The Famous Five

BBC

Moonage Pictures and byNWR for BBC

July, 1939. George Barnard’s life on the Dorset coast is turned upside down when she learns that her cousins are on their way from London to stay for the summer. George is smart, independent, and adventurous, and she just knows her prissy relatives will spoil her fun. She’s also worried about Timmy – the dog she found abandoned in a sinking fishing boat near Kirrin Island. She’s not allowed pets at home; will her cousins snitch?

But when Julian, Dick, and Anne arrive, George finds herself including them in what turns out to be the most exciting adventure of her life so far.

The body of Timmy’s owner washes up on the beach, apparently the victim of a local curse, and the Five set about investigating the murder, first sailing to an uninhabited island that belongs to the family.

In a subterranean chapel protected by a deadly booby trap they discover a goblet whose engraving strongly suggests that a lost hoard of Knights Templar treasure is waiting to be discovered – clues left behind like a trail of breadcrumbs by Sir William Marshal, ‘the greatest knight who ever lived’.

But there’s a hitch: the Five are not the only ones looking for treasure. Ruthless antiquarian Thomas Wentworth and his right-hand man Mr Boswell are also on the hunt, and they’re one step ahead.

Beating Wentworth and discovering the secret of the Knights Templar will involve deceiving Uncle Quentin and Aunt Fanny, unearthing a lost crypt, infiltrating Wentworth’s stately home and exposing the secret history of the Barnard family.

The adventure is the making of the Famous Five. The experience seals George’s newfound bond with her cousins: for the rest of the summer they will be inseparable.