# The Brooklyn Murders — Character guide

> Key figures in The Brooklyn Murders by G. D. H. Cole.

- [Joan Cowper](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_brooklyn_murders_se/characters/joan_cowper.md): Joan Cowper moves through Liskeard House as a guest whose composure after discovering a corpse makes her both pitied and quietly scrutinized. Her alibi is airtight—Mary Woodman confirms she never left her room—yet her wi
- [Carter Woodman](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_brooklyn_murders_se/characters/carter_woodman.md): Carter Woodman arrives at the Byron Club late at night to find Walter Brooklyn desperate for money, and his dry remark that Walter's idea of living 'runs away with the money' shows a man comfortable wielding the family's
- [Sir Vernon Brooklyn](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_brooklyn_murders_se/characters/sir_vernon_brooklyn.md): Sir Vernon Brooklyn lies unconscious upstairs at Liskeard House while his brother Walter paces below, praying the old man will die before he can alter his will again. Too feeble to have struck the savage blows himself, h
- [Robert Ellery](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_brooklyn_murders_se/characters/robert_ellery.md): Robert Ellery has long distrusted Prinsep, liked George Brooklyn, and now stands to inherit Liskeard House and the Brooklyn Corporation if the family's fortunes shift his way. Engaged to Joan Cowper and gently prodded by
- [Walter Brooklyn](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_brooklyn_murders_se/characters/walter_brooklyn.md): Walter Brooklyn receives Inspector Blaikie at the Byron Club with barely concealed fury, slamming the door after him and leaving the inspector more certain than ever that he is the murderer. Desperate for £10,000 to clea
- [John Prinsep](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_brooklyn_murders_se/characters/john_prinsep.md): John Prinsep was Joan Cowper's suitor, a man Ellery cordially disliked, and the second victim found in the garden with evidence pointing both toward and away from him. The cigar-holder, the letter, and the fingerprints o
- [Charis Lang](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_brooklyn_murders_se/characters/charis_lang.md): Charis Lang moves through the world of the theatre and the Brooklyn household with a composure that costs her dearly; her sense of duty is unusually strong, and it compels her to give Inspector Blaikie a full and damagin
- [Kitty Frensham](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_brooklyn_murders_se/characters/kitty_frensham.md): Kitty Frensham is not the ordinary street-crawler Ellery expected; she is clever, fascinating, and most often seen about with Horace Mandleham, the painter. Jaxon describes her as something quite out of the common run, n
- [George Brooklyn](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_brooklyn_murders_se/characters/george_brooklyn.md): George Brooklyn left Liskeard House by the front door around 11:30, was seen alive after that hour, and yet somehow returned to the garden where his body was later found. The circumstantial evidence at Prinsep's murder s
- [Mary Woodman](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_brooklyn_murders_se/characters/mary_woodman.md): Mary Woodman sat with Joan Cowper in the lounge until eleven o'clock on the night of the murders, and her confirmation of Joan's account gives the police one of their few firm timestamps. She is the kind of woman whose r
- [Superintendent Wilson](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_brooklyn_murders_se/characters/superintendent_wilson.md): Superintendent Wilson's motives are more careful than the newspapers suppose: he wants Walter Brooklyn to incriminate himself, yes, but he also wants to offer him a fair opportunity to explain his presence in the house. 
- [Sir John Bunnery](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_brooklyn_murders_se/characters/sir_john_bunnery.md): Sir John Bunnery moves through the case with the ease of a man who knows the Brooklyn household from the inside, and it is his information about the butler Winter's quarrel with Prinsep that opens a new line of inquiry. 
- [Harry Lucas](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_brooklyn_murders_se/characters/harry_lucas.md): Harry Lucas is the steady older presence in Ellery's life, the man whose counsel Ellery half-follows and half-resists as he navigates love and amateur detection at once. He urges patience and restraint in courtship, reve
- [Morgan](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_brooklyn_murders_se/characters/morgan.md): A servant or associate involved in the household's secrets.
- [Moorman](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_brooklyn_murders_se/characters/moorman.md): A lawyer or business associate of the family.
- [Marian Brooklyn](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_brooklyn_murders_se/characters/marian_brooklyn.md): A member of the Brooklyn family, possibly George's wife.
- [Will Jaxon](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_brooklyn_murders_se/characters/will_jaxon.md): A local man with knowledge of the family's affairs.
- [Isabelle Raven](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_brooklyn_murders_se/characters/isabelle_raven.md): A woman with a past connection to the Brooklyn family.
- [Inspector Gibbs](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_brooklyn_murders_se/characters/inspector_gibbs.md): A police officer involved in the case.
- [Mrs. Purvis](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_brooklyn_murders_se/characters/mrs_purvis.md): A housekeeper or servant in the Brooklyn household.
- [William Gloucester](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_brooklyn_murders_se/characters/william_gloucester.md): A historical name-drop with no sustained role.

HTML index: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_brooklyn_murders_se/characters