Hodgson was a short man of "very ordinary" build who suffered greatly from bullying in his early years in the Merchant Marine. He resolved to compensate for his lack of inches by exercise...

Hodgson ran a "School of Physical Culture" in Blackburn in 1902 and 1903. In 1902 he squared up to Houdini....

Hodgson died in the trenches in 1918. This extract from one of his last letters, written early in 1918, is provided by Philip Ellis, and was part of an obituary in a magazine unknown to us:
"What a scene of desolation, the heaved-up mud rimming ten thousand shell craters as far as the sight could reach..."

Back in 1988/9, having read — I now forget where — not only that William Hope Hodgson had lived for some time in Blackburn, Lancashire, but, of particular interest, that his idea for the mysterious dwelling of 'The House on the Borderland' may well have been influenced by his Blackburn home, I made attempts to find out where that home had been...

"To Scraps,
That impudent maiden to whom I first told the ever shaping tale of The Night Land..."

William Hope Hodgson's war memorial is in Tyne Cot Cemetery. We have an image, and links to the Commonwealth War Graves Commission entries.

Sam Gafford, publisher of Sargasso: The Journal of William Hope Hodgson Studies, has much biographical material on his blog ...