When Sherlock Got His Deerstalker.

When Sherlock Got His Deerstalker.

In 2004, a piece of publishing history was put up for sale at Sotheby’s in New York. It was an original drawing by the artist Sidney Paget, depicting Sherlock Holmes and Professor Moriarty at the Reichenbach Falls in Switzerland. The illustration was eventually sold for $220,800.

Many artists have illustrated the Sherlock Holmes stories over the years. The first was D.H. Friston, who illustrated A Study In Scarlet in 1887. Others have included George Hutchinson, Frederic Dorr Steele, and Leo O’Mealia.

But Sidney Paget remains the most famous of them all. His superb drawings have become the template for our popular image of Sherlock Holmes. This likeness has been further promoted by film, television, and theatre adaptations of the Holmes’ stories.

Sidney Paget was born in 1860 in Clerkenwell, London. He had two brothers, Walter and Henry, who also became artists. In 1881, Sidney Paget entered the Royal Academy of Arts. He later contributed 18 paintings - including nine portraits - to Royal Academy of Arts exhibitions.

However, it was as an illustrator that Sidney Paget made his mark. His work appeared in such periodicals as The Illustrated London News, The Sphere, and The Pall Mall Magazine. But his drawings for the Sherlock Holmes stories in The Strand Magazine made Sidney Paget famous.

How he came to illustrate the Holmes’ stories has been the subject of some debate. Winifred Paget (Sidney’s daughter) wrote an article for John O’London’s magazine in 1954. Winifred wrote that the editor of The Strand Magazine mistakenly contacted Sidney instead of his brother Walter; “…so Sidney got the commission and Walter, who should have had it, became the model.“ (Though Walter did illustrate one Sherlock Holmes story, The Adventure of the Dying Detective, when it was published in The Strand Magazine in 1913.)

However, Winifred’s claim was disputed in a 2019 paper published in the Baker Street Journal. Sidney Paget’s brother, Henry Marriott Paget, also denied that his brother Walter had been the model for the great detective.

Winifred Paget also wrote that, “As a model for Watson I think it is true to say that my father took an architect friend of student days, though there have been other claims to this honour.“ The individual concerned was most likely Alfred Morris Butler, who Sidney Paget befriended at the Royal Academy of Arts.

Sidney Paget’s first illustrations were for the story, A Scandal in Bohemia. He went on to illustrate the remainder of The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes for The Strand Magazine from July 1891 through to June 1892.

Paget drew a Sherlock Holmes with sharp, aquiline features. He also later introduced a deerstalker cap, together with an Inverness coat and cape, as apparel for Holmes. (Though these items of clothing do not appear in the original stories.)

In 1893, Sidney Paget illustrated The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes. He was now given more room in The Strand Magazine with full-page illustrations, together with smaller drawings. He had also become the favourite illustrator of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle himself.

Paget went on to provide illustrations for The Hound of the Baskervilles when it was serialised in The Strand Magazine from 1901-1902. He also illustrated The Return of Sherlock Holmes in The Strand Magazine from 1903-1904.

Sidney Paget died in 1908 aged just 47. During his short lifetime he had provided 356 illustrations for the Sherlock Holmes series. These covered one novel, together with 37 short stories. Sidney Paget not only enhanced the work of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, but he also gave us a depiction of Sherlock Holmes that has lasted for more than a hundred years.

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