He was born at the home of his paternal grandparents in Canon Street, Shrewsbury, Shropshire, where his parents and older siblings then lodged before his father moved on promotion to a station master's post at Birkenhead in 1898.
[3] During the First World War, Harold Owen was an officer on board the British cruiser, HMS Astraea.
In the weeks following the armistice, whilst the ship was at anchor of the coast of Cameroons, Owen fell ill with malaria.
He did not rise and I saw that he was involuntarily immobile, but his eyes which had never left mine were alive with the familiar look of trying to make me understand; when I spoke his whole face broke into his sweetest and most endearing dark smile.
Suddenly I felt terribly tired and moving to my bunk I lay down; instantly I went into a deep oblivious sleep.