Wilfrid was born in Rio de Janeiro. His parents were Robert Lawrence Kup and Dorothy May Woodhead. The Kup family had commercial connections with Brazil over many years. Robert described himself as a mining engineer when he sailed from Rio in August 1914 to marry Dorothy at All Souls Church, Langham Place on 1 September 1914. Her father was a Corn and Seed Merchant in Leeds.
Wilfrid had a brother born in Brazil in 1917 and Dorothy brought the boys back to England in 1919 and 1922, staying with her parents in Leeds. Two further children were born in England, a son in 1924 and a daughter in 1932.
Wilfrid was educated at Haileybury and Matriculated in 1935. He graduated with a 3rd in History in 1938.
He was a Sergeant Observer in the RAFVR when he was killed in a Liberator, along with the rest of the crew, when an elevator failed whilst banking, on a training flight. They had taken off at 17.14 from Marston Moor on Wednesday 5 August 1942.
He is buried in Harrogate (Stonefall) Cemetery Sec. 21E. Grave 7081.
His parents were divorced prior to 1945 when his father married Margaret Menzies. He died in 1947. His mother who was living in Gerrards Cross, wrote to the College on 15 May 1949. She died in Oswestry in 1979.
Letters between Wilfrid and his mother are in the Richard Brown Baker Family Papers. Baker was a writer and art collector, of Providence, RI and New York, NY. He died on 22 January 2002 in Shelburne, VT. and bequeathed the majority of his art collection along with his original diaries to Yale University and the remainder to the Rhode Island School of Design. His connection to Dorothy Kup is unknown.