| Anthony Loyd | |
|---|---|
| Born | Anthony William Vivian Loyd 12 September 1966 Churt on the Hampshire/Surrey, UK |
| Occupation | war correspondent |
| Spouse(s) | 2002 - 2005 Lady Sophia Hamilton |
Anthony William Vivian Loyd (born on 12 September 1966) is an English journalist, noted war correspondent,[1] and former British Army officer who saw active service in the First Gulf War.
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Loyd grew up in Churt on the Hampshire/Surrey border and attended St Edmunds School, Hindhead and Eton College. He joined the Royal Green Jackets and served with the British Army in Northern Ireland and the first Persian Gulf war.
On leaving the army he went to school for journalism and then went to Bosnia with a vague plan to cover the ongoing war. He started taking pictures but almost by accident an American reporter offered to buy some that he saw. So Loyd became a war photographer supporting himself by selling photos for 50 Deutschemarks per photograph.[1] Much later Loyd was traveling taking photos with British forces around Travnik, central Bosnia and Herzegovina about 90 km west of Sarajevo. While covering a fire fight a French correspondent who was writing for The Daily Telegraph was wounded by a claymore mine set off by the Croat HVO forces. The wounded correspondent asked Loyd to fill in until the paper could send a replacement, Loyd agreed and so started his first job as a journalist.[1] Afterwards he was put on retainer by The Times of London and regularly sent to war zones around the world.
Among the wars he reported were the conflicts in Bosnia, Kosovo, Chechnya, Afghanistan, Sierra Leone and Iraq. Loyd was noted for the risks he took in pursuing his stories. His most recent bylines (as of 15 September 2005) have been from Baghdad, where he has been out on patrol with both the American and Iraqi forces.[2]
My War Gone By, I Miss It So, is a noted book based on his experiences in Bosnia and Chechnya. The memoir is a chilling depiction of the depravity of war and adrenalin addiction Loyd experienced covering the violent dissolution of Yugloslavia in the mid-1990s. In the book Loyd staggers chapters about war in Bosnia, Chechnya, and boredom tinged with heroin addiction in London.
He published a second volume of autobiography, Another Bloody Love Letter, in 2007. It covered his experiences in the former Yugoslavia, Sierra Leone, Afghanistan and Iraq.
Loyd's risk-taking shows some similarity to his maternal great-grandfather, Lieutenant General Sir Adrian Carton De Wiart VC, KBE, CB, CMG, DSO (1880–1963).[3]
His great-grandfather was not only a highly decorated British soldier, he was also one of the most wounded (eleven times, which included the loss of an eye and a hand).
Both great-grandfather and great-grandson served in the British Army, but neither had much patience for peacetime routines, and both married into the landed aristocracy. Loyd refers to Sir Adrian Carton de Wiart as his grandfather in several articles, whereas Carton de Wiart is actually his maternal great-grandfather.
Loyd married Lady Sophia Hamilton, daughter of the 5th Duke of Abercorn in 2002 at Baronscourt, the Duke's 5,500 acre (22 km²) ancestral estate, near Omagh, County Tyrone, Northern Ireland.[4] They were divorced in 2005, on an amicable basis, occasioned by Loyd's frequent absences reporting on wars. He remarried again in 2007 and is now based in Devon with his wife, daughter and stepdaughter.[5][6]