One can only guess that the first child may have been a nuisance to the new Dad. Frank was obviously bright, possibly always on the go, and they found him difficult to manage. He was sent to his grandfather in Ireland, in Sligo, when he was nine. There he had to go to church and attended a Catholic school; he even became an altar boy. But again somebody thought he could do with more discipline and it was decided to send him, at the age of twelve, to a nautical training college somewhere on the Yorkshire coast.
When he successfully finished the tough training there, he decided to go into the Merchant Navy and spent some years seeing the world before settling back into the north east of England, in Tynemouth, when he was about 30.
He rapidly became a member of the criminal fraternity of the north east, mainly dealing in scrap metal and raising money in any way that he could. Like so many others, he was upheld by a belief that one day he would find 'that pot of gold'. Several times he was caught by the police after robberies, was imprisoned for short periods and was in general at odds with the law and a constant irritation to the local constabulary.
After the murder of a local man with whom Frank Wilkinson often worked, he was charged with the crime and, although he consistently pleaded innocence, was eventually sentenced to life imprisonment by Mr Justice Stuart Smith in Newcastle Upon Tyne Crown Court in January 1987.
The first years of imprisonment Frank spent in total rebellion in the futile hope that he could impress the authorities with his continuing declarations of innocence. A doctor he met at one stage (story here) had him thinking about this more realistically, and he turned his attention to undertaking some further education. As stated elsewhere he now holds a BA, an MA and PhD, mainly in English Literature.
Dr Frank Wilkinson now spends a great deal of his time writing - stories, novels, pieces for InsideTime, correspondence with his lawyer and a wide correspondence with his family and other members of the public. He has written a good novel about a small boy growing up in the forties in the slums behind the shipbuilding yards in Monkwearmouth. This is fiction but obviously drawn from his own experiences of what life on the Barbary Coast was like at that time. The men were tough and proud of it. The police were on friendly terms with them by turning a blind eye to their lesser misdemeanours. Only the women were ever able to show a softer side to the children. It gives a really vivid account of life at that time in that place. It is very readable and is written with humour. The book at the moment is in the hands of an agent who is trying to place it with a publisher. This year (2005) Dr Wilkinson has won three awards from the Koestler Trust for his writings, two of them being Outstanding Awards.
For details of more recent events in Frank's life, especially in regard to attempts to win a downgrade of his Category A security status, see the Newsdesk.
FRANK WILKINSON'S INNOCENCE MAY NOT BE PROVED OVERNIGHT BUT INEVITABLY WILL BE ONE DAY.