Frederick Gerald Haxton (1892 – November 7, 1944), a native of

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...

, was the long term secretary and lover of novelist and playwright W. Somerset Maugham.Hastings, Selinia. ''The Secret Lives of Somerset Maugham'', New York: Random House, 2010 He and Maugham met at the outbreak of

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...

when they both began serving as part of a

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ambulance unit in

French Flanders French Flanders (french: La Flandre française) is a part of the historical County of Flanders in present-day France where a dialect of Dutch was or still is traditionally spoken. The region lies in the modern-day region of Hauts-de-France an ...

Secrecy and arrest

Maugham, and to a lesser extent Haxton, had been affected by the trial of

Oscar Wilde Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde (16 October 185430 November 1900) was an Irish poet and playwright. After writing in different forms throughout the 1880s, he became one of the most popular playwrights in London in the early 1890s. He is ...

. Common to men who were either homosexual or in the case of Maugham who had sexual relationships with both men and women (Maugham had had an affair with the actress Sue Jones before meeting Haxton and later had a child with Syrie Wellcome whom he married), neither spoke of their situation for fear of recrimination. However in November 1915 Haxton and another man, John Lindsell, were arrested in a

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hotel in London and charged with gross indecency.

Military policemen Military police (MP) are law enforcement agencies connected with, or part of, the military of a state. In wartime operations, the military police may support the main fighting force with force protection, convoy security, screening, rear recon ...

, whilst looking for deserters, had burst into the hotel room of Haxton and Lindsell to find them committing a homosexual act that was not buggery. On December 7 that same year both men were indicted under the same law that had been used to prosecute

. However, unlike Wilde, when the two men appeared in the Central Criminal Court at the Old Bailey on December 10 they were both acquitted.

Deportation

Haxton left England shortly thereafter. After touring the South Pacific islands, Haxton was aboard the ''Hitachi Maru'' en route to South Africa when the ship was captured by the German raider SMS ''Wolf'' in September 1917. Haxton was a prisoner aboard the ''Wolf'' until February 1918 when the ''Wolf'' returned to Germany and he was transferred to a German prison camp. He was reunited with Maugham in 1919. On attempting to return in February 1919 he was deported from

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as an undesirable alien and was never allowed to enter the country again. Haxton's Home Office file, containing the reason or reasons for his banishment, was sealed until 2019.

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speculates that

Syrie Maugham Gwendoline Maud Syrie Maugham (''née'' Barnardo, formerly Wellcome; 10 July 1879 – 25 July 1955) was a leading British interior decorator of the 1920s and 1930s who popularized rooms decorated entirely in white. Birth Syrie Maugham was born ...

may have used her high connections in the British government to have Haxton deported.Robert Calder, ''Willie: the Life of W. Somerset Maugham'', p. 161 Because Maugham and Haxton traveled abroad and chose to live on the

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in the " Villa La Mauresque", they were able to carry on their relationship despite Haxton's deportation. They lived in Villa Mauresque at Cap Ferrat almost exclusively until they were forced to flee the advancing Germans at the commencement of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

. It is thought that Haxton's flamboyant nature, said to be portrayed in the character Rowley Flint in '' Up at the Villa'', was the key to Maugham's invitational success with the members of society wherever the pair traveled.

Later years and death

Haxton continued as Maugham's constant companion for 30 years, until he died in a private room in the Doctors Hospital,

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. Maugham later placed the following dedication in his 1949 compilation, ''A Writer's Notebook'': "In Loving Memory of My Friend Frederick Gerald Haxton, 1892–1944".

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Haxton, Gerald 1892 births 1944 deaths LGBT people from California People from San Francisco World War I civilian detainees held by Germany 20th-century LGBT people