Air Commandant Dame Lena Annette Jean Conan Doyle, Lady Bromet, (21 December 1912 – 18 November 1997) was a British military officer in the

Women's Royal Air Force The Women's Royal Air Force (WRAF) was the women's branch of the Royal Air Force. It existed in two separate incarnations: the Women's Royal Air Force from 1918 to 1920 and the Women's Royal Air Force from 1949 to 1994. On 1 February 1949, the ...

. The second daughter of Sir

Arthur Conan Doyle Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle (22 May 1859 – 7 July 1930) was a British writer and physician. He created the character Sherlock Holmes in 1887 for ''A Study in Scarlet'', the first of four novels and fifty-six short stories about Ho ...

, she was a spirited child who was described as a

tomboy A tomboy is a term for a girl or a young woman with masculine qualities. It can include wearing androgynous or unfeminine clothing and actively engage in physical sports or other activities and behaviors usually associated with boys or men. W ...

Harry Houdini Harry Houdini (, born Erik Weisz; March 24, 1874 – October 31, 1926) was a Hungarian-American Escapology, escape artist, Magic (illusion), magic man, and stunt performer, noted for his Escapology, escape acts. His pseudonym is a reference to ...

. Her childhood nickname was "Billy", and letters to her father would be signed "Your loving son." On her tenth birthday, however, she announced that she had decided to be a girl after all. She then went to her Aunt Ida's school, Granville House in

Eastbourne Eastbourne () is a town and seaside resort in East Sussex, on the south coast of England, east of Brighton and south of London. Eastbourne is immediately east of Beachy Head, the highest chalk sea cliff in Great Britain and part of the l ...

, where she took after her mother in developing a love of nature. As a schoolgirl she was a classmate and friend of Joan Boniface Winnifrith, who would become film and television actress

Anna Lee Anna Lee, MBE (born Joan Boniface Winnifrith; 2 January 1913 – 14 May 2004) was a British actress, labelled by studios "The British Bombshell". Early life Anna Lee was born Joan Boniface Winnifrith in Ightham, (pronounced 'Item'), Kent, th ...

. Winnifrith was Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's god-daughter.

Career

She attended school at Granville House,

, and went on to serve for thirty years in the

Women's Auxiliary Air Force The Women's Auxiliary Air Force (WAAF), whose members were referred to as WAAFs (), was the female auxiliary of the Royal Air Force during World War II. Established in 1939, WAAF numbers exceeded 180,000 at its peak strength in 1943, with over 2 ...

(WAAF), where she worked in intelligence during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

. Commissioned a section officer, she was promoted to temporary flight officer on 1 February 1942 and to temporary squadron officer on 1 July 1944. On 19 June 1947, Acting Wing Officer Conan Doyle was granted a short-service commission as a flight officer in the WAAF, G Branch, with seniority from 26 September 1943. She was appointed OBE (Military Division) in the

1948 New Year Honours The 1948 New Year Honours were appointments by many of the Commonwealth realms of King George VI to various orders and honours to reward and highlight good works by citizens of those countries. They were announced on 1 January 1948 for the Briti ...

, she was granted a permanent commission as a wing officer in the secretarial branch of the renamed

(WRAF) on 1 February 1949. She was promoted to group officer on 1 January 1952 On 1 April 1963, she was promoted to air commandant, the highest rank in the Women's Royal Air Force. On 29 April of the same year, she was appointed an honorary Aide-de-Camp to

Queen Elizabeth II Elizabeth II (Elizabeth Alexandra Mary; 21 April 1926 – 8 September 2022) was Queen of the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth realms from 6 February 1952 until her death in 2022. She was queen regnant of 32 sovereign states during ...

, serving until 1966. In the

1963 Birthday Honours The Queen's Birthday Honours 1963 were appointments in many of the Commonwealth realms of Queen Elizabeth II to various orders and honours to reward and highlight good works by citizens of those countries. The appointments were made "on the occ ...

, she was elevated to

Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding contributions to the arts and sciences, work with charitable and welfare organisations, and public service outside the civil service. It was established ...

(DBE, Military Division), and was known as Dame Jean Conan Doyle. On 11 May 1966, she retired from the WRAF. She gained the additional style Lady Bromet upon marrying Air Vice-Marshal Sir Geoffrey Rhodes Bromet (1891–1983). Her husband served a term as

Lieutenant-Governor A lieutenant governor, lieutenant-governor, or vice governor is a high officer of state, whose precise role and rank vary by jurisdiction. Often a lieutenant governor is the deputy, or lieutenant, to or ranked under a governor — a " second-in-co ...

of the

Isle of Man ) , anthem = " O Land of Our Birth" , image = Isle of Man by Sentinel-2.jpg , image_map = Europe-Isle_of_Man.svg , mapsize = , map_alt = Location of the Isle of Man in Europe , map_caption = Location of the Isle of Man (green) in Europ ...

; the couple had no children.

Literary estate

Upon the death of her brother,

Adrian Adrian is a form of the Latin given name Adrianus or Hadrianus. Its ultimate origin is most likely via the former river Adria from the Venetic and Illyrian word ''adur'', meaning "sea" or "water". The Adria was until the 8th century BC the mai ...

, in 1970, Dame Jean became her father's literary executor and the legal

copyright A copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive right to copy, distribute, adapt, display, and perform a creative work, usually for a limited time. The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, educatio ...

holder to some of the rights to the

Sherlock Holmes Sherlock Holmes () is a fictional detective created by British author Arthur Conan Doyle. Referring to himself as a " consulting detective" in the stories, Holmes is known for his proficiency with observation, deduction, forensic science and ...

character as well as her father's other works. She assiduously defended Sherlock Holmes' character. She and her brothers, Adrian and Denis Conan Doyle, Arthur Conan Doyle's children by his second wife (Jean, Lady Conan Doyle) inherited the copyrights with the estate when their mother died in 1940. Dame Jean said that Sherlock Holmes was her family's curse because of the fighting over copyrights. She and the widows of her brothers initially shared control of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's literary trust; however, the women did not get along. Denis Conan Doyle had married a Georgian princess known as Princess Nina M'divani and died in 1955. Using a loan from the

Royal Bank of Scotland The Royal Bank of Scotland plc (RBS; gd, Banca Rìoghail na h-Alba) is a major retail and commercial bank in Scotland. It is one of the retail banking subsidiaries of NatWest Group, together with NatWest (in England and Wales) and Ulster B ...

(RBS), in 1970 Princess Nina bought the estate and established Baskervilles Investments Ltd. in the

. Eventually, the princess fell dramatically behind on the loan, and the RBS ended up with the rights to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's works. The bank then sold the rights to Lady Etelka Duncan whose former son-in-law, Sheldon Reynolds, produced two series of Sherlock Holmes adaptations, in the 1950s and the 1990s. His ex-wife, Lady Duncan's daughter, administered the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle Literary Estate until November 2014. Conan Doyle Estate Ltd., a privately owned UK company formed in 2005, claims that Dame Jean regained some of the US rights following the passage of the

Copyright Act of 1976 The Copyright Act of 1976 is a United States copyright law and remains the primary basis of copyright law in the United States, as amended by several later enacted copyright provisions. The Act spells out the basic rights of copyright holders, cod ...

, although all works of Arthur Conan Doyle's published after 1 November 1925 remain with the ''Sir Arthur Conan Doyle Literary Estate'', which sued the Executors of the Dame Jean Conan Doyle Estate for infringement of copyright. When Warner Brothers made ''

,'' released in 2009, the studio was granted a license in 2006 by the Arthur Conan Doyle Literary Estate and ended up signing a "Covenant not to Sue" a year later with Conan Doyle Estate Ltd. At her death at age 84, Dame Jean's will stipulated that any remaining copyrights she owned were to be transferred to the

Royal National Institute for the Blind The Royal National Institute of Blind People (RNIB) is a UK charity offering information, support and advice to almost two million people in the UK with sight loss. History The RNIB was founded by Thomas Rhodes Armitage, a doctor who had ey ...

. According to a 1990 interview, Dame Jean's eyesight was poor from an early age. The National Institute for the Blind sold the rights back to the Conan Doyle heirs. (As of 2015 there were eight surviving Conan Doyle heirs. None is a direct descendant, as neither Jean nor her brothers had any children.) On her death her cremated ashes were interred with those of her husband and his first wife in the churchyard of All Saints Church in

Minstead Minstead is a small village and civil parish in the New Forest, Hampshire, about north of Lyndhurst. There is a shop and a pub, the ''Trusty Servant''. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's grave is under a large tree at the back of the 13th century Al ...

Hampshire Hampshire (, ; abbreviated to Hants) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in western South East England on the coast of the English Channel. Home to two major English cities on its south coast, Southampton and Portsmouth, Hampshire ...

.''The Independent'' obituary
/ref>

References

Sources

ash-nyc.com; accessed 23 March 2014.

Media

{{DEFAULTSORT:Doyle, Jean Conan 1912 births 1997 deaths. British women in World War II Women's Auxiliary Air Force officers Dames Commander of the Order of the British Empire Women's Royal Air Force officers Arthur Conan Doyle Neurological disease deaths in England People from Eastbourne Deaths from Parkinson's disease Place of birth missing Place of death missing Wives of knights Jean Conan