| George Edalji | |
|---|---|
George Edalji |
|
| Born | March 1876 West Midlands |
| Died | 17 June 1953 (aged 77) 9 Brocket Close, Welwyn Garden City |
| Cause of death | Coronary thrombosis |
| Ethnicity | Anglo-Indian |
| Occupation | Solicitor |
| Known for | Great Wyrley Outrages |
| Religion | Anglican |
| Parents | Shapurji Edalji Charlotte Stoneham |
George Ernest Thompson Edalji (March 1876 – 17 June 1953) was a solicitor from the West Midlands who became world-famous in 1907 when Sir Arthur Conan Doyle campaigned to have him declared innocent of maliciously wounding a pony in 1903.
Edalji was the eldest of the three children of Shapurji Edalji and Charlotte Edalji (née Stoneham). His father was of Indian descent (a Parsi of Bombay), and his mother Scottish. Edalji became a solicitor in Birmingham, England, in 1898. He had proved to be a capable student during law school, and won prizes from the Law Society. He wrote the book Railway Law for the "Man in the train", which was "intended as a guide for the Travelling Public".
He was wrongly convicted of the eighth of the ''Great Wyrley Outrages', but cleared as the result of a campaign by Arthur Conan Doyle. His wrongful conviction led to the creation of England's Court of Criminal Appeal in 1907. Nonetheless, despite the Home Office's conclusion that Edalji was innocent of slashing animals, the Home Office stood by the idea that Edalji was responsible for sending menacing letters in Staffordshire during the summer of 1903. Long after the incident had faded from public memory, a fifty-seven year old labourer named Enoch Knowles confessed to having sent further offensive letters over a thirty-year period.
Edalji died at 9 Brockett Close, Welwyn Garden City, on June 17, 1953, from coronary thrombosis.
The episode of the 1972 BBC anthology series The Edwardians about Conan Doyle centres on his involvement in the Edajli case. Written by Jeremy Paul and directed by Brian Farnham, it stars Nigel Davenport as Conan Doyle, Sam Dastor as George Edalji, and Renu Setna as the Reverend Edalji.
Julian Barnes's 2005 novel Arthur & George (ISBN 0-224-07703-1) recounts the entire episode in great detail, as does the non-fiction work Conan Doyle and the Parson's Son: The George Edalji Case (ISBN 1843862417). A new non-fiction book, Outrage: The Edalji Five and the Shadow of Sherlock Holmes by Roger Oldfield (ISBN 978 184386 601 5), sets the case within the context of the wider life-stories of the Edalji family as a whole.