Cecil John Charles Street (3 May 1884 – 8 December 1964), also known as John Street, was a major in the British Army and a crime fiction novelist.
He began his military career as an artillery officer and during World War I, he became a propagandist for MI7. During the Irish War of Independence, he acted as an Information Officer for Dublin Castle alternating between Dublin and London and working closely with the British official Lionel Curtis.The Administration of Ireland, 1920 Reprint, 2001 by Athol Books. Introduction by Dr. Pat Walsh p5 He later earned his living as a prolific writer of detective novels written under several pseudonyms including John Rhode, Miles Burton and Cecil Waye.
Early life, education, and career Street was born in Gibraltar to General John Alfred Street CB of Woking, and his second wife, Caroline, daughter of Charles Horsfall Bill of Storthes Hall, Yorkshire, head of a landed gentry family.A Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Landed Gentry of Great Britain & Ireland, vol. I, Bernard Burke, Harrison, 1879, p. 128 Caroline had married comparatively late and her only son was born when she was thirty-five. General Street, having retired from the Army at the age of sixty-two just after his son's birth, died suddenly. Consequently, Street and his mother went to live with his maternal grandparents at their house in Firlands, Woking, which was "comfortably staffed with seven domestics". Street remained "modestly circumspect" about his privileged background in later life and valued "a man's personal accomplishments over his family heritage".Masters of the "Humdrum" Mystery: Cecil John Charles Street, Freeman Wills Crofts, Alfred Walter Stewart and the British Detective Novel, 1920-1961 Curtis Evans, McFarland, Inc., 2012, p. 53
Street was educated in Wellington College, Berkshire and later in Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, and was commissioned into the Royal Artillery in 1903, before getting transferred to the Special Reserves. Before the First World War, he lived at Summerhill, a regency country mansion outside Lyme Regis (later owned by the Scottish educator A. S. Neill and run as a school, the name being subsequently used for his school at Leiston, Suffolk), where he was a shareholder in, and chief engineer for, the Lyme Regis Electric Light & Power Company.
He later served as a Captain in the Royal Garrison Artillery. He was wounded three times in combat and won the Military Cross for his services. As a Major, he headed a branch of British Military Intelligence and later, he acted as an Information Officer at the headquarters of the British administration, based in Dublin Castle.Masters of the "Humdrum" Mystery: Cecil John Charles Street, Freeman Wills Crofts, Alfred Walter Stewart and the British Detective Novel, 1920-1961 Curtis Evans, McFarland, Inc., 2012, p. 48
Marriages In 1906, Street married Hyacinth Maud Kirwan, daughter of Major John Denis Kirwan of the Royal Artillery. They had a daughter, Verena Hyacinth Iris Street, who spent most of her life living with her grandmother and died in 1932 aged 25. The marriage was unsuccessful, with Maud suffering mental imbalance and getting admitted to a private asylum. They were separated by the late 1930s.
Street later lived with Eileen Annette Waller, granddaughter of the Irish writer John Francis Waller, who belonged to a landed gentry branch of the Waller baronets of Tipperary.A Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Landed Gentry of Great Britain & Ireland, vol. 2, Bernard Burke, Harrison, 1879, p. 1676, "Waller of Cully and Finoe" pedigree They married in 1949, shortly after his first wife's death. They lived "a comfortable life together" living in "attractive older homes" including The Orchards, Laddingford, Kent, and Swanton Novers, Norfolk.Masters of the "Humdrum" Mystery: Cecil John Charles Street, Freeman Wills Crofts, Alfred Walter Stewart and the British Detective Novel, 1920-1961 Curtis Evans, McFarland, Inc., 2012, pp. 49-50, 53
Novelist
John Street wrote three series of novels; one under the name of John Rhode, mostly featuring the mathematics professor Dr. Lancelot Priestley; another under the name of Miles Burton, mostly featuring the retired naval officer Desmond Merrion; and a third under the name of Cecil Waye, featuring the Perrins Investigators.
The Dr. Priestley novels followed in the tradition of Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes mysteries and R. Austin Freeman's Dr. Thorndyke books by featuring scientific detection of crimes, such as analysing the mud on suspects' shoes.
Notable crime fiction critic Julian Symons considered Street to be a prominent member of the "Humdrum" school of detective fiction. According to Symons, "Most of them [the "Humdrums"] came late to writing fiction, and few had much talent for it. They had some skill in constructing puzzles, nothing more, and ironically they fulfilled much better than S. S. Van Dine his dictum that the detective story properly belonged in the category of riddles or crossword puzzles. Most of the Humdrums were British, and among the best known of them were Major John Street." The historian Jacques Barzun was more positive towards Street, praising several Rhode books in particular, even though he reviewed only a small proportion of the more than 140 novels written by Street.
In recent years, copies of many Rhode and Burton books have become hard to obtain and are highly sought after by collectors, often commanding "eye-wateringly" high prices.The Secret of High Eldersham, Miles Burton, British Library Crime Classics, 2016 (reprint; originally published 1930), p. 10
The only detailed account of Street's life and works was written by the crime fiction historian Curtis Evans in his 2012 book Masters of the "Humdrum" Mystery who wrote the book "in part to give a long overdue reappraisal of these purportedly "humdrum" detection writers as accomplished literary artists. Not only did they produce a goodly number of fine fair play puzzles, but their clever tales have more intrinsic interest as social documents and even sometimes as literary novels than they have been credited with having."Masters of the "Humdrum" Mystery. Curtis Evans, McFarland, 2012
Bibliography Source:
Writing as John Rhode
Dr. Priestley novels Featuring Lancelot Priestley, Inspector Hanslet and Inspector Waghorn
The Paddington Mystery (1925) Dr. Priestley's Quest (1926) The Ellerby Case (1927) The Murders in Praed Street (1928) Tragedy at the Unicorn (1928) The House on Tollard Ridge (1929). (On first publication in the U.S. the book was promoted as being by C J C Street) The Davidson Case (1929) (U.S. title Murder at Bratton Grange; on first publication in the U.S. the book was promoted as being by C J C Street) Peril at Cranbury Hall (1930) Pinehurst (1930) (U.S. title Dr. Priestley Investigates; on first publication in the U.S. the book was promoted as being by C J C Street) Tragedy on the Line (1931). (On first publication in the U.S. the book was promoted as being by C J C Street) The Hanging Woman (1931) Mystery at Greycombe Farm (1932) (U.S. title The Fire at Greycombe Farm; on first publication in the U.S. the book was promoted as being by C J C Street) Dead Men at the Folly (1932) The Motor Rally Mystery (1933) (U.S. title Dr. Priestley Lays a Trap; on its publication in the U.S. the book was promoted as being by C J C Street) The Claverton Mystery (1933) (U.S. title The Claverton Affair) The Venner Crime (1933) The Robthorne Mystery (1934) When one of the Robthorne twins commits suicide, there is a question over which one it is and whether it was suicide or murder. Poison for One (1934) Shot at Dawn (1934) The Corpse in the Car (1935) Dr. Priestley solves how Lady Misterton was killed whilst sitting, alone, in her car. Supt Hanslet attempts to track down her killer. Hendon's First Case (1935). (In first publication in the U.S. the book was promoted as being by C J C Street) Mystery at Olympia (1935) (U.S. title Murder at the Motor Show) Death at Breakfast (1936) In Face of the Verdict (1936) (U.S. title In the Face of the Verdict) Death in the Hopfields (1937) (U.S. title The Harvest Murder) Death on the Board (1937) (U.S. title Death Sits on the Board) Proceed with Caution (1937) (U.S. title Body Unidentified) Invisible Weapons (1938) The Bloody Tower (1938) (U.S. title The Tower of Evil) – Inspector Waghorn identifies a ruthless murderer and solves a set of clues to the whereabouts of long-hidden treasure Death Pays a Dividend (1939) Death on Sunday (1939) (U.S. title The Elm Tree Murder) Death on the Boat Train (1940) Murder at Lilac Cottage (1940) Death at the Helm (1941) They Watched by Night (1941) (U.S. title Signal For Death) The Fourth Bomb (1942)
Dead on the Track (1943) Men Die at Cyprus Lodge (1943) Death Invades the Meeting (1944) Vegetable Duck (1944) (U.S. title Too Many Suspects) Bricklayer's Arms (1945) (U.S. title Shadow of a Crime) (Dr. Priestley plays only a minor role in this book, all the actual detection being done by Inspector Waghorn) The Lake House (1946) (U.S. title Secret of the Lake House) Death in Harley Street (1946) Nothing But the Truth (1947) (U.S. title Experiment in Crime) Death of an Author (1947) The Paper Bag (1948) (U.S. title The Links in the Chain) The Telephone Call (1948) (U.S. title Shadow of an Alibi) Blackthorn House (1949) Up the Garden Path (1949) (U.S. title The Fatal Garden) The Two Graphs (1950) (U.S. title Double Identities) Family Affairs (1950) (U.S. title The Last Suspect) The Secret Meeting (1951) Doctor Goodwood's Locum (1951) (U.S. title The Affair of the Substitute Doctor) Death at the Dance (1952) Death in Wellington Road (1952) Death at the Inn (1953) (U.S. title The Case of the Forty Thieves) – Inspector Waghorn breaks a gang of thieves who have found an ingenious way to defraud the Post Office and, along the way, murder a man by poisoning By Registered Post (1953) (U.S. title The Mysterious Suspect) Death on the Lawn (1954) The Dovebury Murders (1954) Death of a Godmother (1955) (U.S. title Delayed Payment) The Domestic Agency (1955) (U.S. title Grave Matters; on first publication in the U.S. the novel was promoted as being by C J C Street) An Artist Dies (1956) (U.S. title Death of an Artist) Open Verdict (1956) Death of a Bridegroom (1957) Robbery With Violence (1957) Death Takes a Partner (1958) Licensed For Murder (1958) Murder at Derivale (1958). (On first publication in the U.S. the book was promoted as being by C J C Street) Three Cousins Die (1959) The Fatal Pool (1960) Twice Dead (1960) The Vanishing Diary (1961)
Non-series novels A.S.F.: The Story of a Great Conspiracy (1924) (U.S. title The White Menace). Non-series thriller. The Double Florin (1924) The Alarm (1925) Mademoiselle From Armentieres (1927) Drop to His Death (1939) (U.S. title Fatal Descent; on its first publication in the U.S. the book was promoted as being solely by C J C Street), with "Carter Dickson", a pseudonym of John Dickson Carr Night Exercise (1942) (U.S. title Dead of the Night). Sir Hector Chalgrove, acerbic businessman and Home Guard Colonel, disappears during a World War II night exercise. Major Ledbury (Officer Commanding the Wealdhurst Company, Home Guard) assists police to find the killer and assuage local suspicion of his guilt.
Non-fiction books The Case of Constance Kent
Short stories The Elusive Bullet. Stories of Detection, Mystery and Horror - Second Series, Ed. Dorothy L Sayers, 1931 (Dr. Priestley story). Reprinted: Bodies from the Library. Ed. Tony Medawar. HarperCollins, 2018 The Vanishing Diamond. The Great Book of Thrillers. Ed. H. Douglas Thomson, 1935 (Dr. Priestley story) The Yellow Sphere. Sunday Dispatch, 3 April 1938. Reprinted: Bodies from the Library 3. Ed. Tony Medawar. HarperCollins, 2020.