Edmund Clerihew Bentley (1875 –1956) - British novelist; inventor of the Clerihew humorous verse form

I have included Edmund here because he was made a Chevalier of the Order of the Crown - a Belgian award - for 'valuable services in the Allied cause' during WW1 and, while he may not have written any verse during the conflict, he was an important British poet

Edmund was born in London on 10th July 1875. His parents were John Edmund Bentley, a civil servant, and his wife, Margaret Richardson Bentley, nee Clerihew. His father, John Edmund Bentley, was a civil servant and a former Rugby Union international, having played for England in the first ever international match against Scotland in 1871. 

Educated at St Paul's School, London, before going on to Merton College, Oxford University, Edmund became a journalist and worked for several newspapers, including “The Daily Telegraph”.  He also worked for the weekly magazine “The Outlook” during the editorship of James Louis Garvin. 

When he was sixteen and a pupil at St Paul's School, the lines of his first Clerihew - about Humphry Davy - dropped into Edmund's head during a science class. Together with his schoolfriends, one of whom was G.K. Chesterton, Edmund filled a notebook with examples.

In June 1902, Edmund married Violet Alice Mary Boileau in Brentford, Middlesex.  Violet's father was Neil C. Boileau, a senior officer in the British Army  By 1911, Edmund and Violet were living in Hampstead and had the following children - Neil Edmund Boileau Bentley, b. 1903, Violet Bentley b. 1904 and Nicholas Clerihew Bentley b. 1908.

According to a notice in The  London Gazette of 16th May 1919, Edmund received an award – Chevalier of the Order of the Crown - conferred by  His Majesty the King of the Belgians  in recognition of valuable services in the Allied cause  

Edmund died in 1956 in London. His son Nicholas Bentley, who preferred to spell his first name Nicolas, became an artist.

Cover of the first book
of Clerihews

Edmund's first Clerihew:

Sir Humphry Davy

Abominated gravy.

He lived in the odium

Of having discovered sodium.[

Sources:

https://www.findmypast.co.uk/transcript?id=GBOR%2FLONDON-GAZ%2F%2F15947688

https://www.findmypast.co.uk/transcript?id=GBOR%2FED-GAZ%2F2539996

“Biography for Beginners” Edited by E. CLERIHEW, B.A. With 40 Diagrams by G. K. CHESTERTON (T. Werner Laurie, London, 1905) is available to view as a free down-load from the Gutenberg Project:

https://www.gutenberg.org/files/46691/46691-h/46691-h.htm

NOTES: 

The Order of the Crown

The Order of the Crown is the second highest Belgian Order of Knighthood, junior only to the Order of Leopold. H.M. King Leopold II established the Order in 1897. Receiving a Knighthood in the Order of the Crown is considered a gift of very high value in international diplomacy. This award can be compared to the modern 'Order of the Merit'...

It was awarded for important contributions to the First World War effort by way of artistic, written or scientific contributions, or important contributions to industry and trade.

Clerihew

A Clerihew has the following properties:

It is biographical and usually whimsical, showing the subject from an unusual point of view; it mostly pokes fun at famous people

It has four lines of irregular length and metre for comic effect

The rhyme structure is AABB; the subject matter and wording are often humorously contrived in order to achieve a rhyme, including the use of phrases in Latin, French and other languages.

The first line contains, and may consist solely of, the subject's name. According to a letter in The Spectator in the 1960s, Bentley said that a true clerihew has to have the name "at the end of the first line", as the whole point was the skill in rhyming awkward names.

Clerihews are not satirical or abusive, but they target famous individuals and reposition them in an absurd, anachronistic or commonplace setting, often giving them an over-simplified and slightly garbled description.

G.K. Chesterton wrote a poem to Violet Boileau: