Robert Kee was born in 1919 and read history at Magdalen College, Oxford. He was a bomber pilot in the RAF, and after leaving in 1946, he became a journalist. He worked for Picture Post, the Observer and the Sunday Times, and was a literary editor of the Spectator. He was considered one of the great broadcasters of his generation, appearing for many years on both the BBC and ITV as reporter, interviewer and presenter. He took part in current affairs programmes and in documentaries for the BBC and ITV. More recently he wrote on Britain during the Second World War in 1939: The World We Left Behind and 1945: The World We Fought For; also Trial and Error about the Guildford pub bombings. He was awarded the BAFTA Richard Dimbleby Award in 1976. He died in 2013.

Arguably the best POW book ever written