Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1920-07-08
Wanted: A Sherlock
Holmes
By Frederic J. Haskin
n YEW YORK, July "A wealthy
~ sportsman who is a man of
many flirtations is found

Il
| many flirtations Is found
seated in an armchair of his
house with a bullet hole through his
brain. The wholetoWn is agog.- All
Of it's detective brains are at work on
the problem, and all of it's best news
paper talent is following them and
recording their every move. Yet
after weeks If hard work, scarcely
to be excelled for thoroughness, no
arrest had been made when this was
written.
The mystery may be ultimately
solved, bpt if it is not, it will take
it's place as one Of a long list of UNI
solved murder mysteries. 1t is true
the police capture large percentage
of murderers, but 1t is also true that
the total number of such mysteries
which are never solved is very large.
And of these unusolved murder mys-
teeies you will note that a great
many of them have one thing in COM
mon: they are not murders commit
ted for the purpose of robbery. This
means that they are not the work of
professional criminals, but or normal
and ordinarily lay-abiding men who
have been driven to crime by some
high passion such as jealousy, re-
venge, or outraged honor.
These facts suggest that, while
our police and detective systems are
effective in catching professional
criminals, they are often helpless
WnGn Will TIC "OIh VI q
man who. is a criminal only by
chance. A study Of modern detective
methods tends strongly to bear out
this idear. If you study these meth
DDS you will find that they are moth
ing like the methods. of the, detec,-
tives of fiction, such as Sherlock
Holmes of Conan Doyle's stories, and
the Dupin of Poe's Murders in the
Rue Morgue" These Imaginary gen.
tlemen worked by logic. They de-
f.. u, Or en-
worked out what Is popularity called
the personal equation. And these
fiction detectives were no doubt
based to some extent upon detec-
tives who had worked in real life
before the development OF crime de-
lection as a science.
Foe as a Detective
These fiction detectives have been
much ridiculed because, it Is said.
such methods as they used are not
used by real detectives: 1t is true
that they are not used by modern
detectives, but it is not so certain
in his famous story, 1.-THE Murder of
Marie Roget" took famous murder
mystery which happened in New
York, changed the name OF the girl
and removed the scene of crime to
Paris. He then -wrole his story, US
ing the facts of the crime just as
they were, and hemade out a very
convincing case to the effect that all
of the detectives were working on the
wrong clue. He also pointed out
very convincingly what was proba-
bly, the right clue. He showed that
the detectives were wasting their
time in almost indiscriminate ques-
tioning of persons who had been near
the scene of the crime, and In the
investigation of the scene itself and
he MI showed
that by studying the girls. character
and associations, by constructing q
picture of her life, the man who had
killed her could bediscovered II at
If Poe were alive, the Elwell muir
ly another such opportunity. For
here again the detectives have been
b,1zzing busily about the scene Of
the crime. They have discovered
priceless facts as that Elwell bought
a paper just before he was killed.
take him home, and that he had re-
moved his false teeth when he was,
shot. They have compiled cata-
logue of his flirtations. But, as far
as one can judge by reading the
study the mans life as a whole, with
view to discovering the points OF
contact which could have given rise
to such crime of violence. This is
the thing that Sherlock Holmes or
Dupin would have done, as soon as the
scene of the crime had definitely
failed to yield promising clue.
No doubt it is highly presumptfve
to sit in chair and tell other peo-
pie how the thing ought to be done.
But is Is everyone's privilege to
speculate about great crime, and
we. are going to have our fling at