Steven H. Casely's interest in military history began many years ago with modelling military vehicles from scratch, before the advent of the 1/35th scale tanks that became available. Steve would travel to Bovington Tank Museum to measure up, photograph and make sketches of whichever vehicle he hoped to reproduce in model form.
That research, coupled with an intense interest in photography and having an eye for detail, eventually led Steve to a chance meeting with former Editor-in-Chief of After the Battle, Winston Ramsey, on Slapton beach in South Devon on April 15, 1984, where he began recording the recovery of the Sherman tank which was to be raised from the sea bed, three quarters of a mile off the shore and subsequently mounted, as it is today, in the car park by the beach, as a memorial to those service personnel who trained there, and in many cases, lost their lives on exercise Tiger and the D-Day beaches of Normandy. That chance meeting led to Steve’s first work for the company with the article ‘The Tank That Missed D-Day’, published in issue 45 of the then quarterly magazine, which was also called After the Battle.
Steve's engineering training has led him through a career as a mechanical and electrical manager in the construction industry and for over 40 years there has been much involvement with After the Battle throughout the UK and Europe, in articles published in the former magazines After the Battle and Wheels and Tracks, as well as in many books, such as those on D-Day, the Blitz, Bomber Command, Coastal Command, Wreck Recovery (especially with the Devon Aircraft Research and Recovery Team) and The Falklands War Then and Now to name but a few in his 40 plus years as a contributor/author with the company.
Steve lives in South Devon and his interest in all matters of military history is as strong today as it ever was.
