# The Starvel Hollow Tragedy — Character guide

> Key figures in The Starvel Hollow Tragedy by Freeman Wills Crofts.

- [Inspector French](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_starvel_hollow_tragedy_se/characters/detective_inspector_joseph_french.md): French arrives among the townspeople as a pleasant, easygoing stranger, letting them mistake him for a company man until the courtroom revelation of his true rank leaves the room holding its breath. Behind the affability
- [Ruth Averill](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_starvel_hollow_tragedy_se/characters/ruth_averill.md): Ruth stands at the drawing-room window of Starvel in threadbare clothes three years out of fashion, her dark, old-fashioned prettiness framed by a landscape as bleak as her prospects. Dependent on Simon Averill's grudgin
- [Pierce Whymper](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_starvel_hollow_tragedy_se/characters/pierce_whymper.md): Whymper's tentative courtship of Ruth is so slight that French is astonished to find the whole town has been tracking it, yet it is Whymper who later passes a £20 note that should have burned with the house. That single 
- [Dr. Herbert Philpot](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_starvel_hollow_tragedy_se/characters/dr_herbert_philpot.md): Philpot is a respectable physician with an Edinburgh degree and a quiet practice, yet a written confession of murder bearing his name falls into Roper's hands, and French cannot decide whether it is genuine, forged, or t
- [John Roper](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_starvel_hollow_tragedy_se/characters/john_roper.md): Roper and his wife replaced the old servants at Starvel and quickly became the household's only working machinery, handing Ruth her invitations, producing her travelling money, and controlling access to her drugged, slee
- [Mr. Oxley](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_starvel_hollow_tragedy_se/characters/mr_oxley.md): Oxley is the friend Tarkington trusts with disturbing news, the man who knows the Averill land dealings and the shape of the old miser's finances from years of legal work. His wife's well-meant kindness keeps Ruth linger
- [Dr. Emerson](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_starvel_hollow_tragedy_se/characters/dr_emerson.md): An elderly doctor who offers medical insights into the case.
- [Mrs. Roper](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_starvel_hollow_tragedy_se/characters/mrs_roper.md): Mrs. Roper arrives at Starvel with her husband to run the household after the old servants leave, and Ruth Averill takes to neither of them. Her competence is real, but so is the unease she stirs in the lonely niece who 
- [Markham Giles](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_starvel_hollow_tragedy_se/characters/markham_giles.md): A deceased man whose past is relevant to the mystery.
- [Mr. Tarkington](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_starvel_hollow_tragedy_se/characters/mr_tarkington.md): Tarkington pieces together the facts of the Starvel tragedy before the official machinery has fully turned, and his hypothesis about the hoarded notes shapes how the investigation proceeds. There is kindness beneath his 
- [Sergeant Kent](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_starvel_hollow_tragedy_se/characters/sergeant_kent.md): A police sergeant assisting Inspector French.
- [Old Mr. Averill](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_starvel_hollow_tragedy_se/characters/starvel_mr_averill.md): The elderly patriarch of the Averill family, deceased before the story.
- [Mrs. Palmer-Gore](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_starvel_hollow_tragedy_se/characters/mrs_palmer_gore.md): A woman of some standing in the community.
- [Mr. Dashwood](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_starvel_hollow_tragedy_se/characters/mr_dashwood.md): A solicitor or businessman involved in the case.
- [Mrs. Oxley](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_starvel_hollow_tragedy_se/characters/mrs_oxley.md): The wife of Mr. Oxley, a local resident.
- [Simon Averill](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_starvel_hollow_tragedy_se/characters/simon_averill.md): Another member of the Averill family, possibly a brother.
- [Chief Inspector Mitchell](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_starvel_hollow_tragedy_se/characters/chief_inspector_mitchell.md): A senior police officer who oversees aspects of the investigation.
- [Major Valentine](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_starvel_hollow_tragedy_se/characters/major_valentine.md): A military man who may have knowledge of the case.
- [Mr. Stanley](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_starvel_hollow_tragedy_se/characters/mr_stanley.md): A person mentioned in connection with the case.
- [Inspector Marshall](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_starvel_hollow_tragedy_se/characters/inspector_marshall.md): A police officer who assists in the investigation.
- [William Fuller](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_starvel_hollow_tragedy_se/characters/william_fuller.md): A person of interest in the investigation.
- [James Gray](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_starvel_hollow_tragedy_se/characters/james_gray.md): A person mentioned in connection with the tragedy.

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