Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Hill, Rowley

1389594Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 26 — Hill, Rowley1891Beaver Henry Blacker ‎

HILL, ROWLEY, D.D. (1836–1887), bishop of Sodor and Man, third son of Sir George Hill, bart., of St. Columb's, co. Londonderry, born 22 Feb. 1836, was educated at Christ's Hospital, London, and at Trinity College, Cambridge, where he graduated B.A. 1859, M.A. 1863, and D.D. honoris causâ 1877. He was ordained a deacon in 1860, and served the curacy of Christ Church, Dover; in the following year he was admitted to priest's orders, when he removed to the curacy of St. Marylebone, London. In 1863 he became perpetual curate of St. Luke's, Edgware Road, and after five years' service in that parish he was presented to the rectory of Frant, in the diocese of Chichester. In 1871 he exchanged his rectory for the vicarage of St. Michael's, Chester Square. He was presented in 1873 to the vicarage of Sheffield. That large and important parish he held, with the rural deanery of Sheffield and a prebend in York Cathedral, until August 1877, when he was raised to the bishopric of Sodor and Man. He discharged his duties with great zeal and success. But his plan of uniting the proposed bishopric of Liverpool to that of Sodor and Man was not generally approved, and was declined by the government. After a very brief illness he died at his residence in London, 10 Hereford Square, Old Brompton, 27 May 1887.

Hill married, first, 30 April 1863, Caroline Maud, second daughter of Captain Alfred Chapman, R.N., by whom, who died 6 April 1882, he had issue; and secondly, in 1884, Alice, daughter of Captain George Probyn, who survived him.

Besides smaller publications Hill wrote: 1. ‘Sunday School Lessons; the Collects,’ 2nd edition, 1866. 2. ‘Sunday School Lessons; the Gospels,’ 1866. 3. ‘The Titles of Our Lord,’ 1870. 4. ‘Instructions on the Church Catechism,’ 1874. 5. ‘The Church at Home; a Series of Short Sermons,’ 1881.

[Burke's Peerage and Baronetage, 1880, p. 637; Graduati Cantabrigienses, 1873, p. 198; Church Bells, 15 April 1878, viii. 215; Men of the Time, 1884, p. 569; Annual Register, 1887, Chron. p. 134; Illustrated London News, 1887, xc. 628, 682.]

B. H. B.