Dennis Wheatley
| Dennis Wheatley | |
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Portrait by Allan Warren, 1975
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| Born | Dennis Yeats Wheatley 8 January 1897 London, England |
| Died | 10 November 1977 (aged 80) |
| Occupation | Writer, editor |
| Nationality | British |
| Citizenship | British |
| Period | 1930–1980 |
| Genre | Adventure, occult, and historical fiction |
| Notable works | The Devil Rides Out |
Dennis Yeats Wheatley (8 January 1897 – 10 November 1977) was an English writer whose prolific output of thrillers and occult novels made him one of the world's best-selling authors from the 1930s through the 1960s. His Gregory Sallust series was one of the main inspirations for Ian Fleming's James Bond stories.
Wheatley was born in South London to Albert David and Florence Elizabeth Harriet (Baker) Wheatley. He was the eldest of three children in the family that owned Wheatley & Son of Mayfair, a wine business. He admitted to having little aptitude for schooling and was later expelled from Dulwich College for allegedly forming a "secret society" (as mentioned in the writer’s introduction of The Devil Rides Out).
Soon after his expulsion, Wheatley became a British Merchant Navy officer cadet on the training ship HMS Worcester.
Wheatley was commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant into the Royal Field Artillery during the First World War, receiving his basic training at Biscot Camp in Luton. He was assigned to the City of London Brigade and the 36th (Ulster) Division. Wheatley was gassed in a chlorine attack during Passchendaele and was invalided out, having served in Flanders, on the Ypres Salient, and in France at Cambrai and St. Quentin.
In 1919 he took over management of the family's wine business. In 1931 however, after business declined in the Great Depression, he sold the firm and began writing.
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