The Four Defences is a 1940 detective novel by the British author J.J. Connington, the pen name of the chemist Alfred Walter Stewart.

[1] It was published in London by Hodder and Stoughton and in the United States by Little, Brown and Company.

[2][3] It is a sequel to the 1939 novel The Counsellor featuring radio personality Mark Brand in a brief hiatus for Connington's best-known series detective Chief Constable Sir Clinton Driffield.

After the burning wreck of a car is discovered with an unidentifiable corpse in it Brand's assistance is called for by the coroner to help him demonstrate to the dubious police that it is a case of suicide.

With his usual enthusiasm, Brand takes up the dominant role in the investigation alongside Inspector Hartwell of the local force.