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The Purloined Letter: Dupin's final case, in its first printing

Published

Opening page of "The Purloined Letter. By Edgar A. Poe." from The Gift annual for 1845, beginning "At Paris, just after dark one gusty evening in the autumn of 18—".
From the preserved historical source. Follow the archive link below to inspect the original.

Before Sherlock Holmes, there was C. Auguste Dupin.

"The Purloined Letter," the third and last of Poe's Dupin stories, first appeared in The Gift: A Christmas and New Year's Present for 1845. That was a decorative gift-book annual published by Carey & Hart in Philadelphia and issued in time for the 1844 holidays.

It opens with Dupin and his friend smoking in the dark in a Paris book-closet, when the Prefect of police arrives with a problem. Dupin's reply is the essence of the great detective:

"If it is any point requiring reflection, we shall examine it to better purpose in the dark."

The puzzle is a stolen letter that the police cannot find, however hard they search. The solution is the famous idea that the best hiding place can be in plain sight. Detective writers have borrowed the idea ever since.

The archive preserves all 21 pages of the tale (pages 41–61 of the annual) as first printed.

→ Read The Purloined Letter in The Gift for 1845