Britain’s first black policeman?
A long, long time ago, in the English Midlands, in the ancient cathedral city of Lichfield – once also a county – a competition was held every couple of years for a novel set in the city. With a view to entering the competition, I travelled to Lichfield to see what ideas might be inspired there. It was a place to which I had always been drawn for some reason. I remember my father taking my mother, me and my two older brothers there when he was filming a programme called ‘Know Your Midlands’ for the newly established ATV channel.
I had read about Samuel Johnson and the curious rag-tag family he gathered about himself in London. He was a character to whom I felt drawn. He reminded me of a kind and gentle tutor I once had, a heavily built maths teacher with a double first from Balliol who would finish The Times crossword by simply going through each clue and writing down the answer without a pause.
I was also drawn to Francis Barber, the black slave child Samuel Johnson inherited who became his manservant. More importantly he was like a son to Johnson, so much so that Johnson left Frank a considerable inheritance and the advice that he should leave London and go to Lichfield.
My initial wander around Lichfield led me to consider a modern police procedural as the kind of novel I might write. But on a visit to Lichfield’s Record Office, quite by luck I happened across an index card with the name Barber, directing me to a court record book. There I discovered that, just for one year, Frank Barber had been a ‘dozener’, the name for a kind of local constable in Lichfield based on the Saxon tradition of appointing a guardian for every twelve dwellings. In many ways, Frank could be considered Britain’s first black policeman.
That simple discovery led me to write an historical detective story set in Lichfield in the late eighteenth century, a story that begins with the discovery of a mutilated dead body in the cathedral during its rebuilding. Frank Barber is a key character in the story, a researcher helping freelance thief-taker, Samuel Kinsman. In many ways, Frank is the brains behind the investigation.
If historical detective fiction takes your fancy, I think you will find much to enjoy here. There’s a complex plot involving English loyalists, Huguenot insurrectionists and French government spies. There are strong, memorable characters, plenty of action and lots of clues and signposts to intrigue you on your way.
I hope you enjoy reading The Reward of Delay.
