Ernest William Hornung - 'Willie' to his friends - was the author of numerous works, including novels, poetry and short stories. But it is for his character Raffles that he is best remembered today.

Born on June 7th, 1866, he was the third son of John Peter Hornung, a Hungarian immigrant to England. He studied at Uppingham, and was keen player and watcher of cricket (a trait he gave also to Raffles). From 1884-1886 he resided in Australia ‘for the sake of his health’. In addition to "Le Premier Pas", two of his novels - "A Bride from the Bush" and "The Boss of Taroomba" - also had Australian settings.

After returning to England, he married Constance Doyle, the sister of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, in 1893. Hornung and his brother-in-law were good friends, and Doyle, the famous creator of Sherlock Holmes, encouraged Hornung to write more. As criminals, it is likely that Raffles and Manders are intended to ironically mirror Holmes and Watson. (A later author of Raffles and Holmes stories, Philip Jose Farmer, posited that the two characters were likewise brothers-in-law, in homage to the creators of the characters).

Ernest and Constance had but one child, a son named Arthur Oscar Hornung. Arthur served in His Majesty's Army in World War One, at the rank of Second Lieutenant, in the Essex Regiment. Ernest Hornung worked in a YMCA mobile library for the troops during the war, travelling across the French front. He survived the war, although Arthur, not so lucky, was slain at Ypres. In response to this, as well as his own experiences, Hornung wrote several poems, and a collection of his war poetry was later published under the title ‘The Young Guard", in addition to his autobiographical work "Notes of a Camp Follower on the Western Front".

>On March 22, 1921, he died at the age of 55, at St Juan de Luz, in France. He was survived by his wife and a literary legacy that continues to entertain and inspire a century on.