The Big Six

The Big Six is the ninth book of Arthur Ransome's Swallows and Amazons series, published in 1940. The book returns Dick Callum and Dorothea Callum to the Norfolk Broads where they renew their friendship with the members of the Coot Club. It is set in September 1932 (plus the last chapter takes place on a Saturday morning in late February 1933). The book becomes a detective story as the Ds and the Coot Club try to unravel a mystery that threatens the Death and Glories freedom to sail the river.

Publication

The slightly obscure title comes from the passage And how are the Big Six getting on? (Ella Dudgeon, BS22). An inscription on the title page quotes Dorothea: It's the Big Five really. They are the greatest detectives in the world. According to the Metropolitan Police website, By 1906 Scotland Yard were regularly assisting provincial forces to investigate murders, invariably by the "Big Five" Chief Inspectors Arrow, Dew, Fox, Frost and Cane. (see Metropolitan Police History.

Characters

• The Ds (Dot, Dick Callum)
• Tom Dudgeon
• Death and Glories (Joe, Bill, Pete) and Ratty, Joe's white rat.
• George Owdon
• Mr Tedder
• owner of the Cachalot
• minor characters:
  • Dr Dudgeon and Ella Dudgeon
  • Frank Farland
  • Jim Wooddall
  • Simon Fastgate
  • Mrs Barrable
  • Ralph Strakey George Owdon's partner in crime
  • Harry Bangate the eel man
  • the mums of the Death and Glories
  • (Mr Jonnatt the head of Jonnatt's, boat-builders at Horning)
  • Hannam's, another boat-builder at Horning
  • (Mr Sonning the head of Sonning's, boat-builders at Potter Heigham)
  • Jim & Jack Towzer (brothers)
  • Mr Bixby the cycle shop man
  • The Ranworth man
  • Old Miss Evans
  • The old parson

Boats

Titmouse, Death and Glory, Sir Garnet, Cachalot, various boats cast off including a motor cruiser of Jonatts, the Towzer boys' rowing boat or skiff, the green houseboat and the racing cutter Shooting Star (BS2,5).

Plot summary

The Ds return to Norfolk, hoping to enjoy a holiday with their friends of the Coot Club. Unfortunately, they find the Death and Glories coming under an increasing cloud of suspicion for setting moored boats adrift.

Everywhere they go boats seem to be cast adrift and they are threatened with being forbidden to sail. Things get worse when new shackles are stolen from a boatbuilder after one of the casting-off episodes and some of them are found aboard the Death and Glory. Around the same time, the boys befriend the fisherman of the Cachalot. When he rewards them for catching a large pike they become unusually flush with cash, drawig further suspicion on themselves since they feel compelled to keep quiet about the prize catch.

Dick, Dorothea, Tom Dudgeon, and the three Death and Glories form a team "Scotland Yard" to investigate the crimes and collect evidence, and are named "the Big Six" by Tom's mother (after a native crimebusting team, the Big Five).

Eventually a carefully prepared trap is sprung and in a flash (literally, to take a night photo of the real culprits), the villains are discovered and the boys are exonerated. The source of their secret supply of money is uncovered when a local pub unveils a magnificent stuffed pike.

Chronology and cross-references

References to other stories in the Swallows and Amazons series help to place the setting in September 1932:

• ...prospecting for gold... (BS22)

Timeline

(numbers are days but not actual dates in September 1932, names are chapter titles)

1. Out of the Dentist's Window
2. First Sign of Trouble, Eel Sett at Night
3. Misleading Appearances, Darkening Clouds
4. Tow Out of Trouble
5. The World's Whopper, At the Roaring Donkey, Money to Burn
6. Breakfast at Dr Dudgeon's, "We Got to Emigrate"
7. Worse and Worse, Two Ways of Looking at the Same Thing, The First Clue, Rival Detectives
8. Spreading the Net, News From the Outposts, A Scrap of Flannel
9. Unwanted Gift, Dunlop Tyres
10. Morning Visitors, Another Coat of Paint, The Villain Leaves His Mark
11. The Villain Leaves His Mark, Things Look Black, The Last Chance, A Kid For the Tiger, Setting the Trap, Blinding Flash, Siege of the Death and Glory
12. "All the Evidence We Got", In the Dark Room, The Legal Mind

On a Saturday morning in late February 1933: What Happened to the Fish

Notes

• Pete had the loose tooth
• Death and Glory got a cabin over the summer
• Port and Starboard are at school in Paris
• Mrs Barrable took a bungalow in the village
• Tom Dudgeon is several inches taller than the tallest of the Death and Glories
• Does Tom wear (long) trousers, not just short pants? When William gets a "scrap of grey flannel" from the villain Pete says: "Somebody's trousies, It's like what Tom wear" (BS18). But in several illustrations eg Saving Sir Garnet (BS10) Tom is wearing shorts. At the beginning of CC1 Tom wore "flannel shorts"
• Dick is described as a smallish boy{(evidence?}}
• The Ds are planning on being there until the end of the holidays^{ref req} and to return at Easter (BS epilogue 'What happened to the fish'.)

Film, TV or theatrical adaptations

BBC produced a TV series based on The Big Six in 1984: Swallows and Amazons Forever!: The Big Six (1984) (TV)

For the book of the TV series see Swallows and Amazons for Ever; the book is an abridgement of Coot Club and The Big Six.

Arthur Ransome's Swallows and Amazons series

Swallows and Amazons | 'Their Own Story' | Swallowdale | Peter Duck | Winter Holiday | Coot Club | Pigeon Post | We Didn't Mean to Go to Sea | The Big Six | Secret Water | Missee Lee | The Picts and the Martyrs | 'Coots in the North' | Great Northern? This page uses content from Guide to Swallows and Amazons series by kind permission of Bill Wright.