Ernle Dusgate Selby Bradford (11 January 1922 – 8 May 1986) was a noted 20th-century British historian specializing in the Mediterranean world and naval topics.[1][2][3][4] He was also an authority on antique jewellery and was the founder editor of the Antique Dealers and Collector's Guide.[1][5][6]
Ernle Dusgate Selby Bradford | |
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Born | Cole Green, Norfolk, England | 11 January 1922
Died | 8 May 1986 | (aged 64)
Nationality | British |
Education | Uppingham School |
Known for | Author, historian and sailor |
Life
Bradford was the son of Jocelyn Ernle Sydney Patton Bradford MBE MC,[7][8] and his wife, Ada Louise Dusgate.[9] He was born in Cole Green, Norfolk and educated in England at Uppingham School.[1][10] He served in the Royal Navy during World War II, initially as an Ordinary Seaman but rising to the rank of first lieutenant of a Hunt Class Destroyer.[11]
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/89/Ernle_Bradford_-_street_in_Kalkara.png/220px-Ernle_Bradford_-_street_in_Kalkara.png)
A keen yachtsman himself, Bradford spent almost 30 years sailing the Mediterranean, and many of his books are set there.[12][13][14] His book, The Journeying Moon describes some of these voyages.[15] It ends with the sale of his Bristol Channel Pilot Cutter, Mischief, to HW Bill Tilman, who made a number of significant voyages in it to high latitudes.[16]
A sometime BBC broadcaster and magazine editor, Bradford was also a prolific author and popular historian, many of his books remaining in print to this day.[9] He regularly wrote letters to the British press, in particular The Times and Country Life, on matters of history and sailing.[17][18]
Bradford lived in Kalkara, on Malta for a number of years, this also being where he died, and where a commemorative marble plaque exists to his memory and a street next to his old home is named after him.[9]
List of works
- Contemporary Jewellery and Silver Design (Heywood & Co., 1950).
- Four Centuries of European Jewellery (Country Life, 1953).
- The Journeying Moon (Jarrolds, 1958); reprinted as: The Journeying Moon: Sailing into History.
- English Victorian Jewellery (Country Life, 1959).
- The Mighty Hood: The Life and Death of the Royal Navy's Proudest Ship (Hodder & Stoughton, 1959).[19]
- The Wind Off the Island (Hutchinson, 1960); reprinted as: The Wind off the Island: A Portrait of Sicily and Life on the Mediterranean Sea.
- US title: A Wind from the North: The Life of Henry the Navigator (Harcourt Brace, 1960); UK title: Southward the Caravels: The Story of Henry the Navigator (Hutchinson, 1961).
- The Great Siege: Malta 1565 (Hodder & Stoughton, 1961); US title: The Great Siege (Harcourt Brace, 1961).
- The Touchstone (Cassell, 1962).
- Ulysses Found (Hodder & Stoughton, 1963).
- The Companion Guide to the Greek Isles (Collins, 1963), reprinted many times.
- Three Centuries of Sailing (Country Life, 1964).
- The America's Cup (Country Life, 1964).
- Drake. A Biography (Hodder & Stoughton, 1965); US edition: The Wind Commands Me: A Life of Sir Francis Drake (Harcourt, 1965); subsequently reprinted as Drake: England's Greatest Seafarer.
- (Editor) The Siege of Malta 1565: Translated from the Spanish Edition of 1568 by Francisco Balbi di Correggio (Folio Society, 1965); reprinted by the Boydell Press, 2011.
- Wall of England: The Channel's 2000 Years of History (Country Life, 1966); USA: Wall of Empire: The English Channel (Barnes, 1966).
- The Great Betrayal: Constantinople 1204 (Hodder & Stoughton, 1967); USA: The Sundered Cross: The Story of the Fourth Crusade (Prentice Hall, 1967).
- The Sultan's Admiral: The Life of Barbarossa (USA: Harcourt Brace, 1968; UK: Hodder & Stoughton, 1969).
- Teach Yourself Antique Furniture (English Universities Press, 1970).
- Mediterranean: Portrait of a Sea (Hodder & Stoughton, 1971).
- Gibraltar: The History of a Fortress (Hart-Davis, 1971).[20]
- Cleopatra (Hodder & Stoughton, 1971).
- The Shield and the Sword: The Knights of Malta (HarperCollins, 1972); US edition: The Shield and the Sword: The Knights of St. John, Jerusalem, Rhodes and Malta (Dutton, 1973).
- Christopher Columbus (Michael Joseph, 1973).
- The Sword and the Scimitar: The Saga of the Crusades (Victor Gollancz, 1974).
- Paul the Traveller: Saint Paul and his World (Allen Lane, 1974).
- Nelson: The Essential Hero (Macmillan, 1977).
- The Year of Thermopylae (Macmillan, 1980); also published as: Thermopylae: The Battle for the West.
- Hannibal (Macmillan, 1981); republished by The Folio Society (1996), with an introduction by Kenneth McLeish.
- The Story of the Mary Rose (Hamish Hamilton, 1982).
- Julius Caesar: The Pursuit of Power (Hamish Hamilton, 1984).
- Siege: Malta 1940-1943 (Hamish Hamilton, 1985).
- The Great Ship (Hamish Hamilton, 1986); reprinted as: The Great Ship: How Battleships Changed the History of War.[21]