DAVID R JONES is an amateur historian with a keen interest in the Crimean War. This interest led to several visits to the Crimea to walk the battlefields and stand in the footsteps of those photographers and artists who recorded the scenes. Born in Birmingham in the UK, he was raised in nearby Dudley before attending the universities of Hull, Exeter and Keele to study botany and then plant diseases. His professional career has been as a plant pathologist specialising in the problems of banana. He has retired to Jervis Bay on the south coast of New South Wales, Australia.