Sunday 29 September 2019

Sherlockian Sojourns - Special #3: Practices Make Perfect

In October 1876, Conan Doyle entered the Medical School at Edinburgh University. Seeking to make the most of the long recess at the end of each academic year, and following the birth of his youngest sister, Dodo,  meaning that his family was in financial difficulties, in 1878 Conan Doyle advertised for a temporary opening as a doctor's assistant. He undertook two such placements in 1878 and one in 1879. (In 1880, he took the decision to become surgeon on the whaling ship 'Hope' sailing from Peterhead).

Over the past year I have visited all three practices where Conan Doyle worked as an assistant. For ease, I have placed my accounts in the order that the placements were undertaken by Conan Doyle, rather than the order of my visits.



07/09/2019 - 86 Spital Hill, Sheffield, Yorkshire.

Conan Doyle's first placement was in April 1878, when he was taken on by Dr Charles Sydney Richardson, an Irishman who had done part of his training in Edinburgh, and now worked as a general practitioner on Spital Hill, an inner-city area of Sheffield. It seems that Conan Doyle did not get along with Dr Richardson or Sheffield patients, and he left after three weeks, glossing over a serious clash of personalities, blaming his youth, later writing:'These Sheffielders would rather be poisoned by a man with a beard than saved by a man without one.'

He did at least appear to have ventured out of the city into the Peak District, where his memory of the eerie limestone caves in the Penine hills later provided material for one of his most spine-chilling stories – 'The Terror of Blue John Gap'.

The site of the practice was a building on the corner of Spital Hill and Hallcar Street, which is now the New Roots CafĂ© and Burngreave Ashram. I visited the building as the last stop on a tour of locations used in Series 11 of 'Doctor Who', carried out with a friend. 
 






27/09/2019 – Cliffe House, Big Walls, Ruyton-XI-Towns, Shrewsbury.

Having left Sheffield, Conan Doyle was resigned to returning to Edinburgh and taking a lowly, but salaried job as a hospital dresser. However, at the last minute, he was offered a temporary position with another former Edinburgh graduate, Dr. Henry Elliott, who had a general practice in the exotic-sounding village of Ruyton-XI-Towns, in Shropshire (eleven miles outside Shrewsbury). He began this job in July 1878, living in Cliffe House. He later recalled Ruyton in his 'Memories and Recollections' (1923) as:

not big enough to make one town, far less eleven".

However, he again had problems with his employer, a man in his thirties, who turned out to be coarse and bad tempered. Elliott exploded when his young assistant dared argue against capital punishment, saying that he would not have such things said in his house. Conan Doyle calmly replied that he had a right to voice his opinions when and where he wanted, and it would seem that during his time with Dr. Elliott, he discovered an ability to stand up for himself, and his self-esteem grew appreciably. However, he spent only four months in this position, returning to his studies in Edinburgh in October 1878.

I made my pilgrimage following several days visiting Cardiff, Southerndown, Monmouth and Hay-on-Wye, catching a bus from Shrewsbury. Due to a lack of regular buses, I chose to get off at a stop just inside the village, and walk to Cliffe House. The first point of interest that I passed was the parish's World War I war memorial, which is an 8ft carved cave within the sandstone cliff of the Brownhill, and is unique to Shropshire. It was conceived by the London architect Stanley Vaughan after a visit to Ruyton. It was created by local father-and-son stonemasons Warwick and Len Edwards. The benches within the arch and the cross are all carved out of rock. The memorial was unveiled in October 1920. The names of fallen from both the First and Second World Wars are listed on plaques within the archway.




Continuing along, and passing the parish churchyard, after about a further fifteen minutes, I found myself at Cliffe House. Unfortunately, at this point the heavens opened, and I had to shelter under my umbrella. The house is now a private residence, but as the gates to the drive were open, I took my chance to rush up it, take a few photos of the house, then rush back down again.







Walking further on, I reached The Cross, sensibly at a crossroads. This gave some of the history of the town, and also indicated that it had been named in the Domesday Book. The village acquired its unusual name in the twelfth century when a castle was built, and it became the major manor of eleven local townships, leading to the Roman numerals for eleven being included in its name. The eleven were Ruyton, Coton, Shotatton, Eardiston, Wykey and Shelvock (a possible source for a certain detective’s first name) which remain in the parish; and Felton, Haughton, Rednal, Sutton and Tedsmore, which are now in the parish of West Felton. 
 
 
 
 

I decided to retrace my steps to the original bus stop as it was the only one with a shelter. On the way back, I decided to pop into the churchyard. Parts of the parish church date from the 1130s. Lying in the Welsh Marches, Ruyton castle was destroyed in 1202 by the Welsh. It was rebuilt by 1313 but was destroyed again by Owain Glyndwr. Its ruins stand in the churchyard.



Catching a bus back into Shrewsbury, I spent the rest of the morning touring Shrewsbury Prison (near the site of the Dana Gaol, a medieval prison), decommissioned in 2013, and undertaking some of the Charles Darwin town trail, Shrewsbury being his birthplace, before catching a train to Coventry where I was to attend Coventry Comic Con the next day.


 








01/06/2019 - 63 Aston Road North, Birmingham, West Midlands.

In May 1879, Conan Doyle was ready for a further period of hands-on medicine as an assistant to Dr. Reginald Ratcliff Hoare in the Midlands. Conan Doyle had hoped that Dr. Hoare's surgery, Clifton House in Aston Road North, Birmingham, would be located in a semi-rural suburb, but was instead on a busy thoroughfare, with tramlines and shops on either side. However, this was an eye-opener for Conan Doyle as he saw for himself that an inner-city general practice could be a lucrative business, with Dr. Hoare earning £3,000 per year. Conan Doyle is also said to have become friends with one of the first surgeons in charge of the Thimble Lane dispensary (a branch of the main city one), whose name was David Holmes (possibly inspiring a certain detective's surname). It was also around this time that he sold his first story to Chambers Journal - 'The Mystery of Sasassa Valley'.

I visited Aston Road North, which has a plaque commemorating its previous occupant, following attending Collectormania 2019 at NEC Birmingham (where I had met Vernon Dobtcheff who has played Holmes, and bought some very unofficial 'Sherlock' miniatures). Catching a train from Birmingham International to Birmingham New Street, I undertook the half-hour walk to the site of the former practice, finding it difficult to negotiate the 'busy thoroughfare' to reach my destination. 




Photos taken of the building, and I retraced my steps, catching the train back to Birmingham International and then home.

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