Aubrey Hamilton Reviews: Murder in Belgravia by Lynn Brittney

Murder in Belgravia  by Lynn Brittney (Crooked Lane, 2019) is set in World War I London in 1915, the first of a series. Chief Inspector Beech is investigating the murder of Lord Murcheson at his home in Belgravia. His young wife Lady Harriet has confessed to the murder but will not discuss it further with the inspector. In addition, she will not move from the chair she’s sitting in and appears to be in great pain. Her bloody clothes speak for themselves. She has asked to talk to a woman of her class, and Beech calls on his childhood friend Caroline Allardyce, a physician at the Women’s Hospital on Euston Road, to interview Lady Harriet and treat her.

Caroline is so successful in extracting information from Lady Harriet that Beech asks his superior for permission to set up an investigative team with Caroline and her lawyer friend as well as a couple of hand-picked members of the police force. Permission is granted as long as Beech does not expect to put the women on the payroll and no one finds out women are involved in police business.

The butler and the scullery maid have disappeared, and the accounts of the remaining staff are disjointed. It’s clear though that the injuries Lord Murcheson sustained during the early days of the war were so severe that he turned to alcohol and opiates for relief,  resulting in frequent violent episodes. While many of the narcotic potions he took were available over the counter, identifying Murcheson’s source of heroin became a major concern of Beech and his team. This line of inquiry takes the team to the offices of Harley Street consultants, brothels, and the lairs of criminal gangs.

The story gives a good overview of London during the war up to and including the first Zeppelin attack. Multiple references are made to the expectation that women will have to step in at home to take the place of men on the front. Beech and his supervisor agree on the need for women on the police force and also agree the time is not yet right for them to be accepted.

A good read but I am not convinced that the attitudes of the time toward women are accurately captured. This war was indeed pivotal for women, as it took nearly an entire generation of English men, leaving women to lives they were not prepared for but did people realize it at the time? The online historical mystery discussion group Crime Through Time has been talking about anachronisms in dealing with women. Someone pointed out that strong independent women were simply not that common during most of history. Perhaps World War I was the turning point, when women were forced to find a way to support themselves outside marriage.

There’s at least one point which has to be wrong: when Beech expresses surprise after Caroline says Harriet will not be the first upper-class victim of sexual assault she has treated. Surely he saw violence at all levels of society when he was walking the beat and investigating crimes as a homicide inspector and knows domestic abuse occurs at all levels of society.

How this series unfolds will be interesting.

 

·         Hardcover: 288 pages

·         Publisher: Crooked Lane Books (March 13, 2019)

·         Language: English

·         ISBN-10: 1683318935

·         ISBN-13: 978-1683318934

Aubrey Hamilton ©2019

Aubrey Hamilton is a former librarian who works on Federal It projects by day and reads mysteries at night.