Henry Newbolt

Henry Newbolt No. 2, etching by William Strang (1898). Courtesy Wikimedia Commons.

Sir Henry John Newbolt
Born	June 6 1862(1862-Template:MONTHNUMBER-06) Bilston, Staffordshire, England
Died	April 19 1938(1938-Template:MONTHNUMBER-19) (aged 75) Kensington, London, England
Occupation	Poet
Nationality	British
Notable work(s)	Vitaï Lampada

Sir Henry John Newbolt CH (6 June 1862 - 19 April 1938) was an English poet. He is most remembered for Vitaï Lampada, a lyrical piece used for propaganda purposes during World War I.

Life

Youth and education

Newbolt was born in 6 June 1862, son of Rev. Henry Francis Newbolt, the vicar of St. Mary's Church, Bliston; and his 2nd wife, Emily. After his father's death, the family moved to Walsall, where Henry was educated.

Newbolt attended Queen Mary's Grammar School, Walsall, and Caistor Grammar School, from where he gained a scholarship to Clifton College.

At Clifton he was head of the school (1881) and edited the school magazine. His contemporaries there included Douglas Haig.

He graduated from Corpus Christi College, Oxford.

Career

Newbolt was called to the bar at Lincoln's Inn in 1887 and practised until 1899.

Between 1900 and 1905, Newbolt was the editor of the Monthly Review. He was also a member of the Athenaeum Club and the Coefficients dining club.

Family

He married Margaret Edina Duckworth of the prominent publishing family; they had 2 children; a boy, Francis and a daughter, Celia. In 1914 Celia Newbolt married Lt. Col. Sir Ralph Dolignon Furse (1887–1973), the Head of Recruitment at HM Colonial Service from 1931–48; they had four children. Lady Furse died in 1975.

Subsequently it became apparent that behind the prim Edwardian exterior lay a far more complicated domestic life for Newbolt: a ménage à trois. His wife had a long running lesbian affair with her cousin, Ella Coltman, who also became Newbolt's mistress.  One of his poems, in which he refers to someone as "dearest", is entitled "To E.C." Coltman accompanied the Newbolts on their honeymoon.

Death

Newbolt died at his home in Campden Hill, Kensington, London, aged 75. He is buried in the churchyard of St Mary's church on an island in the lake on the Orchardleigh estate of the Duckworth family in Somerset.

Writing

His earliest book was a novel, Taken from the Enemy (1892), and in 1895 he published a tragedy, Mordred; but it was the publication of his ballads, Admirals All (1897), that created his literary reputation. By far the best-known of these is "Vitai Lampada". They were followed by other volumes of stirring verse, including The Island Race (1898), The Sailing of the Long-ships (1902), Songs of the Sea (1904) and Songs of the Fleet (1910).

In 1914, Newbolt published Aladore, a fantasy novel about a bored but dutiful knight who abruptly abandons his estate and wealth to discover his heart's desire and woo a half-fae enchantress. It is a tale filled with allegories about the nature of youth, service, individuality and tradition. It was reissued in a new edition by Newcastle Publishing Company in 1975.

Drake's Drum

According to legend a drum owned by Sir Francis Drake will beat in times of national crisis and the spirit of Drake will return to aid his country. Sir Henry reinforced the myth, with his 1897 poem 'Drake's Drum', which has been put to both classical and folk tunes.

Recognition

Sir Henry Newbolt commemorative plaque in Kensington, London. Photo by Simon Harriyott. Courtesy Flickr Commons.

Newbolt was knighted in 1915 and was appointed a Companion of Honour in 1922.

His poem "He fell among Thieves" was included in the Oxford Book of English Verse 1250-1900.

In his home town of Bilston, a public house was named after him, and a blue plaque is displayed on a modern building in the street where he was born. Another blue plaque commemorates his residency at his home in Kensington.

'Drake's Drum' is the 1st of 5 poetic settings by composer Charles Villiers Stanford. Stanford has 2 song cycles, both using the poetry of Newbolt, the Songs of the Sea and also Songs of the Fleet.

Recordings were made of Newbolt reading some of his own poems. They were on 4 78rpm sides in the Columbia Records 'International Educational Society' Lecture series, Lecture 92 (D40181/2).

Publications

Songs of Memory and Hope, 1909. Courtesy Internet Archive.

Poetry

• Mordred: A tragedy. London: T.F. Unwin, 1895.
• Admirals All, and other verses. London: Elkin Mathews, 1897; New York: John Lane, 1898.
• The Island Race. London: Elkin Mathews, 1898; New York: John Lane, 1899.
• The Sailing of the Long-Ships, and other poems. London: John Murray, 1902; Toronto: Morang, 1902; New York: D. Appleton, 1902.
• Clifton Chapel, and other school poems. London: John Murray, 1908.
• Songs of Memory and Hope. London: John Murray, 1909.
• Collected Poems, 1897-1907. London & New York: Nelson, 1910.
• Poems: New and old. London: John Murray, 1912.
• Drake's Drum, and other songs of the sea. London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1914.
• St. George's Day, and other poems. London: John Murray, 1918.
• New Paths on Helicon. London & New York: Nelson, 1927.
• The Linnet's Nest (illustrated by Ralph Keene). London: Faber & Gwyer, 1927.
• A Child is Born. London: Faber, 1931.
• A Perpetual Memory, and other poems (with memoirs by Walter de la Mare & Ralph Furse). London: John Murray, 1939.
• Selected Poems (edited by Patric Dickinson). London: Hodder & Stroughton, 1981.

Novels

• Taken from the Enemy. London: Chatto & Windus, 1892.
• The Old Country: A romance. London: Smith, Elder, 1906.
• The New June. Edinburgh & London: W. Blackwood, 1909.
• The Twymans: A tale of youth. Edinburgh: W. Blackwood, 1911.
• Aladore. Edinburgh & London: W. Blackwood, 1914.
• The Book of the Grenvilles. London & New York: Longmans Green, 1921.

Short fiction

• The Book of the Blue Sea. London & New York: Longmans Green, 1914.

Non-fiction

• The Year of Trafalgar: Being an account of the battle and of the events which led up to it, with a collection of the poems and ballads written thereupon between 1805 and 1905. London: John Murray, 1905.
• The Story of the Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry. London: Country Life, 1915; New York: Scribner, 1915.
• A New Study of English Poetry. London: Constable, 1917; New York: Dutton, 1919.
• A Note on the History of Submarine War. New York: Doran, 1917; London: Longmans Green, 1918.
• Poetry and Time. London: British Academy / Humphrey Milford / Oxford University Press, 1919.
• A Naval History of the War, 1914-1918. London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1920.
• History of the Great War: Naval Operations, Volume IV. London & New York: Longmans Green, 1920.
• Days to Remember: The British Empire in the Great War (with John Buchan). London: Nelson, 1923; London & New York: Nelson, 1928.
• The Tide of Time in English Poetry. London & Edinburgh: Nelson, 1925.
• Essays and Essayists. London: Nelson, 1925.
• Studies Green and Gray. London: Nelson, 1926; Freeport, NY: Books for Libraries Press, 1968.
• The Idea of an English Association. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1928.
• Devotional Poets of the XVII Century. London & Edinburgh: Nelson, 1929.
• My World As in My Time: Memoirs, 1862-1932. London: Faber, 1932.

Juvenile

• The Book of the Thin Red Line. London & New York: Longmans Green, 1915.
• Tales of the Great War. London & New York: Longmans Green, 1916.
• The Book of the Happy Warrier. London & New York: Longmans Green, 1917.
• Submarine and Anti-Submarine. London & New York: Longmans Green, 1918.
• The Book of the Long Trail. London & New York: Longmans Green, 1919.
• [The Book of Good Hunting. London & New York: Longmans Green, 1920.

Collected editions

• Prose and Poetry, from the works of Henry Newbolt. London: Dent / New York: Dutton, 1920.

Edited

• An English Anthology of Prose and Poetry: Showing the main stream of English literature through six centuries. London & Toronto: Dent / New York: Dutton, 1921.

Letters

• The Later Life and Letters of Sir Henry Newbolt (edited by Margaret Edina Duckworth Newbolt). London: Faber, 1942.

Except where noted, bibliographical information courtesy WorldCat.

Sir Henry Newbolt - Poem 'He fell among thieves', read by Jasper Britton

Henry Newbolt Reading his Own Poems - Vitaï Lampada & 3 Other Poems - 78 rpm - HMV 102

Audio / video

• Sir Henry Newbolt: Reading his own poems (78). London: Columbia Graphophone Co., for International Educational Society.

Poems by Henry Newbolt

1. Vitai Lampada

See also

• List of British poets
• Timeline of British poetry

References

•  Chisholm, Hugh, ed (1911). "Newbolt, Henry John". Encyclopædia Britannica. 19 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 463.  Wikisource, Web, Oct. 29, 2020.
• Black Country Bugle
• A Perpetual Memory and other Poems, an anthology by Sr Henry Newbolt, published in 1939 by John Murray.
• Chitty, Susan (1997). Playing the Game: Biography of Sir Henry Newbolt. Quartet Books. ISBN 978-0704371071. 
• David Gervais (article ‘Newbolt, Sir Henry John (1862–1938)’) (2004). Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. 

External links

Poems

• "He fell among Thieves".
• "The Final Mystery"
• "Mors Janua"
• 'Vitai Lampada"
• Newbolt, Henry John (1862-1938) (5 poems) at Representative Poetry Online
• Sir Henry Newbolt at PoemHunter (81 poems)

Audio / video

• "Henry Newbolt at YouTube

Books

• Works by Henry Newbolt at Project Gutenberg
• Henry John Newbolt at the Online Books Page
• Sir Henry John Newbolt at Amazon.com

About

• Sir Henry Newbolt in the Encyclopædia Britannica
• Hanry Newbolt at Spartacus Educational
• Sir Henry Newbolt, CH (1862-1938) at the War Poets Association.
• Robert Fulford's column about Henry Newbolt

 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain, the 1911 Edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica.. Original article is at: Newbolt, Henry John