Historical tours in London – learn about Sherlock Holmes

Everyone has heard of 221B Baker Street. It must be one of the most famous, if not the most famous, addresses in the world. It is (or was) the home of the world’s most famous consulting detective Sherlock Holmes.

You can, if you so desire, make your way to Baker Street and pay a visit to the Sherlock Holmes Museum which now claims the address of 221B Baker Streets.

Until fairly recently 221 was a little further along Baker Street and was the headquarters of the Abbey National Building Society. They used to receive so many letters, from all over the world, addressed to Sherlock Holmes they actually tasked a specific employee with answering everyone of the letters. Nowadays, the Abbey National has moved on, and the letters are delivered to the Museum.

221B Baker Street, Sherlock Holmes Museum, London, England, UK by Jordan 1972

But there are lots of locations around London that you can still visit on London discovery tours that have association with Sherlock Holmes and his faithful sidekick Dr John H. Watson.

A must for all hunters of things Sherlockian is the Sherlock Holmes Pub in Northumberland Avenue, just off Trafalgar Square. Its walls are adorned with all manner of Holmesian memorabilia, from old copies of the Strand Magazine (the publication in which the majority of the stories appear) to a TV that screens black and white films, albeit with the volume turned down!

But the chief glory of the pub is to be found in its upstairs bar. For here you will find an exact replica of Holmes and Watson’s sitting room at 221B Baker Street.

Elsewhere in London, in Giltspur Street. Over in the City of London, and a few streets away from St Paul’s cathedral, you will find St Bartholomew’s Hospital. This is the oldest hospital in London to still stand on its original site. It was in the pathology department of the Hospital that Holmes and Watson met in the first story A Study In Scarlet.

Main entrance to St Bartholomew’s Hospital, London, England, UK by DisillusionedBitterAndKnackered

More recently it was from the roof of the Pathology Department that Holmes, apparently, leapt to his death at the end of series two of the BBC series Sherlock, starring Benedict Cumberbatch.

A red phone box, which stands next to the wall of the Pathology Department on Giltspur Street, has now become a place of pilgrimage to distraught Sherlock Fans from all over the world and they arrive here to post notes on the windows of the box assuring Holmes, and Watson, of their undying devotion. “Come back Sherlock, we miss you,” “Japan Love Sherlock Holmes,” and “You really did it rather well,” are just some of the messages that have been left on this phone box in recent weeks by eager Holmesian fans.

So, if you really want to explore Sherlock Holmes’s London, you can do what so many people do and go searching for him and Watson along the busy baker Street. But by far the most rewarding way to experience his London is to track him through the streets, alleyways and thoroughfares of the Victorian and Edwardian Metropolis that felt that little bit safer in the knowledge that Holmes deductive skills were always on hand to defeat even the most dastardly villain!

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Sarah Hewitt is a new blogger who blogs about anything and everything. You can contact her via her Twitter page or Google+

Tags: 221B Baker Street, Abbey National Building Society, Dr John H. Watson, Giltspur Street, Northumberland Avenue, Pathology Department, Sherlock Holmes, Sherlock Holmes Pub, Trafalgar Square

Category: Cities, Cities