Novelist. (1897-1977) [GLADES OF REMEMBRANCE]

An English writer whose prolific output of thrillers and occult novels made him one of the world's best-selling authors from the 1930s through the 1960s. His Gregory Sallust series was one of the main inspirations for Ian Fleming's James Bond stories.

Wheatley was commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant into the Royal Field Artillery during the First World War, receiving his basic training at Biscot Camp in Luton. He was assigned to the City of London Brigade and the 36th (Ulster) Division. Wheatley was gassed in a chlorine attack during Passchendaele and was invalided out, having served in Flanders, on the Ypres Salient, and in France at Cambrai and Saint Quentin.

In 1919 he took over management of the family's wine business. In 1931, however, after business had declined because of the Great Depression, he sold the firm and began writing.

During the Second World War Wheatley was a member of the London Controlling Section, which secretly coordinated strategic military deception and cover plans. His literary talents led to his working with planning staffs for the War Office. He wrote numerous papers for them, including suggestions for dealing with a possible Nazi invasion of Britain (recounted in his works Stranger than Fiction and The Deception Planners). The most famous of his submissions to the Joint Planning Staff of the war cabinet was on "Total War". He received a direct commission in the JP Service as a Wing Commander, RAFVR, and took part in the plans for the Normandy invasions. After the war Wheatley was awarded the U.S. Bronze Star for his role in the war effort.

Wheatley mainly wrote adventure novels, with many books in a series of linked works.

During the 1930s, Wheatley conceived a series of mysteries the reader had to inspect this evidence to solve the mystery before unsealing the last pages of the file, which gave the answer. Wheatley also devised several board games including Invasion (1938), Blockade (1939) and Alibi (April 1953)

Some of his books were made into films by Hammer, of which the best known is The Devil Rides Out (book 1934, film 1968). Wheatley also wrote non-fiction works, edited several collections of short stories, and from 1974 through 1977, he supervised a series of 45 paperback reprints for the British publisher Sphere with the heading "The Dennis Wheatley Library of the Occult".

He was cremated at Tooting and his ashes interred here. He is commemorated on the Baker/Yeats family monument at West Norwood Cemetery.

Wartime SOE (Special Operations Executive)

Wing Commander Forest Frederick Edward Yeo-Thomas, GC, MC & Bar, known as "Tommy", was a British Special Operations Executive (SOE) agent in the Second World War. Codenamed "SEAHORSE" and "SHELLEY" in the SOE, Yeo-Thomas was known by the Gestapo as "The White Rabbit". He was one of the most highly decorated agents in the Second World War.

Merchant Banker.
A Canadian merchant banker, born in St. Elmo, Glengarry County, Ontario. He is perhaps best known as a director of the Bank of England, or for his role as receiver general to the Duchy of Cornwall, the principal property management arm of the Royal Family.

Musician.

A Dalmatian musician who moved to London where he was Professor of Singing at the Royal College of Music, becoming a Fellow in 1921. He was the stepfather of the novelist Radclyffe Hall.

Born in Solin in Dalmatia to a landowner Italian father and an English mother, Visetti was originally intended by his father for a career as a surgeon so was sent to the University of Padua to study medicine, but affected by the sights of the dissecting room he withdrew and turned instead to music. He was awarded musical scholarships from the Austrian and Italian governments. He studied music at the Milan Conservatory where a friend was Arrigo Boito who wrote the libretto for Visetti's Cantico des Cantici, and where he was a pupil of Alberto Mazzucato in class composition, winning several awards. While here he made the acquaintance of Verdi.[1] Visetti was later engaged as a conductor at Nice before moving to Paris where he was an assistant to the composer Daniel Auber at the Court of Napoleon III. While in Paris he composed the opera Le Trois Mousequetaires after he met Alexander Dumas, who wrote the libretto. However, the almost complete manuscript was destroyed in a fire during the Siege of Paris.

Visetti moved to England in May 1871 after the turmoil of the Siege of Paris, living there for the rest of his life, being naturalised in 1884. Here he became a champion of English music and musicians, arranging for the works of such composers as Arthur Sullivan, William Sterndale Bennett and Charles Villiers Stanford to be performed for the first time at La Scala in Milan and in Rome and Naples.

Visetti became one of the leading professors of singing in the country, teaching singing at the Guildhall School of Music where his students included Bruce Carey; the London Academy of Music, at Watford School and the Royal College of Music, where his students included Clara Butt,[5] Denise Orme, Jones, Louise, Phyllis Lett and Agnes Nicholls. Visetti was musical adviser to the soprano Adelina Patti for five years, and wrote the popular song La Diva for her. He was Director and Conductor of the Philharmonic Society of Bath from 1878 to 1890 and for whom he wrote two cantatas, The Desert and The Praise of Song. In 1880 Umberto I the King of Italy conferred on him the Order of the Crown of Italy for his literary achievements. He wrote and translated several books including a life of Giovanni Palestrina and wrote a biography of Verdi for the Bells Miniature Series of Musicians (1905). In 1921 Visetti was made a Fellow of the Royal College of Music.

Founder of the British School of Motoring.
Inventor, Automotive Pioneer. An outstanding figure in technical education and training in Britain. Roberts was convinced that Britain could maintain its position in the world only by training more people in science and technology. He founded the British School of Motoring in 1909, and the Automobile College in 1923. In the following year, he founded the College of Aeronautical & Automobile Engineering in Chelsea. The young Alec Issigonis, designer of the Mini, was a student there. Roberts also invented many improvements for the audio industry, including the "Vestone" gramophone.