He was born Lionel Walmsley, at 7 Clifton Place, Shipley in the West Riding of Yorkshire in 1892. Two years later, his family moved to Robin Hood's Bay on the coast of present-day
North Yorkshire, where he was schooled at the
old Wesleyan chapel and the Scarborough Municipal School. He was the son of the painter James Ulric Walmsley (1860–1954) who studied under Stanhope Forbes in Cornwall before settling in Robin Hood's Bay. During the
First World War he served as an
observer with the
Royal Flying Corps in East Africa, was
mentioned in dispatches four times and was awarded the
Military Cross. After a plane crash he was sent home, and after some time teaching at the school in Robin Hood's Bay, eventually pursued a literary career. After the war he left Robin Hood's Bay to work in London where he met his first wife. where he settled at
Pont Pill near
Polruan, where he became friendly with the writer
Daphne du Maurier. Walmsley was married three times. He married Elsie Susanna Preston in 1919, divorcing her in 1932. Then, in 1933, he married Margaret Bell Little, divorcing her around 1946. His final marriage was to Stephanie Gubbins, in 1955. His most notable works were
Foreigners,
Three Fevers,
Phantom Lobster and
Sally Lunn, the second of which was filmed as
Turn of the Tide (1935). The author's note to
Phantom Lobster, states that "There is no secret about Bramblewick. Its latitude and longitude are roughly 54.28.40 north, 0.34.10. west." He died in Fowey, Cornwall, on 8 June 1966. The house that he lived in on King's Street in Robin Hood's Bay has a
blue plaque on the outside. ==Bibliography==