Holmes Alignment is Six-Point

 

A Black Pudding has no alignment, but a Carrion Crawler is neutral

The alignment scheme in Holmes is generally referred to as "five-point". This scheme is adapted from the Strategic Review #6 (Feb '76) and includes lawful good, chaotic good, neutral, lawful evil and chaotic evil. These are all that is described in the section on "Character Alignment" (pg 8). But there's actually a sixth option for monsters: no alignment. A number of monsters simply lack a line for Alignment; as an example, see the entry for Black Pudding shown above. The 1st edition contained a nonsensical explanation for this, presumably due to an editing error ("If the monsters' alignment is given here, then there follows a brief description which should include any special powers and attributes of the creature", page 22, "Monsters"). This was corrected in the 2nd edition (Nov '78): "If the monster's alignment is not given, it may be assumed to be an unintelligent beast that will attack anyone who comes near". 

The following monsters in the 1st edition of Holmes have no entry for alignment:
Black Pudding, Gelatinous Cube, Giant Tick, Gray Ooze, Green Slime, Horse, Ochre Jelly, Yellow Mold

The 2nd/3rd edition adds the following to the above:
Fire Beetle, Giant Ant, Giant Centipede, Giant Rats, Shrieker, Spider*

*Giant Spiders are described as chaotic evil in the entry, being of low intelligence.

As with other products from this era, usage is not always consistent. The entry for Purple Worm says they are "unintelligent and always attack", exactly the conditions for having no alignment, yet they are neutral. Basilisks and Cockatrices are also described as unintelligent but are neutral. Skeletons (and Zombies) are listed as neutral, although they seemingly have no intelligence of their own and "act only under instructions of their motivator, an evil magic-user or cleric".

In terms of game play, the sixth option provides an economical way of indicating whether a reaction roll should ever be made for that monster. "Unintelligent" monsters are also the only ones possibly deterred by food (pg 11) and can never accept a surrender (pg 21). The Monster Manual went in a different, more standardized direction, including both an alignment and an intelligence for every monster.

Another implication of this scheme is that some "neutral" monsters could be more intelligent than normally assumed based on other rule sets. Carrion Crawlers, Hydras, Owlbears, Rust Monsters and Stirges are all "neutral", and thus do not necessarily attack on sight. By way of comparison, they could be considered more intelligent than other creatures lacking alignment such as Giant Rats and Horses. 

Up for a parley with that Carrion Crawler coming towards you on the ceiling?

Update:

I wrote this post prior to seeing Holmes' manuscript for Basic. Looking back at it, I don't see any errors of assumption, but we now know that in the manuscript Holmes used only the original 3-point system. Therefore, it was Gygax himself that incorporated his ideas from Strategic Review to make the 5-point system that was used in rulebook as printed.

Regarding the editing error in the Monsters section, see this post in the manuscript series.

See also: The Monster Manual is a Holmes Supplement, where I note that the Monster Manual (mostly) uses a 5-point alignment scheme.

Turns in Holmes Basic

Holmes Basic is known for having "shifting" turns. Normal turns (moving, exploring) are ten minutes long, but during combat the turns shift to ten rounds of 10 seconds, so yielding a "combat turn" that are only 100 seconds long; i.e., 1 minute and 40 seconds.

Here are the relevant quotes from the rulebook:

"Each turn is ten minutes except during combat where there are ten melee rounds per turn, each round lasting ten seconds" (pg 9)

"There are ten "rounds" of combat per turn. Each round is ten seconds, so a combat turn is shorter than a regular turn, but results in at least as much muscular fatigue" (pg 20)

However the rulebook doesn't specify what the purpose of tracking "combat turns" is. Why not just track rounds during combat? Combat movement per round is given on pg 20, so it's not like the "combat turn" is needed for movement.

The main thing that "combat turns" would seem to apply to is spell/magic (i.e., potion) durations. However, the shortest spell duration is 2 turns, which is 20 rounds, longer than most combats. Once combat is over, the tracking of time shifts back to normal, which means the remainder of the spell duration then shifts back to "normal turns" until it ends. So what the different turns are used for is tracking how much of your spell turns are used up by melee rounds (10 combat actions = 1 turn) vs exploration (1 movement or search = 1 turn).

As an example, Mar Pres the Conjurer, a third level magic-user, casts the spell Enlargement on fellow party member Tensho the Warrior during the 1st round of a combat with an ogre. This spell has a duration of 1 turn plus caster level, so Tensho will remain enlarged for 4 turns. If the combat is 10 rounds or less, 1 turn of the spell would be used. After combat is over, 3 "regular turns" (30 min) would remain. If combat went between 10-20 rounds, a second "combat turn" would be used, so after combat Tensho would only remain enlarged for 2 more "regular turns" before returning to normal size.

In the module B2, the original version of which was written specifically for Holmes Basic, Gygax gives some useful advice on the "combat turns":

"If fighting should occur, the time reference shifts to a melee turn which is subdivided into ten, 10 second melee rounds. The concept of a melee turn is designed to simulate the quick exchange of blows in combat. For the sake of convenience, a DM can consider one entire melee turn to equal one normal turn (that is, 10 minutes), no matter how many melee rounds the combat took. The extra time is spent recovering one's breath, checking for woulds, re-sharpening blunted weapons, etc." (pg 4, section TIME)

This is practical because it results in the actual time length between combat turns and normal turns being the same, and fits with Holmes statement that combat turns result in the same amount of fatigue as a normal turns.

[the above is adapted from several recent posts in a thread on OD&D Discussion]