Return to the Marshes

Return to the Marshes - Gavin Young

Gavin David Young (24 April 1928 – 18 January 2001) was a journalist and travel writer.

He was born in Bude, Cornwall, England. His father, Gavin Young, was a lieutenant colonel in the Welsh Guards. Daphne, his mother, was the daughter of Sir Charles Leolin Forestier-Walker, Bt, of Monmouthshire.[1][2] Young spent most of his youth in Cornwall and South Wales. He graduated from Oxford University, where he studied modern history.[3]

Young spent two years with the Ralli Brothers shipping company in Basra in Iraq before living with the Marsh Arabs of southern Iraq between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers.[4] He fashioned his experiences into a book, Return to the Marshes (1977). In 1960, from Tunis, he joined The Observer of London as a foreign correspondent, and was the Observer's correspondent in Paris and New York. He had covered fifteen wars and revolutions throughout the world, and worked for The Guardian and was a travel writer. Young died in London on 18 January 2001; he was 72 years old.