The Secret Places

Ashdown Forest* 

These are the first two chapter of The Secret Places (Elkin Mathews & Marrot London 1929) - a chronicle of the 'pilgrimages' of the author, Reginald Francis Foster (1896-1975), and his friend 'Longshanks' in Sussex, Kent and Surrey. One of those magical walking/ rambling books that appeared in the 1920s and 1930s while, to quote Waugh, 'the going was good' despite ribbon development and the ubiquitous motor car. It was probably aimed at urban and suburban dwellers who got away to the country at weekends or when they could. Foster  was a jobbing journalist who also wrote books on the countryside and how-to-write  books. Most of this book had appeared in the Evening News in the late 1920s. He also wrote detective fiction. Between 1924 and 1936, according to Hubin, he produced 11 mysteries, some featuring a detective called Anthony Ravenhill (The Dark Night, The Missing Gates, The Moat House Murder etc.,) This contemporary review of The Secret Places in The Tablet gives a flavour of the work. There follows the first two chapters…(more to come)

We like The Secret Places. Mr. R. Francis Foster knows where treasure lies hid, and would gladly share his secret with those worthy of the trust.

Eric Parker, Country Writer, Bird Lover & Sportsman

This press-cutting of an obituary was loosely inserted in a copy of Highways and Byways in Surrey (Macmillan, London 1919). It is dated 14/2/55 and was probably cut from The Times. He is so far unknown to the all knowing Wikipedia despite having written many books. A recent article about him  in The Guildford Dragon News is headlined Eric Parker, Who He? In the second hand book world however he is not forgotten on account of his many books, still mostly quite saleable...

Writer on Sport and Countryside

Mr. Eric Parker, a well-known writer on field sports and the countryside and an active campaigner for the protection of wild birds, died at his home near Godalming yesterday at the age of 84. He was editor of the Lonsdale Library and a former editor-in-chief of the 'Field'.


Frederic Moore Searle (Eric) Parker was born at The Grange, East Barnet, in 1870, the eldest son of Frederick Searle Parker and Elisabeth, daughter of William Wilkieson, of Woodbury Hall, Bedfordshire. He was a King's Scholar at Eton and a Postmaster at Merton College, Oxford. He took a second class Hon. Mods. in 1891, and a fourth class in Lit. Hum. in 1893. He entered journalism in 1900, when he became junior assistant editor to Theodore Cook on the 'St. James Gazette'. While still on the staff of the 'St. James's' he started to write for the 'Spectator' under St. Loe Strachey, and when St. Loe Strachey bought the 'Country Gentleman' Parker was appointed editor of that paper, coupling it with regular writing for the 'Spectator'.

The 'Country Gentleman' ceased publication in 1907. By that time Parker has written one book, 'The Sinner and the Problem', and illustrated another, A. K. Collett's 'British Inland Birds. He was always a great Surrey man, and lived in that county for most of his life, and so it was fitting that he should than have been asked to contribute the volume on Surrey to the Highways and Byways series of Messrs. Macmillian. He had a thoroughly enjoyable, thought strenuous, time in prowling about the nooks and crannies of the county, and the result, illustrated by Hugh Thomson, was by no means the least attractive of an attractive series. 

College at Eton

In 1911 he became shooting editor of the 'Field'