Thomas Head Raddall

Thomas Head Raddall (13 November 1903 – 1 April 1994) was a Canadian writer of history and historical fiction. Early life Raddall was born in Hythe, Kent, England in 1903, the son of an Army officer, also named Thomas Head Raddall, and Ellen (née Gifford) Raddall. In 1913 the family moved to Nova Scotia, where his father had taken a training position with the Canadian Militia. The elder Raddall then saw active service during the First World War and was killed in action at Amiens in August 1918. Raddall attended Chebucto School in Halifax until 6 December 1917, when the school was converted into a temporary morgue in the wake of the Halifax Explosion. The Raddall family survived the explosion and Raddall wrote about it in his memoirs, In My Time. At the age of fifteen, Raddall trained at the Canadian School of Telegraphy in Halifax and shortly thereafter started working at the age of 18 as a marine telegraph operator for the Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company.