Hernando de Bengoechea (1889 – May 1915) was a French-Colombian poet who was killed in the

First World War World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

Biography

Born in

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

to Colombian parents, he was a literary figure of the

Belle Epoque Belle may refer to: * Belle (''Beauty and the Beast'') * Belle (given name), a list of people and fictional characters * Belle (surname), a list of people Brands and enterprises * Belle Air, a former airline with headquarters in Tirana, Albania ...

. When war broke out in August 1914, he volunteered to fight and was soon incorporated into the

French Foreign Legion The French Foreign Legion (french: Légion étrangère) is a corps of the French Army which comprises several specialties: infantry, Armoured Cavalry Arm, cavalry, Military engineering, engineers, Airborne forces, airborne troops. It was created ...

. He was killed during the Artois offensive in May 1915. Partly because he had chosen to adopt a Colombian passport over a French one, Bengoechea's death was widely reported and mourned in Colombia.Article
/ref> Although fluent in both Spanish and French, Bengoechea wrote mainly in French. His poems are available in a volume entitled ''Les Crépuscules du matin''. He left around forty letters from the front, which dealt with subjects such as life in the trenches, his love of Paris, France, and the French language, his desire to maintain an intellectual life in spite of his harsh circumstances, etc. The main recipients were his mother, his brother Alfred, his sister Elvira, the brothers García Calderón, his best friend Diego Suárez Costa, Baroness Renée Franchon, Countess Moltke-Huitfeld, etc. One of his correspondents was Jose Garcia Calderon, a young writer of Peruvian origin, who also died in action, a year after Bengoechea's death. Hernando's elder brother, Alfred de Bengoechea, a poet and translator, published his letters after the war, in a volume entitled ''Le Sourire de l'Ile-de-France : Essais et poèmes en prose, suivis des Lettres de guerre, 1914–1915''. This book, illustrated by E.-A. Bourdelle, appeared in 1924. Twenty-four years later, in 1948, Alfred published a selection of the works of his dead brother, with a long preface by Hernando's friend,

Léon-Paul Fargue Léon-Paul Fargue (, 4 March 187624 November 1947) was a French poet and essayist. He was born in Paris, France, on rue Coquilliére. As a poet he was noted for his poetry of atmosphere and detail. His work spanned numerous literary movements. ...

(also a poet), under the title: ''Hernando de Bengoechea ou l’Âme d’un poète''.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bengoechea, Hernando 20th-century Colombian poets 20th-century French poets 1889 births 1915 deaths Colombian male poets French male poets 20th-century French male writers Poets from Paris French military personnel killed in World War I Soldiers of the French Foreign Legion