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A long-lost short story by Bram Stoker, author of the classic Gothic novel Dracula, has been unearthed by an amateur historian in Dublin who came across the work while browsing the archives of the National Library of Ireland.

The story, titled “Gibbet Hill,” was uncovered by Brian Cleary, who found a reference to it in an 1890 Christmas supplement to the Dublin Daily Express newspaper. He made the discovery last year after taking time off from work following a sudden onset of deafness in 2021.

The short story was published just seven years before Dracula and remained undocumented for more than 130 years. “Gibbet Hill” was not mentioned in any Stoker bibliography.

Cleary contacted Stoker's biographer Paul Murray, who confirmed that Gibbet Hill had indeed been missing for more than a century.

“Gibbet Hill is of great importance to Stoker's development as a writer. In 1890 he was a young writer and made his first notes for Dracula,” Murray told AFP. “It’s a classic Stoker story, the battle between good and evil, evil emerging in exotic and unexplained ways.”

The macabre tale tells the story of a sailor who was murdered by three criminals, whose bodies were hung from a gibbet or gibbet as a warning to passing travelers.

Perfect read in the run up to Halloween… And Dublin City Council's Bram Stoker Festival knows it. Gibbet Hill is published by the Rotunda Foundation – the fundraising arm of Dublin's Rotunda Hospital, where Cleary worked – and the first public reading of the story will take place at this year's festival on Saturday October 26th.

Proceeds from the book will benefit the newly established Charlotte Stoker Fund Rotunda Foundationto fund research into preventable deafness in at-risk newborns.

Dublin City Council Bram Stoker Festivaltakes place from the 25th to the 28th. October.

Additional sources • Dublin City Council Bram Stoker Festival, AFP