Single page of Holmes novel worth £100,000

IT began as a publicity stunt to stoke interest in a star author’s forthcoming novel.

Half a dozen handwritten pages from the book were sent across the US to whet readers’ appetites. Most vanished, but at least one survived and could fetch more than £100,000 at auction.

The author was Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and his subject was Sherlock Holmes, “back from the dead” in The Hound of the Baskervilles.

The novel marked the return of the detective after his apparent fatal fall at the Reichenbach Falls, in The Final

Problem in 1893. Sir Arthur had repeatedly tried to kill off Holmes, prompting outcries from his readers. There was a huge appetite for the sequel when it was published and in a publicity drive US publisher McClure, Phillips & Co asked Sir Arthur to copy Pages 185 to 190 which were then displayed in bookshop windows with the American edition.

In the extract, Holmes is discussing an attempted murder, inspired by the legend of a supernatural hound, with his friend and partner, Dr Watson.

The Bonhams Fine Literature sale in New York on April 11 also includes a handwritten draft of Sir Arthur’s 1893 Holmes mystery, The Adventure of the Greek Interpreter, estimated to fetch up to £300,000 and best known for the first appearance of the amateur sleuth’s older brother, Mycroft.

Also on sale is the handwritten manuscript of The

Problem of Thor Bridge, written in 1922 and one of the last of the Holmes mysteries.