Born a Beachcomber

Born in the last year of the Great War on a croft in the north of Unst, Shetland, Thomas Mathieson grew up in a way of life that hadn't altered significantly in several centuries. Like thousands of Shetland boys before him, Thomas dreamed of escaping the hard toil of the croft for the romance of life at sea and the chance to visit exotic and mysterious lands. Inspired by several generations of seafarers in his family, he made his way to the great seaports of Britain in pursuit of a career in the merchant marine, not knowing that the realisation of his ambitions would coincide with the beginning of the next war, and lead to the kind of adventures he had never imagined when he first set out from his island home, including incarceration as a prisoner of war in Africa.