hen Arthur Conan Doyle’s first Holmes short stories, beginning with A Scandal in Bohemia, were accepted for publication in the fledgeling Strand Magazine, a commission for the illustrations was not sent to Walter Paget (below, left), as was intended, but rather to his older brother Sidney (at right).

Requiring a model who approximated ACD’s description of Sherlock Holmes, Sidney asked Walter to sit for him. This all turned out to be a happy accident indeed, for these illustrations were so linked to the successful series, at least in Britain, that the artwork of one brother and the physical likeness of the other became synonomous with Sherlock Holmes. After Sidney died in 1908, it was only apropos that Walter picked up the pen: he illustrated one Holmes story, The Adventure of the Dying Detective, in 1913.

Many of the illustrations peppered throughout this site are those of Sidney Paget, and are taken from facsimiles of the original Strand stories. To view more illustrations, please wander on over to the excellent Sidney Paget and Walter Paget galleries gracing the walls at Camden House.

Images are from The Life & Times of Sherlock Holmes by Peter Weller.