Doctor watson

John H. Watson, known as Doctor Watson, is a fictional character who accompanies and assists Sherlock Holmes on many of his adventures. Both characters were created by Arthur Conan Doyle and appeared for the first time in the novel A Study in Scarlet, published by Conan Doyle in 1887, this novel being the first work in the Holmesian canon.

Biography

Little is related in Doyle's works about the life of Dr. Watson. According to extracanonical data, John H. Watson was born on August 7, 1852. The son of Henry Watson (born in Hampshire) and Ella Mackenzie, John had a brother named Henry Jr., who apparently died of alcoholism in 1888. The Watsons were a upper class and respected family. His mother died when he was just a child and his father moved to Australia, taking their two children with her. After many years he returns to England. In 1872 he began his medical studies at the University of Oxford and graduated in 1878. He continued his studies at Netley, an essential requirement to be a military doctor.

He was attached as an assistant medical surgeon to the 5th Northumberland Rifles. He was garrisoned in India, but by the time Watson arrived in the Asian country, the second Anglo-Afghan war had broken out, where he is heading to join his squad. At the Battle of Maiwand, attached to the Berkshire troops, he was wounded in the left shoulder. For this reason, and for having contracted typhus, he is sent back to England to recover.

He spends some time in an important London hotel, from which he is forced to move in 1881 due to lack of money. For this reason he found Sherlock Holmes, who had already seen some rooms that were comfortable to pay, halfway; they belonged to Mrs. Hudson and were located at 221B Baker Street. He introduced them to a mutual friend, Stamford, whom Watson met by chance while at St. Bartholomew's Hospital, while studying Medicine. In 1884 he traveled to the United States, where he met what would be his first wife, Constance Adams, whom he married after returning to England in 1886, and was widowed in 1887.

In 1888 he married Mary Morstan (he met her in the case called The sign of the four), remaining a widower for the second time in 1892. In 1902 he married again.

Participation in history

Sherlock Holmes and Dr. John H. Watson; illustration for Strand Magazine (1893).

In addition to being Sherlock Holmes' adventure companion, he is the narrator of them (except on four occasions: two related by Holmes (The Soldier with the Bleached Skin and The Mane of lion) and two with an omniscient narrator (His last greeting on stage and The Mazarin Stone), both The corvette Gloria Scott as The Musgrave Ritual are police cases prior to the association between Dr. Watson and Sherlock Holmes, in which it is clear that, despite the fact that Watson wrote them, it was Holmes who narrated them as an anecdote from his early days as a detective. According to Doyle himself, he is nothing more than Watson's literary agent, who writes the stories later published by sir Arthur. In the first part of Study in Scarlet stands out the caption that reads "Reprinted from the memoirs of Mr. John Watson, MD, former Army Medical Corps."

Time ends of Sherlock Holmes's career

First stage (1877-1891)

Sherlock Holmes began his practice as a consulting detective in 1877, living on Montague Street at the time. Around this time he solves the case of The Musgrave Ritual. Dr. John Watson meets Sherlock Holmes in July 1881, thanks to an introduction by a doctor who knew both of them. They begin to share rooms at 221B Baker Street, events recounted in the first novel, A Study in Scarlet. The Band of Spots is the oldest case in Holmesian chronology after A Study in Scarlet, with Watson as a companion. The events are narrated in April 1883. The last case of Holmes's first stage before his disappearance is The final problem , which occurred in May 1891. Here he confronts the gang from Professor Moriarty. By then, Watson had already moved in for his wedding three years earlier. It should be noted that the events reported in the four novels take place in this first stage.

Second stage (1894-1903)

The first case, in The Return of Sherlock Holmes, is that of The Uninhabited House, which occurred in April 1894. Dr. Watson moves in again with Holmes in a very short time to the old rooms of 221B Baker Street. For the next adventure, The Builder of Norwood, which occurred in the middle of the same year, it was already fully installed. The last case that Dr. Watson shared with Holmes as a roommate was that of The Three Garridebs, in June 1902. In August of the same year, Watson moved to Queen Anne Street. The next case, with the doctor already living in his own home, but intervening anyway, is that of The Illustrious Client, which occurred in September 1902. The last regular case in Sherlock Holmes's career published is The Man Who Climbed, in September 1903.

Later Years (1904-1914)

In January 1904 Holmes finished his career and retired to a farm on the Sussex coast (south-east England), dedicating himself to the care and study of bees. As a bonus, we have a later case that Holmes came across, by chance, there in Sussex and had the opportunity to solve, called The Lion's Mane, which occurred in July 1907. Finally, after ten After years of retirement, Sherlock Holmes agrees to go back into action on the eve of the First World War, for patriotic reasons. This last case is His last bow to him, from August 1914. Here, Holmes acts as a spy, disarming a German espionage operation, in which he has the support of Dr. Watson, whom I hadn't seen him for many years. He continues to publish accounts until 1927, occasionally, of Holmes's professional career.

Later adaptations

• In Sherlock Holmes (1984-1994) was played by David Burke in the first two seasons. In the third was played by Edward Hardwicke until the end of the series.
• In the animated series Sherlock Holmes (1984-1985), Dr. Watson meets Sherlock Holmes in the first chapter, living with him in the next chapter, and helping him fight professor Moriarty.
• In the American series Elementary (2012-2019), they made important changes to the character: she became a woman, Joan Watson, interpreted by Lucy Liu. In addition, it changes its past, being in this adaptation a surgeon who left his post behind a bad praxis, and became "sober companion" of rehabilitated drugs. He is hired by Sherlock Holmes' father in New York to help his son not fall.
• In the video game Dai Gyakuten SaibanWatson is killed at the beginning of the game, while his daughter Iris works with Holmes and with defense attorney Ryūnosuke Naruhodō.

Movies and TV

• Sherlock Holmes Baffled (1900)
• Sherlock Holmes (1916)
• Sherlock Holmes (1922)
• The Hound of the Baskervilles (1939)
• The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (1939)
• Sherlock Holmes and the Voice of Terror (1942)
• Sherlock Holmes and the Secret Weapon (1942)
• Sherlock Holmes in Washington (1943)
• Sherlock Holmes Faces Death (1943)
• The Spider Woman (1944)
• The Scarlet Claw (1944)
• The Pearl of Death (1944)
• The House of Fear (1945)
• The Woman in Green (1945)
• Pursuit to Algiers (1945)
• Terror by Night (1946)
• Dressed to Kill (1946)
• Sherlock Holmes' private life (1970)
• Sherlock Holmes (TV, 1984-1994)
• Young Sherlock Holmes (1985)
• Sherlock Holmes in the 21st century (lived series, 1999-2001)
• Sherlock Holmes (2009)
• Sherlock (TV, 2010-2017)
• Sherlock Holmes: Game of Shadows (2011)
• Elementary (TV, 2012-2019)
• Mr. Holmes (2015)
• Holmes and Watson (2018)
• Enola Holmes 2 (Netflix, 2022 - ?)

Main actors who have played Dr. Watson

• Nigel Bruce (American Film Series between 1939 and 1946)
• Vitali Solomin (Vitali Solomin)The adventures of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson1979-1986)
• John MillsThe Masks of Death1984)
• David Burke (1984-1985) and Edward Hardwicke (1986-1994) (Sherlock Holmes1984-1994)
• Jude Law (two British-American films, 2009 and 2011)
• Martin Freeman (Sherlock2010-2017)
• Himesh Patel (Enola Holmes 2, Netflix, 2022 - ?)