Editing Edgell Rickword (section)

==Early life==
Rickword was born in [[Colchester]], [[Essex]], the fifth and last child of George Rickword, borough librarian, and his wife Mabel, née Prosser. After a [[dame school]], he attended the [[Colchester Royal Grammar School|local grammar school]].<Ref>{{cite ODNB | url=https://www.oxforddnb.com/display/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-40704 | doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/40704 | title=The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography | date=2004 }}</ref> He served in the [[British Army]] in [[World War I]], having joined the [[Artists' Rifles]] in 1916, before being [[Officer (armed forces)|commissioned]] as a [[Temporary gentlemen|temporary]] [[second lieutenant]] in the [[Royal Berkshire Regiment]] in October 1917.<ref>{{London Gazette|issue=30352|page=11023|date=26 October 1917|supp=y}}</ref> Almost exactly a year later, he was awarded the [[Military Cross]] (MC), the citation for which reads:

{{Quote|For conspicuous gallantry and initiative near Dourges on 15th October, 1918. He volunteered to cross the Haute Deule Canal and make a reconnaissance. After crossing the canal at Pont-a-Sault, his presence was discovered by the enemy, who kept him covered with their machine guns. In spite of this he worked his way along the western bank of the canal, and brought back most valuable information, which enabled his company to form a bridgehead.<ref>{{London Gazette|issue=31583|page=12329|date=3 October 1919|supp=y}}</ref><ref name = PN>{{Cite web |url=http://www.poetrymagazines.org.uk/magazine/record.asp?id=1920 |title=''A Conversation with Edgell Rickword'' |access-date=17 September 2004 |archive-date=6 May 2004 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20040506145649/http://www.poetrymagazines.org.uk/magazine/record.asp?id=1920 |url-status=dead }}</ref>}}

He was a published [[war poet]], and collected his early verse in ''Behind the Eyes'' (1921).<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.english.emory.edu/LostPoets/Rickword.html|title = Trench Poets}}</ref>

On 4 January 1919, Rickword developed an illness that was diagnosed as a "general vascular invasion which had resulted in general septicaemia". His left eye was so badly infected that they thought it necessary to remove it to prevent the infection from spreading to the other eye.

He went up to [[Pembroke College, Oxford]] in 1919, staying only four terms reading French literature, and leaving when he married. Literary friends from this period included mainly other ex-soldiers: [[Anthony Bertram]], [[Edmund Blunden]], [[Vivian de Sola Pinto]], [[A. E. Coppard]], [[Louis Golding]], [[Robert Graves]], [[L. P. Hartley]] and [[Alan Porter]].<ref>Hobday, p. 44.</ref> His work appeared in the ''Oxford Poetry'' 1921 [[anthology]], with Blunden, Golding, Porter, Graves, [[Richard Hughes (writer)|Richard Hughes]] and [[Frank Prewett]].<ref>{{cite web| url = http://www.gnelson.demon.co.uk/oxpoetry/index/ir.html| url-status = dead| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20001017233825/http://www.gnelson.demon.co.uk/oxpoetry/index/ir.html| archive-date = 2000-10-17| title = Oxford Poetry: Index of Contributors: R}}</ref>