A medium-sized, red book in a hard cover with a typescript and presentation befitting the autobiographer. The book is divided into two parts: the first twenty six chapters end with the author's discharge from the army, and the second half begins with his marriage and the start of his own family, the whole occupying 310 pages. The main illustration is a fine sepia-coloured portrait of the author in his sergeant's uniform, alongside a vertical row of interesting mini-photos, all on the particularly robust dust-cover.

The subtitle is A look back at Seventyand on the reverse side is detailed the publication of the first part as a limited private printing of 150 copies under the title From My Cradle To Their Graves in 1990, followed by the addition of part two to make the Barnardo Boy title. The Foreword emphasises that the Barnardo entity and closely related army life appears in part one, whereas the second part is concerned with his life in the business of printing: this fine book, by content, style, and structure, encompasses both.

The first few paragraphs introduce the reader to the author's illegitimate birth in St James Hospital, Balham, and immediate transferral to Barnardo's at Stepney Causeway in East London, all in a style both so formal and reflective, that the juxtapositon of being born a Cockney orphan and immediately passed on to the care of an organisation that would instil prayer, reflection, and gratitude to Almighty God and the late founder of the Homes, easily carry the reader along to further paragraphs accounting for his time in 'Babies Castle' and his first actual memories: affection and care that was abruptly terminated by his removal to the Boys Garden City (the intended equivalent to the Girls' Village Home at Barkingside).The resulting sorrow is vividly remembered, and the next nine years of his life is described in equally sensitive detail that provides us with a valuable and relatively rare account of that particular Barnardo institution, and a portrait of a lonely child, with ability and determination.

There is a lengthy description of a complex relationship which involved an assault upon him by a young lady assistant carer, culminating in apportionment of blame to him, a further dose of physical punishment from the Governor himself, and permanent estrangement from the house-matron with whom he had previously established a good working relationship - all of this is related without embitterment.

By contrast, the William Baker Technical School to which he was next sent, proved very successful, principally because he was taught the printer's trade, to which he took with innate ability, and he writes of the halcyon years. His continued relationship with Barnardo's while he started a job in the outside world reflects well their care in this respect, particularly when John starts to seek his real mother. His success in this undertaking is remarkable, and he soon finds himself among a family, including his twin sister, of whom he had known nothing, and a stepfather. He adapts to this suddenly acquired family, and to living with them for a while, but war had been declared and he was called up to join the army.

Like many another ex-Barnardo boy he writes of the ease with which he adapts to army discipline, and when his service takes him to the battlefront in Italy, he describes the warfare in powerful detail, including his close experience of death and destruction; the aftermath involved a period of re-habilitation in hospital.

The first part of the book finishes with mention of the person with whom he wishes to make a serious relationship, and the second part commences with the start of his family life, but is otherwise a studied account of his progress through the world of printing, proof-reading, and publishing, with rises and falls, culminating in his own business, and the participation of his wife and grown children. There is again mention of serious stress-related illness, and the importance of family continuity to him.

Having stated at the outset the initially anecdotal nature of his autobiographical writing, and ultimately produced a styelised blending of the the parts of his life, from Barnardo Boy to important participator in the National Graphical Association, with the temporary participation of his re-found blood relatives, as opposed to the life-long value of own made family, and friends, without deep analysis into the relation of his childhood deprivation to his adult mental illnesses, this might be said to be more a printer's book than a writer's, but a good one to read, nevertheless.

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