Doyle, Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan

(1859-1930)

   Scottish author and poet, Doyle was born in Edinburgh and educated at Stonyhurst Jesuit School in Lancashire, England, followed by an another year of schooling in Austria. He qualified as a doctor from Edinburgh University in 1885 and practiced at Southsea, Portsmouth, from 1882 to 1890. The insights he derived from the observation skills of his medical professor, Joseph Bell, inspired him in his legendary detective novels of Sherlock Holmes. He also wrote non-fiction: The Great Boer War (1900). The British Campaign in France and Flanders, 6 volumes (1916-20). The Crime of the Congo (1909). He was knighted in 1902 for his medical services during the South African (Boer) War. He was interested in spiritualism and psychic research. He died at Crowborough, Sussex, and in 1930, thousands filled London's Royal Albert Hall for a séance during which Estelle Roberts, the spiritualist medium, claimed to have contacted Sir Arthur. He is buried in the church yard at Minstead in the New Forest, Hampshire. Some of his poems: "A Hunting Morning," "A Parable," "A Tragedy," "Cremona," "H.M.S. Foudroyant," "Pennarby Mine," "The Old Huntsman," "The Passing," "Ware Holes."

   Sources: Arthur Conan Doyle: Poems (http://www.poetry-archive.com/d/doyle_arthur_conan.html). Dictionary of National Biography. Electronic Edition 1.1. Oxford University Press, 1997. Encyclopædia Britannica Ultimate Reference Suite DVD, 2006. The Columbia Granger's Index to Poetry. 11th ed. The Columbia Granger's World of Poetry, Columbia University Press, 2005 (http://www.columbiagrangers.org). The Home Book of Modern Verse. Burton Egbert Stevenson, ed. Henry Holt, 1953. The National Portrait Gallery (www.npg.org.uk). The Oxford Companion to English Literature. 6th edition. Margaret Drabble, ed. Oxford University Press, 2000. Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia).