Howell Arthur Gwynne

Who was Howell Arthur Gwynne?

Howell Arthur Keir Gwynne, CH was a British author, newspaper editor of the London Morning Post from 1911 to 1937. The owner was Lilias, Countess Bathurst, a.k.a. Lady Bathurst, wife of Seymour Henry Bathurst, 7th Earl Bathurst. The Bathursts sold the paper in 1924.

Early in his career, Gwynne was part of the group of journalists and writers including also Rudyard Kipling, Perceval Landon, Julian Ralph and F.W. Buxton who helped start a newspaper, The Friend, for Lord Roberts for the British troops in Bloemfontein, the newly captured capital of the Orange Free State during the Boer War. Later, "[l]ike many another elderly Conservative in the nineteen-twenties [Kipling]'s reacted at the news of events in Ireland, Egypt, India, by moving further to the right in politics." Gwynne's Post "continued to fight its rearguard action, and [Kipling] continued to urge Gwynne to take stronger stands." Kipling "was for years closely associated with the editorial policy of the Post and on terms of friendship with Lady Bathurst ..., [and] spent many week-ends at Cirencester." Gwynne's relationship with Kipling continued close throughout the latter's life—he was a pallbearer at Kipling's 1936 burial in Poet's Corner at Westminster Abbey.