The Robbery at Rudwick House

‘A very entertaining yarn’ New York Times ‘Whitechurch’s writing was of a higher quality than that of many other detective novelists of his time’ Martin Edwards This 2025 Spitfire Publishers ebook and paperback edition represent the first republication of this classic of the ‘Golden Age of Crime’ in almost a century Includes a complete bibliography of Victor Whitechurch’s crime novels Brooks, the new footman at Rudwick House is not all he seems. He is attentive to Lady Middleton and a help to Hudson, the household’s rather elderly butler. He appears to fit in seamlessly with the domestic staff at Sir Henry’s country house on the South Coast of England. Meanwhile two miles away in the Cathedral city of Frattenbury, Archdeacon Cyril Lakenham is dealing with the fallout from his brother’s untimely death in America – wills, codicils and the imminent arrival on the transatlantic liner, Berengaria, of his brother’s widow and son. The collision of these apparently unrelated individuals will test the experience and resolve of both Inspector Fraser of Scotland Yard’s C.I.D. and Southshire Police’s Superintendent King. About the Author Victor Lorenzo Whitechurch was a Church of England clergyman and noted English crime novelist. He was born in Norham, Northumberland in 1868 and trained to be a vicar at Chichester Theological College and Durham University. Relatively late in life Victor became rather infatuated with the detective novel and between 1912 and 1932 wrote seven, many centred around the fictional South Downs cathedral and university city of Frattenbury, and often featuring members of the clergy. He was one of the founding members of the Detection Club and contributed to the Club’s collaborative novel The Floating Admiral, published in 1931, which also featured Agatha Christie Dorothy L. Sayers, and G.K. Chesterton. His most famous literary creation however, is amateur railway detective Thorpe Hazelle, a wealthy, vegetarian fitness fanatic who starred in Thrilling Stories of the Railway(recently dramatized for BBC Radio 4 and featuring Benedict Cumberbatch). Ellery Queen described Hazelle as ‘the first of the speciality detectives’. Another was the young detective clergyman, Reverend Harry Westerham, who appeared in The Crime at Diana’s Pool, described by Martin Edwards in The Story of Classic Crime in 100 Books as ‘A quintessentially English country-house mystery with a touch of the exotic.’ Victor Whitechurch died in 1933, aged 65. Praise for Victor L. Whitechurch ‘Should delight those who take pleasure in pitting their analytical abilities against those of the sleuth created by the author’ New York Times ‘A model of the detective story… the solution has the neatness of a bold mate at chess’ Glasgow Herald ‘All Whitechurch’s stories have distinct merit’ Barzun & Taylor, A Catalogue of Crime ‘Enthralling… keeps the reader keenly interested’ Boston Transcript