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Catherine Gavin
Catherine Irvine Gavin (1907-2000) was a Scottish academic historian, war correspondent, and historical novelist.
She was born in Aberdeen in 1907 and studied history and English at the University...view moreCatherine Irvine Gavin (1907-2000) was a Scottish academic historian, war correspondent, and historical novelist.
She was born in Aberdeen in 1907 and studied history and English at the University of Aberdeen, graduating with first-class honours. After obtaining a doctorate on Louis Philippe of France in 1931, she took up positions as a history lecturer at Aberdeen and at the University of Glasgow. She stood as a Unionist candidate in two parliamentary elections in the 1930s, but without success.
During World War II, she worked in France and the Netherlands for Kemsley Newspapers. After the war, she married American advertising executive John Ashcraft and moved to the United States with him. They were together until his death in 1998.
Spanning a writing career of seven decades, Catherine Gavin authored many historical novels, including: Clyde Valley (1938), The Hostile Shore (1940), The Black Milestone (1941), The Mountain of Light (1944), Madeleine (1957), The Fortress (1964), The Moon Into Blood (1966), The Devil in Harbour (1968), The House of War (1970), Give Me the Daggers (1972), The Snow Mountain (1973), Traitors’ Gate (1976), How Sleep the Brave (1980), The Sunset Dream (1984), A Light Woman (1986), A Dawn of Splendour (1989), and The French Fortune (1991).
The University of Aberdeen awarded her an honorary D.Litt. in 1986. The Catherine Gavin Room there was named in her honour. The university also has a 1940 portrait of her, in oil, by Elizabeth Mary Watt.
Catherine Gavin died in 2000, aged 92.view less