Cyril Ray

Early years Ray was born in Bury, Lancashire, the eldest son of Albert Benson Ray (né Rotenberg), an optician, and Rita Ray (née Caminetsky), both Jews. He was educated at the Wesleyan church school in Bury and then at Manchester Grammar School from where he won an open scholarship to Jesus College, Oxford. He had to leave Oxford after a year, as the family's funds ran out. When Ray left Oxford the Great Depression was at its worst and worthwhile jobs were scarce. Ray worked as a teacher, and then took a job in a riding school, where riding became one of his great loves. He took a short service commission in the Royal Air Force, and was posted to an obsolescent balloon squadron. His duties were light, and he had leisure for extensive reading. From 1950 to 1952 Ray was the paper's Moscow correspondent, a frustrating post at a time when the Soviet authorities were at their most secretive and suspicious. One of Ray's strongest interests was military history, and in 1952 he published From Algiers to Austria: The History of 78 Division. He held strong views on morals and politics. He left The Sunday Times over its editorial support for capital punishment. Wine writer Ray's position as a wine writer came out of his appointment in the early 1950s as editor of a magazine, The Compleat Imbiber, sent to its customers by an independent wine merchant, W. and A. Gilbey. This led to invitations to contribute wine columns to Punch and other magazines. When the proprietor of The Spectator, Ian Gilmour, announced in 1962 that he proposed to stand for Parliament for the right-wing Conservative party, Ray and many other Spectator writers left. He had already written for the Sunday paper, The Observer since 1959, and he went on doing so until he retired in 1973. In retirement he continued to write for Punch and published another 14 books between 1973 and 1988. In his later years, Ray lived mostly in London, in his rooms at Albany. He died in 1991 at the age of 83. ==Books==