BIOGRAPHY

Lawrence Eric Wheeler

1910-1987

 

Lawrence Wheeler was born in Brixton to theatrical parents and spent  the first three years of his life in London. The family then moved to Shoreham-by -Sea, Sussex, where he received his education firstly at Shoreham Grammar school and then later at Steyning Grammar school. On leaving school he became employed in an insurance office in Brighton but his hate of the indoor life led him to take up jobs in the docks, on farms and in local nurseries . During this time he was prolific in his poetry writing and had work published in poetry journals. He was very active in the local tennis Club, a keen canoeist and was very friendly with the film-set on Shoreham Beach which was then a centre of the British Film Industry. 

 

He met his wife to be, Constance Cuckney,  whilst working in a nursery in Sompting but to gain better paid employment he became an insurance agent and moved for a short while to Capel and then to Newdigate in 1938 just across the county border in Surrey. It was in Newdigate  that he loved so well,  that he spent the rest of his life. His son was born in 1940. 

 

Lawrence served as a radio operator in the Royal Engineers during the Second World War; saw action in Normandy on D-Day, and was present at the liberation of Belsen Concentration Camp. He acted for a while as a Burgermeister in a small occupied German Town. His older brother Stanley was killed in action in Italy in 1944.   A few war poems scribbled on paper scraps have been salvaged from piles of handwritten notes that Lawrence left.

 

After the war he returned to Newdigate where he bcame deeply involved in local activities which, together with his employment  and work in his beloved  but large garden, meant that he had less time available for his pen than he had had in his youth.  However, retirement gave him time once again for his poetry and short stories.

 

In his later years he joined a writing group for Sussex poets run by some quite well known amateur poets, Basil Evershed and Victor Swan; published in their magazine, 'The Seasons', and often recited his work aloud at various meetings of like-minded folk. 

 

A natural ear for music and a love of nature influenced his writings, and his poetry demonstrates that.  He also called on his experiences and innermost feelings as subject matter to produce thought-provoking and emotionally-charged work.