Francis Duncan (writer)

Francis Duncan was the pen name of William Underhill (1918–1988), a British writer who published over twenty works of detective fiction between 1938 and 1959.[1] Later in his career he also wrote five historical romances (as Hilary West) and children's fiction (as Robert Preston).[2] Underhill's detective works follow the conventions of the Golden Age of Detective Fiction, and mostly feature one of two detective characters – Peter Justice or Mordecai Tremaine.[3] Largely neglected after his death in 1988, the success of a reprint of his 1949 novel Murder for Christmas in 2015 has led to further works being brought back into print.[1]

Biography

Born in Bristol in 1918 to a working-class family (his father was a docker at Avonmouth[2]), Underhill obtained a scholarship to Queen Elizabeth's Hospital school, but was unable to afford to attend university.[4] Underhill began writing in his spare time to supplement his income as a debt collector for Bristol City Council.[1] He married Sylvia Henly in 1938 and had two children – Kathryn in 1943 and Derek in 1949.[2]

In World War II he registered as a conscientious objector and volunteered for the Royal Army Medical Corps, serving as a medical orderly in France shortly after D-Day.[1] His son, Derek, recalls his father saying that his most successful writing period was during World War II, when his time off-duty gave him the freedom to write, and there was a ready market for escapist detective fiction.[2] After World War II, there was a national shortage of teachers and he was given training to be a primary school teacher.[1] After undertaking an external economics degree he later became a lecturer in economics and history at a college of further education. He died of a heart attack in 1988.[3]

Detective fiction

His novels were moderately successful but, owing to his pseudonym, he remained virtually unknown and his books soon went out of print.[3] A reprint of his 1949 novel Murder for Christmas in November 2015 proved commercially and critically successful, leading the publisher Vintage Books to put out a call for information about the author, about whom they had no details.[1] The family contacted the publisher after seeing the reprint in a branch of Waterstones.[1][3] Five of his novels featuring Mordecai Tremaine, a former tobacconist and lover of romance novels who dabbles in amateur detective work, have now been reprinted.[4][5][6]

Peter Justice series

1. The Hand of Justice (1936)
2. The League of Justice (1937)
3. The Sword of Justice (1937)
4. Justice Returns (1940)
5. Justice Limited (1941)[5]

Mordecai Tremaine series

1. They'll Never Find Out (1944)
2. Murder Has a Motive (1947)
3. Murderer's Bluff (1948)
4. Murder for Christmas (1949)
5. So Pretty a Problem (1950)
6. In at the Death (1952)
7. Behold a Fair Woman (1954)[5]

Standalone novels

• Tigers Fight Alone (1938)
• Dangerous Mr. X (1939)
• Murder in Man (1940)
• Night Without End (1943)
• Fear Holds the Key (1945)
• Ministers Too Are Mortal (1951)
• Murder But Gently (1953)
• A Question of Time (1959)[5]

References

1. Thorpe, Vanessa (3 January 2016). "Solved: mystery of Christmas whodunnit that was a hit 66 years after publication". The Observer.
2. "Letter: How I killed off mystery writer". The Observer. 10 January 2016.
3. Cowdrey, Katherine (20 May 2016). "Vintage to publish Francis Duncan murder mystery series". The Bookseller.
4. "Biography: Francis Duncan". Penguin Books. Retrieved 17 January 2021.
5. "Francis Duncan". Fantastic Fiction. Retrieved 17 January 2021.
6. "Francis Duncan". Classic Crime Fiction. Retrieved 17 January 2021.