Michael Gilbert

Michael Francis Gilbert was born in Lincolnshire in 1912. He attended the University of London where he gained an LLB with honours in 1937. During World War II Gilbert served in the Royal Horse Artillery in North Africa where he was captured and imprisoned; an experience which led to the writing of his acclaimed novel Death in Captivity, first published in 1952. After the war Gilbert worked as a solicitor in London, during which time he found himself legal adviser to Raymond Chandler.