Philip Gillespie Bainbrigge (19 September 1890 – 18 September 1918) studied at Eton and had taken a first in

classics Classics or classical studies is the study of classical antiquity. In the Western world, classics traditionally refers to the study of Classical Greek and Roman literature and their related original languages, Ancient Greek and Latin. Classics ...

at Trinity College, Cambridge. While he was an undergraduate at Trinity College he met

C. K. Scott Moncrieff Charles Kenneth Scott Moncrieff (25 September 1889 – 28 February 1930) was a Scottish writer and translator, most famous for his English translation of most of Marcel Proust's , which he published under the Shakespearean title ''Remembranc ...

and became his friend and lover.Hidden: The Intimate Lives of Gay Men Past and Present
Clinton Elliot, page 21Chasing Lost Time: The Life of C.K. Scott Moncrieff: Soldier, Spy and Translator
Jean Findlay From 1914, he became a classics master at Shrewsbury School. In November 1917 during the Great War after learning of the death of two of his colleagues in Shrewsbury,Wilfred Owen: On the Trail of the Poets of the Great War
Philip Guest, page 71-72 and despite being nearly blind without his thick glasses, Bainbrigge enlisted in the army after memorizing the standard army's eye test. Bainbrigge attempted to enlist in the same regiment as Moncrieff, but failed and ended up in the Lancashire Fusiliers as a

second lieutenant Second lieutenant is a junior commissioned officer military rank in many armed forces, comparable to NATO OF-1 rank. Australia The rank of second lieutenant existed in the military forces of the Australian colonies and Australian Army until ...

. Moncrieff would later refer Wilfred Owen to Bainbrigge who was stationed near

Scarborough, North Yorkshire Scarborough () is a seaside town in the Borough of Scarborough in North Yorkshire, England. Scarborough is located on the North Sea coastline. Historic counties of England, Historically in the North Riding of Yorkshire, the town lies between 10 ...

and the two would become friends. Bainbrigge died in action on 18 September 1918 in the Battle of Épehy, while leading a patrol over a sunken road where the enemy was hiding. Six weeks later, his friend Owen would be killed in action as well. At the inaugural ceremony of the Shrewsbury School war memorial his lack of physical fitness and his courage were noted by describing him as "magnificently unsuited for war in everything except courage". Bainbrigge was buried at Five Points Cemetery, Léchelle, France, in Grave B. 24. He was among those named by J. B. Priestley as a "Cambridge Lost Generation"; the others being D.H.L. Baynes, Geoffrey Hopley, Donald Innes, Allan Parke,

Francis Storrs Francis Edmund Storrs (1883 – 10/11 November 1918) was a British academic and intelligence agent. He was the younger brother of Arabist and colonial administrator Sir Ronald Storrs. He was educated at Radley College from 1897 to 1902, and then ...

, Geoffrey Tatham and James Woolston.

Poems

Bainbrigge wrote a few homoerotic ballads, "mostly ballads of a private kind", as described by Moncrieff. He also wrote a verse play titled ''Achilles in Scyros'', which was printed privately in 1927 with only 200 copies, one of which is in the British Library.Stand in the Trench, Achilles: Classical Receptions in British Poetry of the Great War
Elizabeth Vandiver, page 328 In a parody of

Rupert Brooke Rupert Chawner Brooke (3 August 1887 – 23 April 1915)The date of Brooke's death and burial under the Julian calendar that applied in Greece at the time was 10 April. The Julian calendar was 13 days behind the Gregorian calendar. was an En ...

's '' The Soldier'', Bainbridge wrote ''If I Should Die'':Oscar Wilde, Wilfred Owen, and Male Desire: Begotten, Not Made
James Campbell

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bainbrigge, Philip 1890 births 1918 deaths People educated at Eton College Alumni of Trinity College, Cambridge Schoolteachers from Shropshire 20th-century English poets English male poets 20th-century English dramatists and playwrights English male dramatists and playwrights 20th-century English male writers English erotica writers English gay writers Lancashire Fusiliers officers British military personnel killed in World War I British Army personnel of World War I Gay military personnel 20th-century English LGBT people