Richard Aldington (1892 – 1962) – British WW1 soldier poet

Richard was born on 8th July 1892 in Portsmouth, Hampshire, UK. Christened Edward Godfree Aldington, he was the eldest of four children. His parents were Albert Edward Aldington, a solicitor, and his wife Jessie May Aldington, nee Godfree. 

Both Richard’s parents wrote and published books and in their home was a large collection of European and classical literature. As well as reading, Richard's interests included butterfly-collecting, hiking, and learning languages – French, Italian, Latin and ancient Greek.

Educated at Mr Sweetman's Seminary for Young Gentlemen, St Margaret's Bay, near Dover, Kent, UK, and Dover College, Richard went on to study at the University of London. Unable to complete his degree because of the strained financial circumstances of his family, Richard began work as a sports journalist and started submitting his poetry to British magazines. He gravitated towards literary circles of the era, meeting fellow poets William Butler Yeats and Walter de la Mare.

In Kensington, London, UK in 1913, Richard married the American poet Hilda Doolittle (known as H.D.). The marriage was registsered in December 1913.   Although the couple were later divorced they remained friends for the rest of their lives.

Between 1914 and 1916, Richard was Literary Editor and a columnist for the magazine “The Egoist”. “The Egoist” (subtitled An Individualist Review) was a London-based literary magazine founded by British Suffragette Dora Marsden as a successor to her feminist magazine “The New Freewoman”. The title and content was changed under the influence of American poet Ezra Pound into a literary magazine. Published from 1914 to 1919 “The Egoist” published important early modernist poetry and fiction.  

Richard, WW1

Richard joined the British Army in June 1916 and was sent for training to Wareham in Dorset.  He encouraged H.D. to return to America where she could make a safer and more stable home. 

Initially joining the 11th Leicestershire Regiment, Richard was posted to the Western Front in December 1916.  He wrote to H.D. telling her that he “managed to complete 12 poems and three essays since joining up and wanted to work on producing a new book, keeping his mind on literature, despite his work of digging graves”. He found the soldier's life degrading, living with lice, cold, mud and little sanitation. His encounters with gas on the front had a profound effect on him for the rest of his life. He was given leave in July 1917 and he and H.D. enjoyed a period of reunion. 

Commissioned as a Second Lieutenant into the Royal Sussex Regiment in November 1917, Richard was gassed but finished the war as a Signals Officer and temporary Captain and was demobilised in February 1919.

After the war, Richard became a literary critic and biographer.

“Bombardment”

Four days the earth was rent and torn

By bursting steel,

The houses fell about us;

Three nights we dared not sleep,

Sweating, and listening for the imminent crash

Which meant our death.

The fourth night every man,

Nerve-tortured, racked to exhaustion,

Slept, muttering and twitching,

While the shells crashed overhead.

The fifth day there came a hush;

We left our holes

And looked above the wreckage of the earth

To where the white clouds moved in silent lines

Across the untroubled blue.

Richard Aldington poem illustrated by Paul Nash (1889 - 1946)

found for us by Josie Holford

Richard Aldington’s WW1 poetry collections were: “Collected poems” (Covici Friede, New York, 1928; “The Eaten Heart” (Chapele-Reanvile, France, 1919) and“Images and other Poems” (The Egoist, 1919) and his poems were included in thirteen W1 poetry anthologies.

Richard died on 27th July 1962 in Sury-en-Vaux, Cher, France where he had lived from 1958

Richard Aldington is among the First World War poets listed on the memorial  Poets’ Corner in Westminster Abbey. The inscription on the mmorial stone is a quotation from the work of a fellow Great War poet, Wilfred Owen. It reads: "My subject is War, and the pity of War. The Poetry is in the pity."

Sources:  Find my Past, FreeBMD, Wikipedia and

Catherine W. Reilly “English Poetry of the First World War: A Bibliography” (St. Martin’s Pres, New York, 1978)  pp. 38 – 39.

Otfried Krzyzanowski (1886 – 1918) – Austrian/German poet

Another WW1 poet found for us by AC Benus*

Born in Starnberg, Bavaria on 25th June 1886, Otfried Krzyzanowski’s parents were Heinrich Krzyzanowski (1855–1933), and his wife, Auguste née Tschuppik (1861–1909).  Otfried's father, Heinrich, was a childhood friend of Austrian composers Hans Rott and Gustav Mahler.

The family moved to Vienna in 1897 and in 1907 Otfried went to study philosophy at the University of Vienna.  

After the death of his mother in 1909, in 1910, Otfried left his studies and devoted himself to poetry and literature, living a free life, completely rejecting bourgeois customs and lifestyle. 

"I've written and studied poetry, but I know very well that it's not work. The truth is, I don't do anything and doing nothing is a great nuisance. How few can stand it!” (“Against the Idlers”, 1918, quoted from “Collected Works” , p. 59).

From 1912, Otfried had some of his poems published in magazines.

Otfried died of starvation in Vienna on 30th November1918, during the chaos that followed the end of the First World War. The official cause of death given by the Vienna General Hospital was "emaciation" and "debility".

Here are three of the WW1 poems from Otfried's collection "Unser täglich Gift: Gedichte"  - En. Tr. Our daily poison. poems. (Kurt Wolff Verlag, Leipzig, 1918) 

"ÄSTHETIK DES KRIEGS"

Nur der erschaut die schönen Berge wirklich,

Der keine Zeit hat, sie zu bewundern.

Die Soldaten im Süden, nicht die Touristen sehn

Die Dolomiten am besten.

Denn die Natur, ob sie schön oder grausam sei:

Für unsre leere Zeit ist sie nicht gemacht.

Und wirklich sieht den Krieg nur einer, der irgendwie

Keine Zeit für ihn hat.

Der Soldat vielleicht, wenn er daheim

Bei seinem Weibe ruht.

"DER TRINKER AUF DEM SCHLACHTFELD"

Du! schläfst im fließenden Wein!

Du! rufst im Traum.

Hier, Tod, hat dein Spiel

Lichten freien Raum.

Resignation.

Du große Stille! Der Ruf nach Heldentum ist

Verzweiflung des Herzens. Und doch gibt es Männer.

Ihr leuchtenden Sterne! Der Ruf nach Schönheit ist nur

Verzweiflung der irren Sinne. Du große Stille!

“Ballade”

Ein geschändeter Leichnam

Erschlagen im Walde.

Seinen Feinden wehe zu tun

Hat keiner verstanden wie er.

Nacht war’s und einsam der Weg,

Da horcht er: Sie lauern ihm auf.

Narrheit ist Betteln, ist Angst,

Verlangt es die Wölfe nach Blut.

Tauch auf! Es enttauchte der Furcht

Seine Seele und lachte der Kälte.

Enttaucht! Wie lüsternen Grimms

Er nach seinem Dolche griff –

Ein geschändeter Leichnam

Erschlagen im Walde.

 AC Benus has very kindly translated these poems for us:

“War’s Aesthetic”

He with no time to admire them

Honestly sees the beauty of mountains.

The soldiers in the South, and not the blasted tourists,

Can view the Dolomites the best.

For Nature, whether it be cruel or beautiful,

Was not created for our empty hours.

Likewise, those with only time to reflect, see the war  

When they’ve no time for it.

The soldier, perhaps, who is at home

On leave with his sweetheart.

“The Drinker on the Fields of Slaughter”

You! Asleep in the flowing wine.

You! Scream in dreams.

There, Death, toys with you

In free and easy space.

It’s in resignation.

The powerful quiet. Heroism’s call is

The desperation of hearts. And yet men remain.

You light-emitting stars! The mere call of beauty is

Desperation to crazed senses. You powerful quiet.

“Ballad”

A mutilated human body

Struck dead in the woods.

Nobody understood like he

How to hurt his enemies.

t was night; the way, lonely,

Then he hears: they’re waiting for him.

Begging is foolish, just like angst,

For wolves crave only blood.

 Dive in! His soul bails for fear

And now laughs at the cold.

Bailed out! How with passionate fury

He grabbed for the dagger –

A mutilated human body

Struck dead in the woods.

https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/52183/pg52183-images.html

* AC Benus is the author of a book about German WW1 poet Hans Ehrenbaum-Degele : “The Thousandth Regiment: A Translation of and Commentary on Hans Ehrenbaum-Degele’s War Poems” by AC Benus (AC Benus, San Francisco, 2020). Along with Hans's story, the book includes original poems as well as translations.    ISBN: 978-1657220584 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1657220583

John Buchan, Lord Tweedsmuir (1875 – 1940) – writer, poet, historian

I only recently realised that John Buchan - one of my favourite writers - had also written poetry and deserves to be remembered here

Joh Buchan, WW1

Born in Perth, Scotland on 26th August 1875, John’s parents were John Buchan, a Free Church of Scotland Minister, and his wife Helen. John junior was the eldest child and had three brothers - William, Walter and Alastair - and a sister, Anna. Anna Masterton Buchan (24 March 1877 – 24 November 1948) also became a writer and used the pen name O. Douglas.   

John grew up in Fife, attending schools in Kirkcaldy. Then in 1888, the family moved to Glasgow, where John’s father was called to serve at the John Knox Church in the Gorbals.  After attending Hutcheson's Boys Grammar School, John went on to study Classics at the University of Glasgow in 1892.. In 1895, John won a scholarship to study at Brasenose College, Oxford University, where he met and befriended Thomas Arthur Nelson, grandson of the founer of the Edinburgh publishers.   

John married Susan Charlotte Grosvenor in 1907 and the couple had four children.  

By the time the First World War began, John’s career continued to be pulled in two directions - the political and the literary. He worked for the publishers Nelsons, in Edinburgh. John fully understood the importance of positive propaganda to the war effort and, with the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel, from 1915,  he worked as a war correspondent for “The Times” and “The Daily News” newspapers, sending optimistic reports from the Western Front in France.   He became Director of Information at the Foreign Office’s Department of Information (1917-1918) and, for a brief time, Director of Intelligence.  He continued to write novels and poetry – “Greenmantle” and “The Thirty-Nine Steps” were written at that time. 

Though more famous as a novelist than a poet, the war inspired John to write and publish "Poems, Scots and English" in 1917, a volume that included verse in Scots vernacular. 

“POEMS  SCOTS AND ENGLISH” BY JOHN BUCHAN ( Thomas Nelson & Sons Ltd., London, Edinburgh & New York 1917)  Dedication:

TO MY BROTHER ALASTAIR BUCHAN, LIEUTENANT, ROYAL SCOTS FUSILIERS WHO FELL AT ARRAS ON EASTER MONDAY 1917 

John’s brother, Alastair Ebenezer Buchan (b. 1895), a Lieutenant in the Royal Scots Fusiliers, was killed fighting in the First World War at the Battle of Arras on Easter Monday, 9th April 1917 – the same day and during the same Battle that John’s friend Thomas Arthur Nelson was killed. Alastair Buchan was buried in Duisans British Cemetery, Etrun, France, Grave Reference: I. N. 14.

John's Mother, Helen, visiting
the grave of Alastair Buchan in 
Duisans, France

“On Leave” pp. 55 – 58 

I HAD auchteen months o' the war, 

Steel and pouther and reek, 

Fitsore, weary and wauf, — 

Syne I got hame for a week. 

Daft -like I entered the toun, 

I scarcely kenned for my ain. 

I sleep! t twae days in my bed, 

The third I buried my wean. 

The wife sat greetin' at hame, 

While I wandered oot to the hill, 

My hert as cauld as a stane, 

But my heid gaun roond like a mill. 

I wasna the man I had been, — 

Juist a gangrel dozin' in fits ; — 

The pin had faun oot o' the warld, 

And I doddered amang the bits. 

I clamb to the Lammerlaw 

And sat me doun on the cairn ; — 

The best o' my freends were deid, 

And noo I had buried my bairn ; — 

The stink o' the gas in my nose, 

The colour o' bluid in my ee, 

And the biddin' o' Hell in my lug 

To curse my Maker and dee. 

But up in that gloamin' hour, 

On the heather and thymy sod, 

Wi' the sun gaun doun in the Wast 

I made my peace wi' God. . . . 

• • • • • 

I saw a thoosand hills, 

Green and gowd i' the licht, 

Roond and backit like sheep, 

Huddle into the nicht. 

But I kenned they werena hills, 

But the same as the mounds ye see 

Doun by the back o' the line 

Whaur they bury oor lads that dee. 

They were juist the same as at Loos 

Whaur we happit Andra and Dave.- 

There was naething in life but death, 

And a' the warld was a grave. 

A' the hills were graves. 

The graves o' the deid langsyne, 

And somewhere oot in the Wast 

Was the grummlin' battle-line. 

• • • • •

But up frae the howe o' the glen 

Came the waft o' the simmer een. 

The stink gaed oot o my nose, 

And I sniffed it, caller and clean. 

The smell o' the simmer hills. 

Thyme and hinny and heather, 

Jeniper, birk and fern. 

Rose in the lown June weather. 

It minded me o' auld days, 

When I wandered barefit there, 

GuddHn' troot in the burns, 

Howkin' the tod frae his lair. 

If a' the hills were graves 

There was peace for the folk aneath 

And peace for the folk abune. 

And life in the hert o' death. . . . 

• • • • • 

Up frae the howe o' the glen 

Cam the murmur o' wells that creep 

To swell the heids o' the burns. 

And the kindly voices o' sheep. 

And the cry o' a whaup on the wing, 

And a plover seekin' its bield. — 

And oot o' my crazy lugs 

Went the din o' the battlefield. 

I flang me doun on my knees 

And I prayed as my hert wad break. 

And I got my answer sune, 

For oot o' the nicht God spake. 

As a man that wauks frae a stound 

And kens but a single thocht, 

Oot o' the wind and the nicht 

I got the peace that I socht. 

Loos and the Lammerlaw, 

The battle was feucht in baith. 

Death was roond and abune, 

But Hfe in the hert o' death. 

A' the warld was a grave, 

But the grass on the graves was green, 

And the stanes were bields for hames, 

And the laddies played atween. 

KneeHn' aside the cairn 

On the heather and thymy sod, 

The place I had kenned as a bairn, 

I made my peace wi' God. 

1916

John Buchan died on 12th February, 1940.

https://archive.org/details/poemsscotsenglis00buch/page/54/mode/2up

According to Catherine W. Reilly, John Buchan’s WW1 poetry collection were:

“Meditations of a country chiel: a collection of verse” (Edinburgh, Bishop, 1918)

“Poems: Scots and English” (Jack, 1917)

“Poems: Scots and English” (new edition – Nelson, Edinburgh, 1936) 

He also had a poem or poems published in 2 WW1 anthologies:

“Northern Numbers: representative selections from certain living Scottish poets (Foulis, 1920)

William Robb, Comp. “A book of twentieth-century Scots verse. (Gowans & Gray, 1925).  All in Scots dialect. 

Sources:  Find my Past, FreeBMD, Wikipedia,

Catherine W. Reilly “English Poetry of the First World War: A Bibliography” (St. Martin’s Press, New York, 1978) pp. 22, 25 and 73

https://www.jstor.org/stable/26070692

https://archive.org/details/poemsscotsenglis00buch

https://livesofthefirstworldwar.iwm.org.uk/story/23343

https://www.peeblesshirenews.com/news/17199203.april-9-1917---day-will-forever-haunt-buchan-family/

https://www.cwgc.org/find-records/find-war-dead/casualty-details/168887/alastair-ebenezer-buchan/

Willard A. Wattles (1888-1950) – poet and educator

 

Another WW1 poet found for us through the wonderful research of poet and writer AC Benus*

Born on 8th June 1888, in Baynesville, Kansas, USA, Willard’s parents were Harvey Austin Wattles, a farmer and lumber dealer, and his wife, Jennie Fay Wattles.

Willard studied at the University of Kansas, graduating in 1909.  He began teaching at a high school in Leavenworth, Texas, before returning to Kansas University for a further two years, completing a fellowship and Master’s degree in 1911.  He then taught English Literature at Leavenworth High School, the University of Massachusetts, and the University of Kansas.

After completing his undergraduate studies at the University of Kansas in 1909, Willard began his teaching career as an English teacher at a high school in Leavenworth, Texas.  He returned to Kansas University for another two years, completing a fellowship and Master’s degree by 1911. Willard spent the next nine years in academia, instructing students in English at Leavenworth High School, the University of Massachusetts, and the University of Kansas.  

After graduating from Princeton in 1921, Willard moved to Connecticut and then Oregon, where he continued to teach and pursue his love for poetry. Willard became widely recognized, not only for his teaching background, but also for several books and for his poems, some of which were published in “The Independent”. 

On 25th June 1925, Willard married Mary Brownlee (1889 – 1989).

Hamilton Holt, editor of “The Independent” and president of Rollins College, was so impressed by Willard's work that he requested Willard Wattles’ presence at Rollins.  In 1927, Willard joined the faculty, bringing the “qualities of heart and mind that made him greatly beloved by the students.”   

Willard Wattles died on 25th September 1950.  The Omnipotent Order of Osceola presented his widow, Mary Wattles, with a plaque, inscribed, “to our teacher and friend, Willard Austin Wattles…we walk together when we are apart, our eyes have met and what we saw, no man shall know, nor forget.”

During the First World War, it is likely that Willard served in some capacity – possibly teaching - in the US Army, because the Introduction he wrote to his volume “Lanterns in Gethsemane; a series of Biblical and mystical poems in regard to the Christ in the present crisis” (E.P. Dutton & Company, 1918) was dated “18th September 1918 at Camp Funston.” 

Willard Wattles died on 25th September 1950.  The Omnipotent Order of Osceola presented his widow, Mary Wattles with a plaque, inscribed, “to our teacher and friend, Willard Austin Wattles…we walk together when we are apart, our eyes have met and what we saw, no man shall know, nor forget.”

“To Robert Westman dead in battle”

I was his teacher on a time

Some happy seasons back,

Guiding his hand and mind to trace

That knowledge which youths lack.

Now dead in France, his tenderness

Enfolds me as the sea,

Now I am like a little child

In wonder at his knee.

“Bobbie I love you” is all my heart can say

No matter where I wake at night or wander in bright day.

No word of mine could every say

One half of what is true

No reticence is graver than

The poem that is you.

Willard Wattles. 

From the anthology "Men and Boys", Edited by Edward Mark Slocum (New York, 1924), p. 79.

Collections published by Willard Wattles:

The Funstan double track : and other verses (N. A. Crawford, 1919) 

The Funston double track (N. A. Crawford, 1919) 

Lanterns in Gethsemane; a series of Biblical and mystical poems in regard to the Christ in the present crisis (E.P. Dutton & Company, 1918) 

Sunflowers, a book of Kansas poems (A. C. McClurg & co., 1916) 

NOTES: Camp Funston is a U.S. Army training camp located on Fort Riley, southwest of Manhattan, Kansas. The camp was named in memory of Brigadier General Frederick Funston (1865–1917). It is one of sixteen such camps established in the USA at the outbreak of The First World War.

Construction beganat Camp Funston during the summer of 1917 and eventually encompassed approximately 1,400 buildings on 2,000 acres (8.1 km2). The Camp Funston Garrison was administered by the 164th Depot Brigade, commanders of which included George King Hunter.  Depot brigades were responsible for receiving, housing, equipping, and training enlistees and draftees, and for demobilizing them after the war.

Two divisions commanded by Major General Leonard Wood, totaling nearly 50,000 recruits, trained at Camp Funston. Notable units who received training at Camp Funston include the 89th Division, which was deployed to France in the spring of 1918, the 10th Division and black soldiers assigned to the 92nd Division.

During the First World War, Camp Funston also served as a detention camp for conscientious objectors (COs) many of whom were there due to religious convictions. 

In March 1918, some of the first recorded American cases of what came to be the worldwide influenza pandemic, also known as "Spanish flu", were reported at Camp Funston.

Photograph - Camp Funston WW1 - Soldiers Sending Civilian Clothes Back Home -- This picture postcard is one of the few items of evidence showing the presence of the American Express Company at military camps during the First World War. In this case, the soldiers are posing in front of the American Express building near the railway at Camp Funston, Kansas. They are sending their civilian clothes back home, after being issued with their uniforms.  Both American Express and the Railway Express companies provided services to the soldiers during WW1, along with the U.S. Post Office.

The Anthology "Men and Boys", Edited by Edward Mark Slocum (New York, 1924) 150 copies of the original book were printed privately. The reprint is: “Men and Boys: An Anthology [Timothy d'Arch Smith / Donald H. Mader, Commentators) (The Coltsfoot Press, New York 1978).

Sources: 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1657220583

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1657220583

http://swansongrp.com/wwi.html

https://omeka.wppl.librarymarket.com/exhibits/show/histbioref/mary-wattles

https://lib.rollins.edu/olin/oldsite/archives/golden/Wattles.htm

https://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/webbin/book/lookupname?key=Wattles%2C%20Willard%20Austin%2C%201888%2D1950

* AC BENUS

AC Benus is the author of a book about German WW1 poet Hans Ehrenbaum-Degele : “The Thousandth Regiment: A Translation of and Commentary on Hans Ehrenbaum-Degele’s War Poems” by AC Benus (AC Benus, San Francisco, 2020). Along with Hans's story, the book includes original poems as well as translations.    ISBN: 978-1657220584

To purchase a copy please see: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1657220583

Rodolphe Louis MEGROZ (1891 - 1968) – writer, poet and journalist

As far as I have been able to discover, Rodolphe Louis Mégroz was born at 40 Alderney Street, St. George Hanover Square, London, UK, on 2nd August 1891, the eldest child of Swiss-born Rodolphe Frederic Mégroz (c.1855-1899) and his wife Alice Jane (née Bull, 1862-1933), who were married in 1890.   After the death of his father, Rodolphe Louis was educated at various institutions, including one of the Gordon Boys Homes.

When he was 17, Rodolphe joined Farrow's Bank as a clerk, learned shorthand and accounts and became a cashier in 1911. He joined up immediately at the outbreak of the First World War and served with the West Yorkshire Regiment as a Lance-Corporal, later becoming a Second Lieutenant.  He was at Gallipoli in 1915, taking part in the landings at Suvla Bay. In 1916 he was in Egypt serving as a shorthand writer in the Chief Censor's office. He must have served at some stage on the Western Front because he wrote the following poem in France in 1917:

“Con Amore” written in France in September, 1917 by Rodolphe Louis MEGROZ (though his name is incorrectly spelt in the anthology...)

IF but my love were as my love should be, 

And pen a fitting scribe unto my heart, 

Even then your praise I could not worthily 

In ringing rime chime forth :  no earthly art 

Could frame the incommunicable worth 

That is all yours, purchased with many tears, 

And patient bravery, and happiness of earth 

Renounced to buy your children's future years. 

Then on the little mound your toil made good 

Against a merciless tide of circumstance 

I'll stand, taking the breath of gratitude 

To mind and heart their power to enhance, 

That I may reach the ear of future times 

And hint my Mother’s worth in these poor rimes. 

The world must know your greatness, little Mother ! 

I will not have it so to be confined 

That it should dwell but in the heart of my brother, 

My sister's and mine own, and in our mind 

Invoke respect, tongue-tied however just. 

O Heart ! turn lyre within me ! You are stirred 

At her great contemplation, then you must 

Shake into song, though be it as a bird 

Whose artless iteration of his theme 

Makes music without skill, by virtue of 

The cherished sweetness of the Spring, his dream 

Through bitter Winter. Sing but of her love, 

Of her exceeding love, O Heart, then you 

May render somewhat of the debt her due. 

So great your love is, Mother, it may be 

Nor held by words nor compassed by my rime ; 

It has o'erwhelmed the wide, disparting sea, 

It has assaulted battlemented Time 

To keep your guardian spirit round me when 

Danger affronted or but lay in lurk 

Danger of death in this mad war of men, 

Danger of sin in Life's worse war of work 

And play, shadow and light, quick tears, brief joys : 

You knew Life's sweetness when you gave me birth 

And shared my infant bliss in stingless toys, 

Alas ! that since then joy has been in dearth 

And grief has loosed so many of those tears 

Which grew your Faith and Love beyond the years. 

I have been exiled now for two long years, 

Known many dangers, many pleasant places ; 

I have been near to Death just when he rears 

With terrible intent, and gazed upon the faces 

Of stricken comrades after his dread leap ; 

In eastern deserts I have worshipped beauty 

Austerely still, where Death and Life to sleep, 

And Home is a strange dream, and stranger " Duty " ; 

Yet have your mother-hands reached out always 

With some sweet draught for Mem'ry ; your pitying 

Softened the couch of hardships ; darkest days 

Your brightest words did light who knew the sting 

Of this cruel war most cruelly deep at heart 

Your love to sing then, what an Angel's art !

Stern War has caused my life's frail barque to ride 

Some perilous seas of Death, made me warm friends 

With cold Privation, and like Dante's guide, 

Down doleful, dayless ways where this life ends 

And deeds, desires, are woven in hidden looms 

That pattern human fate, me has he led 

With hand relentless on my hand. 'Mid tombs 

My dragging and his careless feet did tread, 

Echoing fear about my heart, and then, 

With his contempt content, my hand he freed 

And left me breathing still the air of men 

On this sweet earth. Yet in my daily creed 

Shall be deep thanks to War that touched my eyes 

With sight to see in you my priceless prize. 

The full text of the poem is on pp. 113 – 119 “More songs by the fighting men. Soldier poets; second series Edited by Galloway Kyle, (Erskine Macdonald, London, 1917) and you can read the remainder of the poem here as a free download on Archive:

https://archive.org/details/moresongsbyfight00kyleuoft/page/112/mode/2up

William Galloway Kyle (1875-1967) - Editor of “Poetry Review” Magazine and founder and director of the Poetry Society. 

Rodolphe’s WW1 poetry collection was entitled “Personal poems” (Erskine Macdonald, London, 1919), and he had a poem published in Galloway Kyle’s anthology “Soldier Poets: More songs by the Fighting Men” (Erskine Macdonald, London, 1917).

After the First World War ended, Rodolphe married Phyllis D Marks in 1921.  He trained as a journalist and wrote numerous books, and stories. After the death of his first wife, Rodolphe married Isabel L Walton. On the 1939 Census they are listed as living in Tufnell Park, Islington, London.  During the Second World War, Rodolphe worked for the BBC.  Rodolphe died in St. Albans in 1968. 

Works by Rodolphe Louis MEGROZ

Personal Poems (1919)

A talk with Joseph Conrad and a criticism of his mind and method (1926)

The Three Sitwells; a biographical and critical study (1927)

Francis Thompson: The Poet of Earth in Heaven. A Study in Poetic Mysticism and the Evolution of Love-Poetry (1927) (Faber & Gwyer)

Ronald Ross, discoverer and creator (1931)

Rhys Davies. A Critical Sketch (1932)

The Lear Omnibus (1938)

The Real Robinson Crusoe (1939)

Dante Gabriel Rossetti, painter poet of heaven in earth

Profile Art Through the Ages: A Study of the Use and significance of Profile and Silhouette from the Stone Age to Puppet Films

Shakespeare as a Letter Writer and Artist in Prose

Walter de la Mare: A Biography and Critical Study (1972)

Sources:  Find my Past, FreeBMD

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R._L._M%C3%A9groz

https://bearalley.blogspot.com/2009/09/rodolphe-louis-megroz.html

https://bearalley.blogspot.com/2006/10/

Catherine W. Reilly, “English Poetry of the First World War: A Bibliography” (St. Martin’s Press, New York, 1978), p p.18 and  222 

 “More songs by the fighting men. Soldier poets; second series” Edited by Galloway Kyle, (Erskine Macdonald, London, 1917), pp. 113 – 119