| Description | The collection of 144 items includes three black and white and two colour photographs, four sketches of Henry and Loetitia Williamson by C F Tunnicliffe, an unfinished pencil sketch of a nude female, manuscript and typescript letters from Tunnicliffe to Williamson, 1932-1951, correspondence with publishers, hunt meet programmes, press cuttings, manuscript drafts, picture postcards, telegrams, one proof title page (for 'Salar the Salmon'), unfinished bird sketches, and a letter from Anne Williamson to Tunnicliffe, written after Williamson's memorial service in 1977. Most of the material predates 1951. |
| Admin History | Henry Williamson (1895-1977), writer, was born in south London and educated at Colfe's Grammar School, Lewisham. He fought in the army in the First World War and gained a deep sense of the futility of conflict as a result. He worked as a journalist for a short while before writing his first novel, 'The Beautiful Years', in 1921. This became volume one of a quarter, named 'The Flax of Dreams'. At the same time he moved to North Devon and, in 1927, wrote there 'Tarka the Otter', the book on which his fame most heavily rests, and 'A Patriot's Progress' (1930), based on his trench experiences. After 'Salar the Salmon' (1935) he became an outspoken supporter of German reform and British fascism, which led to his being briefly interned at the start of the war. His postwar work, which is arguably his most important, is a cycle of fifteen novels entitled, 'A Chronicle of Ancient Sunlight', which was completed in 1960.
Charles Frederick Tunnicliffe (1901-1979), wildlife painter, etcher and illustrator, studied at the Macclesfield School of Art, the Manchester School of Art and the Royal College of Art, before working for the Royal Society of Painter-Etchers and Engravers. He then returned to Macclesfield, working as a freelance artist, and developing particular interests in birdlife. He made his name in 1932 with wood engravings for 'Tarka the Otter', and went on to illustrate 'Salar the Salmon'. A personal friend of Williamson's, he exhibited at the Royal Academy. He eventually settled at a house on the Cefni Estuary, Anglesey, where the environment was to inspire his most famous book, 'Shorelands Summer Diary' (1952). He was elected a Royal Academician, Vice-President of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, Vice-President of the Society of Wildlife Artists, and was made an OBE in 1978. |