chief with spittoons hanging around his waist who enjoyed decaying bodies in a morgue and laughed as he watched an old woman being run over by a bus, and there is reference to bowling with a human skull. Clearly ACD’s interest in horror and the gothic set in early – important ingredients in his development as an author.

The Roundabout Papers.

From an obsolete Journal.

My readers must excuse my laying before them the second volume of this interesting narrative of personal experiences; but as my friend the indian chief, in a fit of abstraction, swallowed the first, we must of course do as best we can. But before proceeding further it would be well to explain who I am, and who the Indian chief is, and how I came into possession of that rare speciman of the genus homo. It was in the summer that my friend Spanker and I went out to see the opening of the Suez canal, that he conceived the insane project of teaching eleven Indians cricket, and causing a sensation in England, by playing some team. He atlast succeeded in teaching them the elements of the game, by giving them a war club for a bat, and bowling with a human skull, at three thigh bones as wickets. In a fit of a rash generosity I offered to take over to England with me, the chief of the scalp-his-head Indians to act as umpire for them, and at the moment when my journal begins I had succeeded in getting him as far as Paris.

(Extracts from my journal)

10 A.M. July 5th - Came down to the dining room in the hotel where I found the chief sitting on the mantle-piece. He had torn down the window curtains and tied them round his neck, he had also knocked the bottom out of a foot-bath, and was using it as a kettle drum, and he had four spittoons slung round his waist, but otherwise I never saw him in so quiet and meek a humour. 

12 A.M. I have taken the chief out for a walk; unfortunately he saw a boy blackening my shoes, and he insisted on having his whole person polished in the same manner. I was lucky enough to coax him away when he had only had his shirtfront, face, neck, and legs blackened. I thought I knew what would please him, so I took him to the „morgue”, where the dead bodies found in the Seine are exposed. The chief was greatly pleased on finding six putrid bodies there; he laughed for a long time, and I may mention that I have only seen him laugh once before, and that was when he saw an old woman run over by an omnibus in Vienna. He examined the dead bodies with great interest, and then remarked to me, that it reminded him of a scene in a farce he had written for the theatre Royal in Pokeyland, which is his native abode. 

6 P.M. Table d’hote at the hotel. I got the chief up very satisfactorily, and tried to persuade him to behave well as it

Conclusion

After reading and analysing The Feldkirchian Gazette it seems to us that ACD, only 16 years old at the time, already demonstrated literary promise. We can marvel at the way he approached his project with a planned and targeted programme so quickly after his arrival. The way he poured his ideas into rhythmically skilful rhyme and played with literary models, stylistic devices and traditions is also impressive. Then there is the courage the greenhorn displayed in terms of content and the way he thanked his editorial colleagues and encouraged them to continue working with him is also remarkable. The high praise from his literary-minded godfather Michael Conan for “His ‘Feldkirch Newspaper’” was well deserved and must have emboldened ACD’s literary self-confidence in the long term. As the above quotes from ACD show, after the seven disobliging years spent at Stonyhurst, he had entered a completely different world at the Stella Matutina, which allowed him to blossom and finally breathe freely and lustfully.

With this in mind, we would like to encourage experts in Conan Doyle to regard the Feldkirch years as deeply formative. The great Doylean scholar Owen Dudley Edwards had already come to this same conclusion in 1983: “Thus passed the Feldkirch year, of whose actual content we know virtually nothing beyond happiness, enjoyment of lands cape, schoolboy pranks, playing in the band, and a few scattered letters to and fro, but whose imprint on Arthur’s mind seems to have been decisive in his intellectual and artistic development.” (102) Above all, ACD’s own statement that at the Stella he “ceased to be a resentful young rebel and became a pillar of law and order” (103) gives us good reason for regarding the years 1875-76 as being significant in his development. It was also at this time, in Feldkirch, that ACD was “electrified” by the writings of Edgar Allan Poe. (104) These years sowed the seeds of ACD’s future success and in the creation of his fictional guardian of law and order in criminal matters, the master detective Sherlock Holmes.

****************

Appendix: Father Alexander Baumgartner SJ (1841–1910)

In the early autumn of 1874, ACD wrote from Stonyhurst to his mother Mary: “I am in the first class in German, and getting on very well. We have 2 hours in the week for German, which is all that could be spared. The Father, whose name is Father Baumgarten, talks to us in German always, while teaching us. I like it very much.” (105) Fr Alexander Baumgartner SJ had just taken up his post as a teacher of modern languages (German, Italian, French) at Stonyhurst. How did this come about? Let’s start at the beginning.

Alexander Baumgartner was born on 27 June 1841 in the eastern Swiss town of St. Gallen, the son of Gallus Jakob Baumgartner (1797-1869), a Catholic politician from Altstätten in the St. Gallen Rhine Valley, and Anna Elisabeth Reithard (1802-1871), a Protestant from Küsnacht in the canton of Zurich. His father was the ruling Landammann of the canton of St. Gallen. (106) Alexander’s place of birth was automatically that of his father, Altstätten, neighbouring Feldkirch, which later sometimes led to the confusion that he was also born in Altstätten. (107)

According to his autobiography Aufzeichnungen aus meinem Leben (Chronicles from my Life), (108) Alexander attended the cantonal school in St. Gallen from 1853 to 1854 after completing primary school. There he soon developed rebellious traits that would no doubt have been familiar to ACD: “[I] became a hopeless rascal – a real scalawag – studied little, drew a lot and did nothing but stupid pranks. Punishment followed punishment. I spent whole hours on my knees, celebrated as a martyr by my mates and always in good spirits.” Alexander then attended the cantonal school in Chur from 1854 to 1855 and finally, from 1855 to 1858, three years of grammar school at the Benedictine monastery school in Einsiedeln. From an early age, his guiding passions were poetry, literature and the theatre. In Einsiedeln, at the age of 14, he also came into contact with the English language for the first time: “Studying English encouraged poetry and an interest in it.” 

When his maternal uncle, the poet Johann Jakob Reithard (1805-1857), died in 1857, the 16-year-old wrote a poem in his honour, which attracted so much attention that it was printed in Neues Tagblatt aus der östlichen Schweiz (6 November 1857), a newspaper that otherwise never published poetry. (109) For Alexander, already a bookworm, this first publication was a considerable achievement and an incentive to further his literary work.

During this time, Alexander also worked as an editor for the fortnightly newspaper Das Waldröslein published by the Swiss Student Association. In 1858, however, complaints were made against the rebellious newspaper, whereupon its archives were confiscated and Alexander was threatened with expulsion from the school. Thanks to Fr Basil Oberholzer (1821-1895), later abbot of Einsiedeln, this was averted. When Alexander’s father, a highly respected Catholic liberal politician, was drawn into the maelstrom of controversy surrounding the student newspaper, the family decided to take the boy away from Einsiedeln.

As a result, in October 1858 Alexander was admitted as a pupil to the then new Jesuit College Stella Matutina in Feldkirch and suddenly – in another echo of ACD – everything was different. The former rebel quickly became a model pupil at the Stella. Alexander skipped the VI. class and after two years  passed his A-levels with brilliant results. According to his former class teacher at the Stella, the philologist Fr Wilhelm Fox SJ (1833-1925), Alexander was not only excellent in every respect and in all subjects, but was also one of the funniest pupils in his class, with a great talent for drawing caricatures. He is also said to have had a “harmless love of mischief”. (110) On 20 October 1860, at the age of 19, he joined the Society of Jesus as a novice in Gorheim. Even then, he was able to leave behind two volumes of his own poetry as a memento for his fellow members.

Baumgartner suffered a serious illness in Gorheim in the summer of 1862, after which he returned to the Stella in Feldkirch to recover. There he studied philosophy and Italian literature for a year with confreres from the Venetian Province who had been expelled from Italy. Once he was fully recovered, he moved in Autumn 1863 to Friedrichsburg Castle in Münster, Westphalia, where he studied the ancient classics for two years. From Autumn 1865, he spent a further two years at the Jesuit College in Maria-Laach (Rheinland-Pfalz) to complete the prescribed triennium.

In the autumn of 1867, Baumgartner came to the Stella Matutina for a third time, this time as a teacher, and took over the teaching of French and Italian, and later English, while also introducing the large number of English students present to the German language. (111) Baumgartner made a name for himself as an expert director of the school theatre. According to his companions, he is said to have been an excellent actor from boyhood and understood perfectly how to pass on his enthusiasm and passion for the theatre to the young actors. (112)  

After the death of his father in July 1869, Baumgartner began studying theology in Maria-Laach, surrounded by numerous Italian and English fellow students. He was ordained a priest on 30 June 1872. However, as part of the Kulturkampf (1871-1887), the so-called Jesuit Law came into force on 4 July 1872, which banned all branches and activities of the Jesuit order on the territory of the German Empire. (113) As a result, in December 1872 Baumgartner moved to Ditton-Hall in Lancashire, England, with some of the Maria-Laach Jesuits and completed the theological course there. He is said to have already preached his second public sermon in English. From Ditton-Hall, Baumgartner undertook his first trip to Scotland in 1873, which introduced him not only to the homes of the poet Sir Walter Scott, but also to his family circle. (114) He later described his experiences in the book Reisebilder aus Schottland (1884, 1895).

Father Alexander Baumgartner SJ (1841-1910), taken around 1894 (118)

Alexander Baumgartner SJ, Reisebilder aus Schottland (title page first edition, 1884).

At the end of 1873, Baumgartner returned from England for the first time and went to Exaeten in Holland to complete his last year of religious probation, the so-called tertianship. In August 1874, his superiors appointed him to the magazine Stimmen aus Maria-Laach (trans. Voices from Maria-Laach), to which he devoted himself in quiet seclusion until his death in 1910, some 36 years later.

In the late summer of 1874, the then 33-year-old Baumgartner returned from Holland to England to teach German, Italian and French to pupils at Stonyhurst. He had already gained his first experience in this field at the Stella Matutina in Feldkirch between 1867 and 1869. With his many sociable gifts, his mischievousness, his multilingual literacy and his enthusiasm for the theatre, he must have gone down well with the boys at Stonyhurst, of whom one was ACD. This was the first meeting of these two soulmates.

As far as Baumgartner’s temperament was concerned, his former class teacher P. Fox at the Stella was not alone in the assessment described above. Whoever met Alexander Baumgartner emphasised his sociability and humour, and his affability and good-naturedness are said to have made him particularly popular with the common people. Fr Otto Pfülf SJ (1856-1946), a long-time friend of the Stimmen aus Maria-Laach, characterised him as follows in an obituary for their magazine in 1910: “He was a cheerful, sociable, communicative nature, among a crowd of colourful talents, nationalities and character types just right in his place, inexhaustible in jokes and harmless pranks, as a mimic, singer, draughtsman and actor always at the forefront of the cheerfulmaker… P. Baumgartner was indisputably an extraordinary and strange personality. Even his outward appearance had something original, yet spiritually significant about it: a frequent and striking change in facial expressions, a peculiar mixture of severity and cosiness, of strength and kindness of heart. He was made for lively socialising, for a privileged position in larger circles. His manifold sociable gifts had already made him folklike among his youthful comrades; they also won him many friends into old age.” (115)  

During his time in Stonyhurst, Baumgartner also contributed articles to English newspapers. But since the climate and way of life in that area did not prove conducive to his health, he returned to the continent before the end of 1875, where he stayed on and off for many years. He worked alternately in Tervuren near Brussels and in the various stations of his exiled religious province in Limburg, Holland, until he finally found a permanent home in the autumn of 1899 with the long-planned and desired establishment of his own writers’ home in Luxembourg. (116)  

Baumgartner’s fame is based above all on his writings on literary history. In addition to countless articles in the Stimmen aus Maria-Laach, these include biographical writings on Lessing (1877), Joost van den Vondel (1882) and Longfellow (1887) as well as his famous three-volume biography of Goethe (1885-1886), which also dealt with other authors of the Weimar Classical period such as Wieland, Herder and Schiller. (117) His biography of Goethe earned him a lot of criticism because he dared to take the revered German poet off his pedestal to take a critical look at his work. In Meyer’s Konversationslexikon, for example, it was said that Baumgartner’s aim was “to spoil the German people for their greatest poet”, but this was nonsensical as he fully recognised Goethe’s genius and the poetic value of his major works. (118)  

In the 1890s, Baumgartner devised the Herculean plan to write a 10-volume History of World Literature. The first two volumes were published in 1897 and two more followed in 1900. Between 1901 and 1903, Baumgartner was nominated three times for the Nobel Prize for Literature. (119) The fifth volume of his Weltliteratur was published in 1905. At that time, Baumgartner had already been regarded for years as the world’s leading literary authority within the Catholic Church. When he died in Luxembourg on 5 September 1910 at the age of 70, he had completed six of the planned ten volumes. In 1912, a supplementary volume was published posthumously with various of his writings that had not previously been published in book form.

Fr Alexander Baumgartner SJ (1841-1910). Photo from obituary. (124)

Baumgartner’s favourite authors included Homer, Shakespeare, Goethe, Dante, Manzoni, Cervantes, Calderon, and Sir Walter Scott, (120) who ACD admired from a young age. And, there was also one other author, exceptionally critical of religion and the church, of whom Baumgartner was fond: Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849), one of the forefathers of crime fiction, who is credited with introducing the detective to the English-speaking world. In the supplementary volume mentioned above, none of Baumgartner’s contributions on English-language authors was as extensive as that on Poe. (121) His special appreciation for Poe was also evident in the fact that he translated several of his poems into German.

Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849)

Poe's Tales of Mystery, Imagination and Humour. Title page of first edition 1852.

Poe was also the author who triggered an awakening in ACD during his time in Feldkirch when he got his hands on a book that “not only impressed Arthur; it electrified him”. This was Tales of Mystery, Imagination, & Humour (1852), and the first story he encountered in it was ‘The Gold-Bug’. In later years ACD confessed “that no author, with the exception of Macaulay and Scott, so much shaped his tastes or his literary bent” as Poe. (122) Probably the earliest literary traces of ACD’s admiration for Macaulay and Scott can be found in his skilful parodies of the two authors in the school newspaper The Feldkirchian Gazette presented here.

Fr Alexander Baumgartner SJ must have left a lasting impression on his young Stonyhurst pupil. How else can it be explained that the young author included his former teacher three times in his early stories? Disguised as “Baumgarten”, he appears as Inspector Baumgarten in ‘The Silver Hatchet’ (1883), as Professor Alexis von Baumgarten in ‘The Great Keinplatz Experiment’ (1885) and as Prussian Captain Baumgarten in ‘The Lord of Chateau Noir’ (1894). (123) ACD experts seem in little doubt that in all these cases the character “Baumgarten” found inspiration in the Swiss Jesuit priest Baumgartner. In this sense, these appearances in early stories can certainly be understood as a tribute to his former German teacher at Stonyhurst, who, according to our thesis, made the boy’s path to the Stella Matutina in Feldkirch palatable and paved the way for his love of literature, literary and ambitions and later literary success. To our knowledge, no other teacher of ACD received a similar honour. (124)

Inspector Baumgarten (with hatchet) in 'The Silver Hatchet' (1883)

Professor Alexis von Baumgarten (left) in 'The Great Keinplatz Experiment' (1885).

Above and below: Captain Baumgarten in 'The Lord of Chateau Noir' (1894).

As already mentioned, the biographies and literary tastes of Baumgartner and ACD show striking parallels. Both had to endure corporal punishment and other humiliations in their early schools, which they defied with defiant recalcitrance and a firm determination not to let their superiors get them down. Both found solace, edification and happiness in their love of poetry and literature from an early age. Both were they pupils at the Stella Matutina, where they quickly turned from Saul to Paul, and from rebels to model pupils. Both published their first autonomous literary texts at the age of 16, one in a daily newspaper, the other in the form of a school magazine. Both had a literary figure in their immediate family who supported them in their literary ambitions. Both were reprimanded for one of their early publications, which was subsequently banned. Both were cheerful fellows who never took themselves too seriously and relied on humour and self-irony in their private dealings and writings. Both were inspired by a belief in the good in people. Both were, despite their close ties to the church, always open to people of other faiths. Both had fathers who suffered great injustices in life. Both were analysts and tireless creators, focussing on precision and stringency of content. Both shared favourite authors, such as Scott and Poe. And both developed, in the course of their lives, into global luminaries in their fields.

****************

There is currently (2026) a forum on the internet that is appreciated by today’s Doyleans and Sherlockians alike, the podcast Doings of Doyle, (125) hosted by Mark Jones and Paul M. Chapman. In Episode 23 on ‘The Great Keinplatz Experiment’ the hosts observe that “the setting for the story is based on Feldkirch, Austria… Feldkirch is also the inspiration for the settings of ‘A Pastoral Horror’, ‘The Silver Hatchet’ and ‘An Exciting Christmas Eve’.” A certain connection between these four stories and the Montfort town is undeniable, as one of them is explicitly set in the Feldkirch area and the other three feature a protagonist called Baumgarten. They also include names such as “von Spee” and “Leopold Walderich”, which have a direct connection to ACD’s fellow students at the Stella, pupils who also appear in his school newspaper. (126)    

Jones and Chapman also make the statement that “the Feldkirch tales share themes of madness and loss of control.” This is indeed true. In the short story ‘A Pastoral Horror’, for example, the main perpetrator ends up in the Feldkirch mental hospital. On the other hand, this reference of the Feldkirch stories to “madness and loss of control” is surprising as it was in the Montfort town that ACD found a healthy and cheerful self-confidence that helped him to take control of his life for the first time and give it direction. Whatever the case, it is indisputable that the town of Feldkirch and its famous Stella Matutina left their mark not only in ACD’s school newspaper The Feldkirchian Gazette but on his later printed work.

ACD's signature

Bibliography

Biographical information on ACD (chronological)

[1] Arthur Conan Doyle, Memories and Adventures – an Autobiography (Boston, Little, Brown & Co., 1924).

[2] John Dickson Carr, The Life of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (London, John Murray, 1949).

[3] Owen Dudley Edwards, The Quest for Sherlock Holmes (Edinburgh, Mainstream Publishing, 1983). Especially the fifth chapter, ‘To Feldkirch and Back’, pp.122-147.

[4] Jon Lellenberg, Daniel Stashower & Charles Foley, Arthur Conan Doyle – A Life in Letters (New York, The Penguin Press, 2007).

[5] Andrew Lycett, The Man Who Created Sherlock Holmes (London, Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2007).

[6] Russell Miller, The Adventures of Arthur Conan Doyle (London, Harvill Secker, 2008).

[7] Daniel Stashower, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle – Das Leben des Vaters von Sherlock Holmes (Köln, Baskerville Bücher, 2008). This is the First German-language biography of Conan Doyle.

[8] Daniel & Eugene Friedman, Strange Case of Dr. Doyle: A Journey Into Madness (New York, Square One Publishers, 2015).

[9] Philipp Schöbi, Das literarische Feldkirch. Die Montfortstadt als Schauplatz der Literatur (Hohenems, Bucher Verlag, 2018). Especially pp.36-43 and pp.102-107.

Further writings (chronological)

[10] J. E. Hodder Williams, ‘Arthur Conan Doyle’ in The Bookman, April 1902, pp.6-13. (127) 

[11] P. Otto Pfülf SJ: ‘P. Alexander Baumgartner S.J.’, obituary in Stimmen aus Maria-Laach, Band 79, Heft 9, S.349–372. (Freiburg im Breisgau, Herder, 1910). (128)

[12] P. Alexander Baumgartner SJ, Geschichte der Weltliteratur. Ergänzungsband zu den Bänden I-VI (Freiburg im Breisgau, Herder, 1912). (129)

[13] Anon., ‘Sir A. Conan Doyle’s End’ in The Lancashire Daily Post, 7 July 1930. (130)

[14] Stella Matutina (Hrsg.), 75 Jahre Stella Matutina, Festschrift in 3 volumes (Feldkirch, Self-published by Stella Matutina, 1931).

[15] P. Josef Knünz SJ, 100 Jahre Stella Matutina (1856–1956). Special edition of the college magazine Aus der Stella Matutina (Bregenz, J.N. Teutsch, 1956).

[16] Bernhard Löcher, Das österreichische Feldkirch und seine Jesuitenkollegien “St. Nikolaus” und: Stella Matutina” (Frankfurt am Main, Peter Lang, 2008).

[17] Philipp Schöbi, 'The Feldkirchian Gazette. Die erste eigenständige Publikation von Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, dem geistigen Vater von Sherlock Holmes' in Montfort 1/2024, 76th volume (Innsbruck, StudienVerlag, 2024), pp. 111-150.

Illustration credits

All illustrations from the school newspaper The Feldkirchian Gazette are taken from a colour laser copy of the manuscript which was made available to the author by the British Library, London. We owe the photo of ACD in the Stella brass band to the archives of the Central European Province of the Jesuits, Zurich site, Stella Matutina Archives. The two engravings of the Stella Matutina from 1877 are taken from the Deutscher Hausschatz in Wort und Bild, 4th volume 1877/78, No. 48 and No. 49. The two photos of the dining room and the billiard room from 1888 are privately owned and were provided by Natter Fine Arts, Vienna. The photograph of Fr Wilfrid Edward Lomax SJ is taken from an obituary of him provided by the British Jesuit Archives. The pictures of ACD at the age of 14 with a cricket bat and of the character ‘Baumgarten’ in various stories are from the online repository The Arthur Conan Doyle Encyclopedia. The photo of Fr Baumgartner with his signature comes from the supplementary volume [12], his death picture from an obituary by Father Johannes Mayrhofer SJ from 1910. The photos from the Stella register of pupils, the Garina country house in 1867, the pupils playing football in the Reichenfeld and the multifunctional assembly hall at the Stella are from the archive and the municipal library of Feldkirch. The picture showing the Stella buildings between 1896 and 1900 is from the Vorarlberger Landesrepositorium (volare_o_69192). All other images are publicly accessible online. All images are in the public domain or were made available to us free of charge with permission for publication.

Footnotes

(1) This article is a slightly expanded translation of the corresponding article [17].

(2) See: [2], p.18. The godfather must have received the newspaper by post. It can be ruled out that the boy brought it to him personally in Paris. This is because the uncle wrote his above-mentioned praise of the ‘Feldkirch Newspaper’ around Christmas 1875, and his nephew stayed in Feldkirch for the entire school year.

(3) See: [9], p.41. 

(4) At the auction, the manuscript was included in the conglomerate 'A Jesuit Education’, part of the collection auctioned at the time under the title 'The Conan Doyle Collection’.

(5) Marcus Geisser was co-founder and long-standing president of the Swiss Sherlock Holmes Society, the Reichenbach Irregulars. He and Helen Dorey are also members of the Sherlock Holmes Society of London. The British Library kindly provided us with a colour laser copy of the manuscript.

(6) Countless items of information about ACD, systematically organised and excellently presented, can be found at the online repository The Arthur Conan Doyle Encyclopedia at the link https://www.arthur-conan-doyle.com/ (accessed February 2026).

(7) See [1], p.11. 

(8) See [1], p.11. 

(9) See [1], p.12.

(10) See [1], p.12.

(11) See [1], p.12. In contrast to The Feldkirchian Gazette, the college magazine at Stonyhurst was not an independent publication and was not initiated or written by ACD.

(12) See [1], p.13.

(13) See [2], p.17. Since there is no indication in the detailed directories of Stella Matutina that Fr Purbrick ever knew the Feldkirch school personally, and since to our knowledge no other former Stella teacher apart from Fr Alexander Baumgartner SJ had taught at Stonyhurst up to this time, we may assume that the rector’s particularly warm recommendation of the school in the Montfort town arose from Fr Baumgartner’s positive experiences with his home school.

(14) Robert and Karl Rockliffe had already joined the Stella in 1873 and 1874 respectively.

(15) See [4], p.76. 

(16) See [1], p.13.

(17) See [1], pp.13-14.

(18) As far as the location of Feldkirch in the ‚Tyrolean Alps’ is concerned, ACD should be honoured. For at the time of his stay at the Stella Matutina in 1875-76, Vorarlberg was actually (and until 1918) under Tyrolean administration, i.e. under the jurisdiction of the Imperial-Royal Governor’s Office in Innsbruck. For this reason, Doyle could well consider himself to be in a "small corner of the Tyrolean Alps” in Feldkirch at the time.

(19) See [11], p.357. 

(20) At the time, ACD considered The Cloister and the Hearth (1861) by Charles Reade (1814-1884) to be the greatest English historical novel. See [10], pp.9-10. 

(21) One hundred years after Baumgartner’s death, in October 2010, the weekly cultural supplement 'Die Warte’ (trans. 'Perspectives’) of the daily newspaper Luxemburger Wort published a long article in memory of the famous Jesuit entitled ‚Der katholische Literaturpapst’ (trans. 'The Catholic Pope of Literature’) in honour of his importance.  

(22) Nominated in the three consecutive years, 1901-1903, at the suggestion of the Norwegian theologian Knud Karl Krogh-Tonning (1842-1911).

(23) After his departure as a teacher from the Stella in 1869, Fr Baumgartner wrote a wistful poem 'Abschied von der Stella matutina (trans. ‚Farewell to the Stella Matutina’) which was also included in Volume III ([14], p.53) of the commemorative publication for the school’s 75th anniversary in 1931.

(24) See https://digital.tessmann.it/tessmannDigital/Buch/23286/ (accessed February 2026).

(25) Every pupil at the Stella was given a matriculation number when they first entered the school, which they kept fort he duration. The numbers were assigned in ascending alphabetical order of the surnames and first names of the new pupils in the respective school year, and the list of matriculation numbers was simply continued in the following year.

(26) Unfortunately, the author of this article was unable to trace the fates of all 17 of these English-speaking schoolmates of ACD at the Stella Matutina, but would like to encourage readers to tackle this task. It may well be that such research would reveal new insights about ACD, perhaps including previously unknown photos of him.

(27) See https://archive.org/details/historyofdubuque02oldt/page/534/mode/2up and 

https://www.encyclopediadubuque.org/index.php/RHOMBERG,_Alphons_L. Note that the link unusually includes a dot at the end (accessed February 2026).

(28) Nikolaus C. Benziger and Karl Benziger were the sons of the Einsiedeln publisher and high-ranking politician Nikolaus Benziger-Benziger II (1830-1908) and his wife Meinrada Josefa Benziger. Nikolaus C. Benziger became head of the New York branch of the Benziger publishing house at the age of 21 in 1880 and married Agnes Stoffel (1862-1930). Karl also joined his father’s business in 1880 and became a partner and head of the technical department in 1886. Married to Mina Gottfried (1859-1947). Cf. Heinz Nauer, Fromme Industrie. Der Benziger Verlag Einsiedeln 1750–1970 (Zurich, Verlag Hier und Jetzt, 2017). 

(29) Dr Häusle was also on friendly terms with the Habsburg heir to the throne Franz Ferdinand (1863-1914), who was assassinated in Sarajevo on 28 June 1914 and whose death triggered the First World War.

(30) A prefect in a church boarding school is an educator or pupil with supervisory duties who looks after (other) pupils in their free time and when they are doing their homework.

(31) These pedagogical elements had already been upheld at the predecessor college of the Stella Matutina in Fribourg, Switzerland. After the expulsion of the Jesuit order from Switzerland in 1847, the Fribourg Jesuits found a new home in Feldkirch in 1856, where the principle was: "Everything as in Fribourg” ([16], p.340).

(32) See [4], p.75-88. 

(33) See [4], p.87. 

(34) See [14], p.43. 

(35) See [4], p.83.

(36) See [9], p.39. 

(37) See [6], p.40. 

(38) The manuscript of the October issue was accompanied by a small piece of paper with the following note: "Written by my Darling when a boy at School in Germany”. It can be ruled out that this note about "my Darling” was written by ACD’s mother Mary, as it is clear from the correspondence with her son that she was well aware of the location of Feldkirch in Austria and not in Germany. ACD’s first wife Louisa Hawkins (1857-1906), whom he married in 1885, must also have known that his former school town was in Austria, as he explicitly described Feldkirch as a place in Austria in his story 'A Pastoral Horror’, written in 1884 and published in 1890. So, in our opinion, the only author left for this erroneous note is ACD’s second wife Jean Leckie (1874-1940).

As already noted, the overview article [10] by J. E. Hodder Williams published in the monthly magazine The Bookman (April 1902), which incorrectly located Feldkirch in Germany, was repeatedly referred to in biographical accounts of ACD. This was particularly the case in the first death notice [13] published in the newspaper The Lancashire Daily Post on ACD’s death on 7 July 1930 where entire paragraphs were taken verbatim from Williams’s article, including those with "Feldkirch in Germany”. This same death notice contained a scalding interview with ACD’s youngest son Adrian Conan Doyle (1910-1970), who was present that morning when his father smiled and breathed his famous last words to Jean Leckie: "You are wonderful”. This led to a number of other newspapers taking over this exclusive article without checking it - and with it the false report about the geographical location of Feldkirch in Germany. When Jean Leckie organised the estate of her husband and wrote the note about the school newspaper, she was probably guided by these false reports about the location of Feldkirch.

(39) A gazette is a newspaper, a magazine or an official journal.

(40) This detailed information about Fr Lomax and the photo below are taken from an obituary kindly provided by the British Jesuit Archives, London.

(41) When Watson is instructed by Sherlock Holmes to acquire as much knowledge as possible about Chinese porcelain, he turns to his friend Lomax, who provides him with a considerable amount of literature on the subject. See https://www.arthur-conan-doyle.com/index.php/The_Adventure_of_the_Illustrious_Client (accessed February 2026).

(42) See https://scholarexchange.furman.edu/sublibrarians/history.html (accessed February 2026).

(43) In the original by Macaulay (matching text underlined): "No sound of joy or sorrow // Was heard from either bank; // But friends and foes in dumb surprise, // With parted lips and straining eyes, // Stood gazing where he sank: // And when above the surges // They saw his crest appear, // All Rome sent forth a rapturous cry, // And even the ranks of Tuscany // Could scarce forbear to cheer.” 

(44) See [2], pp.12-15.

(45) In this and other places in the manuscript, ACD was very creative in his use of quotation marks, i.e., various characters are missing. In the transcription, the characters he used were strictly adopted without further commentary. In the German translation, on the other hand, an attempt was made to place the characters in such a way that they make sense in terms of content.

(46) An 1878 edition of the illustrated book with the nursery rhyme can be found at: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/12109/12109-h/12109-h.htm (accessed February 2026).

(47) We would be grateful for more detailed information about it.

(48) The Carina therapy centre and the Antonius Chapel, built in 1685, have been preserved close by.

(49) See [9], pp.104ff, [4], pp.80-83.

(50) Andrew Lycett wrote in his biography The Man who Created Sherlock Holmes ([5], p.45): 'His account of a three-day game between the college and the town, which appeared in yet another of his self-published magazines, was surely a fantasy, with its report of his own high-scoring innings.’ However, Lycett seemed to have overlooked the fact that this report was obviously not from ACD at all, but – in contrast to his own contributions – signed with the initials D and H. Furthermore, if the report had been pure fiction, it would have made no sense at all to explicitly mention the absence of a cricket pavilion in it. Like everything else, such a pavilion could have simply been invented. And, as mentioned above, ACD told his mother in 1876 that they had always played ‘rounders’ near their country house Garina.

(51) Cricket is a two-team batting game (also known as Thorball until around 1900). It revolves around the duel between the bowler (pitcher) and the batter (batsman). The bowler tries to get the batter to make a mistake so that he is out, while the batter in turn tries to hit the ball away to score runs. The bowler is supported by the other fielders, who try to get the ball back as quickly as possible.

(52) For the names Harker, Squash and Bubble, as well as for the later names Smallpose, Snooks, Thinsen and Squeak, no corresponding or at least similar names could be found in the Stella Matutina’s register of pupils, which is why it can be assumed that these names are malapropisms, if only because of their special meanings corresponding to the game.

(53) "Schäffer” is probably Stella pupil no. 1706, ACD’s fellow pupil Gustav Schäffer from Hambach in Bavaria, born on 9 February 1861, who attended the Stella Matutina in the two school years 1875-1877.

(54) A ´maiden over´ in cricket is an over in which no runs are scored.

(55) A ‘wide’ in cricket is a type of illegal delivery to a batsman (the other type is a ‘no-ball’) that is judged by the umpire to be too wide or too high for the batsman to hit by the means of a normal cricket shot. A run is awarded to the batting team as a result of such an illegal throw.

(56) "Fitzpatrick” is Stella pupil no. 1576, ACD’s fellow pupil Jakob Fitz-Patrik from Dublin, who attended the Stella Matutina in the two school years 1874-1876. – In the article 'A Feldkirch Football match’ in the November issue of the school magazine, he is only abbreviated as 'Fitz’. In the surviving photo of the Stella brass band with ACD, the tall Fitz-Patrik can be seen standing on the far right as a marching drum player.

(57) In cricket, the term "century” is used for "hundred” or "hundred points”.

(58) "Fielding” in cricket is the collection of the ball by the fielders after it has been hit by the batsman (batter) to limit the number of runs the batsman scores and/or to get a batsman out by either catching a batted ball before it bounces or by leaving a batsman out before he can complete his current run.

(59) A "wicket” is the "goal” in cricket, so to speak. It consists of three "stumps”, wooden sticks stuck vertically into the ground, which are connected at the top by a total of two crossbars, also made of wood, known as "bails”.

(60) "Cullen” is one of the two Stella pupils No. 1566 and 1567, the brothers Michael and Paul Cullen from Liverpool, both fellow pupils of ACD, who attended the Stella Matutina in the two school years 1874-1876. Paul Cullen is also depicted in the surviving photograph of the Stella brass band, in which he played the euphonium.

(61) "R. Rockliffe” and "C. Rockliffe” are the two Stella pupils No. 1522 and No. 1613 from Liverpool, Robert Rockliff, born on 12 November 1860, who attended the Stella in the three school years 1873-1876, and Karl (Carl) Rockliff, born on 10 October 1862, who attended the Stella in the two school years 1874-1876. Before ACD came to Feldkirch, he had visited their family and travelled with them to Vorarlberg ([5], p.45). Robert Rockliff is also depicted in the surviving photograph of the Stella brass band, as a marching drummer in the front row on the far left.

(62) The presumed co-author "Ives” of the school newspaper is Stella pupil no. 1594, ACD’s fellow pupil Franz Jves from New York, who attended the Stella Matutina in the two school years 1874-1876. Note the spelling with “I” instead of "J” at ACD. He is also pictured in the surviving photo of the Stella brass band as third from the left in the front row. There he played an alto horn in euphonium form.

(63) In cricket, the "long field” is the area of the pitch behind the batsman.

(64) Regarding "Lomax”, please refer to our earlier comments.

(65) In cricket, a "duck” is the departure of a batsman with a score of zero.

(66) "Bowling” is a strictly regulated throwing technique in cricket, which has stipulated a complete extension of the arm since 1864 and is still a typical characteristic of the sport today.

(67) See: https://archive.org/details/parodiesofworkso03hami/page/134/mode/2up (accessed 15 May 2024).

(68) Published, for example, on 17 April 1871 on page 2 of the Indianapolis News; on 3 June 1871 on page 1 of the Republican and Democrat; on 3 August 1871 on page 4 of the Richmond Indiana Radical; on 16 September 1873 on page 8 of The Atlanta Daily Herald.

(69) See https://www.loc.gov/resource/sm1879.03896.0 (accessed February 2026).

(70) A comparison with the versions of this poem published in various newspapers shows that ACD or the contributor with the signature 'F.I.’ has obviously made a clerical error here (head instead of neck). Also, the rhyme on the word "deck” only works with „neck”. The mistake has of course been corrected in the German translation.

(71) In English, "asses” means donkeys and fools, but in American it also means arses, of which the Jesuits in Feldkirch would not have approved.

(72) ACD’s supposedly incorrect spelling of "andstand” instead of "Anstand” for "Decency” corresponds to the way many Swiss people speak, and many of the Jesuits at the Stella were indeed Swiss by birth. In this sense, this was merely a phonetically correct rendering and not really a misspelling.

(73) As already mentioned above, it is not clear to us which person was meant by the capitalised name "Pipes”. In lower case, "pipes” here apparently stands for "tobacco pipe”.

(74) See [9], pp.102-105. 

(75) See [4], p.85.

(76) See [4], p.85.

(77) See [4], p.83.

(78) Set in Scotland and England in the 16th century, the verse novel Marmion consists of six cantos, each with an introductory letter and numerous ancient notes, and ends with the Battle of Flodden in 1513.

(79) Father Meyer is also mentioned by name by ACD in a letter to his mother as procurator or administrator ([4], p.77). In the 1875-76 school year, there was another priest working at the Stella whose surname was phonetically the same as Mire: Fr Julius Mayr SJ (1848-1909). However, as the school magazine later refers to "old Father Mire”, Mayr is out of the question here, as he was only 27 years old in 1875, while Father Meyer was already 56 at the time.

(80) "Floating like foam upon the wave” is a quote from Marmion, where it also says: "Wide raged the battle on the plain”.

(81) "Wild and disorderly” is a quote from Marmion, where it also says immediately before: "Crests rose, and stooped, and rose again”.

(82) "Amid this scene of tumult high” is a quote from Marmion. 

(83) "Fitz” is the Jakob Fitz-Patrik from Dublin already mentioned in note 56. He was still called Fitzpatrick in the article "College v. Town” in the October issue of the school magazine.

(84) "Proboscis” describes an organ that arises from the fusion of the nose with the upper lip and is found in both mammals and invertebrates. It is sometimes also called the trunk-nose (Rüsselnase).

(85) For the "Cullen brothers” mentioned here, see note 60.

(86) A total of four of ACD’s fellow pupils come into question for "Howell”. On the one hand, Stella pupil 1121, Bernhard Howell from London, born on 13 November 1857, who attended the Stella in the period 1869-1876. On the other hand, the three pupils with the matriculation numbers 1386-1388, namely the two twins Edmund and Gerhard Howell, born on 7 November 1862, and Wilfried Howell, born on 13 May 1864, all from London, who all attended the Stella in the long period 1872-1880. In terms of age, we would guess that the first named was already 18 years old in 1875. The three brothers, on the other hand, were only 13 and 11 at the time – presumably an older brother of these four pupils, David Howell, had written the report "College v. Town” about a cricket match for the October issue of the school magazine.

(87) "Montford” probably refers to the team from the Montfort town of Feldkirch, as there is also talk of lads "on Montford’s side”. – In any case, there was no schoolmate of ACD named Montford or Montfort.

(88) "Spee” is either Stella pupil no. 1340, the later District Administrator Count Leopold von Spee from Düsseldorf, born on 19 September 1858 (Stella stay: 1871-1876, 1878-1879), or Stella pupil no. 1710, Count Heribert von Spee from Heltorf, born on 3 December 1863, in the then Rhine Province (Stella stay 1875-1880), both fellow pupils of ACD. The former seems more likely to us, as he was already 17 years old in 1875, whereas the latter was only 12. It is probably no coincidence that the main character in ACD’s story 'An Exciting Christmas Eve’ (1883) would later be called Dr Otto von Spee.

See https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leopold_von_Spee_(Landrat) and 

https://www.geni.com/people/Leopold-Graf-von-Spee/6000000020768551491 (accessed February 2026).

(89) The "old Valderdoff” is probably the older of the two Stella pupils no. 1544 & 1545, the two brothers Count Leopold von Walderdorff (born 3 June 1860, Stella stay: 1873-1878) and Count Wilderich von Walderdorff (born 2 October 1857, Stella stay: 1873-1876), both from Hautzenstein in Bavaria. Wilderich was probably meant here. In any case, it is probably no coincidence that one of the main characters in ACD’s story 'An Exciting Christmas Eve’ (1883) would later be called "Leopold Walderich”, which is practically a mixture of the names of the two brothers. Both brothers are also depicted as musicians in the surviving photograph of the Stella brass band. Leopold played the euphonium in the band and Wilderich played an instrument that is now known as the Kuhlohorn or Kuhlo-Flugelhorn.

(90) To "Lomax” see our earlier comments.

(91) "Quadt” is Stella pupil no. 1148, ACD’s fellow pupil Count Otto von Quadt-Wykradt from Paris & Bavaria, born on 19 January 1856, who attended the Stella Matutina in the six school years 1869-1874 and 1875-1876.

(92) In sailing ship construction, "rigging” refers to all the devices that support the sails. The "shrouds” are the ropes used to brace the masts. In Greek mythology, "Boreas” was the personification of the winter north wind.

(93) The last 12 lines are partly almost, partly completely verbatim quotations from Marmion. They are in the original (coincident text underlined): "The Howard’s lion fell; // Yet still Lord Marmion’s falcon flew // With wavering flight, while fiercer grew // Around the battle-yell. // The Border slogan rent the sky! // A Home! a Gordon! was the cry: // Loud were the clanging blows; // Advanced,— forced back,— now low, now high, // The pennon sunk and rose; // As bends the bark’s mast in the gale, // When rent are rigging, shrouds, and sail, // It wavered mid the foes.” See: https://www.bartleby.com/lit-hub/the-worlds-best-poetry/flodden-field/ (accessed 15 May 2024).

(94) A comparison with all the other verses of this poem suggests that ACD has probably forgotten the indentation in this line. We have therefore added the overlooked indentation in the German translation.

(95) By "anstatt”, ACD probably made a mistake here and actually meant "anstand”. It was also translated in this corrected sense.

(96) A bombarde is a mortar-like siege weapon used from the late Middle Ages onwards, which was also known as a blunderbuss (Donnerbüchse). The giant tuba was called a bombardon because of its similarity to a bombarde.

(97) See [1], pp.13-14. 

(98) See [9], p.39 and pp.104ff; [4], pp.80-83. 

(99) In this poem, ACD consistently writes "bombarden” four times and not "bombardon”, as the instrument he played in the Stella brass band was actually called in English and German. Of course, it is conceivable that he made a mistake all four times, as he would also correctly call the instrument a bombardon in his autobiography from 1924. – However, we believe that ACD deliberately chose the slightly different spelling "bombarden” because he and his fellow students were well aware of the etymological origin of the word bombardon from the "bombarde”, a mortar-like powder gun that looks very similar to the musical instrument, and this is precisely why they called their giant tuba a "bomb horn” (Bombenhorn). Etymologically related to bombarde is the term "bombardment” for a sustained strafing by heavy artillery.

(100) In Russell Miller’s biography of ACD ([6], pp.40-41) the poem was transcribed or quoted rather inaccurately. The title itself incorrectly reads "Bombardier” instead of "Bombarden”, in the second line of the poem the word "the” was forgotten, in the fourth line it reads "instrument” instead of "monument”, and in the eighth line "Bombardon” was read instead of "Bombarden”.

(101) If the opening of the Suez Canal mentioned in the article refers to the opening of the completed structure, which took place on 17 November 1869, then the original article must have been written after this date. However, an opening in mid-November is contradicted by the fact that the narrator allegedly travelled to it "in the summer”. There are also said to have been big celebrations for the opening of the Suez Canal on 25 April 1859. If this opening was meant, as we suspect, it is conceivable that the original text was written by the British author William Makepeace Thackeray (1811-1863). In the years 1860-1863, he published a series of often bizarre and humorous essays in Cornhill Magazine under the title 'The Roundabout Papers’, which, it was said at the time, "are reviled by many, but delight all”. This would certainly explain the title of this article. As scholars assume, Thackeray’s title alludes to his conviction that time is circular, carousel-like or cyclical.

(102) See [3], p.145.

(103) See [1], p.13. 

(104) See [2], p.19; see also Appendix.

(105) See [4], p.69. 

(106) See https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gallus_Jakob_Baumgartner (accessed February 2026).

(107) Feldkirch and Altstätten are the only towns in Austria and Switzerland that directly border each other.

(108) See [12], pp.12-16. 

(109) The poem printed on page 2 was entitled ‚Am Grabe meines Oheims J.J. Reithard’ (trans. 'At the grave of my uncle J.J. Reithard’) and had previously appeared on a flyer. The newspaper placed the following footnote under the poem: "Poetischer Versuch vom sechzehnjährigen Neffen des zu frühe Hingeschiedenen, deshalb nachsichtiger Aufnahme empfohlen.” (trans. ‚Poetic attempt by the sixteen-year-old nephew of the prematurely deceased, therefore recommended for lenient acceptance’).

(110) See Fr Nikolaus Scheid SJ: P. Alexander Baumgartner, S. J. Ein Gedenkblatt seines Lebens und Wirkens. (Hamm (Westf.), Breer & Thiemann, 1911, published in 1912), pp.53-84.

(111) He also worked as a prefect for the sick and even taught natural history as a substitute in the 1868-69 school year; the zoological illustrations he painted are said to have provided excellent services at the school for years to come.

(112) See [11], p.363. 

(113) The members of the Society of Jesus were considered the spearhead of the Pope and therefore enemies of the German Reich. Despite the official end of the Kulturkampf in 1887, the Jesuit Law remained in force for another three decades, until 1917.

(114) See [11], p.357. 

(115) See [11], p.355 and p.370. 

(116) From then on, the monthly magazine Stimmen aus Maria Laach was edited in this “Bellevue” writers’ home for German-speaking Jesuits on the Limpertsberg in Luxembourg.

(117) According to the ACD biographer Owen Dudley Edwards ([3], p.128), ACD is said to have first read Schlegel, Herder, Schiller and Goethe in Feldkirch. It may be a coincidence that a few years later one of the students in ACD’s story 'The Silver Hatchet’ (1883) was given the name Otto von Schlegel.

(118) In Volume III of his biography of Goethe, Baumgartner wrote (p. 439), "[dass man] von dem nahezu götzendienerischen Kult des großen Dichters wieder zu einer nüchternen, vernünftigen und gerechten Würdigung seines Lebens und seiner Werke zurückkehre, ihn kennen lerne, wie er wirklich war, und ihn nicht mehr achte, als er es verdient” (trans. 'that we should return from the almost idolatrous cult of the great poet to a sober, reasonable and just appreciation of his life and his works, get to know him as he really was, and respect him no more than he deserves’).

(119) Cf. note 24. 

(120) Baumgartner also had a favourite among these authors: "Turmhoch über allen in einsamer Größe thront Shakespeare.” (trans. 'Shakespeare sits enthroned high above them all in solitary grandeur’).

(121) See [12], pp.767-791. Online at: https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_W6UwAAAAYAAJ/page/67/mode/1up?view=theater (accessed February 2026).

(122) See [2], p.19. 

(123) All of ACD’s stories can be easily found on the Internet under their original title and downloaded free of charge as a pdf.

(124) ACD’s teacher at Edinburgh University, the famous Scottish surgeon Joseph Bell (1837-1911), was also of decisive importance for his development as a writer. ACD made no secret of the fact that Dr Bell, whom he admired for his methodical approach of observation and deduction, was the model for his famous creation Sherlock Holmes, at least as far as the detective’s deductive and criminal-analytical method were concerned. However, we do not know whether ACD ever included the surgeon by name in one of his stories, as was the case three times with Father Baumgartner as "Baumgarten”.

(125) Online at https://www.doingsofdoyle.com/ (accessed February 2026).

(126) On von Spee and Leopold Walderich, see notes 91 and 92.

(127) Online at https://www.arthur-conan-doyle.com/index.php?title=Arthur_Conan_Doyle_(article_by_J._E._Hodder_Williams) (accessed February 2026).

(128) Online at https://ia600201.us.archive.org/27/items/stimmenderzeit79freiuoft/stimmenderzeit79freiuoft.pdf (accessed February 2026).

(129) Online at: https://ia800302.us.archive.org/15/items/geschichtederwel00baumuoft/geschichtederwel00baumuoft.pdf (accessed February 2026).

(130) Online at: https://www.arthur-conan-doyle.com/index.php/Death_of_the_Creator_of_Sherlock_Holmes (accessed February 2026).