Philip Graves

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Philip Perceval Graves (February 25, 1876 – June 3, 1953) was a British journalist and writer. While working as a foreign correspondent of The Times in Constantinople, he exposed The Protocols of the Elders of Zion as anti-Semitic fraud.

Born in Ballylickey Manor, Cork County, Ireland, into a prominent Anglo-Irish family, Graves studied in Haileybury and Oxford University and became a prominent journalist and author.

As a correspondent of The Times in Constantinople from 1908 to 1914, he reported on the events preceding World War I. In 1914, as a British citizen, he had to leave the Ottoman Empire due to the war. In 1915-1919, he served in the British Army in the Middle East war theatre.

Graves exposed the Protocols as a forgery in The Times. August 16-18, 1921

After the war he exposed The Protocols of the Elders of Zion as anti-Semitic forgery in a series of articles in The Times.

After 1919, Graves reported from his own homeland on the Anglo-Irish War. He worked as a foreign correspondent in India, the Levant and on the Balkans and finally returned to London to work as an editor of The Times.

His most monumental work was a 21-volume history of World War II. Graves received numerous international awards and titles, among which are French Légion d'honneur and Italian Crown order.

In his journeys, Philip Graves developed an interest in entomology and published articles in scientific journals. He was member of the Royal Irish Academy.

He retired in 1946 and dedicated himself mainly to zoological hobbies.

[edit] Entomology

Graves specialised in the Lepidoptera of Syria , Lebanon , Iraq , and Palestine, often working with Robert Eldon Ellison . Another Irishman (born Wingstown near Dublin) Ellison was a career diplomat.

His published work on insects reflects the strengths of his collection but not it's extent. In 1938, for instance, he presented more than 2, 500 specimens were presented to the Natural History Museum , London). These are described in the catalogue of acquisitions Rhopalocera (Levant and Balkans). There are a few specimens, including an excellent series of Archon apollinus in the Ulster Museum, Belfast.

His published work on insects includes:

Collecting Lepidoptera in Syria, 1905 Entomologist’s Rec. J. Var 18:125-6 (1906).
Collecting in Syria: Ain Zhalta in May -June 1905. Entomologist’s Rec. J. Var 18:149-152 (1906).
A contribution to the fauna of Syria Entomologist’s Rec. J. Var 23: 31-36 (1910).
Two new Lycaenid subspecies from the Lebanon Entomologist 56: 154-157(1925).
The Rhopalocera and Grypocera of Palestine and Transjordania Trans. Ent. Soc., London, 1925 17-125 (1925).
with Ellison, R.E. The butterflies of the Jabal Quinesia, Lebanon Entomologist’s Rec. J. Var 40:177-180 ( 1938).

An account of Graves work in entomology is given in Hesselbarth, G.; Oorschot, H. van & Wagener, S.,1975 Die Schmetterlinge der Türkei, Band 2: 1179 - 1199 [B 2189:2].

He is named for Gonepteryx rhamni gravesi Huggins,1956, the Irish race of the Brimstone butterfly.

[edit] Political Works

Briton and Turk, London, Hutchinson Publishers, 1941
Palestine, the land of three faiths, 1923
The question of the straits, Ernest Benn Publishers, 1931
Memoirs of King Abdallah of Transjordan (edited by P. Graves, translated from the Arabic by G. Khuri), London, Jonathan Cape, 1950