Walter Blythe

Walter Cuthbert Blythe (named after his grandfather, Walter Shirley, and his adopted grandparents, Marilla and Matthew Cuthbert) is a fictional character, son of Gilbert and Anne Blythe. He is mentioned in Lucy Maud Montgomery's "Anne of Ingleside" (book 6 of the "Anne" series, published in 1939), "Rainbow Valley" (book 7 of the "Anne" series, pub. 1919) and "Rilla of Ingleside" (book 8 of the "Anne" series, pub. 1921). He has 5 siblings: James, nicknamed "Jem", who is older; younger sisters Anne and Diana, twins known as "Nan" and "Di" respectively; younger brother Shirley; and youngest sister Bertha Marilla, or "Rilla".

Walter loves poetry and aspires to one day become a famous poet. Unbeknownst to him, he will one day fight and die in one of the world's most terrible wars. In "Rilla of Ingleside", Walter joins World War I along with his brothers, Jem and Shirley Blythe and neighbours, Kenneth Ford, Thomas Carlyle Meredith (Carl) and Gerald (Jerry) Meredith. He dies in the war, while the others survive with wounds and scars. However, he is survived by a poem that goes on to become beloved across Canada after his death.

His death is "foreshadowed" in Chapter 41 of "Anne of Ingleside", published 18 years "after" the book in which he dies:

Walter was smiling in his sleep as someone who knew a charming secret. The moon was shining on his pillow through the bars of the leaded window ... casting the shadow of a clearly defined cross on the wall above his head. In long after years Anne was to remember that and wonder if it were an omen of Courcelette ... of a cross-marked grave "somewhere in France."