NLA image of person
Alan Moorehead Alan Moorehead i(A28611 works by) (a.k.a. Alan McCrae Moorehead)
Born: Established: 22 Jul 1910 Melbourne, Victoria, ; Died: Ceased: 29 Sep 1983 London,
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England,
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United Kingdom (UK),
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Western Europe, Europe,

Gender: Male
Expatriate assertion Departed from Australia: 1936
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BiographyHistory

Alan Moorehead was educated at Scotch College, Melbourne, and at Melbourne University. He joined the (Melbourne) Herald in 1933 as a staff reporter and left for England in 1936, working his passage as a crewman. He began reporting from Gibraltar for the (London) Daily Express and in June 1940 was accredited war correspondent, reporting throughout the war in Africa and Europe. In 1946 Moorehead retired from journalism to write full time and lived mainly in Italy. He wrote a series of works on the campaigns of the Second World War: Mediterranean Front (1941), A Year of Battle (1943) and The End in Africa (1943), combined as the African Trilogy, subtitled 'a personal account of the three years' struggle against the Axis in the Middle East and North Africa, 1940-3' (1944). Moorehead also wrote biographies of General Montgomery and Winston Churchill; historical narratives including Gallipoli (1956), Cooper's Creek (1963), and The Fatal Impact : The Invasion of the South Pacific, 1767-1840 (1966); travel books including No Room in the Ark (1959); two novels; and an autobiography. Moorehead visited Australia several times during his life and his personal papers are held at the National Library of Australia.

Most Referenced Works

Notes

  • Only a selection of Moorehead's work has been included in AustLit.

Awards for Works

y separately published work icon Cooper's Creek Cooper's Creek : Tragedy and Adventure in the Australian Outback; Cooper's Creek : The Real Story of Burke and Wills London : Hamish Hamilton , 1963 Z995999 1963 single work prose 'In 1860, an expedition set out from Melbourne, Australia, into the interior of the country, with the mission to find a route to the northern coast. Headed by Robert O'Hara Burke and William John Wills, the party of adventurers, scientists, and camels set out into the outback hoping to find enough water and to keep adequate food stores for their trek into the bush. Almost one year later, Burke, Wills, and two others from their party, Gray and King, reached the northern shore but on their journey back, they were stranded at Cooper's Creek where all but King perished. Cooper's Creek is a gripping, intense historical narrative about the harshness of the Australian outback and the people who were brave enough to go into the very depths of that uncharted country.' (Publisher's blurb)
1963 winner Royal Society of Literature Prize
y separately published work icon Gallipoli London : Hamish Hamilton , 1956 Z995979 1956 single work prose war literature

'A century has now gone by, yet the Gallipoli campaign of 1915-16 is still infamous as arguably the most ill conceived, badly led and pointless campaign of the entire First World War. The brainchild of Winston Churchill, then First Lord of the Admiralty, following Turkey's entry into the war on the German side, its ultimate objective was to capture the Gallipoli peninsula in western Turkey, thus allowing the Allies to take control of the eastern Mediterranean and increase pressure on the Central Powers to drain manpower from the vital Western Front.

'From the very beginning of the first landings, however, the campaign went awry, and countless casualties. The Allied commanders were ignorant of the terrain, and seriously underestimated the Turkish army which had been bolstered by their German allies. Thus the Allies found their campaign staled from the off and their troops hopelessly entrenched on the hillsides for long agonising months, through the burning summer and bitter winter, in appalling, dysentery-ridden conditions. By January 1916, the death toll stood at 21,000 British troops, 11,000 Australian and New Zealand, and 87,000 Turkish and the decision was made to withdraw, which in itself, ironically, was deemed to be a success.' (Publication summary from Allen & Unwin, 2015 edition)

1956 inaugural winner Duff-Cooper Award (UK)

Known archival holdings

Albinski 160-161
National Library of Australia (ACT)
Last amended 10 Dec 2012 13:37:16
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