# Hal Summers

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**Henry Forbes Summers** (18 August 1911 in [Harrogate](/source/Harrogate), [Yorkshire](/source/Yorkshire) – 22 December 2005 in [Basingstoke](/source/Basingstoke), [Hampshire](/source/Hampshire))[1], aka **Hal Summers**, was a senior [British civil servant](/source/Civil_Service_(United_Kingdom)). He published several volumes of [poetry](/source/Poetry).

Summers was educated at [Fettes College](/source/Fettes_College), [Edinburgh](/source/Edinburgh) and [Trinity College, Oxford](/source/Trinity_College,_Oxford). He joined the Ministry of Health in 1935. He was Private Secretary to [Aneurin Bevan](/source/Aneurin_Bevan) while he was Minister of Health, during the passage of the National Health Bill, 1945.

He moved to the [Ministry of Housing and Local Government](/source/Ministry_of_Housing_and_Local_Government) on its creation and was promoted to Under-Secretary in 1955. This ministry was later absorbed into the [Department of the Environment](/source/Secretary_of_State_for_the_Environment). He was made a [CB](/source/Order_of_the_Bath) in 1961 and retired in 1971.

## Publications

- *Smoke After Flame*, 1944
- *Hinterland*, 1947
- *Poems in Pamphlet IV: Visions of Time*, 1952
- *Tomorrow is my Love*, 1978
- *The Burning Book*, 1982
- *Brevities*, 1991

His most popular poems include "My Old Cat" (voted one of Britain's favourite 20th-century poems in a [BBC](/source/British_Broadcasting_Corporation) poll), "The Beginners" and "The Seed".

## References

1. ["Hal Summers"](https://www.rlf.org.uk/estate/hal-summers/). *Royal Literary Fund*. Retrieved 2026-03-11.

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