Julia Jones is a writer, publisher, and campaigner.
Julia Jones was born in Woodbridge, Suffolk and spent much of her childhood on board Peter Duck, the yacht that had been built for Arthur Ransome. Her bunk was created from the space where Ransome had planned to store his typewriter — it was the perfect reading spot. As well as reading the Ransome stories Julia was certain that she wanted to be the heroine of every pony book ever written. She was delighted when her parents moved to the family farm in Essex and she was allowed to own a particularly slow and stubborn wall-eyed pony on whom she dreamed about jumping five barred gates and returning home smothered in red rosettes.
Julia read English at Bristol University then married an Essex farmer who shared her love of horses. She opened a bookshop in the Essex village of Ingatestone and spent many happy hours with their three children reading through the profits. Bookselling developed into small scale local publishing under the Sarsen imprint (seven titles, four of them in association with Age Concern Essex). It was particularly exciting to rediscover Margery Allingham’s autobiographical The Oaken Heart, an account of the early years of the Second World War in Essex. This was the beginning of a close friendship with Margery's sister Joyce Allingham. Joyce gave Julia complete freedom to work in Margery’s former study and rummage through family papers as she researched Margery’s life for a biography (published in 1991). She also gave Julia her father Herbert Allingham’s papers.
Julia’s first marriage came to an end and she eventually sold the bookshop and discontinued Sarsen Publishing. In 1993 she and Francis began living together and had two children. Julia was working part time as an OFSTED lay inspector as well as studying with the Open University and working as an adult education tutor. Gradually she developed a full-time commitment as a community organiser for the WEA. This was a fascinating and worthwhile role. Nevertheless after Joyce Allingham’s death in 2001 the time seemed right for a return to personal research and writing. She felt she had a responsibility to catalogue Herbert Allingham’s mass of papers and ensure their preservation. This formed the basis for her University of Surrey (Roehampton) PhD thesis Family Fictions (2006) and later the Golden Duck-published biography Fifty Years in the Fiction Factory (2012). The papers are now held by the University of Westminster.
In 1999 Francis and Julia were able to buy and restore Peter Duck, sold after the death of Julia’s father George Jones in 1983. She was relaunched in 2000. The discovery of new Allingham material prompted a re-issue of the Margery Allingham biography in 2009 and this was soon followed by Philip Allingham’s Cheapjack and other Allingham titles. The first of the Strong Winds series — 21st century sailing adventure stories — was published in 2011. It marked the beginning of her creative partnership with the artist Claudia Myatt.
Julia’s mother June was by now living with dementia. Julia took responsibility for her care as she moved through very sheltered housing to dementia nursing care. It was a time of great emotion and learning, anguish and joy. Some of this is reflected in the book Beloved Old Age (2016) and more in Julia’s dementia blogs (on the Authors Electric site) and her writing and speaking for John’s Campaign. This significant initiative was co-founded with Nicci Gerrard in November 2014 after the death of Nicci’s father Dr John Gerrard. Julia’s mother died in December 2018. Both Julia and Nicci retain their commitment to improving the understanding of dementia, especially in the context of family relationships.
Currently Julia is the editor of The Deben magazine and literary contributor to Yachting Monthly. The discovery and publication of her father’s The Cruise of Naromis: August in the Baltic 1939 opened a new area of research interest which is on-going. She continues to write monthly blogs for Authors Electric and articles on dementia care and maritime subjects for a range of publications. She has become a regular speaker in sailing clubs as well as schools and libraries, hospitals and care homes. Julia has five grandchildren. She and Francis married in October 2019.
