Arthur Bingham Walkley

Arthur Bingham Walkley (17 December 1855 – 7 October 1926), usually known as A B Walkley was an English public servant and drama critic. As a civil servant he worked for the General Post Office from 1877 to 1919, in increasingly senior posts; he did not seek the highest official positions, preferring to leave himself time and energy for his parallel career as a drama critic. As a journalist he worked with Bernard Shaw on The Star at the beginning of his newspaper career; he is probably best known for his twenty-six years as theatre critic of The Times. He retired from the Post Office in 1919, and for the last six years of his life concentrated wholly on writing.

Walkley was born at Bedminster, Bristol, the only child of Arthur Hickman Walkley, a bookseller, and his wife, Caroline Charlotte, née Bingham. He was educated at Warminster School and then gained an exhibition in mathematics at Balliol College, Oxford, and matriculated in October 1873. In January 1874 he moved to Corpus Christi College, Oxford, having been elected a scholar there. He took a first class in both the mathematical moderations (1875) and the final school of mathematics (1877).

In June 1877 Walkley successfully entered an open competitive examination for appointment to the civil service; he was appointed a third-class clerk in the secretary's office of the General Post Office. On 29 March 1881 he married Frances Sarah Maud Antrobus Eldridge (1858–1934). There was one daughter of the marriage.

Walkley's abilities were recognised by the civil service. He was promoted successively to the grade of second-class clerk (1882), first-class clerk (1892), principal clerk (1899) and assistant secretary, in charge of the telegraph branch (1911). He represented the Post Office at three important international gatherings: in 1897 he was secretary of the British delegation to the Washington Postal Congress, in 1898 secretary to the Imperial Penny Postage Conference, and in 1906 a delegate to the Rome Postal Congress.

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