Joan Coggin
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Joan Coggin | |
|---|---|
| Born | 22 July 1898 |
| Died | 11 August 1980 (aged 82) |
| Pen name | Joanna Lloyd |
| Occupation | |
| Genre |
|
| Literary movement | Golden Age of Detective Fiction |
Joan Coggin (22 July 1898 – 11 August 1980) was a British crime writer during the golden age of detective fiction. She also wrote children's novels under the pseudonym Joanna Lloyd.
Coggin was born in Lemsford, Hertfordshire in 1898, the daughter of the Revd Frederick Ernest Coggin (1859–1947) and his wife Clara (née Lloyd) (1866–1906); Clara Lloyd was the daughter of the publisher Edward Lloyd. At the time of her birth, her father was Vicar of Lemsford (1891–1905); his successor, the Revd A.E. Ward (1905–1920), was the father of the society osteopath, Stephen Ward.[1]
Joan Coggin was one of four children. Her siblings were:
- Maurice Edward Henry, who married Eleanora Illeris, a member of the SOE during WWII.[2] Their daughter Janet Coggin was a novelist, and the first wife of the KGB spy Dieter Gerhardt.[3]
- (Frederick) Leslie, who was a schoolmaster: in 1937 he travelled to Moscow to learn Russian and thereby set up the Russian department at Marlborough College.[4] He married Elaine Wood, the headmistress of the Geelong C of E Girls' Grammar School, The Hermitage in the 1960s.
- Enid, who married another clergyman, Geoffrey Hilder.[5]
Immediately prior to her mother's early death, Coggin's father retired to Eastbourne; on her death he was left the large sum of £54,871[6] (worth £4m in 2017). Apart from her schooling, Coggin lived the rest of her life in Eastbourne.[7]
Coggin attended Wycombe Abbey School from 1911 to 1916, and was then a ward nurse at the De Walden Court Military Hospital in Eastbourne during the remainder of the First World War.[8]
Literary career
Her crime novels featured Lady Lupin Lorimer Hastings, a clergyman's wife, as her detective. She also wrote children's novels under a pseudonym.
