Sorry, I don't know one way or the other; I forgot to sign my last, so was in fact the 'guest' to whom Ruth Archer was responding.

For what it's worth, the dedicatee of the 'Shropshire Lad' songs was male: but I know of no evidence one way or the other, on the question of whether Butterworth was gay. The biography doesn't refer to the matter at all, nor have I seen any reference to his friend's private life, in anything written by Vaughan-Williams.