dr Angela Buckley
- crime historian and author
- PhD in Victorian and Edwardian police detective practice
- researcher of historical murder cases, the history of CSI & forensic science
- member of the Society of Authors, the Crime Writers’ Association, and
- the Historical Writers Association
- associate lecturer at Oxford Brookes University
- drangelabuckley.com
THE SCIENCE OF SLEUTHING: THE EVOLUTION OF ENGLISH DETECTIVE PRACTICE IN THE INVESTIGATION OF HOMICIDE, 1836-1914
The investigation of murder has captured the public's imagination since the early nineteenth century, and the fascination with detectives and their sleuthing adventures endures today. Yet, despite the widespread interest, little is known about how the first professional police detectives developed their investigative skills, especially in relation to homicide. Based on a study of regional archival sources and assize court depositions, this paper will examine and evaluate the practice of Victorian and Edwardian borough police detectives in regional murder cases. Through a comparison of homicide investigations in Manchester, Liverpool and Birmingham, it will provide evidence of the strategies employed by borough detectives as they worked on murder cases, including traditional methods such as surveillance and information gathering, and scientific techniques such as crime scene examination, photography, trace analysis and fingerprinting. In addition, it will assess their dual role as investigators and prosecutors, which will include the identification, tracking and apprehension of suspects and the collection of evidence, as well as their use of visual aids in court. The study will also reveal how murder investigations were organised in the borough detective departments in relation to suspect management and processing, and the preservation of evidence. This paper will demonstrate that English borough detective officers were professional, innovative and adaptive from the earliest years of the new police. It will chart the evolution of their practice throughout the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, which formed the foundation for crime detection practices today.
The investigation of murder has captured the public's imagination since the early nineteenth century, and the fascination with detectives and their sleuthing adventures endures today. Yet, despite the widespread interest, little is known about how the first professional police detectives developed their investigative skills, especially in relation to homicide. Based on a study of regional archival sources and assize court depositions, this paper will examine and evaluate the practice of Victorian and Edwardian borough police detectives in regional murder cases. Through a comparison of homicide investigations in Manchester, Liverpool and Birmingham, it will provide evidence of the strategies employed by borough detectives as they worked on murder cases, including traditional methods such as surveillance and information gathering, and scientific techniques such as crime scene examination, photography, trace analysis and fingerprinting. In addition, it will assess their dual role as investigators and prosecutors, which will include the identification, tracking and apprehension of suspects and the collection of evidence, as well as their use of visual aids in court. The study will also reveal how murder investigations were organised in the borough detective departments in relation to suspect management and processing, and the preservation of evidence. This paper will demonstrate that English borough detective officers were professional, innovative and adaptive from the earliest years of the new police. It will chart the evolution of their practice throughout the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, which formed the foundation for crime detection practices today.
Professor RUTH HEHOLT
Professor of Literature and Culture,
Falmouth University in Cornwall
author of Catherine Crowe: Gender, Genre, and Radical Politics
(Routledge 2020)
co-author of Gothic Kernow: Cornwall as Strange Fiction
(Anthem Press 2022)
co-editor of e.g. Folk Horror: New Global Pathways, Gothic Britain:
Dark Places in the Provinces and Margins of the British Isles (2018)
and Haunted Landscapes (2017)
organiser of Haunted Landscapes (2023)
Crones, Crime, and the Gothic (2022)
and Folk Horror in the Twentieth Century (2019)
leader of Dark Economies Scholarly Association (DESA)
editor of the peer reviewed journal Revenant:
Critical and Creative Studies of the Supernatural
revenantjournal.com
‘CHOCK FULL OF UNEASE’: THE PSY-DETECTIVE AND THE SPACE FOR EMPATHY
The figure of the detective has, historically, been confident, willing, and often masterful: from Sherlock Holmes to Miss Marple, from the American hard-boiled to the dark detectives of Nordic noir. Yet at the same time detective figures are often being mavericks, outsiders, damaged and alone. This paper looks at two detectives of the latter sort – Nicci French’s Frieda Klein, a psychotherapist, and Val McDermid’s Tony Hill, a psychologist. Crime fiction of course has employed psychiatrist figures before, both as villain and detective. However, Klein and Hill stand out. They are troubled souls, filled with trauma, familial estrangement, loneliness, and loss. They are outsiders who do not fit easily into any category. I will argue that Freida Klein and Tony Hill allow a space for the reader that is absent in most other serial killer texts. Their independence, social failures, and unease manage to engage the reader in their personal and detection journey in a way that is both radical and unusual. The crime fiction genre incessantly plays with the reader. However, the novels featuring Klein and Hill invite an affective reading similar to that of the realist Victorian novels, offering space for empathy from the reader. Can we gain a type of ethical insight from these crime fiction novels? Is this at odds with the usual gains and pleasures present for the reader in serial killer crime fiction? This conference’s raison d’etre is to re-examine the serial killer narrative and the move away from ‘killer as anti-hero’. This paper argues that the series’ that feature Tony Hill and Frieda Klein have shifted the genre in favour of a narrative empathy that embraces the detective and their ‘families of choice’.
The figure of the detective has, historically, been confident, willing, and often masterful: from Sherlock Holmes to Miss Marple, from the American hard-boiled to the dark detectives of Nordic noir. Yet at the same time detective figures are often being mavericks, outsiders, damaged and alone. This paper looks at two detectives of the latter sort – Nicci French’s Frieda Klein, a psychotherapist, and Val McDermid’s Tony Hill, a psychologist. Crime fiction of course has employed psychiatrist figures before, both as villain and detective. However, Klein and Hill stand out. They are troubled souls, filled with trauma, familial estrangement, loneliness, and loss. They are outsiders who do not fit easily into any category. I will argue that Freida Klein and Tony Hill allow a space for the reader that is absent in most other serial killer texts. Their independence, social failures, and unease manage to engage the reader in their personal and detection journey in a way that is both radical and unusual. The crime fiction genre incessantly plays with the reader. However, the novels featuring Klein and Hill invite an affective reading similar to that of the realist Victorian novels, offering space for empathy from the reader. Can we gain a type of ethical insight from these crime fiction novels? Is this at odds with the usual gains and pleasures present for the reader in serial killer crime fiction? This conference’s raison d’etre is to re-examine the serial killer narrative and the move away from ‘killer as anti-hero’. This paper argues that the series’ that feature Tony Hill and Frieda Klein have shifted the genre in favour of a narrative empathy that embraces the detective and their ‘families of choice’.