“Be Prepared!”: Looming Conflict, Active Citizenship and the Rise of the Professional Boy Detective

Abstract

Andrew examines the centralisation of the professional boy detective in the Harmsworths’ boys’ story papers in the first decade of the twentieth century, both in the adult detective/boy assistant pattern and in series featuring independent boy detective heroes and boy detective partnerships. The chapter considers how representations of the boy detective respond to anxieties about the decline of the British Empire, physical deterioration and the impending threat of war in the early twentieth century. Andrew explores the ways in which these boy detective narratives emphasise and articulate the crucial role of boys to the future security of the Empire and the importance of training them to become active citizens and defenders of the Empire—aims reflected in Robert Baden-Powell’s Boy Scout movement, founded in 1908.