I came across some unexpected material while looking for information about the novelist Beverley Nichols, who is of interest here mainly because of his children's books: I found some connections to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle that are worth highlighting.
While Conan Doyle's best-known fictional character is a private detective, he also created a witch; conversely, while the witch Miss Smith is one of Beverley Nichols's best-known characters, he also created a private detective: this was Horatio Green, who appears in five crime novels.
As previously mentioned, Beverley Nichols wrote a book to support the official British position on India; Conan Doyle too produced propaganda materials for the government - this was during the First World War.
Both Nichols and Conan Doyle were contributors to The Strand Magazine; incidentally, Winston Churchill, who was friends with these men and admired their writing, wrote several articles for this magazine.
Beverley Nichols hated his father, who like Conan Doyle's father was an alcoholic; Conan Doyle is said to have come to hate his 'son', Sherlock Holmes.
Another minor mystery in Beverley Nichols's life involves a completely false rumour that he was writing a biography of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle!
From his 1948 letter to someone who offered to help him with the book:
“Dear Dr. Ernest, Thank you so much for your kind offer of assistance. I do appreciate it as such, but I have to confess that this is the first I have heard about my forthcoming biography on Conan Doyle! The subject would certainly prove to be an interesting one, but he cannot imagine how the idea originated. 'It is all most mysterious.' “
Perhaps some people learned that Nichols had written an article about Conan Doyle in the past, and Chinese whispers turned this into writing a whole book about him in the present.
Beverley Nichols's book Are They The Same at Home? (1927) contains profiles of many illustrious people. It includes a short article titled Sir Arthur Conan Doyle or, An Ungrateful Father.
Nichols interviewed Conan Doyle in person; he describes Conan Doyle as having 'pale, distant eyes', a 'soft and even voice' and a passionate interest in Spiritualism.
He reports that Conan Doyle spoke of Sherlock Holmes as if he were a real person, but one that he didn't like very much. Conan Doyle appreciated what Holmes had done for him financially, but had become very tired of him. He insulted his readers with this comment:
“'I feel he, and all his doings, probably appeal to a lower level of intelligence than the things that absorb me now.' (Meaning, of course, the study of spiritualism.)”
Beverley Nichols goes on to say that Conan Doyle was being a little hard on his creation, and that he would rather have one story about Sherlock Holmes than a whole volume of spirit messages.
Despite the above comment, Beverley Nichols shared Conan Doyle's interest in psychic phenomena.
He went ghost hunting in a haunted house in Torquay in Devon in 1920; Conan Doyle, who was a member of The Ghost Club, gave a lecture on life after death in Torquay in 1920.
Both Beverley Nichols and Conan Doyle wrote horror stories for The Strand Magazine.
Beverley Nichols wrote about ghosts, premonitions, telepathy and many other paranormal topics in Powers That Be (1966).
