  Sherlock Holmes is a fictional character who first appeared in the story of "A study in Scarlet" in 1887. He was created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle in late nineteenth century. Even though Sherlock Holmes didn't receive much attention at the beginning of publication, there are 60 narratives (65 short stories and 4 full length novels) and the stories have enjoyed enormous international popularity down through the years (Berg).  Nowadays, Sherlock Holmes is the one of the most common literature characters appearing on the screen as James O'Brien said, "Sherlock Holmes is the most recognizable character in all of literature"(O'Brien 13 ). Many classic TV shows and movies were created about him. Therefore a universal brand has been formed to describe Sherlock Holmes that he is a tall thin man, with a deer stalker cap, pipe, who can easily deduce things with scientific explanations and skills. As Stanton O. Berg described Sherlock Holmes in his article published in Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology in 1971, "Holmes acted as a catalyst in the evolving the modern investigative, identification and forensic science"(Berg). Sherlock Holmes is not only a fascinating character of the novel; he also has made a great contribution to the criminology field and forensic science field.

Berg published the article "Sherlock Holmes: Father of Scientific Crime and Detection". He provides that many experts from different scientific fields give credit to Sherlock Holmes as a mentor of forensic science and investigation. Ashton-Wolfe, a criminologist, once gave his word in The Illustrated London News, "Many of the methods invented by Conan Doyle are today in use in the scientific laboratories" (Berg). Ashton-Wolfe describes these methods, "various ashes ... mud and soil ... poisons, hand-writing, stains, dust, footprints, traces of wheels, the shape and position of wounds ... the theory of cryptogram" as techniques that, " germinated in Conan Doyle's fertile imagination"(Berg). In the novel, Sherlock is able to observe and distinguish the mud and soil on people's shoes in order to know where people are coming from. When Sherlock Holmes arrived at the crime scene, he always uses his magnifying glass to observe the environment by looking at the traces, footprint, dusts, and so on. Sometimes he smells victims to determine the possibility of poison, exams their clothes to know which class they are from, the place they were coming and going, and checks blood stains and temperature to know the time of death. A professor of Forensic Medicine, Sir Sydney Smith wrote in his autobiography Mostly Murder, "Conan Doyle had the rare, perhaps unique, distinction of seeing life become true to his fiction" (Berg). Smith believed that investigation method that Doyle gave to Sherlock had been used in modern forensic science.

Many people today believe that because of the publication of Sherlock Holmes, the field of forensic science started to use these investigation skills and develop them. Sherlock Holmes invented methods such as the use of cipher, the study of different tobacco ashes, distinction of individuals' fingerprints, identification of firearms, ways to differentiate the human blood stains, analyzing idiosyncrasies of typewriters and handwriting, and the use of dogs. However, Conan Doyle didn't invent these investigation skills; he had borrowed the ideas from the real world science even though in 19th century, the field of forensic science was not well-known and developed.  Snyder wrote in her article, "Mathieu Orfila's 1813 Traite des poisons was used ...  it was the first work of international renown on poisons." The use of poison in forensic science appeared before Doyle published his novel. Synder mentioned, "Before the first appearance of Holmes, Alphonse Bertillon ... put out an article on the study of handwriting." It indicates that the other author had researched differences in handwriting earlier than Conan Doyle discussed in his novel Sherlock Holmes. Additional proof is that "During the early years of the 19th century, the famous criminal catcher Eugene Francois Vidocq had studied the shape assumed by bloodstains as they fell  ... The first use of forensic ballistics in a court case occurred in 1784"(Synder), which indicates that Conan Doyle was not the first person who invented this scientific method. Like Synder said, Sherlock Holmes published articles about scientific investigation method in the novel. This "reflected a spirit of scientific inquiry that was already being applied to criminal detection" (Synder). O'Brien also discussed the history of investigation methods that appeared in Sherlock Holmes by comparing real cases that appeared before Sherlock Holmes that involved the method to the cases in Sherlock Holmes. Therefore, it is important to understand the history of forensic science involved in these attractive investigation methods in order to place Sherlock Holmes in the right position in the development of forensic science.

When Conan Doyle published his first story, A Study in Scarlet, it wasn't a good start. O'Brien mentioned in his book, " ... A Study in Scarlet was rejected by four or five publishers" (O'Brien 3). However, the popularity of this story was high in the United State, as O'Brien said, "In America, Holmes was an immediate hit" (O'Brien 3). There are a lot of Sherlock Holmes fans in the U.S. Even though Doyle didn't invent investigation methods, he brought this attractive forensic science knowledge to the public. For example, Conan Doyle published in his story about the idiosyncrasies of typewriters before this method could be used as useful evidence (O'Brien). O'Brien pointed out that, "FBI typewriter analysis began in 1933 and immediately lead to capture of a woman who had mailed poisoned fudge" (O'Brien 73). The 19th century is the beginning of exploring methods of science; the forensic science field was too young to establish a trustworthy image to the public. Wagner mentioned in his book, "The treatment of human remains had long been a sensitive issue in England" (Wagner 6). Without getting information and evidence from the body in criminal cases, there is no clue to find the perpetrator. Wagner described the system regarding suspect death, "The English had always relied on a system in which suspect deaths were referred to the Coroner, or Crowner, a political official who was not required to have any scientific or medical training" (Wagner 6). Unfortunately, England had disappointing ways to deal with crime scenes with a poor forensic science system even though there were some useful forensic methods that didn't have the chance to be developed. Doyle's creation, an attractive character named Sherlock Holmes with abilities of skillful investigation techniques, gave readers a new version of forensic science in a period that lacked scientific methods. Another example is the use of dogs. Doyle used fun and interesting ways to spread the idea to use dogs as one of the investigation methods. In the novel, the dog could be used to track the people, detect a major change in his master, demonstrate the absence of the person, and even used as a murder weapon (O'Brien, 86). Because Conan Doyle presented forensic investigation techniques to the world, it helped enhance the skills and system of forensic science and opened up more ideas in the field. Synder said, "The Holmes stories presented the 'science of criminal detection' in a positive light in Britain. In a case, which happened in 1859, a suspect who was accused of murder by the evidence of a leading toxicologist, turned out to be innocent." Instances such as this in courtrooms lead to distrust of scientific methods in the public. As Synder said, "By creating a 'scientific detective' who could demonstrate the logical steps leading to his invariably correct conclusions, Conan Doyle gave to the public a criminal catcher they could trust." Conan Doyle used his talent in writing to present a successful character who is intelligent, charming, and skillful, with a lot of scientific knowledge, who could popularize the image and potential benefits of forensic science.

Deduction is one of Sherlock Holmes's fascinating characteristics. Conan Doyle had a medical mentor, Doctor Joseph Bell, who many people believe was the original model of Sherlock Holmes. Dr. Joseph Bell was a surgeon and editor of the Edinburgh Medical Journal (O'Brien 12). He was well-known for his amazing deduction skills. He was very successful in diagnosing the patient's conditions and sometimes their occupations, where they lived, and how they had traveled to the clinic (O'Brien 12). After Dr. Joseph Bell became Doyle's mentor, Doyle became familiar with Bell's ability to observe trifles and make logical deductions from them (O'Brien, 12).Under the great influence of Dr. Joseph Bell and Doyle's medical background, he was able to create Sherlock Holmes with these attractive skills. In modern times, many scholars would like to study and explain the way of Sherlock Holmes made his deductions. There is an article published in British Journal of Psychology titled, "Sherlock Holmes -- an expert's view of expertise." This article uses modern psychological knowledge on cognitive expertise to explain how and why Sherlock Holmes can deduct faster than normal people. It described, "Their superiority comes from the nature and organization of their knowledge. To understand cognitive expertise is to understand how knowledge gets acquired and reorganized in memory as expertise develops" (Andre). Sherlock Holmes once told Dr. Watson about how his memory works. In the story of A study in Scarlet, he said, "I shall do my best to forget it ...  Depend upon it; there comes a time when for every addition of knowledge you forget something that you knew before. It is of the highest importance, therefore, not to have useless facts elbowing out the useful ones."(Andre) Sherlock believes that his brain contains a certain amount of space, which stored the knowledge that is divided into categories of useful and useless. In order to gain more useful knowledge, he had to make himself to forget useless knowledge. This theory that Sherlock presents is known as mnemonists  --  the necessity of forgetting (Andre). Therefore, experts like Sherlock Holmes don't have much more capacity of memory than novices; the ability of acquiring, organizing, and constructing knowledge is what makes them the experts. Sherlock is able to acquire knowledge by observation not only in his surroundings, but also in the appearance of nature. The nineteenth century was a period of enormous interest in exploring the natural world. Conan Doyle, along with many of his contemporaries, frequented lectures on the subject and was fascinated by the theories of Charles Darwin and his followers (O' Brien 32). Therefore, Doyle made Sherlock Holmes a fan of bees. Sherlock even described his retirement life as alone, and with his bees ---"My house is lonely. I, my old housekeeper, and my bees have the estate all to ourselves" (Wagner 39).

There is an article called "The real Sherlock Holmes: Was Sherlock Holmes the original forensic scientist? Peter Calamai investigates the evidence", published in Cosmos magazine. The article started with a segment from the novel of Sherlock Holmes about the differential diagnosis of human blood test that Sherlock Holmes found. In the real world, this test would be discovered 13 years later by a German medical researcher (Calamai). Then the journalist provides the words from experts of science that indicate Doyle pointed the way to the future (Calamai). The views Doyle had on scientific investigation in the nineteenth century are the inspiration of modern criminology. Calamai discusses the background of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and points out his professor Joseph Bell is the reason of the inspiration for the forensic Sherlock Holmes. Even though this article wasn't published on an academic journal website, the facts appear true toward the novel of Sherlock Holmes. The argument is more about identifying Sherlock Holmes as a forensic scientist and why the author had the idea. In a criminology blog, there is an entry called "A Study in Sherlock: What We Own Sherlock Holmes." The author thinks that in the criminal justice and forensic field that owe a lot to Doyle's creation (Criminology & Justice Digital Media USA Inc). A majority of people still believe Sherlock Holmes is a pioneer in the criminology and forensic science field. It indicates the point of view that people have toward Sherlock Holmes in modern day. Sherlock Holmes is a trustworthy detective with much scientific knowledge that was created by Doyle, a man on the side of science. However, Doyle was a trained scientist who also fervently believed in "spiritualism" and fairies (Jones). Even though Doyle was born in a family of Catholics, he changed his faith and ended his Catholic schooling. Doyle was not successful in his medical year. He once wrote, "Not one single patient ever showed up" (O'Brien). There was a lot of free time in the clinic, which Doyle used to write the stories of Sherlock Holmes. Doyle was able to study at the highly respected medical school, University of Edinburgh and had exposure to science when he was writing Sherlock Holmes (O'Brien 2).  Therefore, there is no doubt that the scientific theories that appear in the novel were up to date at the time of publication. 

Their superiority comes from the nature and organization of their knowledge. To understand cognitive expertise is to understand how knowled ge gets acquired and reorganized in memory as expertise develops Most crime shows today have many plots use Sherlock Holmes case as reference. The influence Sherlock Holmes has on the forensic science and modern investigation skills. Many authors and experts from different fields had their own opinions toward Sherlock Holmes. The word had on Sherlock Holmes whether they were published in the news or their books come from experts that related to general scientific fields such as criminology and medicine. They think that Sherlock Holmes has influence not only in forensic science and criminology fields, but also science as a whole. Sherlock Holmes has contributed such as the field of cipher, the study of different tobacco ashes, identification of firearms and the importance of individuality of one's handwriting, to reality. These scientific investigation methods are using in today's real crime cases. By studying the history of forensic science and real cases that involved the scientific investigation technique, we know that Doyle didn't invent these methods, but had a great contribution to spread the ideas to the public and gave them a trustworthy image of forensic science and had an important impact on the development of forensic science.

