1. Cecil Hambrough in life: the model of Victorian sophistication and breeding.
2. Steephill Castle, Ventnor – the inheritance that wasn’t to be. Cecil was only six months away from achieving the age of majority.
3. Ardlamont House, where Cecil eventually ended up instead, provided the backdrop for his undoing.
4. The scene of the boating accident of 9 August, the night before the hunting trip.
5. The boat used on the splash-fishing outing, showing the part cut out for production in court, which contained the plughole.
6. The three men who set out on that infamous hunting excursion on the morning of 10 August 1893: (l–r) Alfred Monson, Cecil Hambrough and Edward Scott. Only two would return.
7. The gateway of the field that James Dunn saw the shooting party cross prior to the fateful shot.
8. Illustration of the spot where Cecil Hambrough’s body was found, showing the ditch and grassy surroundings.
9. The Royal Hotel, Tighnabruaich, outside of which Monson was arrested on 29 August.
10. In the wake of Cecil’s death, the man known as Edward Scott disappeared. A warrant for his arrest was issued as all leads on his whereabouts proved fruitless. Meanwhile, the two men likely to have inspired Arthur Conan Doyle to create Sherlock Holmes were brought in to investigate a mystery worthy of the Great Detective: Joseph Bell, and Henry Littlejohn.
11. As the investigation got under way, the exhumation of Hambrough’s body was ordered. Henry Littlejohn then travelled to Ardlamont to make a study of the site where the body was found and establish the exact circumstances surrounding the shot that killed the young lieutenant.
12. Once news of the death at Ardlamont broke, it became a source of intense press speculation ahead of the most talked-about trial in years.
13. Some of the notable figures in the courtroom: (left to right) Agnes Monson, the gamekeeper George Lamont and Beresford Loftus Tottenham aka ‘Tot’.
14. Monson in court.
15. The key legal players: Solicitor-General Alexander Asher, leading the prosecution; John Comrie Thomson, senior defence counsel; the Lord Justice Clerk, Lord Kinsburgh, John Hay Athole Macdonald.
16. The verdict in the Ardlamont trial proved just as stunning as each of the previous instalments in the case, ensuring it would go down as one of the most remarkable cases in British legal history. It was truly a mystery worthy of Sherlock Holmes.
