Erskine Childers
1870–1922
Biography
Robert Erskine Childers, usually known as Erskine Childers, was born in England in 1870. He became a writer and an Irish nationalist. As a volunteer in the Second Boer War he had at first been a convinced supporter of the British Empire, but what he saw in South Africa started a slow loss of faith in British imperialism. He stood as a Liberal candidate in British elections before turning to Irish republicanism.
His best-known book, The Riddle of the Sands (1903), follows two men sailing the shallow waters off the German coast and uncovering a German plan to invade England by sea. The novel is said to have influenced Winston Churchill, then First Lord of the Admiralty, in strengthening the Royal Navy's Home Fleet. When the First World War began, Churchill helped bring Childers into naval service, where he was decorated.
Childers later smuggled guns into Ireland for the Irish Volunteers, played a part in the negotiations that produced the Anglo-Irish Treaty, and then opposed the treaty. He was executed by the Irish Free State in 1922. The site holds The Riddle of the Sands, and much of the book's appeal lies in its detailed sailing and its tense, careful plotting of a secret threat.
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Books
The Riddle of the Sands
by Erskine Childers
The Riddle of the Sands: A Record of Secret Service is a 1903 novel by Erskine Childers. The book, which enjoyed immense popularity in the years before World War I, is an early example of the espionage novel and was extremely influential in the genre of spy fiction. It has been…
Summary from Wikipedia: The Riddle of the Sands (CC BY-SA 4.0)