“DOMINION'S AIR CREWS HELPED TO DEAL BLOW ON JAPS AT COLOMBO,” Toronto Star. April 10, 1942. Page 38.
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Nipponese Planes Sink 22-Year-Old Aircraft Carrier Hermes Off Ceylon, But Most of Crew Believed in London to Have Been Saved
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BRITISH FLIERS DAMAGE JAP CARRIER AND COUNT 18 FOE PLANES SHOT DOWN
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H.M. AIRCRAFT CARRIER HERMES
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London, April 10 - Canadian air crews are manning huge flying boats over the Bay of Bengal and already have performed heroic service against the Japanese, it was learned today.
"They have played an exceptionally important and heroic part in recent air operations against the enemy," the air minister said.
It was a Canadian air crew that played a primary role in the disastrous defeat dealt Japanese bombing squadrons in the enemy attack on Colombo, Ceylon, last Sunday, the air ministry revealed.
At the same time the admiralty announced that Japanese planes have sunk the 22-year-old, 10,850-ton aircraft carrier Hermes off the coast of Ceylon, and that British fliers materially damaged a Japanese aircraft carrier and knocked down 18 planes in the same waters.
One informed source said the attacks in which the Hermes, Dorsetshire and Cornwall were sent to the bottom cost the Japanese fully 75 planes. He said the Hermes was sunk by bombs, not plane-launched torpedoes.
A Canadian-manned aircraft first spotted the Japanese bomber fleet headed for Colombo and "hence was instrumental in thwarting the attack," said an air ministry spokesman.
The reconnaissance crew flashed word enabling the city to prepare for the raid, with the result that a large portion of the 75 enemy aircraft were destroyed for certain. The admiralty said that Japanese claims of cruisers in addition to the Cornwall and Dorsetshire sunk off Trincomalee were known to be "quite untrue."
[AL: This is very slanted reporting, as we should expect war reporting. Colombo was not a disastrous defeat and the Japanese airplane losses were very low - Hermes was caught with its planes on deck, for one. A disastrous loss for sure.]
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Research dump. Working on a theory that Leda Strike was named Leda not because of the well-known myth depicted on the wall of the Rivoli, but because her father was a ship-enthusiast. It keeps me out of trouble. And it's long struck me as an odd name to choose for a child.
HMS Leda was an 18pdr-armed, 38 gun, Fifth Rate frigate, built at the Chatham Royal Dockyard. The ship went on to be the lead vessel of a class of 47 large frigates.
Two of the Leda class still exist, and one - HMS Trincomalee - was, for some time, moored in Falmouth.
So pretty. I know that's not the point.
There was also a minesweeper called Leda but I can't find a Cornish connection. Not that there needs to be one, I suppose. Ted and Leda's father might have been interested in war ships in general.
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The Unpublished Cases
If you are ever looking for plot ideas... take a look at the list of cases mentioned in Arthur Conan Doyle’s stories which are mentioned but not explained. I have italicised the cases that make a reappearance in some form or another in BBC Sherlock.
The Abernetty family (depth which the parsley had sunk into the butter)
The mortal terror of old Abrahams
The singular affair of the aluminum crutch
The Amateur Mendicant Society
The ancient British barrow (the Addleton tragedy)
The tragedy of the Atkinson brothers at Trincomalee
The colossal schemes of Baron Maupertuis (Netherland-Sumatra Company)
Bert Stevens, the mild-mannered murderer
The Bishopgate jewel case
Blackmailing one of the most revered names in England
The bogus laundry affair
The Camberwell poisoning case (Holmes winding a dead man's watch)
The sudden death of Cardinal Tosca
Colonel Warburton's madness
The Conk-Singleton forgery case
The two Coptic Patriarchs
Saving of Count Von und Zu Grafenstein
The cutter Alicia (never emerged from a small patch of mist)
The Darlington substitution scandal
The dramatic introduction of Dr. Moore Agar
The Dundas separation case (hurling false teeth at wife)
The Dutch steamship Friesland
The papers of Ex-President Murillo
The French Government matter of supreme importance
The giant rat of Sumatra (Matilda Briggs)
The Grice Patersons in the island of Uffa
The Grosvenor Square furniture van
Huret, the Boulevard assassin
The madness of Isadora Persano (remarkable worm unknown to science)
The disappearance of Mr. James Phillimore (umbrella)
The peculiar persecution of John Vincent Harden
The King of Scandinavia ("My last client of the sort was a king.")
The loss of the British bark Sophy Anderson
The Manor House case (Adams)
The woman at Margate with no powder on her nose
Merridew of abominable memory
The unfortunate Mme. Montpensier
Morgan the poisoner
The most repellent man of my acquaintance is a philanthropist
The most winning woman (poisoned three little children)
The Nonpareil Club card scandal (Colonel Upwood)
The Paradol Chamber
The politician, the lighthouse, and the trained cormorant
The repulsive story of the red leech (death of Crosby the banker)
The reigning family of Holland
Ricoletti of the club foot and his abominable wife
The old Russian woman
The Second Stain and Monsieur Dubuque
Services to the Crown for which Holmes refused a knighthood
The Smith-Mortimer succession case
The Sultan of Turkey
The Tankerville Club scandal
The Tired Captain
The Trepoff murder in Odessa
Vamberry, the wine merchant
Vanderbilt and the Yeggman
The Vatican cameos
Venomous lizard or gila
Vigor, the Hammersmith wonder
Vittoria, the circus belle
Wilson, the notorious canary-trainer
I have used several of these in my own stories, including Wilson, the notorious canary-trainer and the Bishopsgate Jewellery case. Case fic lies at the heart of every Sherlock Holmes story, so you might want to think about how to work these ACD stories into your own.
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