Who Killed Rodger Presbury?

“Dead man was identified as Rodger Prescott, famous as forger and coiner in Chicago.”

– The Adventure of Three Garridebs (3GAR)

Who killed Rodger Presbury????

The answer is Killer Evans.

But you just read The Adventures of the Three Garridebs in a previous post here, and Killer Evans killed the counterfeiter Rodger Prescott….

Peter E. Blau shared a news item in the December, 1985 issue of Scuttlebutt from the Spermaceti Press that Donald A. Redmond discovered that in the original periodical publications of 3GAR in 1924 and 1925, the counterfeiter was named Presbury.  When the Casebook of Sherlock Holmes was published on June 16, 1927, Presbury became Rodger Prescott.

There were seven periodicals that printed the original 3GAR story that had Presbury as the counterfeiter shot by Killer Evans. They were:

Collier’s – October 25, 1924

Current Opinion – December 24, 1924

The Strand Magazine – January 1925

The Louisville Courier-Journal – March 22, 1925

Los Angeles Times – March 29, 1925

New Orleans Times-Picayune – March 29, 1925

Philadelphia Evening Bulletin – April 4, 1929

The listing of the seven periodicals were gleaned from the excellent website of la Société Sherlock Holmes de France.