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After a triumphant tour in the United States, the play opened in London at the Lyceum Theater in the fall of 1901. The British critics panned it, but as it often happens, vox populi prevailed, and the play was a huge success.
The inspiration for his next novel came from a prolonged stay in the Devonshire moors, which included a visit to Dartmoor the famous prison. At first, it was based mainly on local folklore about an inhospitable manor, an escaped convict and a huge black sepulchral hound. As the novel progressed, he came to realize that his story lacked a hero. He is quoted as having said, "Why should I invent such a character, when I already have him in the form of Sherlock Holmes." However, rather than resurrecting the detective, the author wrote the story as if it was a previously untold adventure. Continued...  Back to Biography page 1 |
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When the Boer War started, Conan Doyle declared to his horrified family that he was going to volunteer. Having written about many battles, without the opportunity to test his skills as a soldier, he felt this would be his last opportunity to do so. Not surprisingly, being somewhat overweight at the age of forty, he was deemed unfit to enlist. Without losing an instant, he volunteered as a medical doctor and sailed to Africa in February of 1900. There, instead of fighting bullets, Conan Doyle had to wage a fierce battle against microbes. During the few months he spent in Africa, he saw more soldiers and medical staff die of typhoid fever, than of war wounds. 
Exhausted and disappointed, Conan Doyle opted for yet another change of direction when he returned to England. He threw himself headfirst into politics by running for a seat in Central Edinburgh, which he described as being the "premier Radical stronghold of Scotland. "Having been raised by Jesuits, he was unfairly accused of being a Catholic bigot. To his credit, he lost the election by only a narrow margin and went back to London and to being an author.