Blunt, Wilfrid Scawen |
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BORN 17 Aug 1840, Petworth House, Sussex - DIED 10 Sep 1922, Southwater, Sussex: Newbuildings Place GRAVE LOCATION Southwater, West Sussex: Newbuildings Wood (behind his house, now private property) |
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Second son of Francis Blunt and born into an old Sussex family. When he was eighteen he entered the British diplomatic corps and he worked in Athens, Constantinople, Frankfort, Lisbon, Madrid, Paris and Argentina. After his retirement in 1872 and his marriage to Anne Isabella Noel (the only known descendant of Lord Byron). They first met in Venice and he observed that 'she thought herself plainer than she was'. Together with his wife he travelled on horseback through the Mid-East and lived in Cairo. Blunt opposed British rule in Egypt and was also in favor of Irish home rule. For the latter he even served a prison term. Blunt had an affair with Jane Morris, wife of William Morris and model of Gabriel Dante Rossetti. They met in 1884 and in 1887 or earlier they became lovers. They had a sexual relationship until 1894 and remained close friends afterwards. When he died in 1922 he was buried like a Muslim at the Newbuildings Estate, sixteen miles away from Crabbet. Work: "The Love Sonnets of Proteus" (1880); "The Wind and the Whirlwind" (1883); "My Diaries (1919, 1920, two volumes). Family • Daughter: Blunt-Lytton, Judith Anne Dorothea, 16th Baroness Wentworth • Wife: Noel, Anne Isabella, 15th Baroness Wentworth (1869-, London) Related persons • was the lover of Batten, Mabel Veronica • was written about by Lytton, Noel Anthony Scawen, 4th Earl of Lytton • was the lover of Morris, Jane • was the lover of Walters, Catherine 'Skittles' |
Sources • Stephen, Leslie [Sir], Sidney Lee [Sir] [Editors], The Dictionary of National Biography, From the Earliest Times to 1900, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1960 • The Times |
