The Mysterious Disappearance of Agatha Christie

Agatha Christie – English Crime Novelist/Short Story Writer/Playwright

Agatha Christie is also recognized as Dame Agatha Mary Clarissa Christies, Lady Mallowan, was an English crime novelist, a short story writer and playwright. She is well-known for her collections of 66 detective novels and 14 short stories which orbited around investigative work of her fictional detectives Hercule Poirot and Jane Marple.

She had also written the longest running play in the world which was a murder mystery. Agatha Christie had mysteriously disappeared from her home on December 3, 1926. Her car was located abandoned some miles away with a few of her clothes together with her identification around in the car.

Though no foul play was suspected, the newspapers had reported that the car had been deliberately run down Newlands corner with the brakes off. Before her disappearance, Agatha had written several baffling letters. One had been written to her brother-in-law stating that she was just going for a vacation in Yorkshire, while another to the local chief constable stating that she feared for her life.

 A lake known as Silent Pool which was a quarter-mile from where her car was found abandoned had been utilised for motivation for one of the deaths of her character. Fifteen thousand volunteers had been organised by the police to search for her in the surrounding countryside.

Mysterious Affair at Styles – First Book

Colonel Archie Christie, her husband had informed reporters that she had been suffering from nervous breakdown. Suspicions were raised that probably he had been responsible for her disappearance, like a plot in one of his wife’s mystery novels.

 This was reinforced with the rumours regarding his infidelity which instigated the police to tap his phone. For eleven days, she had disappeared with no trace regarding her whereabouts. When she was ultimately discovered at a spa in Harrogate, her husband claimed that she had been suffering from temporary amnesia.

What had led Agatha Christie to leave her home on that cold December night seems to be a mystery. Till date, her biographers tend to vary on what precisely could have occurred during those two weeks in December 1926.

Agatha Christie had published over ten novels and short stores, by the date of her disappearance, each more being much more successful than the other. The Mysterious Affair at Styles, her first book was eventually accepted in 1919 for publication and along with it, the Belgian detective Hercule Poirot had been introduced to the world.

1926 – Agatha Disappeared

The year 1926 had been the year where Agatha had lost her mother Clara. Thereafter she had to put up with another bit of bad news regarding her husband Archie who had informed her that their marriage of twelve year would come to an end since he had fallen in love with another woman, Nancy Neele, needed a divorce. Agatha had implored with Archie to give their marriage another chance to which he had agreed unwillingly.

On that significant day, she had been informed by Archie that he would be spending the weekend with some friends and would not be returning home. On that Friday night at 9.45, Agatha had informed her secretary that she was going out and had left in her car to Newland Downs where she had abandoned the car.

Thereafter she had walked back to town and got into a train to London where she did some shopping for winter coat. It was here that she had posted a letter to Campbell her brother-in-law, informing him that would be going to a spa in Yorkshire after which she had taken a train to Harrogate and had checked in Hydro spa under the name of Theresa Neele.