Charles Kenneth Scott Moncrieff - First World War and After

First World War and After

In August 1914 Scott Moncrieff was given a commission in the Kings Own Scottish Borderers and served with the 2nd Battalion on the Western Front from 1914 to 1917. He made a conversion to Catholicism while at the Front in 1915. On the 23rd April 1917, while leading the 1st Battalion in the Battle of Arras he was seriously wounded by a shell explosion which tore into his left leg. Although he avoided amputation, his injuries disqualified him from further active service and left him permanently lame.

After his release from hospital in March 1918, Scott Moncrieff worked in the War Office in Whitehall. He supplemented his income by writing reviews for the New Witness, a literary magazine edited G. K. Chesterton.

In January 1918 at the wedding of Robert Graves, Scott Moncrieff met the war poet Wilfred Owen in whose work he took a keen interest. Through his role at the War Office Scott Moncrieff attempted to secure Owen a Home posting which would have prevented his return to the Front. According to Owen's biographer the evidence suggests a 'brief sexual relationship that somehow failed'.

After Owen's death, Scott Moncrieff's failure to secure a "safe" posting for Owen was viewed with suspicion by his friends, including Osbert Sitwell and Siegfried Sassoon. During the 1920s, Scott Moncrieff maintained a rancorous rivalry with Sitwell, who depicted him unflatteringly as "Mr. X" in All At Sea. Scott Moncrieff responded with the pamphlet "The Strange and Striking Adventure of Four Authors in Search of a Character, 1926.", a satire on the Sitwell family.

Through his friendship with the young Noël Coward, he made the acquaintance of Lady Astley Cooper and became a frequent house guest at her home Hambleton. He dedicated the first volume of his translation of Proust to Lady Cooper.

After the war, Scott Moncrieff worked for a year as private secretary to the press Baron, Alfred Harmsworth or Lord Northcliffe, owner of The Times, thereafter transferring to the editorial staff in Printing House Square. In 1923 his health compelled him to move to Italy, where he divided his time between Florence and Pisa, and later, Rome.

He subsequently supported himself with literary work, notably translations from medieval and modern French.