University of Virginia Library

CHARLES WILLIAM KENT

Kent Residence House commemorates the
name of Charles William Kent, the Linden
Kent Memorial Professor of English Literature
from 1893 to 1917. He was descended
from early settlers in Virginia, of English
ancestry on his father's side and of Scottish
ancestry on his mother's. He was born at
Louisa Court House 27 September 1860.
After private schooling and a period at the
Locust Dale Academy, he entered the University
of Virginia in 1878, and received
the M.A. degree in 1882. He spent the next
two years in Charleston, South Carolina,
as joint founder and headmaster of a preparatory
school. Then he went to Germany
for advanced study, at the Universities of
Göttingen, Berlin, and Leipzig, receiving
from Leipzig the Ph.D. degree in 1887.

The following year he was again at the
University of Virginia as a Licentiate in
German and French, the duties of a Licentiate
resembling those of the present positions
of Assistant and Instructor. From

1888 to 1893 he filled the comprehensive
chair of Professor of English and Modern
Languages at the University of Tennessee.
But he then was called to become the first
Linden Kent Professor at the University
of Virginia. It was an appropriate appointment,
since the new School of English Literature
had been established by Mrs. Linden
Kent as a memorial to his lawyer
brother. The University's initial School of
English had also been of recent date, 1882;
and that was now designated as the School
of English Language.

Professor Kent's inaugural address in the
new School had the significant title of "Literature
and Life." To a remarkable degree
he was both a painstaking scholar and a
man of action. He edited texts of Cynewulf,
Burns, Tennyson, and Poe, and was
the first Literary Editor of the sixteen-volume
Library of Southern Literature. He
was also the first Editor of the University
of Virginia Alumni Bulletin. He injected
vitality into the University Literary Magazine,
and as early as 1903 he offered a

course in Journalism. He lectured widely
on literary subjects, in recognition whereof
came honorary degrees: LL.D. from the
University of Alabama and Litt.D. from
Colgate. He served as Chairman of the
State Executive Committee of the Young
Men's Christian Association. Known affectionately
as "Chucky," his Sunday Bible
Class for college students was for years a
dynamic influence in the University. Of the
wealth of a disciplined mind he was an
eager and generous donor.

In 1895 he married a daughter (Eleanor)
of Professor Francis Henry Smith, and
they occupied Pavilion IV on East Lawn
until that became the office of the first
President, Edwin Anderson Alderman.
The Kents then moved into joint occupancy,
with Professor Smith, of Pavilion
V on West Lawn. It was there that Professor
Kent died of a cerebral hemorrhage on
5 October 1917, at the beginning of his
fifty-eighth year. He is buried in the University
Cemetery. His was a comparatively
brief but a notably abundant life.