Charles Hamilton began writing for the publishers Trapps Holmes from 1899. Material from him, whether original or reprints, appeared continuously in their papers until the company went out of business in 1920.

The main Trapps Holmes papers comprised The Coloured Comic, Funny Cuts, Larks/Best Budget, Picture Fun, Smiles, Vanguard, and The World's Comic.  With the exception of Vanguard and Best Budget, the papers were a mix of comics and stories.  Vanguard and Best Budget were story papers only, and also relatively short lived.

Hamilton contributed material under his own name, and used a number of pen names including Talbot Wynyard, Robert Stanley, Eric Stanhope, Gordon Conway, Ridley Redway, and Frank Drake.  Many of his stories also were written without an author's name being given.

In his autobiography Hamilton says he gave "yeoman service" in writing for Trapps Holmes.  In a letter published in Collectors Digest No. 66, Hamilton stated that he wrote at least one thousand short stories and "long complete" stories without number.  Bill Lofts further estimates Hamilton wrote several thousand stories for the Trapps Holmes papers.  There is no doubt there is a tremendous volume of Hamilton writing in these papers.

Copies of the Trapps Holmes publications are very difficult to obtain. The paper doesn't age well and is very brittle so perhaps that is why we don't see many issues coming on to the market today. 

A few Trapps Holmes publications were unearthed recently and are scanned in full here to give an idea of what these papers were like. Separate pages on Friardale have also been created for the Picture Fun and Vanguard papers and there are further scans there.  It is intended over time that each of the seven papers will have their own separate page.