Bruce Barrymore Halpenny

Bruce Barrymore Halpenny (born 1937 in Caistor, Lincolnshire) is an English military historian and author, specialising in airfields and aircraft, as well as ghost stories and mysteries. He is also a broadcaster and games inventor.

Halpenny's father was a Canadian First World War soldier who fought at Vimy Ridge, and his mother a British First World War munitions worker from Lincolnshire. Bruce is from Lincolnshire, England.

Halpenny served in the Royal Air Force Police (RAFP) in specialist units, often overseas, but after being wounded, and instead of coming out of the RAF, he moved across to the RAF Police on Special Security Duties (Atomic & Chemical Weapons), and was part of a special RAF military police unit on Special Duties and in the Nuclear Division, that was responsible for the protection of the nuclear weapons that the V bombers were to use in time of war.

In the 1950s whilst in the Royal Air Force, he was wounded and had to undergo several operations, in which his life was in the balance as dedicated surgeons fought to not only save his hand and arm, but also his life. In rehabilitation, he started writing and research as a hobby, and though he stayed in the RAF and was to serve on Special Duties and in the Nuclear Division, his hobby turned into a profession in later years after leaving the forces.

In the early period of his writing career, he started out by writing love stories and cowboy stories for the American market under pen names. Then, because of his specialist knowledge of the Royal Air Force, he focused on military history, especially RAF history of World War Two, often with deep insights, facts and personal human interest stories. At one time, he was writing articles for up to 14 military journals around the world, when he was approached by the publishers Patrick Stephens to do the Airfield books due to his vast knowledge and authority.

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