Gerald Kingsland

Who was Gerald Kingsland?

Gerald W. Kingsland was a journalist, adventurer and writer, born and raised in Whitchurch, Buckinghamshire, England. He was five times married. He had five sons and two daughters from the total marriages. He died from a heart attack at age 70 in London, England.

After a stint in the British Army where he fought combat during the Korean War in 1951, he became a successful journalist and publisher in England, then a wine grower in Italy. In 1980 he set out to become a modern Robinson Crusoe seeking a remote tropical island where he could be self-sufficient together with a female companion. He advertised in Time Out magazine in 1980 for a woman to share life with him on a deserted island. When Kingsland was 49, he met up with 24-year-old Lucy Irvine. They went to Tuin Island, in the Torres Strait between Australia and Papua New Guinea, uninhabited and lacking a dependable water supply, where they nearly perished, but were saved by Badu Islanders. Kingsland and Irvine wrote separate accounts of their adventure. His book, The Islander was published in 1984. Irvine's Castaway was published in 1983. The story was also depicted in the film Castaway.