# Dictionary of National Biography, 1912 supplement/Bowen, Edward Ernest

​BOWEN, EDWARD ERNEST (1836–1901), schoolmaster and song writer, born at Woolaston, near Chepstow, on 30 March 1836, was second of three sons of Christopher Bowen of Hollymount, co. Mayo, an evangelical clergyman who was successively curate of Woolaston and of Bath Abbey church, and perpetual curate of St. Mary Magdalene's, Southwark. His mother, who died on 1 Feb. 1902, at the age of 94, having survived all her three sons and husband, was Catherine Emily, daughter of Sir Richard Steele, 4th baronet, of Hampstead, co. Dublin. Charles, afterwards Lord Bowen [q. v. Suppl. I], was ​ Edward's elder brother. Edward was at school at Lille and at the Rev. E. J. Selwyn's school, Blackheath, and after two years at King's College, London, went up to Trinity College, Cambridge, in the autumn of 1854. He was made a scholar of his college, and won the Bell University scholarship in 1855, the Cams Greek Testament (undergraduates') prize in 1856, and a prize for an English essay, which was published with the title ' The Force of Habit considered as an Argument to prove the Moral Government of Man by God ' (Cambridge, 1858). He graduated B.A. in 1858 as fourth in the first class of the classical tripos, and next year was elected to a fellowship at Trinity. He proceeded M.A. in 1861.
After one term's work as an assistant master at Marlborough, Bowen became in January 1859 a master at Harrow under Dr. Vaughan. He remained at Harrow for life, and from the outset threw himself with ardour into the various activities of the place. As a schoolmaster he was mainly guided by two principles that the boy must be interested in his lessons and at ease with the teacher. While other teachers were grave and distant, Bowen was always cheerful, vivacious, and familiar, abound- ing in genial irony and ingenious fancy. Although order and discipline were necessities of his existence, he held that 'boys ought hardly ever to be punished against their will.' 'Punishments, rewards, and marks ' his fantastic humour defined as 'the three great drawbacks to education.' Teaching he regarded as an individual gift, and when giving evidence before the secondary education commission of 1894 he deprecated any systematic training of teachers for secondary schools. Delighting in form-teaching, he accepted in 1863 a 'small' house, from a sense of duty rather than from choice, and he found it 'a nuisance.' In 1881 he became head of 'The Grove,' one of the 'large' houses, and there his wise and strong guidance of boys was best felt.
Meanwhile, in order to widen the methods and scope of education, he had recommended the creation of the modern side at Harrow. This department was started in 1869, to rank as far as possible on an equality with the classical side, with himself as its head. In 1881 he wrote, at the wish of Dr. Henry Montagu Butler, the headmaster, an exhaustive memorandum on the principles, character, and thoroughly successful results of the new development. Bowen continued the management of the modern side till 1893, when, feeling that under Dr. Butler's successor, Dr. Welldon, the modern side was silently becoming 'a refuge for the destitute,' he resigned his leadership, but he continued to teach the two highest forms.
Bowen's versatile capacity embraced much literary power and insight, and his interests travelled far beyond his school work. He was, like his elder brother, a constant contributor to the 'Saturday Review' in its early days, and there chiefly distinguished himself by his wit. Although he was an ardent lover of peace, he was deeply interested in military tactics, and visited wellnigh all the battlefields of Europe. He taught military history admirably, and published with notes Thiers's account of the Waterloo campaign (1872). Two articles in the 'National Review' (Jan. and Oct. 1863) attest his religious feeling and theological position : they deal in a liberal spirit with 'Bishop Colenso on the Pentateuch' and 'The Recent Criticism of the Old Testament.' At school he organised Shakespeare readings, but for school purposes his literary gift was turned to best advantage as a writer of school songs. His 'Forty Years On,' which he penned in 1872, became 'the national anthem of Harrow' (cf. Harrow School, 1898, with facsimile of Bowen's MS., pp. 212-3), and many other songs followed of almost equal merit and influence. Set to stirring music by John Farmer [q. v. Suppl. II], they greatly increased the sense of corporate union among the boys. Bowen collected his poetic work in 'Harrow Songs and other Verses' in 1886.
Bowen was the first master at Harrow to identify himself thoroughly with sports and games, most of which he played himself. He was a cricketer and a pioneer of football, which he still played with his boys in the last year of his life. He contributed a chapter on 'Harrow Football' to 'Harrow School' (ed. Howson and Warner, 1898). He was also an accomplished skater and a skilful mountaineer. From youth, too, he was a pedestrian of exceptional endurance and enthusiasm. As an undergraduate he walked from Cambridge to Oxford in twenty-six hours ; in after life he walked all over England and over many of the battlefields of Europe. His summer holiday of 1870 was spent in the track of the Prussian army, and his Christmas in Paris, when the Commune was besieged there by the republican army. Always a staunch liberal in politics, he unsuccessfully contested Hertford against Mr. Arthur Balfour in 1880. ​Bowen died suddenly near Moux on 8 April 1901, while on a bicycle tour in the Cote d'Or with his friend Mr. James Bryce. He was buried at Harrow. The bulk of his property he bequeathed to the school. He had previously added two acres to the playing fielcls at his own expense. He was unmarried. Dr. Wood, the fourth and last headmaster under whom Bowen served at Harrow, credited him with 'Attic versatility and Spartan simplicity.'
[Memoir by his nephew, the Rev. the Hon. W. E. Bowen 1903, with many of his essays and songs, together with his evidence before the Royal Commission on Secondary Education in 1894; Mr. James Bryce's admirable sketch in his Studies in Contemporary Biography 1903, pp. 343-63; Harrow School, ed. E. W. Howson and G. Townsend Warner, 1898, passim.]