Biography

British journalist and novelist Philip Gibbs was born Philip Hamilton Gibbs in London in 1877 (his brothers Cosmo Hamilton and A. Hamilton Gibbs were also writers). In 1896 he was appointed as educational editor at the publishing house of Cassell & Co. After holding a variety of positions in the publishing industry, he got a job as an editor at the Daily Mail newspaper, and shortly afterward went to work for the Daily Express. After that he served as literary editor of the Tribune, and when that paper went out of business he moved to Littlehampton on England's South Coast and wrote a memoir of his days on Fleet Street, entitled "Adventures in Journalism". Though the book was critically acclaimed, a libel suit by a journalist he had worked with damaged the book's reputation, and although the suit was finally settled out of court, the book itself was not a financial success and Gibbs was forced to look for a job to support himself. He secured employment with The Daily Chronicle as a "specfial corespondent", which meant that he covered the more sensational stories of the time, such as gun battles between police and criminal gangs and the pursuit of the infamous killer Dr. Crippen across the Atlantic to America.

When World War I broke out Gibbs went to France to cover the fighting. He became one of only five reporters accredited by the British army. His resulting stories have been hailed as among the best war correspondence ever to have been written. In 1920 he and his four colleagues were made Knights of the Order of the British Empire for their work.

After the war he wrote several books about his experiences during it and traveled the world, investigating conditions in Russia during the infamous 1921 famine and journeying to the US several times, during one of which he managed to obtain an interview with the Pope (an almost unheard-of feat for a reporter). He resigned from the Chronicle in 1921 due to his strong disagreement with the paper's coverage of the Irish troubles. A prolific writer, he wrote several books during World War II about the suffering of the British people and how they remained defiant and refused to give up even during the darkest days of the German bombing campaigns against them.

He died in 1962 in Surrey, England, at age 84.
- IMDb mini biography by: frankfob2@yahoo.com