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Our work
Our aim is to publicise the Conan Doyle Collection locally and internationally. To do this, we attend and create local events and work with other partners on projects to promote access and to the Collection.
City Of Stories
Portsmouth City Council have been awarded a grant by Arts Council England to deliver the project City of Stories. A two year programme of activities consisting of a festival of stories, creative writing, storytelling and narratives via a range of media. This work will be inspired by the Arthur Conan Doyle Collection, that of other local writers and the City Archive.
Writers, poets, storytellers and artists will inspire a creative programme and stories will be celebrated through:
- Four story centres based within four of the libraries
- Summers of Sherlock, 2018 & 2019
- Portsmouth Short Story Competitions, children and adults
- Book Fest
- City Read - Stardust by Neil Gaiman 2018, TBC 2019
- Poet in Residence, Portsmouth History Centre
- Conan Doyle group workshops in History Centre
The programme will provide networking and support to enhance a robust literary community.to deliver beyond the life of the project.
Our key aims are:
- Celebrate Portsmouth stories from the archives
- Provide inspirational opportunities for people to learn from the archives
- To increase participation with archives by transforming means of access
- To raise awareness of archives and enhance the sense of ownership and
- community cohesion
- Increase the number and breadth of residents engaging with great writers and
- storytellers
- Embed partnerships between cultural partners and creative providers
- To build skills and resilience in staff and volunteers
ARVON Writers Residency
In January 2018, 8 blind and partially sighted writers and 5 sighted writers took part in an opportunity to have a week long residency at The Hurst in Shropshire. The week was supported by tutors Jake Arnott and KerryYoung. Using the theme of crime writing, each writer developed their practice, and will be showcasing their work in Portsmouth, Summer 2018.
RNIB Sensing Culture
Sensory Exhibition
We have been working with the Royal National Institute for the Blind on a project funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund to assist five museums in the South East in making their collections more accessible for blind and partially sighted visitors.
The Conan Doyle Collection has developed a mini touring exhibition which will give visitors with visual impairments or other disabilities the ability to experience the Collection through audio description and handling objects with a difference.
If you would like to hire the exhibition, please contact Laura - Laura.Weston@portsmouthcc.gov.uk.
Explore the collection
A Map of Great Britain
A map of Great Briatin which hung on the wall of Sherlock Holmes' study
Pterodactyls from The Lost World, Strand Magazine
Pterodactyls from The Lost World in The Strand Magazine, July 1912
Photo of Arthur Conan Doyle honouring W T Stead's memorial
Photograph of Arthur Conan Doyle with his wife, Jean, George Vale Owen, Mr Ticknor and other…
Conan Doyle at the Seaside
This photograph was taken during a Doyle family holiday in 1913 in the Essex seaside resort of…
Photograph of the Study for Sherlock - finishing touches
Putting the finishing touches to Portsmouth MIND's creation of a Study in Sherlock
Photo of South View Lodge - 53 Kent Road in Southsea
Conan Doyle bought this house in June 1896.(February 2015)
Books in the Playing Sherlock Exhibition
Examples of the books from the Collection selected for the Playing Sherlock Exhibition.
Tea poster
Tea towel designed by Jackie Goodrum (2016) based on the set of the BBC series, Sherlock
Photograph of Arthur Conan Doyle with Craigie Aitchison KC
Taken in Edinburgh after the Oscar Slater Appeal hearing, 10 July 1928. (July 2012)
Photograph of Conan Doyle taken in Portsmouth
Doyle threw himself into the life of the city and set up his practice in Elm Grove.
Photo of Arthur Conan Doyle standing by Innes Conan Doyle's grave
After the end of the First World War, Conan Doyle's brother, Innes, took part in relief work in…
The Railway Tour of Canada
Doyle and his wife travelled Canada on a tour of the newly opened Grand Trunk Pacific Railway in…
Photo of Arthur Conan Doyle with Jasper Ball Club and Edson team before a baseball game
Arthur Conan Doyle with Jasper Ball Club and Edson team before a baseball game, 14 June 1914…
Mummy Disguise from To Catch a Thief workshop
A thousand-year-old mummy, swathed in bandages (with stitches in his head and one red eye) is…
Photo Arthur Conan Doyle on a boat returning from the Boer War
Arthur Conan Doyle with Bertram Fletcher Robinson and H W Nevinson returning from South Africa on…
Photograph of Arthur Conan Doyle cycling
A postcard of Arthur Conan Doyle on a bicycle.
Photo from the 1925 Lost World production
Lewis Stone as Sir John Roxton, Bessie Love as Paula White, Lloyd Hughes as Edward Malone.
Photo of Conan Doyle in the Garden at Bignell Wood
Arthur Conan Doyle hoping to attract fairies in the garden of Bignell Wood.

- 1A Map of Great Britain
- 2Pterodactyls from The Lost World, Strand Magazine
- 3Photo of Arthur Conan Doyle honouring W T Stead's memorial
- 4Conan Doyle at the Seaside
- 5Photograph of the Study for Sherlock - finishing touches
- 6Photo of South View Lodge - 53 Kent Road in Southsea
- 7Books in the Playing Sherlock Exhibition
- 8Tea poster
- 9Photograph of Arthur Conan Doyle with Craigie Aitchison KC
- 10Photograph of Conan Doyle taken in Portsmouth
- 11Photo of Arthur Conan Doyle standing by Innes Conan Doyle's grave
- 12The Railway Tour of Canada
- 13Photo of Arthur Conan Doyle with Jasper Ball Club and Edson team before a baseball game
- 14Mummy Disguise from To Catch a Thief workshop
- 15Photo Arthur Conan Doyle on a boat returning from the Boer War
- 16Photograph of Arthur Conan Doyle cycling
- 17Photo from the 1925 Lost World production
- 18Photo of Conan Doyle in the Garden at Bignell Wood
