James Leasor

James Leasor was a prolific British author, who wrote historical books and thrillers. Leasors 1978 book, Boarding Party, about an incident from the Second World War that until that time was secret, was turned into a film, The Sea Wolves, starring Gregory Peck, Roger Moore and David Niven.

Leasor was born in Erith, Kent, in 1923, and was educated at the City of London School. He was commissioned into the Royal Berkshire Regiment and served in Burma with the Lincolnshire Regiment during World War II. In the Far East his troopship was torpedoed and he spenthours adrift in the Indian Ocean. He also wrote his first book, Not Such a Bad Day, by hand in the jungles of Burma on airgraphs, single sheets of lightsensitive paper which could be reduced to the size of microdots and flown to England in their thousands to be blown up to full size again. His mother then typed it up and sent it off to an agent, who found a publisher who sold 28,000 copies, although Leasor received just 50 for all its rights. He later became a correspondent for the SEAC, the Services Newspaper of South East Asia Command, under the inspirational editorship of Frank Owen, after being wounded in action. His novel, NTR Nothing to Report, is a semiautobiographical account of many of his experiences in Ind

Source: Wikipedia