The Black Peril

The Black Peril
Cover Art	Cover of the Red Fox edition.
Author	W. E. Johns
Publisher	John Hamilton
First Published	1935
Other Editions	12 English
Period	Interwar
Setting	England, Baltic coast
See all	List of Books by W. E. Johns

The Black Peril by W. E. Johns was first published in March 1936 by John Hamilton. Around the same time, it was also serialised in 10 parts in Modern Boy from issue #366 to #375 Feb to Apr 1935 under the title "Winged Menace". There have been at least 12 subsequent editions in the English language. From the mid-1950s, the editions generally carried the revised title "Biggles and the Black Peril". Like The Cruise of the Condor and Biggles Flies Again, major editorial changes were made to the postwar editions in an attempt to modernize the setting.

The events in the book take place in England and then on the Baltic coast from Germany to Russia. The book is notable for being the story where Biggles and Algy first meet Ginger.

Synopsis

Biggles and Algy are out on a joyride when they meet bad weather and are forced to spend the night on a lonely creek on the Norfolk coast. There they encounter a mysterious large flying boat landing in the same spot. Almost by accident, Biggles and Algy investigate the mystery, with a little help from Ginger.

Plot

Note: The sections below contain spoilers. In particular, the plot subpage (click here) has an extended summary of the narrative in the book

Characters

• Biggles
• Algy Lacey
• Ginger Hebblethwaite
• Smyth
• Benton
• Squadron Leader Taglen
• Colonel Barlow
• "Blackbeard"
• Darton
• Hesterley
• Sir Harding Boyce
• Serge

Aircraft

• Vickers Vandal
• Blackbeard's large flying boats - similar to Dornier X but with 8 engines
• Blackbeard's seaplane
• Heinkel HE 8 seaplane - of the Royal Danish Naval Air Service
• Hawker Nimrod

Places

Visited

• Brooklands
• Cramlington Aerodrome
• Newcastle-upon-Tyne - they spend night here after Biggles is rescued
• Holtenau
• Christianbad - in Swedish translations, this town becomes Göteborg
• Danzig - Biggles and Co are forced down out of fuel some five to six miles from Danzig.
• Hendon - Hesterley tells Biggles to make straight for here

Mentioned

• Konigsberg (Köningsberg in text) - landmark spotted while Biggles was following one of the enemy flying boats east.

Research Notes

Editorial changes

• The Thames editions (1950s) and Dean and Sons editions (1960s) incorporated drastic changes to the text with the aim of modernizing the setting for a younger audience. Unlike the changes to Biggles Flies Again, these changes do not set up disastrous continuity issues. They simply have the effect of making more vague the year in which the story is set.
• Mr Roger Harris has done a detailed analysis of the editorial changes. The changes fall roughly into three categories as detailed below.
• Attempts to hide the 1930s setting:
  • Mentions of the Vickers Vandal are removed. In the later editions, it is simply an amphibian. All physical descriptions which suggest the aircraft is a biplane, the type of engine and old engine start procedures like swinging and shouting "contact" are removed.
  • Other aircraft mentions also had the same treatment. Blackbeard's seaplane could not have a biplane tail anymore. The large flying boats were no longer likened to the Dornier X because that would have been too suggestive of the 1930s. The Danish seaplane which Biggles encountered on the way home is no longer a Heinkel. The Fleet Air Arm fighters which escorted him at the end are no longer specified as Hawker Nimrods.
  • Mention of Brooklands are removed--it was a popular aerodrome in the 1930s but not thereafter. Probably the same reasoning led to the mentions of Holtenau being removed. It is not clear however why Hendon had to be changed to London airport.
• Attempts to remove suggestions that Germans formed part of the adversaries Biggles had to face. This was probably to keep in line with the Cold War realities the 1950s readers understood.
  • German labelling on the machinery Biggles discovered at the beginning of the story were no longer mentioned. He simply said it was in Russian.
  • Likening the large flying boats to the Dornier X was removed. It also done to hide the 1930s setting.
  • Blackbeard's seaplane no longer had swastikas on its wings and fuselage. It was no longer a German make--it became a Russian one.
  • Blackbeard was a German in the original. In the later editions, he became a Russian.
• Attempts to remove confusing details.
  • In the original, after departing from the Baltic coast of Russia, Biggles had to fly east to Sweden?

References to the past

• Biggles mentions that they had just returned from South America, referencing the events in The Cruise of the Condor and Biggles Flies Again.

Incongruities

In my Dean and Sons edition (and perhaps others) Ginger introduces himself with the name 'Habblethwaite', perhaps merely a typo for 'Hebblethwaite'.

Chronology

• Biggles tells Ginger clearly that they are in 1934.
• The beginning of the book mentions that Biggles and Algy have just returned from South America and the footnotes points the reader to Biggles Flies Again. Later Biggles also says he had just come back from South America. The footnotes reminds the reader of The Cruise of the Condor but curiously, does not mention Biggles Flies Again this time.
• End of chapter 16: Biggles tells Algy, "You better take Smyth and Ginger to your rooms..." It looks like at this point, Biggles and Algy are not sharing a flat yet.

International titles

• Czech: Biggles modré nebezpečí (Toužimský & Moravec 1939)
• French: Biggles à la dérive (Presses de la Cité 1952)
• Swedish: Biggles och den hemliga flygbasen (Lejonserien 1952, Wahlströms 1969)
• Malay: Biggles dan durjana hitam (Eastern Universities Press 1979)
• Norwegian: Biggles og den sorte fare (N.W. Damm & Søn 1989)
• Sinhala: සතුරු කදවුර - saturu kadawura (Tharanga)