Agnes McEwan was born in Lanarkshire in the years following the Second World War, the daughter of a former Gunner with the 155th (Lanarkshire Yeomanry) Field Regiment, RA, John McEwan, who survived three and a half years as a POW of the Japanese. His acclaimed account Out of the Depths of Hell was first published by Pen and Sword in 1999 and is now in paperback.