The detective who solved a 500-year-old royal murder

Art · Published 19 October 2026 Swipe more like this →

In short: In 1951, Josephine Tey published a novel that would eventually be named the greatest crime story of all time. Instead of a standard whodunit, she used rigorous historical research to investigate the real-life death of the Princes in the Tower, blending meticulous scholarship with the art of suspense.

Josephine Tey, born Elizabeth MacKintosh in 1896, was a versatile Scottish writer who navigated multiple identities. While she published several works under the pseudonym Gordon Daviot—including a successful 1933 West End play starring John Gielgud—her most enduring legacy was built under the name of her great-great-grandmother, Josephine Tey. Her career was defined by a transition from physical training and nursing to a literary life fueled by a deep interest in military history and historical realism.

Her masterpiece, The Daughter of Time, stands as a landmark of the genre. In the narrative, a hospitalized Inspector Alan Grant uses reference books and contemporary documents to investigate whether King Richard III murdered his nephews. This method of 'detective work' allowed Tey to bridge the gap between the Golden Age of detective fiction and modern crime novels. By exploring unconventional secrets and psychological motivations, she paved the way for later authors to delve into the darker, more complex aspects of human nature.

Tey was a woman of profound privacy. She shunning publicity throughout her life and remained so secluded that during her final year, she avoided all friends while facing a terminal illness. Her final work, The Privateer, was a romantic reconstruction of the life of Henry Morgan. Today, her literary contribution is cemented by the Crime Writers' Association, which ranked The Daughter of Time as the greatest crime novel of all time and The Franchise Affair as the 11th best in 1990.

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