Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Hulme, William
HULME, WILLIAM (1631–1691), founder of Hulme's Charity, only son of William Hulme of Hulme in Reddish and Outwood in Prestwich, near Manchester, was born in 1631. When he was six years old he lost his father, and was left to the care of a bachelor uncle. It is supposed that he was educated at the Manchester grammar school, and that he subsequently went into trade and acquired considerable property. One writer (AlexanderKay,Letter, p. 5) thought that he had been brought up to the bar. He lived chiefly at Kersley, near Bolton, and was married at Prestwich, on 2 Aug. 1653, to Elizabeth, daughter of Ralph Robinson of Kersley, by whom he had an only son, Banastre Hulme, born in 1658, and buried at Manchester on 11 Sept. 1673. William Hulme died on 29 Oct. 1691, and was buried in the Hulme Chapel, founded by one of his ancestors, in the Manchester Collegiate Church. By his will, dated five days before his death, he left the reversion of his estates for the foundation of exhibitions for four poor bachelors of arts at Brasenose College, Oxford, to be held for four years after the date of their degree. It was ascertained by depositions made by his friends that he intended the exhibitions to be enjoyed by Lancashire scholars. The revenues of the trust, by reason of the principal portion of the estates being situated in the heart of Manchester, gradually and largely increased in value; and the trustees, at various times between 1770 and 1839, obtained acts of parliament to extend the number of exhibitions, and otherwise to enlarge their powers. In 1827 they obtained authority to purchase advowsons of livings out of accumulated surplus money, and by a later enactment they were empowered to augment the endowments of any of their churches, and to perform other acts widely divergent from the objects of an educational trust. The administration of the trust gave rise to much public discussion, and at length a scheme of the charity commissioners for the resettlement of the foundation was approved by the queen in council on 26 Aug. 1881, providing for a governing body of a largely representative nature, to whom power was given to found new schools in Manchester, Oldham, and Bury, and a hall of residence for church of England students attending Owens College. The school at Manchester was opened in 1887, and in addition a sum of 1,000l. a year is paid from the trust fund to Owens College, and a similar sum to the Girls' High School at Manchester. The income of the trust amounted in 1814 to 2,503l. This had increased in 1889 to 8,608l. The original endowment at Brasenose College was for four bachelors at 10l. a year each; at the present time a sum of 2,000l. is set apart to provide the following exhibitions, namely, eight at 130l. per annum, and twelve at 80l. per annum. The trustees are patrons of twenty-eight livings.
[Whatton's Hist. of Manchester School, 1828, p. 55; Kay's Letter on Hulme's Charity, 1854; Correspondence of Nathan Walworth (Chetham Soc.); Thompson's Owens College, 1886; Croston's Hulme's Charity, 1877; Oxford Univ.Calendar, 1890, pp. 428, 437; Notes and Queries in Manchester Guardian, 5 Jan., 2 March, and 22 June 1874, 10 July 1876, 26 March 1877.]