Roy Moxham (born 1939) is a British writer, the author of historical books highlighting little-known historical facts.

Life

Moxham was born in

Evesham Evesham () is a market town and parish in the Wychavon district of Worcestershire, in the West Midlands region of England. It is located roughly equidistant between Worcester, Cheltenham and Stratford-upon-Avon. It lies within the Vale of Evesha ...

Worcestershire Worcestershire ( , ; written abbreviation: Worcs) is a county in the West Midlands of England. The area that is now Worcestershire was absorbed into the unified Kingdom of England in 927, at which time it was constituted as a county (see His ...

on 13 September 1939 and went to Prince Henry's Grammar School there. In 1961 he went to Nyasaland (now Malawi) to manage a tea plantation. In 1973 he returned to Britain and established a small gallery in Covent Garden to sell African art, travelling widely in Africa. In 1978 he went to Camberwell College of Art and Crafts, where he qualified as a book and archive conservator. Subsequently, he was a conservator at Canterbury Cathedral Archives and then became Senior Conservator at the Senate House Library of the

University of London The University of London (UoL; abbreviated as Lond or more rarely Londin in post-nominals) is a federal public research university located in London, England, United Kingdom. The university was established by royal charter in 1836 as a degree ...

, from which he retired in 2005. He lives in London, travels widely in south and south-east Asia and is a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society.

Works

Moxham's first book was ''The Freelander'', a novel based on the exploits of a group of idealists trying to establish a commune on

Mount Kenya Mount Kenya (Kikuyu: ''Kĩrĩnyaga'', Kamba, ''Ki Nyaa'') is the highest mountain in Kenya and the second-highest in Africa, after Kilimanjaro. The highest peaks of the mountain are Batian (), Nelion () and Point Lenana (). Mount Kenya is locat ...

in the 1890s. His best-known book is '' The Great Hedge of India''. This book is part- travelogue, part-historical treatise on the author's quest to find a 1500-mile long customs hedge built by the British in India to prevent smuggling of salt and

sugar Sugar is the generic name for sweet-tasting, soluble carbohydrates, many of which are used in food. Simple sugars, also called monosaccharides, include glucose, fructose, and galactose. Compound sugars, also called disaccharides or double ...

. His next book, ''Tea: Addiction, Exploitation and Empire'' focuses on the effect of British tea addiction on British policies in Asia and Africa, and includes the author's own experience as a tea plantation manager in Africa. An updated edition " A Brief History of Tea" came out in 2009. In 2010 he published a memoir, "Outlaw: India's Bandit Queen and Me" about his friendship with

Phoolan Devi Phoolan Devi (1963–2001), popularly known as the Bandit Queen, was an Mallah woman who grew up in poverty in a village in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. Her family was in a land dispute which caused many problems in her youth and after b ...

, the Indian bandit turned politician. In 2014 he published as an e-book a novel, "The East India Company Wife", based on the real life of Catherine Cooke, a thirteen-year-old English girl who went to India with her parents in 1709. In November 2016 ''The Theft of India: The European Conquests of India 1498 – 1765'' was published.

Bibliography

* ''The Theft of India: The European conquests of India 1498 – 1765'' (HarperCollins India, New Delhi: November 2016) * ''The East India Company Wife'' (e-book: 2014) * ''Outlaw: India's Bandit Queen and Me'' (Rider, London: 2010) * ''A Brief History of Tea'' (Robinson: 2009) * ''Tea: Addiction, Exploitation and Empire'' (Constable, London: 2003) * ''The Great Hedge of India'' (Constable, London: 2001) * ''The Freelander'' (Team, Nairobi: 1990)

External links

Personal website
Living people 21st-century British novelists British travel writers Academics of the University of London British male novelists 21st-century British male writers 1939 births {{UK-novelist-stub