Eric Newby was born in London in 1919 and was educated in St. Paul's school. In 1938 he joined the four-masted Finnish barque Moshulu as an apprentice and sailed in the last Grain Race from Australia to Eutope by way of Cape Horn. During the Second world War he served in the Black Watch and Special Boat Section, and was a prisoner-of-war from 1942 to 1945. After the war his world expanded still further - into the fashion business and book publishing. Wharever else he was doing, he always travelled on a grand scale, either under his own steam or as Travel Editor of the Observer. He was made CBE in 1994 and received the Lifetime Achievement Award of the british Guild of Travel writers in 2001. He died in 2006