He was the globetrotting journalist turned prolific thriller writer, best known as the creator of spy Charlie Muffin and for masterminding the dramatic airlift to rescue Vietnamese children during the fall of Saigon.

Brian Freemantle, who was born in Southampton and lived in the city or Winchester for  much of his life, has died aged 88.

Following a distinguished career as a roving international reporter on the Daily Express then foreign editor on the Daily Mail, Brian became a prolific author, publishing 80 books and selling more than 10 million copies worldwide. 

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Born in June 1936, the son of sailor Harold and Violet, Brian left Bitterne Park School with two O-levels and became a reporter on the New Milton Advertiser. 

He was a well-known face in the Daily Echo's Above Bar offices during the days that all the national newspapers had representatives on the South Coast, quickly becoming one of the most valued 'firemen' on the Daily Express, ready to head to the world's trouble spots at a moment's notice. 

He earned a burst of machine gun fire at his departing car boot from a Russian guard at the Czechoslovakian border, accidentally sprinted onto the front line rather than to safety in Vietnam and suffered a brain haemorrhage while covering the 1968 US election. 

Brian moved to the Daily Mail in 1971, devising the Operation Mercy airlift Vietnamese orphans four years later, just before he left to pursue his writing career full time.  

With the aid of thousands of pounds donated by readers, he chartered a Boeing 707 filled with makeshift cots to rescue 99 children who would otherwise have been at the mercy of the Viet Cong. 

For years, Brian spent his daily commute between Southampton and London scribbling unsellable fiction before, finally, Goodbye to an Old Friend, his 19th attempt at a novel, was published in 1973. He gave up journalism to write full-time two years later.

His many novels, known for their authenticity, included the hit Charlie Muffin series about a characterful British spy. 

In 1956, Brian married TV make up artist Maureen. She survives him with their three daughters, four grandchildren and seven great grandchildren. 

In his later years, he lived in a house overlooking Cathedral Close in Winchester.