Researching Charles Spencer

He was educated at Charterhouse and Balliol College, Oxford. He began his career in journalism at the Surrey Advertiser, and subsequently wrote for the London Evening Standard, The Stage and Television Today, before joining the Telegraph. He won "Critic of the Year" in the 1999 British Press Awards. He has written three crime novels: I Nearly Died (1994), Full Personal Service (1996) and Under the Influence (2000).

In 2006, Compton Miller of The Independent wrote in a profile: "This convivial ex-alcoholic is best remembered for his description of Nicole Kidman's nude scene in The Blue Room as 'pure theatrical Viagra'."

In a review published in The Daily Telegraph on 6 September 2012, he revealed that the reason for his absence from the paper's pages for the previous three months was that he had been suffering from clinical depression.

Charles Spencer is descended from several generations of noted early aeronauts. His great-grandfather, Percival G. Spencer, made the first successful balloon flight in India, and Charles' third great-grandfather Edward Spencer helped to conduct an unsuccessful parachute jump from a balloon over Vauxhall Gardens in London in July 1837.

While at Magdalen College, Oxford, Spencer made his first-class debut playing for Oxford University in 1923 against the touring West Indians. During that same season he played for the university against HDG Leveson-Gower's XI. His final appearance for the university came in 1924 against Middlesex.

Spencer also represented Glamorgan in a single first-class match in 1925 against HDG Leveson-Gower's XI at St. Helen's. In his first-class career he scored 46 runs at a batting average of 11.50, with a high score of 17. Behind the stumps he took 1 catch and made 1 stumping.

Following his brief cricketing career, he went on to teach at Stowe School, Buckinghamshire. Spencer died at Havant, Hampshire, on 29 September 1941 while serving with the Royal Marines.