Ralph Hale Mottram

Ralph Hale Mottram (October 30, 1883 – April 16, 1971) was an English writer, as a war poet of World War I, and then as a novelist, particularly for his "Spanish Farm books."

Life
His father was the chief clerk of Gurney's Bank in Norwich and Mottram had an idyllic childhood growing up in 'Bank House' - a magnificent George II mansion on Bank Plain - which was later Barclay's Bank and is now a youth centre. The Mottrams were non-conformist and worshipped at the Octagon Chapel, Norwich in Colegate.

Mottram went from being a bank clerk in Norwich, before the war, to becoming mayor there in 1953. The Spanish Farm won the 1924 Hawthornden Prize. He also wrote a biography of John Galsworthy.

He was a defender of Mousehold Heath - a large open space in the heart of Norwich. On St. James' Hill, there is a sculpture which depicts the skyline of Norwich which is dedicated to him.

He is buried in the Rosary Cemetery, Norwich. Mottram once said that 'I knew, when I was four years old, exactly where I could be buried.'

Publications

 * Repose and other verses (1907), as J. Marjoram
 * New Poems (1909), as J. Marjoram
 * The Spanish Farm (1924), a trilogy with Sixty-Four, Ninety-Four and The Crime at Vanderlynden’s
 * Sixty-Four, Ninety-Four (1925)
 * The Crime at Vanderlynden's (1926)
 * Our Mr. Dormer (1927), a trilogy with The Boroughmonger and Castle Island
 * The Apple Disdained (1928)
 * Ten Years Ago. Armistice and other memories (1928)
 * The English Miss (1938)
 * A History of Financial Speculation (1929)
 * The Boroughmonger (1929)
 * A Rich Man's Daughter (1930)
 * Europa's Beast (1930)
 * The New Providence (1930)
 * Poems Old and New (1930)
 * Three Men's War (1930), with John Easton and Eric Partridge
 * The Lost Christmas Presents (1931)
 * Castle Island (1931)
 * John Crome of Norwich (1931)
 * The Headless Hound and other stories (1931)
 * Dazzle (1932)
 * At the Sign of The Lame Dog (1933)
 * East Anglia (1933)
 * Bumphrey's (1934)
 * Flower Pot End (1935)
 * Journey to the Western Front Twenty Years After (1936)
 * The Westminster Bank 1836-1936 (1936)
 * Portrait of an Unknown Victorian (1936)
 * Old England (1937)
 * Time to Be Going (1937)
 * Autobiography with a Difference (1939)
 * Miss Lavington (1939)
 * You Can't Have It Back! (1939)
 * Trader's Dream The Romance of the British East India Company (1939)
 * Visit of the Princess - a Romance of the 1960s (1946)
 * Hibbert Houses, A Record (1947)
 * Norfolk (1948)
 * The Glories of Norwich Cathedral (1948)
 * Come to the Bower (1949)
 * East Anglia, a new guide book (1951)
 * The Broads (1952)
 * The Part That Is Missing (1952)
 * If Stones Could Speak (1953), social history of Norwich
 * John Galsworthy (1953), biography
 * The Window Seat or Life Observed (1954)
 * For Some We Loved (1956), biography of John Galsworthy and his wife
 * Another Window Seat (1957)
 * Buxton the Liberator (1958), biography of Thomas F. Buxton the abolitionist
 * Vanities and Verities (1958)
 * Time's Increase (1961)
 * To Hell with Crabb Robinson (1962)
 * Behind the Shutters (1968)
 * 12 Poems (1968)