Against The Law

'This right which I claim for myself and for all those like me is the right to choose the person whom I love' Peter Wildeblood

In March 1954 Peter Wildeblood, a London journalist, was one of five men charged with homosexual acts in the notorious Montagu case. Wildeblood was sentenced to eighteen months in prison, along with Lord Montagu and Major Michael Pitt-Rivers. The other two men were set free after turning Queen's Evidence.

Against the Law tells the story of Wildeblood's childhood and schooldays, his war service, his career as a journalist, his arrest, trial and imprisonment, and finally his return to freedom. In its honesty and restraint it is eloquent testimony to the inhumanity of the treatment of gay men in Britain within living memory.

“The noblest, and wittiest, and most appalling prison book of them all-- New Statesman”

A moving story of men who refused to feel ashamed - Telegraph

The noblest, and wittiest, and most appalling prison book of them all - New Statesman

Born in Italy, Peter Wildeblood came to London at the age of three in 1926. He won a scholarship to Oxford but left to serve in the RAF 1941-46, returning to Oxford after the war. In 1954 he was a well-known London journalist when he was jailed for homosexuality. After serving his prison sentence, he wrote a number of novels, plays and television scripts and had a key role in the decriminalisation of homosexuality. He died in 1999.

'This right which I claim for myself and for all those like me is the right to choose the person whom I love' Peter Wildeblood In March 1954 Peter Wildeblood, a London journalist, was one of five men charged with homosexual acts in the notorious Montagu case. Wildeblood was sentenced to eighteen months in prison, along with Lord Montagu and Major Michael Pitt-Rivers. The other two men were set free after turning Queen's Evidence. Against the Law tells the story of Wildeblood's childhood and schooldays, his war service, his career as a journalist, his arrest, trial and imprisonment, and finally his return to freedom. In its honesty and restraint it is eloquent testimony to the inhumanity of the treatment of gay men in Britain within living memory.

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