Former Daily Mail director Brian Freemantle – who went on to become a bestselling author – has died aged 88.
During a distinguished career at the paper as a foreign editor, he masterminded the Mail’s dramatic airlift to rescue Vietnamese children from Saigon just days before the destroyed city fell to the Viet Cong in 1975.
In an operation as daring as the compulsive thrillers he later wrote, Freemantle suspended makeshift cots from the ceiling of the specially chartered Boeing 707, crewed by nurses and medics, that carried 99 orphaned and sick children to a new life. brought. Britain.
One of the rescued babies, then known as ‘Baby No. 10’, later named her son Harry after Mr Freemantle’s middle name.
Previously, the reporter had played a key role in the Mail’s transformation from a broadsheet to a compact newspaper under the leadership of Sir David English in 1971.
Former Daily Mail director Brian Freemantle (pictured) – who went on to become a bestselling author – has died aged 88
Operation Mercy Airlift which was chartered by Mr Freemantle. He had makeshift cots hung from the ceiling of the specially chartered Boeing 707, crewed by nurses and medics, that brought 99 orphaned and sick children to Britain to start a new life.
However, shortly after Operation Mercy Airlift, Mr Freemantle left Fleet Street to become a full-time writer.
He was prolific and by the time of his death had written some 85 books, including the hugely popular Charlie Muffin spy stories, one of which was made into a film starring David Hemmings as the eponymous hero.
He also wrote histories of the CIA and the KGB, the latter of which saw him banished from Russia.
A free man of the City of London, he is survived by his wife Maureen, three daughters, four grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren.