Christopher Lee

Christopher Lee RD was a British writer, historian and broadcaster, best known for writing the radio documentary series This Sceptred Isle for the BBC read by Anna Massey and directed by Pete Atkin.

Lee's career began after expulsion from school and going to sea in an old tramp steamer.

In his twenties he restarted education, reading history at London University. He later joined the BBC as a defence and foreign affairs correspondent and was posted to Moscow and the Middle East. Leaving his career in journalism for academia, Lee was the first Quatercentenary Fellow in Contemporary History and Gomes Lecturer in Emmanuel College, Cambridge. He went on to research the history of ideas at Birkbeck College in the University of London.

Christopher Lee was recruited into the Royal Navy's Joint Intelligence Reserve Branch and in the 1970s completed a study of the Order of Battle of the Soviet Northern Fleet and its command structure. Promoted to commander, he later became captain of HMS Wildfire based at Chatham in Kent and was awarded a bar to his Reserve Decoration.