In August 1914 two thousand Oxford undergraduates volunteered for the Army, and the mass battles of 1916-17 took a terrible toll of them: by the end of 1917 the University was a hospital for wounded officers, with the actual student body in residence reduced to under 300. Nearly every male contributor to Oxford Poetry 1910-1920 can be found in the University Roll of Army Service: some, like Godfrey Elton, became prisoners of war; many, like A. P. Herbert, were invalided out after being wounded; among the survivors are several of the most-anthologised first world war poets, notable Robert Graves, Edmund Blunden, Edgell Rickword and Robert Nichols. (Female contributors, among them Vera M. Brittain and Winifred Holtby, also served in France, as nurses and ambulance-drivers, sometimes in conditions of great hazard.) Paper shortages in the Second World War made production of Oxford Poetry difficult, but two major poets printed in the one issue that did appear had been lost within twelve months of publication.

First World War

H. R. Freston - Killed in action France, 24 January 1916.
J. C. Hobson - Killed in action near St Julien, Belgium, 31 July 1917.
Alec Johnston - Killed in action Ypres, 22 April 1916.
Leslie Phillips Jones - Killed in action in the Dardanelles, 6 June 1915.
E. A. Mackintosh - Killed in action Fontaine, 21 November 1917.
F. St V. Morris - Died of wounds, 29 April 1917.
G. B. Smith - Died of wounds near Warlincourt, 3 December 1916.

Second World War

Drummond Allison - Killed in action in Italy, December 1943.
Sidney Keyes - Killed in action Tunisia, 1943.

It seems appropriate also to mention Clere Parsons, editor 1928, who died of pneumonia and diabetes in 1931; and William Bell, editor of what amounted to OP in 1945, who died climbing the Matterhorn in 1948. The poetry competition of Magdalen College, Oxford, is named for Richard Selig, editor 1955, who also died tragically young.