~The Book Of Wonder Encyclopaedia~

Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle was born in Edinburgh on the 22^nd May 1859. He was the eldest son of Charles Altamont Doyle, ( a civil servant and youngest son of John Doyle who was the caricaturist known as 'H.B.' ) and Mary Foley Doyle, - who's ancestry could be traced back to the Percy's - the Dukes and Earls of Northumberland, and from there to the lineage of the Plantagenet's.

Conan Doyle was educated locally until he was sent to Lancashire when he was nine years old. Here he attended the Jesuit prep school, Hodder, then Stonyhurst, the Jesuit senior school. He passed his Matriculation Exam and went to study at the Jesuit college in Feldkirch, Austria returning after a year to Edinburgh where he studied medicine at the University from 1876 to 1881 . It was during this time that he had his first story, 'The Mystery of Sasassa Valley', published. (Chambers' Journal - 1879). While he was studying Conan Doyle undertook work as a medical assistant in various places across the country, then as a ship's doctor on an Arctic Whaler - Hope of Peterhead.

Shortly after gaining his MB. CM(Edin.) Doyle served as a ship's doctor again, this time on a voyage to West Africa on the steamer Mayumba, from which he returned in 1882 to set up in partnership with Dr George Turnavine Budd in Plymouth. This was unsuccessful so Doyle left and moved to Southsea where he was very popular as a general practitioner.

In 1885 Conan Doyle and Louise Hawkins married; Louise was the sister of one of Conan Doyle's patients and was in poor health being afflicted with tuberculosis. That same year Conan Doyle was awarded the MD(Edin.)
In 1889 their eldest child, Mary Louise Conan Doyle, was born, followed by a son, Alleyn Kingsley Conan Doyle in 1892.

While living in Southsea, after having many short stories and medical articles published, Conan Doyle began to seriously concentrate on his novel writing again, resulting in the publication of 'A Study in Scarlet' in 1887 - containing his new creation of the detective 'Sherlock Holmes'. This theme was to last until 1893 when to the world's chagrin Holmes was killed off in a death struggle between himself and his arch-enemy Moriarty.

Conan Doyle and Louise were in Cairo when war broke out between the British and the Dervishes; Conan Doyle became a war correspondent reporting back to the Westminster Gazette. This was to become a pattern for him.

During the Boer War Conan Doyle was asked by John Langman to be involved with the sending and overseeing of a field hospital to South Africa, which he did gladly as he had tried to join up with the Middlesex Yeomanry and been placed on a waiting list. Whilst in South Africa he wrote about the conditions, the suffering and the war. He practiced medicine until 1891.

The death of Louise in 1906 affected him so much he was unable to concentrate on his work. Then he began to take an interest in a case of miscarriage of justice.

Conan Doyle's investigations and articles caused indignation around the country resulting in a Government committee being formed to report on the case.

Conan Doyle had a close friendship for many years with Jean Leckie and in 1907 they married. Their first son was born in 1909, Denis Percy Stewart Conan Doyle, their second, Adrian Malcolm Conan Doyle in 1910, followed by a daughter, Jean Lean Annette Conan Doyle in 1912.

As well as being a prolific and extremely talented writer he was an inveterate campaigner. In the course of his life Conan Doyle had twice stood for Parliament; been President of the Divorce Law Reform Union; campaigned against Belgian oppression in the Congo and declared for Irish Home Rule.

When the first stirrings towards war between England and Germany began Conan Doyle was advocating a link between Britain and Europe in the form of a tunnel under the English Channel, something that has only recently become an actuality. When war was declared Conan Doyle helped to form a local volunteer force, but was soon himself in the midst of the fighting as a war correspondent again.

During this time he declared his serious interest in Spiritualism and psychic methods of communication into which he had been doing research for the previous twenty years including experiments with telepathy. After the death of his eldest son Alleyn Kingsley, and his brother, Brigadier General Innes Doyle, he became involved with a global crusade for Spiritualism.