COVE

Sidney Paget’s illustration “we had the carriage to ourselves” is a photographic reproduction of watercolour located on the second page of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s “The Boscombe Valley Mystery.” The story with Paget’s illustration was first published in Strand Magazine in October 1891 before being rereleased as a part of The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes on October 14th, 1892. This is the first of nine images illustrated by Paget to be featured in the story and the fourth of 37 of Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories to be illustrated by Paget, a partnership that was only ended by Paget’s death in 1908.

“The Boscombe Valley Mystery” is the first Sherlock Holmes story to take Holmes and Watson outside of London, and Paget showcases that by depicting the pair on the train to Boscombe Valley as the first image of the story. This image also marks the first appearance in his deerstalker hat, an extradiegetic element added by Paget, adapted from Doyle’s description of Holmes wearing a “close-fitting cloth cap” (78). The deerstalker hat was most commonly worn by hunters in rural areas, not by professional detectives. Many scholars believe that this hat was chosen by Paget as an allusion to Holmes’ actions as a ‘hunt’ for clues in the same way a huntsman would ‘hunt’ for deer. Holmes is seen wearing the deerstalker hat twice more in “The Boscombe Valley Mystery” and countless other times throughout Paget’s illustrations of the detective. Paget’s vision of Holmes in this hat becomes one of the most iconic trademarks of the character, cementing his place as an integral part of the Sherlock Holmes legacy. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle himself even claimed that Paget’s vision of Holmes was better than the author’s own description. Many modern adaptations of the Sherlock Holmes character as well as various other detective figures inspired by the sleuth feature this deerstalker hat despite the garment never being specifically referred to by Conan Doyle.

Pricipal Sources:

Sidney Paget, The Victorian Web

The Boscombe Valley Mystery, Arthur Conan Doyle Encyclopedia

Strand Magazine, Arthur Conan Doyle Encyclopedia