A black & white postcard portrait of Sir Bernard Miles (1907-1991) signed with a fountain pen and dated 1961.

Bernard Miles, character actor, writer and director, was born in Uxbridge, Middlesex and attended Bishopshalt School in Hillingdon. He entered the theatre in the 1930s, soon appearing in films. Like many actors, he featured prominently in the patriotic cinema during the Second World War, including classics of the genre such as In Which We Serve and One of Our Aircraft Is Missing. His typical persona as an actor was as a countryman, with a strong accent typical of the Hertfordshire and Buckinghamshire counties. He was also, after Robert Newton, the actor most associated with the part of Long John Silver, which he played in a British TV version of Treasure Island, and in an annual performance at the Mermaid Theatre commencing in the winter of 1961-62. Miles had opened the Mermaid Theatre in London in 1959, the first new theatre opened in the City of London since the 17th century.