ERNEST DUDLEY in the 1950s. Based on these tape recordings, Confessions of a Special Agent was first published by Robert Hale in 1957. Born Vivian Ernest Coltman-Allen in July 1908, Dudley took his celebrated pseudonym from his place of birth, Dudley, near Wolverhampton. By time of his death in February 2006, he had produced scores of books, mainly crime fiction, but also non-fiction biographies, historical novels, children's books and a number of radio and television series.