Bulldog Drummond

Origin

After serving in the British Army during World War I, Hugh "Bulldog" Drummond found peacetime too boring, and so became a crime fighter and adventurer.

Creation

Bulldog Drummond debuted in a 1920 novel of the same name and was created by "Sapper", a.k.a. Herman Cyril McNeile.

Character Evolution

An instant hit when he debuted in 1920, Bulldog Drummond starred in eight further books written by McNeile, prior to McNeile's death in 1937, and a further seven written by McNeile's friend Gerard Fairlie following this. These days the books make for hard reading, thanks to the casual racism expressed by the characters, worse even than the norm for their time.

As early as 1922 the Bulldog Drummond stories began to be adapted into movies, with Carlyle Blackwell playing the title role in the first movie. John Howard played the part most frequently, playing the role seven times starting in 1937 Bulldog Drummond's Revenge and concluding in 1939's Bulldog Drummond's Bride. The character made his first comic appearance in Fleetway's Super Detective Library 3. More recently he has starred in Moonstone's one-shot Moonstone Noir: Bulldog Drummond, and an elderly version of the character appeared in Alan Moore and Kevin O'Neill's League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: The Black Dossier.

Major Story Arc

Demobilised Officer finding peace incredibly tedious would welcome diversion. Legitimate if possible; but crime of a humorous description, no objection. Excitement essential.

These were the words that Captain Hugh "Bulldog" Drummond, DSO, MC, formerly of His Majesty's Royal Loamshire Regiment, put in the newspapers when faced with the excrutiating boredom of peacetime life. A large man of prodigious strength, during the war Drummond had taught himself to move with a silence and agility that belied his stature, and had frequently undertaken solo nighttime missions into No Man's Land to harrass the enemy. Following the war's end, the independently wealthy Drummond looked for new sources of adventure, aided and abetted by his batman turned butler James Denny, and several old war colleagues. They soon found themselves pitted against the evil of Carl Peterson, the most dangerous man in Europe, who plotted Britain's downfall. Later, when Drummond finally slew Peterson, the villain's lover, Irma, became Drummond's new nemesis, seeking to avenge her fallen paramour.