Sherlock Holmes

Sherlock Holmes's History

Details about Sherlock Holmes' life are scarce in Conan Doyle's stories. Nevertheless, mentions of his early life and extended family paint a loose biographical picture of the detective.

An estimate of Holmes's age in "His Last Bow" places his year of birth at 1854; the story, set in August 1914, describes him as sixty years of age.His parents are not mentioned in the stories, although Holmes mentions that his "ancestors" were "country squires". In "The Adventure of the Greek Interpreter", he claims that his grandmother was sister to the French artist Vernet, without clarifying whether this was Claude Joseph, Carle, or Horace Vernet. Holmes's brother Mycroft, seven years his senior, is a government official. Mycroft has a unique civil service position as a kind of human database for all aspects of government policy. He lacks Sherlock's interest in physical investigation, however, preferring to spend his time at the Diogenes Club.

Holmes says that he first developed his methods of deduction as an undergraduate; his earliest cases, which he pursued as an amateur, came from fellow university students. A meeting with a classmate's father led him to adopt detection as a profession,[19] and he spent several years after university as a consultant before financial difficulties led him to accept John H. Watson as a fellow lodger.

The two take lodgings at 221B Baker Street, London, an apartment at the upper (north) end of the street, up seventeen steps.

Holmes worked as a detective for twenty-three years, with physician John Watson assisting him for seventeen.They were roommates before Watson's 1888 marriage and again after his wife's death. Their residence is maintained by their landlady, Mrs. Hudson. Most of the stories are frame narratives, written from Watson's point of view as summaries of the detective's most interesting cases. Holmes frequently calls Watson's writing sensational and populist, suggesting that it fails to accurately and objectively report the "science" of his craft.