Author. Born Hector Hugh Munro in Akyab, Burma, the third child of Mary Frances Mercer and Major Charles Augustus Munro, an officer in the Indian Police Services of British India, which at the time included Burma. When he was two years old, his mother died following a miscarriage, and the children were sent to England, near Barnstaple, Devon, under the care of their grandmother and maiden aunts, who ran a strict and puritanical household. The ladies would later figure as models for some of the author's characters. In 1893, he followed his father into the Indian Imperial Police, and was posted to Burma where he contracted malaria. After a career of less than two years, he was invalided out of the service, and returned to England. He began a writing career as a journalist, he wrote political satire for newspapers such as the 'Westminster Gazette' and the 'Morning Post' and magazines such as 'Bystander' and 'Outlook.' He published his first book, 'The Rise of the Russian Empire,' in 1900, an atypical serious history. In 1900, he entered a collaboration with political cartoonist Francis C. Gould to produce the political satire 'Alice in Westminster,' when he used the pen-name 'Saki' for the first time. The series lampooned political figures of the day. From 1902, he worked as a foreign correspondent, first in the Balkans, and then in Russia, where he witnessed to the 1905 revolution. He then went to Paris before returning to London in 1908. He had produced the short story 'Reginald' in 1904, and he followed this with numerous others such as, 'Reginald in Russia' (1910), 'The Chronicles of Clovis' (1912), 'The Lumber Room' (1914), and novels such as 'The Unbearable Bassington (1912) and 'When William Came.' He was known for his sharp and occasionally cruel humor. With the outbreak of the First World War, he volunteered for military service, though officially too old to serve, and refused an officer’s commission. He served at the front with the 22nd Battalion of the Royal Fusilliers as a lance-sergeant. He was killed in action at the age of 45 by German sniper during the Battle of Ancre. Numerous sources attest that his last words were, "Put that bloody cigarette out!" Two further collections of his short stories were posthumously published, including 'The Square Egg' (1924) which contained work written on the Western Front. Some of his stories, such as 'Sredni Vashtar and 'The Open Window,' have been continuously in print in various anthologies since their publication. His battlefield grave has been lost, but he is listed on the Thiepval Memorial to the Missing.