Robert Byron was a British travel writer, best known for his travelogue The Road to Oxiana.
12 Facts About Robert Byron
2.
Robert Byron was a noted writer, art critic and historian.
3.
Robert Byron was the son of Eric Byron, a civil engineer, and his wife Margaret Robinson, born in Wembley, London, on 26 February 1905, the only son among three children.
4.
Robert Byron was educated at Eton College and Merton College, Oxford, where he graduated in 1925 in Modern History.
5.
Robert Byron later visited India, the Soviet Union, and Tibet.
6.
Robert Byron completed his account of The Road to Oxiana in Beijing, his temporary home.
7.
Robert Byron was a forceful advocate for the preservation of historic buildings and a founder member of the Georgian Group.
8.
Robert Byron has been described as "one of the first and most brilliant of twentieth-century philhellenes".
9.
Robert Byron attended the last Nuremberg Rally, in 1938, with Nazi sympathiser Unity Mitford.
10.
Robert Byron knew her through his friendship with her sister Nancy Mitford, but he was an outspoken opponent of the Nazis.
11.
Robert Byron died aged 35 in 1941, during World War II, when the ship on which he was travelling was torpedoed en route to West Africa.
12.
Robert Byron was destined for Egypt and would likely have transshipped on arrival and continued his journey via the Cape.