Review: Britain's Greatest Detective by Nell Darby

Synopsis: From his offices at Basinghall Street in the City of London, Henry Slater presided over Britain's best-known private detective agency, king of all he surveyed. In the late Victorian era, and into the twentieth century, his name was synonymous with the Golden Age of private detection; he was a truly modern operator, utilising the press and technology, and creating innovative publicity campaigns to keep his agency in the public eye.

One of the key skills of the private detective was the ability to make friends - to infiltrate the lives of individuals, and to get them to trust them with their secrets. Slater, however, would make one mistake: to befriend the wrong person and to entrust them with his secrets. When that friendship ended, competition in the private detective world would lead to a trial so infamous that Winston Churchill himself came to watch proceedings play out at the Old Bailey. The trial would destroy Henry Slater's career, and expose his real identity.

This is the first in-depth study of private detective work in nineteenth and early twentieth century Britain, looking at the 'Golden Age' of private detectives and the work they did. It provides a fascinating look at the type of person who became a private detective, the people who wanted to be their clients - and the crimes that could be committed along the way. This book sheds new light on this profession, building on the author's previous work on female private detectives in order to enable the reader to gain a better understanding of a job that people of all classes desired to do. But it is also about the career of one man. Sherlock Holmes may have been the most famous fictional private detective, but Henry Slater was, for twenty years, the real star of the private detective world.

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This book does what is sets out to do - gives the reader an entree into the world of the early private detectives, the people drawn to this type of work, the methods used, and the cases they were typically involved in. Anchoring this tome is the character of Henry Slater - the self proclaimed "greatest detective" of his time.

Darby notes that it was with the passing of the Matrimonial Causes Act 1857 that gave rise to the private detective as courts required evidence of matrimonial misdeeds in order to grant a divorce. This was primarily the type of work available for the private detective, especially one with no connection to the police department.

It is against this that Darby focuses on the case that brought down Slater and his agency - the Pollard divorce case - and highlighted the underhanded dealings that went on to secure the evidence (ie: honey trap, payment of witnesses). None of this would have come to light had Slater not spurned the friendship of one of his employees - Francis Stevens - ".. a man who would do anything to get revenge ..." - including setting up a rival agency and using others to bring about Slater's downfall.

The proceeding court case against Slater and his employees is followed in detail, always referring back to the original Pollard divorce case and methodology used in gaining the required evidence.

Darby follows through to not only the conclusion of the case against Slater et al, but also what followed afterwards for the main players in this drama. Did they get off or were all incarcerated? What happened to the Pollards?

At times the construction of the narrative was a little annoying as it tended to go back and forward in the timeline, but overall it was quite easy to follow. The research that went into this tome is very evident, a times a little dry but never uninteresting.

Definitely one for those interested in the detective agencies that were the UK equivalent of Pinkertons in the 19th and 20th centuries.