Remembering Frederick Septimus Kelly

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Because Australia has just commemorated Anzac Day, there has been a lot about World War I and II on our radio and TV stations. One comment about Frederick Septimus Kelly prompted me to google him and this is what I found. Born in Sydney in 1881, he was the seventh child of an Irish-born woolbroker. After an early education at Sydney Grammar School, the family went to England where Kelly continued his education at Eton College. He studied music there and also became a champion sculler, winning gold for Great Britain in the London Olympic Games in 1908 as part of an eights crew. He performed as a pianist on several occasions and began to compose. Following the outbreak of World War I, he saw action at Gallipoli and was wounded twice. He wrote several musical scores there in his tent. He was a close friend of Rupert Brooke, the poet, and helped bury him on Skyros after his death. In the last days of the Battle of the Somme in 1916, Kelly was killed when rushing a German machine gun post. He is buried in Martinsart’s British Cemetery. His final composition was the Somme Lament, created just two weeks before he died. This information is from Wikipedia, and the article also says that a dozen composers were killed at the Somme. War is such a dreadful waste of lives. We are seeing it all again in the battle over Ukraine. Drawing by John Singer Sargent. Attribution not legally required