Arthur Swinson: 1916-1970

Arthur Swinson was a distinguished soldier with a lifelong passion for writing, who produced an astonishing array of books. Born in St. Albans, he trained as an army officer cadet at Sandhurst before seeing action as an infantryman in India, Assam, Burma and Malaya. His time in the army greatly influenced Arthur’s writing, and after serving in World War II he joined the BBC as a writer and producer, first in radio and then in TV, eventually becoming Senior Documentary Producer. He left the BBC in 1961 to concentrate on writing full time, producing the important textbook Writing for TV Today (1963), and himself completed over three hundred plays for TV, radio and stage, as well as over thirty books of fiction and non-fiction. He produced a number of well-regarded novels, including The Temple (1970), and adapted the TV series Sergeant Cork into a series of books under the title Sergeant Cork’s Casebooks. Other areas in which he has written include biography, medical diagnosis, and textbooks for schools.

Arthur is, however, best remembered for his works of military history, such as North-West Frontier (1967) and Four Samurai (1968), and especially for Kohima (1967), an account of a battle in which he took part, and which is widely regarded as one of the best works to emerge from the Second World War. He edited A Register of the Regiments & Corps of the British Army (1971), and contributed a number of volumes to the popular Ballantine’s Illustrated History of WWII, including Mountbatten (1971), The Raiders: Desert Strike Force (1972), and Defeat in Malaya: the Fall of Singapore (1973). Other works include The Great Air Race (1968), The Orchid King (1970), and the work for which he is best known, Scotch on the Rocks: the True Story Behind “Whiskey Galore” (1963). This meticulously researched and hugely entertaining book was re-published by Luath Press in 2005, with a new introduction by Arthur’s daughter Antonia and a foreword by Sir Compton Mackenzie (www.scotchontherocks.net ).

Recent books:

Scotch on the Rocks: the True Story Behind “Whiskey Galore” (Luath: 2005)