Edward Hilton Young, 1st Baron Kennet (20 March 1879 – 11 July 1960) was a British politician and writer.
[5] His secondary schooling commenced at Marlborough but incessant bullying saw him transferred to Eton where he joined the army stream which emphasised science rather than the classics.
[11] Enlisting in the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve on 22 August 1914 and commissioned in September,[12] he served in a wide variety of theatres and actions in the First World War, including the Grand Fleet at Scapa Flow.
[14] A literary consequence of his war service was A Muse at Sea, a compilation of his poems initially published in the Ducal Weekly (the Iron Duke's newspaper), and also in the Morning Post, the Cornhill Magazine and the Nation.
[18] While on active service on Iron Duke, in February 1915 he was elected unopposed as a Liberal MP at a by-election for the seat of Norwich.
[21] In September 1915 he took part Admiral Troubridge's mission to the Danube, whose aim was to stop the Austro-Hungarians sending supplies via the Black Sea to Gallipoli (in the absence of a direct land link, as Bulgaria did not join the Central Powers until October).
[22] Later in the war Young served on Harwich light cruisers, naval siege guns at Flanders, the Zeebrugge Raid in which, commanding a rear gun on HMS Vindictive, he was severely wounded, necessitating the amputation of his right arm, and, finally, in the Russian campaign, commanding an armoured train on the line south of Archangel.
In August 1923 Kathleen, aged 45, gave birth to their son Wayland Young, who became a writer and Labour politician.
Suffering writer's block while working on A Passage to India, the novelist was Young's guest at The Lacket in early May 1922.
Shortly afterwards he wrote to Young declaring, "an unfinished novel’s before me now, and sometimes I work at it with distaste and despair…You certainly have done more than any individual I know to help me by direct remarks.
"[30] These comments suggest that Young gave Forster significant advice and encouragement at a crucial stage on work on the latter's eventual masterpiece.
Out of office with the advent of Bonar Law's Conservative administration (following the Carlton Club meeting in October 1922), he became Chief Whip for the Lloyd George Liberals and a Privy Counsellor.
Speaking at the Gresham's School prize-giving on 13 July 1923, Young "...recommended the boys to go in for great risks and dangerous deeds.
Although he won the seat back at the October 1924 General Election, he devoted the rest of the 1920s to furthering his business interests.
By 1940, Lord Kennet was either chairman or a director of eight listed companies, which apart from the Southern Railway and timber merchants, Denny, Mott and Dickson Ltd, were engaged in the financial services and property sectors.