Dear Bernard:

I doubt this is correct, but I submit Maj John Andre` as Sharpe’s father.  Not sure he was in England at the proper time and it doesn’t fit well with the riddle but it would be an elegantly ironic answer.  He was a bit of a rogue after all.

Break a Leg, this summer!

As always, Scott (now writing from Hawaii – much better than Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay)

 

Hello Mr Cornwell,

I hope this message finds you well. I would like to have another go at your riddle and suggest Tom, The Piper’s Son, sometimes known as Jockey or Jock the Piper’s Son, who I think is also the model for MacHeath and Mack The Knife. Ironic because he only knows one song and that is “Over the Hills and Far Away.”

Could I please ask you to restate your clues? Reading the comments etc, I am not sure which clues are yours and which are assumptions made by readers.

Many thanks again for a brain bashing puzzle

Regards

Russell Sloan

 

 

Sharpe’s father. The legendary Paglesham smuggler William Blyth. Who had an uncanny ability of getting out of numerous scrapes. Ironic that: he’s from South Essex and shares a name with a nemesis of Starbuck.

Eddie T

 

A stab in the dark, but is Sharpe’s father former Wagon Master General Runciman? Not sure if this has been suggested before, so apologies if it has.

Robert Douglas

 

Think Irony…. It would be ironic if Sharpe’s father was French?

Louis Mandrin is the closest I can find, he may well have been a real person but he has been fictionalised into a kind of French Jesse James or Robin Hood.

I can’t find any suggestion that he visited London but why not?

Even if I’m wrong again I love doing the research.

Thanks again for all the hours of joy, any chance of another two book year next year?

Mike Davidson

 

Long time reader and viewer, can’t wait for the next in the Saxon series, both book and TV

 

Sharpe’s father – is it Doctor Syn from Russell Thorndike’s series of books?

Roy Price