John Prebble


John Edward Curtis Prebble, FRSL, OBE, was an English journalist, novelist, documentarian and popular historian. He is best known for his studies of Scottish history.

Early life

He was born in Edmonton, Middlesex, England, but in 1921 he emigrated with his parents to Saskatchewan, Canada, where his father's brother was living. Returning to Edmonton with his family when aged 12, he attended the Latymer School. He joined the Communist Party of Great Britain but abandoned it after World War II.

''The High Girders''

He became a journalist in 1934 and served during World War II with the Royal Artillery. His wartime experiences led to his novels, Where the Sea Breaks, and The Edge of Darkness, published in 1947. His Canadian prairie experience influenced two of his works, The Buffalo Soldier, a historical novel about the American West, specifically, the 10th Cavalry Regiment, and Culloden, about the 1746 battle which resulted in the defeat of the Jacobite uprising. The story of Battle of Culloden had been part of the family lore when he grew up in the predominantly Scottish township of Sutherland, in rural Saskatchewan. His interest in the American West was also inspired by the fact that part of his family lineage was Native American: his 1958 book, My Great-Aunt, Appearing Day, and Other Stories tells of a Cheyenne relative named Appearing Day.
One of his first big successes was The High Girders, a description of the Tay Bridge Disaster, involving the collapse of the first Tay rail bridge to Dundee. It has remained a popular work ever since publication. It was the first detailed account of the disaster to expose the many problems encountered during construction of the bridge, and Prebble also made extensive use of the Board of Trade Public Inquiry in reviewing the evidence. He included some of the many photographs made at the time, and which show the extent of devastation of the centre part of the bridge on the night of 28 December 1879. There is still controversy over the detailed causes of the failure, especially the contributions from poor design of the columns using cast iron and the storm raging at the time of the fall. However, the original conclusions of the Inquiry still stand. It found that the bridge fell owing to "bad design, bad construction and bad maintenance".

''Fire and Sword Trilogy''

The Fire and Sword Trilogy is about the fall of the Scottish clan system. Culloden was the first book and it chronicles the defeat of the clans in one pivotal battle. The two other works were The Highland Clearances and Glencoe. Glencoe was a study of the causes and effects of the Glencoe massacre in 1692, when British soldiers and members of the Campbell Clan attacked and killed members of Clan Donald who lived in Glencoe, a remote glen in the west highlands of Scotland. The book focuses on the political machinations to bring the unruly MacDonalds to heel, both by King William and by Scots with ambitions in royal circles. The massacre was notorious, both then and now, for the Campbells had abused the hospitality of the MacDonalds who had given them food and lodgings for several days before.
His later works, Mutiny and The King's Jaunt would extend the theme. The Highland Clearances remains one of his best known works perhaps because the subject of the Highland clearances as a discrete historical event remains a subject of debate. Historian Tom Devine credits Prebble with tackling "an important and controversial subject" which was being largely ignored at the time by academic historians - the first comprehensive history of the clearances to be produced by a professional historian was published in 1982, some 19 years after Prebble brought the subject to attention.
in Loch Roag. The island was cleared of its inhabitants in 1841 and is now only used for grazing sheep
Prebble makes a case that there was a conscious effort to remove Highlanders and Islanders from Scotland. Others argue that it was purely economic and social factors which led to the population decline in rural Scotland. The historiographer royal in Scotland, Gordon Donaldson, was particularly cutting in his criticism and declared Prebble's books to be "utter rubbish". Prebble's obituary in the Daily Telegraph said "he was often accused of ignoring economic factors in his analysis of social change, but his books, though unashamedly partisan, were based on thorough research". Tom Devine reports the view of historians that Prebble's Highland Clearances was under-researched and lacking in critical perspective. Devine takes the view that Prebble relies extensively on the late 19th century accounts of the Clearances,, with no evidence of any original research.

Other media

His short story My Great-Aunt Appearing Day, first published in 1952 in Lilliput magazine, became the basis of the 1955 film White Feather. He wrote an article entitled "Slaughter in the Sun" for Lilliput in 1958, on which the film Zulu would be based, co-written by Prebble and the director, Cy Endfield.
He contributed to television on the limited serials The Six Wives of Henry VIII, Elizabeth R and The Borgias.
He also wrote radio dramas and documentaries for the BBC. They were usually, but not always, based on his published works. For example, in 1977, he wrote an adaptation of John Buchan's The Three Hostages.

Personal

He was married to the artist Betty Prebble. He had a daughter, Sarah Prebble, and two sons, Jolyon and actor and narrator Simon Prebble. His first wife died in 1993 and he married his long-term mistress Jan Reid in 1994.

Publications include

Fiction