Edward Hilton Young - A Muse at Sea

[seaJane]

Cadged these from a friend.

[Fred van Woerkom]

• Interesting, a naval poet!

All the best,

Fred

[MichaelBully]

Thanks for the pics and for starting this thread SJ !

The full text of 'A Muse at Sea' can be found here

https://archive.org/stream/museatseaverses00kennuoft/museatseaverses00kennuoft_djvu.txt

'At the Gate' -written by Hilton-Young on the way to take part in the Zeebrugge Raid 1918, is one of my favourite war poems: A record of impressions when sailing in to action.

'Miles' who is referred to in the last lines is fellow poet Jeffrey Miles Day, Flight Commander of the Royal Naval Air Service, who disappeared, assumed to have been killed in action on 27th February 1918.

It seems that Hilton-Young gave up writing poetry after 'A Muse at Sea' was published as the quote from the introduction suggests : No more of his work has come to light.

Regards

Michael Bully

AT THE GATE

IT is all over ; all my travelling

in changing, curious time ; and I
of every vital thing that life can bring

have only left, to die.

I have no hope, no fear for my distress.

There is no man on earth so free.
Hope cannot vex one that is futureless ;

fear ends in certainty.

No hope, no fear, no triumph, no regret,
but darkness of the gathering shades.

What have I left to hold for comfort yet,
now that the daylight fades ?

I will think of all good things that I have known,

of everything that I loved best.
I will take all their beauty for my own

to be my strength and rest.

*
Stand by me now, all tranquil memories !

the firelit ceiling's shadow-press
a waking child has watched in ecstasies

of drowsy happiness.

The long, wet orchard grass, the swift mill-race,
the shining blossom on the bough,





the lads that came there for a bathing-place,
dear lads ! stand by me now !

And one high verge of upland ; when the night
was falling on the fields beneath,

thence could the poised spirit take its flight
far beyond time and death.
*

The time is come : and last, to be my guide
through this dim ending of the way,

I take the hero-soul of one who,died,
and, living, lit the day.

O friend I loved, I raise in thoughts of thee
the heart that beat at one with thine.

There is a sound of guns upon the sea ;
now, Miles, thy hand in mine

H.M.S. Vindictive, 1918.

[seaJane]

Not entirely true, as "Verses: A Muse at Sea and others" (obviously a reissue with other poems added) was published by Sidgwick & Jackson in 1935 (there are four copies listed on copac.ac.uk, all in copyright deposit libraries except for the IWM copy). I have a feeling that there are other poetry volumes not recorded on COPAC due to libraries' cataloguing backlogs - I'll see what I can find out.

The same publishers published Jeffrey Miles Day's "Poems and rhymes" in 1919, with a memoir of the author by EHY.

I also have a copy of his "Bird in the Bush", illustrated by Peter Scott and published by Country Life in 1936 - by this time EHY was Peter Scott's stepfather, having married Captain Scott's widow Kathleen in 1922.

sJ

[MichaelBully]

Excellent SJ ! If you can trace any further poems by Lord Hilton-Young please let me know.Happily stand corrected !

I will try to locate the 1935 anthology next time I am at the British Library.

Indeed, Hilton-Young married Captain Scott's widow Kathleen. I have a copy of 'A Great Task of Happiness-The Life of Kathleen Scott' written by their granddaughter Louisa Young, and also Elspeth Huxley's biography of Peter Scott : Useful for some background reading.

Jeffrey Miles Day's 'Poems and Rhymes' with the memoir by Hilton-Young can be read on line here :

Regards as always

Michael

https://archive.org/details/poemsrhymes00dayj

Edit :

The last poem from the 1919 'A Muse at Sea' is a haunting poem titled ' Return' that Hilton -Young wrote about the death of Jeffrey Miles Day:

RETURN

THIS was the way that, when the war was over,
we were to pass together. You, its lover,
would make me love your land, you said, no less,
its shining levels and their loneliness,
the reedy windings of the silent stream,
your boyhood's playmate, and your childhood's
dream.

The war is over now : and we can pass
this way together. Every blade of grass
fs you : you are the ripples on the river :
you are the breeze in which they leap and quiver.
I find you in the evening shadows falling
athwart the fen, you in the wildfowl calling :
and all the immanent vision cannot save
my thoughts from wandering to your unknown
grave.

ST. IVES, 1919.

[seaJane]

That is incredibly moving, Michael - thanks for posting it.

I was trying to place the location, and had come up with Somerset or Norfolk, but Wikipedia tells me that Day was born in St Ives, Huntingdonshire.

I have ordered my own 1919 copy of his "Poems and rhymes" (hardback) from abebooks. His full name is given in Wikipedia as Miles Jeffrey Game Day, which suggests that he is the M.J.G.D. to whom Hilton Young's poem "Air Service" on p.33 of A Muse at Sea is dedicated.

sJ

(Six degrees of separation: Other Half was at school with Peter Scott's son Falcon ... )

[SiegeGunner]

A photo of Jeff Day, glued into EHY's own proof copy of his book 'By Sea and Land', opposite page 326 on which he records that he named the armoured train that he commanded in the North Russian campaign ... 'Miles, in memory of a friend of Harwich days – Miles Day, the airman and poet, who fell in Flanders'. Day's full name is written at the bottom in the half-uncial script that EHY used when he learnt to write with his left hand, having lost his right arm at Zeebrugge.

Although EHY refers to Day as 'Miles', I have a copy of a letter somewhere, written by Day's father after his death in action, in which he consistently refers to his son as 'Jeff'.

To clarify EHY's own name(s), his surname was Young and his forenames were Edward Hilton. He was known as Hilton, so Hilton Young is a forename + surname, not a double-barrelled surname. When he retired from politics in 1935, he was ennobled as Baron Kennet of the Dene (Lord Kennet).

Mick

[MichaelBully]

Thanks SJ and Mick for your comments. Point taken about Hilton Young not having a hyphen Mick !

SJ....I too assumed that the poem 'Return' is about St. Ives , Huntingdon , and is also a favourite of mine. Whilst I appreciate the quality of a lot of Trench Poetry my personal taste is for more understated poetry such as 'Return' , where a writer feels the presence of the Great War dead in moments of solitude. . Whilst 'At the Gate' shows that Hilton Young , when faced with the imminent danger of the Zeebrugge Raid finds comfort in his memories of Miles Jeffrey Day, who died some two months before.

I have read some of Hilton Young's memoir 'By Sea and Land : Some Naval Doings ' at the British Library . Quite fascinating.

Hilton Young's Wiki entry states that he proposed to one Virginia Stephens on board a punt on the River Cam in May 1909. She turned him down. Virginia was later to marry Leonard Woolf..

The source for this is Hall, S.M. (2006), Before Leonard: The Early Suitors of Virginia Woolf .

Regards

Michael Bully

[seaJane]

Thank you for filling in even more of the story, Mick and Mike.

Mick, I envy you that proof copy!!!

[MichaelBully]

Realised that

HIlton Young's war memoir 'By Land and Sea-Some Naval Doings' (1920)

is now available on line.

http://archive.org/stream/bysealandsomenav00kennrich/bysealandsomenav00kennrich_djvu.txt

So Hilton Young was a Naval Poet who served in the Navy and wrote a war memoir.

Not entirely true, as "Verses: A Muse at Sea and others" (obviously a reissue with other poems added) was published by Sidgwick & Jackson in 1935 (there are four copies listed on copac.ac.uk, all in copyright deposit libraries except for the IWM copy). I have a feeling that there are other poetry volumes not recorded on COPAC due to libraries' cataloguing backlogs - I'll see what I can find out.

The same publishers published Jeffrey Miles Day's "Poems and rhymes" in 1919, with a memoir of the author by EHY.

I also have a copy of his "Bird in the Bush", illustrated by Peter Scott and published by Country Life in 1936 - by this time EHY was Peter Scott's stepfather, having married Captain Scott's widow Kathleen in 1922.

sJ

[SiegeGunner]

Thank you for filling in even more of the story, Mick and Mike.

Mick, I envy you that proof copy!!!

Not mine, Jane ... I photographed it in the library of the family home, then inhabited by EHY's son Wayland and his wife Liz, both now sadly no longer with us.

[seaJane]

Ah, I see. (My copy of Poems and Verses has now arrived and has a reproduction of the portrait photograph inside).

[MichaelBully]

Greetings,

Have written up some of my thoughts about Edward Hilton Young and the Zeebrugge Raid on to the Great War at Sea Poetry website : Thanks to everyone whose posted on this thread. Been a great help.

Regards

Michael Bully

http://greatwaratseapoetry.weebly.com/zeebrugge.html

[FionaBam]

On 05/09/2015 at 17:27, MichaelBully said:

Greetings,

Have written up some of my thoughts about Edward Hilton Young and the Zeebrugge Raid on to the Great War at Sea Poetry website : Thanks to everyone whose posted on this thread. Been a great help.

Regards

Michael Bully

Hello Michael 

Sadly the link no longer connects. I found

http://www.eastsussexww1.org.uk/great-war-sea-poetry-project/index.html

 but cannot see your piece about the raid at Zeebrugge and Search facility no longer works. Great project!

Could you possibly provide another link to access your piece please?

Thank you

Fiona 

[MaureenE]

On 06/09/2015 at 02:27, MichaelBully said:

Greetings,

Have written up some of my thoughts about Edward Hilton Young and the Zeebrugge Raid on to the Great War at Sea Poetry website : Thanks to everyone whose posted on this thread. Been a great help.

Regards

Michael Bully

http://greatwaratseapoetry.weebly.com/zeebrugge.html

Here is an archived link from the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine

https://web.archive.org/web/20170228214231/http://greatwaratseapoetry.weebly.com/zeebrugge.html

Maureen

 

[FionaBam]

22 minutes ago, MaureenE said:

Here is an archived link from the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine

Thank you Maureen for your trouble . That's some delving you do , am  most impressed !

That's an interesting read. Have read quite a lot about the Zeebrugge Raid and E.H. Young was correct in not expecting to survive it. Only the love for his  deceased friend gave him , so it seems, the energy to go into the battle.

Fiona 

[MaureenE]

It's easy to see if there is an archived link.  You just copy the link into the  Internet Archive's Wayback Machine https://archive.org/web/web.php and click on Browse History.

Maureen

[FionaBam]

Oooh! Thank you Maureen!

Cheers

Fiona 

[FionaBam]

The ending of Young's poem got me thinking- does a man have a greater capacity to feel love towards a male friend that far exceeds the comparable love  a woman  can feel towards a female friend? This is in terms of heterosexual relationships. 

My imagination does not stretch to me finding myself empowered to  enter into a suicide mission based on an emotional connection to a much loved deceased female friend.

If the theory is correct, it does explain the billions of heroic selfless acts of men in war zones to protect/ rescue comrades.

Not the first person to wonder about this I am sure , just saying. ☺️

Fiona

[seaJane]

Hi Fiona, that's an interesting thought!

I have a feeling myself that for a man in those times, being part of the military ethos, one of a band of brothers, probably intensified the bonds of friendship in a way that didn't happen for women before the suffragist campaigns (and some of the early factory strikes?), because there was no comparable way in which there could be a fighting band of sisters.

sJ

[FionaBam]

1 hour ago, seaJane said:

because there was no comparable way in which there could be a fighting band of sisters.

Hi Seajane

I like your historical analysis. It makes absolute sense. The band of brothers ethos continues . As for sisters....

I was very involved and committed to the feminist theory and practice (activism its called now I think) in the 1970s and early 80s.  Those bonds were close but not comparable to those described by WW1 men. I was never tested in a war zone thank the lord.

 What has happened since then to bands of women? Oh dear me.....

Fiona

[seaJane]

14 hours ago, FionaBam said:

finding myself empowered to  enter into a suicide mission

Still thinking about this! I don't really think it's a case of feeling empowered - the disciplines of the war mean that you obey orders, no going back and no way out.

But it might have been some kind of consolation to believe that a friend who had already gone over to death was waiting to welcome you.