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The Adventure of the Beryl Coronet

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"The Adventure Of The Beryl Coronet"
Short story by Arthur Conan Doyle
Holmes, Watson and Holder, 1892 illustration by Sidney Paget
Text available at Wikisource
CountryThe United Kingdom
LanguageEnglish
Genre(s)Detective fiction short stories
Publication
Published inStrand Magazine
Publication dateMay 1892
Chronology
SeriesThe Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
 
The Adventure of the Noble Bachelor 		 
The Adventure of the Copper Beeches

"The Adventure of the Beryl Coronet", one of the 56 short Sherlock Holmes stories written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, is the eleventh of the twelve stories collected in The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. The story was first published in The Strand Magazine in May 1892.

Plot

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A coronet of a British earl

A Streatham banker named Mr Alexander Holder makes a loan of £50,000 (equivalent to approximately £6.95 million in 2023[1][2]) to a client from one of the "highest, noblest, most exalted names in England," implied to be a member of the British Royal Family and, thus, a son of Queen Victoria and an heir to the throne. The client leaves the beryl coronet, described as one of the "most precious public possessions of the empire," as collateral. Feeling his bank's personal safe is insufficient to protect such a rare and valuable piece of jewellery, he takes it home and keeps it in his dressing room. However, he and his niece Mary later find his son Arthur holding the coronet, seemingly trying to bend it, with three beryls missing from it. A panicked Holder seeks out Sherlock Holmes for help.

Despite the damning evidence against Arthur, who refuses to give a statement, Holmes is unconvinced. With the threat of Holder's reputation being besmirched and a national scandal weighing heavily on his mind, Holmes determines Arthur could not have broken the coronet on his own without making noise, notices footprints in the snow outside Holder's home, and considers Holder's servants, Mary, and Arthur's rakish friend Sir George Burnwell as potential suspects.

Eventually, Holmes concludes Burnwell is a notorious criminal who conspired with Mary, unaware of his real identity, to steal the coronet. Arthur caught the pair in the act and broke the coronet while trying to take it back from Burnwell before taking the blame for Mary out of love for her. Though Burnwell and Mary escape justice, Holmes is convinced they will receive their punishment in due time. He later buys back the missing beryls from a fence that Burnwell sold them to, receives compensation from Holder, and tells him to apologize to Arthur for assuming he was the thief.

Publication history

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"The Adventure of the Beryl Coronet" was first published in the UK in The Strand Magazine in May 1892, and in the United States in the US edition of the Strand in June 1892.[3] The story was published with nine illustrations by Sidney Paget in The Strand Magazine.[4] It was included in the short story collection The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes,[4] which was published in October 1892.[5]

Adaptations

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Film and television

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The 1912 short film The Beryl Coronet was released in the Éclair film series featuring Georges Tréville as Sherlock Holmes.[6]

The story was dramatised as a 1921 silent short film as part of the Stoll film series starring Eille Norwood as Holmes.[7]

The story was adapted for an episode of the 1965 television series Sherlock Holmes with Douglas Wilmer as Holmes, Nigel Stock as Watson, Leonard Sachs as Holder and Suzan Farmer as Mary. It also featured David Burke as Sir George Burnwell. Burke would later play Watson opposite Jeremy Brett in the first two seasons of The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes.

A 2001 episode of the animated television series Sherlock Holmes in the 22nd Century, titled "The Adventure of the Beryl Board", was based on the story.[8]

The story was used in part in the Elementary episode 'How the Sausage Is Made.'[9]

Radio

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Edith Meiser adapted the story as an episode of the radio series The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes which aired on 28 January 1932, with Richard Gordon as Sherlock Holmes and Leigh Lovell as Dr Watson.[10] Other episodes adapted from the story aired on 24 March 1935 (with Louis Hector as Holmes and Lovell as Watson)[11] and 26 September 1936 (with Gordon as Holmes and Harry West as Watson).[12]

A dramatisation of "The Beryl Coronet" was broadcast on the BBC Light Programme on 30 June 1959, as part of the 1952–1969 radio series starring Carleton Hobbs as Holmes and Norman Shelley as Watson.[13] The cast also included Frederick Treves as Arthur Holder and Ronald Baddiley as Roberts. It was adapted by Michael Hardwick.[14]

"The Adventure of the Beryl Coronet" was dramatised as a 1977 episode of the series CBS Radio Mystery Theater with Kevin McCarthy as Sherlock Holmes and Court Benson as Dr. Watson.[15]

The story was adapted by Vincent McInerney for BBC Radio 4 in 1991 as an episode of the 1989–1998 radio series starring Clive Merrison as Holmes and Michael Williams as Watson. It featured Anthony Newlands as Holder, Angus Wright as Arthur, Petra Markham as Mary, and Timothy Carlton (father of Benedict Cumberbatch, another famous Sherlock) as Sir George Burnwell.[16]

A 2010 episode of the radio series The Classic Adventures of Sherlock Holmes was adapted from the story, with John Patrick Lowrie as Holmes and Lawrence Albert as Watson.[17]

Radio MirchiBangla adapted this story for their Sunday Suspense series on 12 September 2021. Mir enacted as Sherlock Holmes and Deep enacted the role of Dr. Watson.

Print

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The novel The Further Adventures of Sherlock Holmes: The Improbable Prisoner by Stuart Douglas is a subtle 'sequel' to this story.

References

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Notes
  1. ^ United Kingdom Gross Domestic Product deflator figures follow the MeasuringWorth "consistent series" supplied in Thomas, Ryland; Williamson, Samuel H. (2024). "What Was the U.K. GDP Then?". MeasuringWorth. Retrieved 15 July 2024.
  2. ^ This calculation assumes that the story takes place in 1886, which is suggested by Leslie S. Klinger in Volume I (p. 761) of The New Annotated Sherlock Holmes (W.W. Norton, 2005). The year in which the story takes place is not stated in the story, and could be considered slightly different.
  3. ^ Smith (2014), p. 66.
  4. ^ a b Cawthorne (2011), p. 71.
  5. ^ Cawthorne (2011), p. 54.
  6. ^ Eyles, Alan (1986). Sherlock Holmes: A Centenary Celebration. Harper & Row. p. 130. ISBN 0-06-015620-1.
  7. ^ Eyles, Alan (1986). Sherlock Holmes: A Centenary Celebration. Harper & Row. p. 131. ISBN 0-06-015620-1.
  8. ^ Barnes, Alan (2011). Sherlock Holmes on Screen. Titan Books. p. 226. ISBN 978-0857687760.
  9. ^ Valentine, Genevieve. "When Joan and Sherlock fight, Elementary wins". TV Club. Retrieved 21 May 2018.
  10. ^ Dickerson (2019), p. 41.
  11. ^ Dickerson (2019), p. 64.
  12. ^ Dickerson (2019), p. 76.
  13. ^ De Waal, Ronald Burt (1974). The World Bibliography of Sherlock Holmes. Bramhall House. p. 386. ISBN 0-517-217597.
  14. ^ "Sherlock Holmes". BBC iPlayer Radio. Retrieved 14 February 2018.
  15. ^ Payton, Gordon; Grams, Martin Jr. (2015) [1999]. The CBS Radio Mystery Theater: An Episode Guide and Handbook to Nine Years of Broadcasting, 1974–1982 (Reprinted ed.). McFarland. p. 229. ISBN 978-0786492282.
  16. ^ Bert Coules. "The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes". The BBC complete audio Sherlock Holmes. Retrieved 12 December 2016.
  17. ^ Wright, Stewart (30 April 2019). "The Classic Adventures of Sherlock Holmes: Broadcast Log" (PDF). Old-Time Radio. Retrieved 14 June 2020.
Sources
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