[1] Originally training as an artist, Maxwell turned his back on art and began to write short stories to help cope with depression.

On his coming of age, his father gave him control of the failing magazine Mistletoe Bough which he tried unsuccessfully to turn around.

He wrote The Last Man In, a drama, produced 14 March 1910, at the Royalty Theatre, Glasgow, by the Scottish Repertory Company; and, with George Paston (i.e. Emily Morse Symonds), a farce, The Naked Truth, which was first played at Wyndham's Theatre, London in April 1910, and in which Charles Hawtrey played Bernard Darrell.

[5] Though nearly 50 years old at the outbreak of the First World War, Maxwell was accepted as a lieutenant in the Royal Fusiliers and served in France until 1917.

His military career began at a recruitment station in a building under Govett and Sons in Throgmorton Street, London.

In a routine transportation of equipment, a shell exploded a bomb pile which had previously been dropped off at the front line by Maxwell.

[5] Maxwell liked to collect 'detail' on his subjects and was particularly interested in the prevailing conditions of English shop-life and employment of girls in towns.

Maxwell was taken ill at a committee meeting of the Royal Literary Fund and died three week later at his home in Ashley Gardens, Westminster, London on the 4 August 1938.