John Chaloner combined a successful business career with the roles of author, illustrator, publisher and farmer. Although best known for founding Der Spiegel after the war, he had a spell as a lumberjack in Canada, and in London served as governor of St George’s Hospital, Hyde Park Corner, and as a borough councillor in Wandsworth.

John Seymour Chaloner started his publishing career in 1939 at the age of 15 when he joined the Boy’s Own Paper, becoming assistant editor within the year. He came from a family of journalists; his father edited a daily newspaper, his mother edited Parents, Ideal Home and Woman’s Magazine.

Chaloner volunteered for the Army and, after Sandhurst, joined the Westminster Dragoons. He was at one time the youngest major in the British Army at the age of 21. In 1945 he was seconded to the Public Relations and Information Services Control (PRISC), a unit set up by the Foreign Office and charged with restarting the press, theatre, radio and cinema in a war-ravaged Germany.

He held the title of press chief in Hanover, where he commandeered printing presses that had survived, requisitioned newsprint and produced local newspapers. In 1946 he started the weekly news magazine Der Spiegel, appointing one of his protégés, Rudolph Augstein, as editor. Despite being ordered to withhold publication by the Foreign Office, he ignored the command and went ahead with what became an overnight success and Germany’s most prosperous weekly magazine. For this defiance, Chaloner lost his job but became assistant director of public relations to Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery.

Once demobbed, Chaloner started his own company, the Seymour Press, specialising in the distribution of overseas publications. He rented a basement office which he ran by day, driving a van by night. The company later became the source of almost every foreign imprint entering the UK.

Parallel with his business suc-cesses ran his popularity as an author and illustrator. Between 1958 and 1975 he wrote and illustrated six children’s books, which sold well in America and Japan as well as Britain. In 1956 his first novel was published — Three for the Road which was followed by Eager Beaver, To Europe with Love, To the Manor Born, Bottom Line and Occupational Hazard.

Meanwhile, Chaloner bought and ran a 130-acre farm in Sussex, where he bred a pedigree herd of 90 milking Jerseys. He started a successful vineyard, eventually producing 2,000 bottles a year of Möller-Thurgau. In 1990 he was awarded the Bundesverdienstkreuz (1st Class) by the President of the Republic of Germany for services in strengthening Anglo-German relations.

On retirement he was recalled to publishing by the Institute of Directors to restore the image and fortunes of Director magazine, later by Lord Forte, for whom he established Forte as a hotel magazine and then by the Confederation of British Industry for its official journal.

He was a frequent writer to The Times letters page on press freedom, farming and other subjects where he could express his support for the underdog.

He is survived by two sons.

John Chaloner, publisher, farmer and businessman, was born on November 5, 1924. He died on February 9, 2007, aged 82