# Is "The Judas Window" by Carter Dickson (John Dickson Carr) a First Edition?

> **Quick answer.** A first edition of The Judas Window by Carter Dickson (John Dickson Carr) (William Morrow, 1938) is identified by: The William Morrow issue, New York, 1938 (sheets printed December 1937): original black cloth, spine and front board stamped in red, top edge stained red. Both the Morrow (New York) and Heinemann (London) 1938 editions are collected.

**Checklist — a true first has these:**
- The William Morrow issue, New York, 1938 (sheets printed December 1937): original black cloth, spine and front board stamped in red, top edge stained red
- Collates vi plus 294 pages with a diagram, 20 cm (Library of Congress, LCCN 38002491); binding independently corroborated by a Sotheby's lot and by dealer copies
- Morrow used no first-edition statement in this period: by publisher rule, any Morrow volume published before 1973 whose copyright page carries no 'Second Printing', 'Second Edition' or later statement is the first printing of the first edition — identification is by the ABSENCE of a later-printing line, and there is no number line to look for (Morrow adopted number lines only in 1973)
- The jacket should be a priced jacket with the price present at the flap
- The UK Heinemann issue, London 1938, is black cloth lettered in gilt, jacket artwork by Youngman Carter, also a priced jacket; note that the English Catalogue of Books records this title's jacket price erroneously, so the ECB is not a safe check here (Goldeneye Rare Books bibliography)
- Publisher imprint reads William Morrow
- Not a book-club edition (see below)

| | |
|---|---|
| Author | Carter Dickson (John Dickson Carr) |
| Publisher | William Morrow |
| Year | 1938 |
| True first | US edition |
| Format | Hardcover (trade) |
| Key point | The William Morrow issue, New York, 1938 (sheets printed December 1937): original black cloth, spine and front board stamped in red, top… |
| Book-club edition exists? | Yes |

## Points of issue
The William Morrow issue, New York, 1938 (sheets printed December 1937): original black cloth, spine and front board stamped in red, top edge stained red. Collates vi plus 294 pages with a diagram, 20 cm (Library of Congress, LCCN 38002491); binding independently corroborated by a Sotheby's lot and by dealer copies. Morrow used no first-edition statement in this period: by publisher rule, any Morrow volume published before 1973 whose copyright page carries no 'Second Printing', 'Second Edition' or later statement is the first printing of the first edition — identification is by the ABSENCE of a later-printing line, and there is no number line to look for (Morrow adopted number lines only in 1973). The jacket should be a priced jacket with the price present at the flap. The UK Heinemann issue, London 1938, is black cloth lettered in gilt, jacket artwork by Youngman Carter, also a priced jacket; note that the English Catalogue of Books records this title's jacket price erroneously, so the ECB is not a safe check here (Goldeneye Rare Books bibliography).

## Is this the true first?
Both the Morrow (New York) and Heinemann (London) 1938 editions are collected. The census claims US precedence and the evidence leans that way without being conclusive: the Morrow sheets were printed in December 1937, and the Morrow's Library of Congress registration number (38002491) is very low for 1938, indicating early-in-year US deposit; no source consulted supplies a month for the Heinemann. Issued under the Carter Dickson pseudonym (John Dickson Carr) in both markets, so this is not a pseudonym-precedence split. Reported but uncorroborated, and therefore not treated as a point here: the British and American texts are said to differ in many minor respects and in the name of one major character — that claim rests on a single uncited source and the name itself is nowhere documented.

## Telling it from reprints & book-club editions
Berkley reissued the novel in 1964 as The Crossbow Murder — a retitled paperback reprint and a textbook 'first thus' trap with no first-edition standing. Later reprints include International Polygonics (1987, LCCN 87080305) and Poisoned Pen Press (2026). On the Morrow first, any copyright-page line reading 'Second Printing' or later rules the copy out; no book-club printing of either 1938 issue is documented in the sources consulted.

## Source
New Mexico Literacy Project — Is *The Judas Window* by Carter Dickson (John Dickson Carr) a first edition? https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/first-edition/the-judas-window
CC BY 4.0. Part of the Canonical First-Edition Points of Issue dataset (https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/api/first-edition-titles.json). Last reviewed 2026-07-04.