Herbert Trench

Who was Herbert Trench?

Frederic Herbert Trench was an Irish poet.

He was born in Avonmore, County Cork, and educated at Haileybury and Keble College, Oxford. From 1891 he worked as an examiner for the Board of Education.

In 1908 a Dramatic Symphony, opus 51, written by Joseph Holbrooke setting Trench's poem Apollo and the Seaman was performed, under Thomas Beecham. Trench then moved into theatrical work for a few years, collaborating with his friend Thomas Evelyn Scott-Ellis, 8th Baron Howard de Walden. They put on The Blue Bird by Maeterlinck in 1909, and Ibsen's The Pretenders in 1913, at the Theatre Royal, Haymarket. Afterwards, he spent time travelling. He died in Boulogne-sur-Mer.

Some of his other poems were set to music by Arnold Bax.