Ralph Durand

Ralph Anthony Durand (7 September 1876 – 20 December 1945) was an award-winning writer of novels, short stories and non-fiction. Much of his early writing was inspired by his travels in Australia and Africa. He served in the Boer War and World War I and was the librarian of the Priaulx Library between 1929 and 1945. He is best remembered for his works of non-fiction, particularly Guernsey Under German Rule, a first hand account of the German occupation of the Channel Islands during World War II. Early life Ralph was born on 7 September 1876 in Earley, Berkshire, the son of Rev Havilland Durand and his wife Mary née Hawtrey, where his father was the rector. The Durand family were descended from Huguenots who had sought refuge in the island of Guernsey following the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes. When his father died in 1884, his mother moved with the family to Guernsey, and Ralph was sent to Christ's Hospital, a boarding school. Durand left school at the age of sixteen, and travelled to Australia, where an aunt had offered to find him work on a cattle station. Travels in Australia and Africa