1788-01-22

GEORGE LORD BYRON, 6th Baron Byron, FRS, who was born on this date (d: April 1824), was a British poet and peer. He is one of the major figures of the Romantic movement, and is regarded as being among the greatest of English poets. Among his best-known works are the lengthy narratives Don Juan and Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage; many of his shorter lyrics in Hebrew Melodies also became popular.

Byron was educated at Trinity College, Cambridge, before he travelled extensively in Europe. He lived for seven years in Italy, in Venice, Ravenna, and Pisa after he was forced to flee England due to threats of lynching. During his stay in Italy, he would frequently visit his friend and fellow poet Percy Bysshe Shelley. Later in life, Byron joined the Greek War of Independence to fight the Ottoman Empire, for which Greeks revere him as a folk hero. He died leading a campaign in 1824, at the age of 36, from a fever contracted after the first and second sieges of Missolonghi.

His one child conceived within marriage, Ada Lovelace, was a founding figure in the field of computer programming based on her notes for Charles Babbage’s Analytical Engine. Byron’s extramarital children include Allegra Byron, who died in childhood, and possibly Elizabeth Medora Leigh, daughter of his half-sister Augusta Leigh.

For many years, literary experts and biographers have debated Lord Byron’s interest in men as sexual partners. While a student at Trinity College, Byron fell deeply in love with a fifteen year old choirboy by the name of John Edleston. About his “protégé” Byron wrote, “He has been my almost constant associate since October, 1805, when I entered Trinity College. His voice first attracted my attention, his countenance fixed it, and his manners attached me to him for ever.”

 

Many years later, upon learning of his friend’s death, Byron wrote, “I have heard of a death the other day that shocked me more than any, of one whom I loved more than any, of one whom I loved more than I ever loved a living thing, and one who, I believe, loved me to the last.”

In his memory Byron composed “Thyrza,” a series of elegies, in which he changed the pronouns from masculine to feminine so as not to offend sensibilities. From 1809 to 1811, Byron went on the Grand Tour then customary for a young nobleman.

The Napoleonic Wars forced him to avoid most of Europe, and he instead turned to the Mediterranean. Correspondence among his circle of Cambridge friends also makes clear that a key motive was the hope of homosexual experience. He was successful in this motive, as evidenced by the subject matter of poems like “Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage” and other writings from this period. Ultimately he was to live abroad to escape the censure of British society, where men could be forgiven for sexual misbehavior only up to a point, one which Byron far surpassed.

This debate is complicated by the fact that any man in 19th-century Britain who was bisexual or homosexual could not openly express his sexuality. For noblemen, who were expected to serve as moral exemplars, this was particularly problematic. If Byron did not publicly acknowledge his sexuality, he had compelling reasons for his discretion, resulting in a lack of overt evidence of his homosexuality or bisexuality. Consequently, Byron may have engaged in brief, anonymous sexual encounters with men.
 
There is significant circumstantial evidence suggesting Byron had male lovers. At sixteen, Byron met William Fletcher, a farm boy he saw plowing a field and was instantly attracted to. Byron made him his valet, a significant status leap for Fletcher, who remained with Byron until his death. Another potential lover was Giovanni Battista Falcieri, known as “Tita,” whom Byron brought into his service while living in Venice. Falcieri, a handsome gondolier, came from a profession known for offering paid sexual services in addition to boating duties.
 
Byron’s literary works contain numerous poems written to and about young noblemen, and a collection of these poems exists. Additionally, Byron was known to have handsome, young male travel companions, including Dr. John Polidori, who was his constant companion in the last four years of his life, Count Pietro Gamba, authors Edward Trelawny, Percy Bysshe Shelley, and Edward Williams. These relationships and the content of his poetry add weight to the argument that Byron’s affections and attractions may have extended beyond the bounds of conventional heterosexual norms.