Frank Baines (1915-1987) Able Seaman, Chindit Officer,
Hindu monk, businessman, journalist, writer, film extra,
prisoner, long-distance cyclist there were many sides to
Frank Baines. Indeed perhaps Frank himself never quite
knew who he was, nor where he belonged. He only
discovered his real name when he was a teenager. He was
gay at a time when homosexuality was still against the
law. Banished from a childhood paradise in Cornwall
following the death of his father, the distinguished
architect Sir Frank Baines, Frank roamed the world for
many years seeking to regain that Shangri La. The quest
took him on the high seas to Australia and South America,
and then to the army in India and behind enemy lines into
Burma, where he went to war with the Chindits and fell in
love with his Gurkha orderly. After the war he settled in
a Hindu monastery in the Himalayan foothills, but,
restless as ever, he moved to steamy Calcutta. Here he
became a businessman, repairing tea chests, and embarked
on his writing career, starting out as a journalist and
columnist on The Statesman, one of India s most prominent
daily newspapers.
