Hubert Burge

Hubert Murray Burge KCVO (9 August 1862 – 11 June 1925) was an Anglican priest, headmaster of Winchester College, Bishop of Southwark and Bishop of Oxford.[1]

Caricature by Spy in Vanity Fair

Life

Burge was born on in 1862[2] and educated at Bedford School, Marlborough[3] and University College, Oxford.[4] His first post after graduation was as a Schoolmaster at Wellington College after which he was Fellow and Dean of his old college. He received a Bachelor of Divinity (BD) in March 1902, and at the same time received a Doctorate of Divinity (DD).[5]

He was Headmaster of Repton from 1900 to 1901 and then of Winchester from 1901 to 1911,[6] before his elevation to the Episcopate as Bishop of Southwark in 1911.[7] It was a surprise appointment because Burge had had no parochial experience and his health was fragile, and the Southwark diocese was regarded as very demanding for a diocesan Bishop. [8]

During the Great War, Burge emphasised the importance of Christian principles underpinning British involvement. ‘The thing for which England is to stand to her children and before the bar of history is not simply political liberty and justice and constitutional government and international conscience, but the ‘Mind of Christ’ informing the life of her people, and giving political and moral ideals their true sanction. For that Force in the world, we are to stand or not stand at all’.[9]

In 1917, he wrote ‘We shall not do much to promote the Great Cause of lofty principles and high ideals in the struggle with materialism, if in any way we encourage the belief that making shells or growing potatoes is national service while the ministrations of the Church and promoting moral welfare are not’.[10]

Translated to Oxford in 1919,[11]ex officio Chancellor of the Order of the Garter and appointed Clerk of the Closet, he was later also a Sub-Prelate of the Order of St John of Jerusalem and Chancellor of the Most Noble Order of the Garter.

He was a keen cricketer.[12]

Burge was made a Knight Commander of the Royal Victorian Order in the 1925 Birthday Honours, days before he died in office on 11 June 1925.[13]

Notes

1. "Bishops of Oxford". Archived from the original on 2009-02-24. Retrieved 2009-04-04.
2. "Reverend Hubert Murray Burge", The Peerage, 4 September 2011
3. "Who was Who" 1897-1990 London, A & C Black, 1991 ISBN 0-7136-3457-X
4. University Intelligence. Oxford The Times Friday, Oct 22, 1886; pg. 5; Issue 31897; col C
5. "University intelligence". The Times (36723). London. 24 March 1902. p. 7.
6. List of Headmasters
7. National Archives
8. The Times obituary, 11.6.1925
9. Southwark Diocesan Chronicle, December, 1914
10. Southwark Diocesan Chronicle, March, 1917
11. The Times, Saturday, Jul 19, 1919; pg. 12; Issue 42156; col C The Times, Saturday, Jul 19, 1919; pg. 12; Issue 42156; col CEcclesiastical intelligence
12. "The Wisden Book of Cricketers’ Lives" Green,B: London Queen Anne’s Press ISBN 0-356-10640-3
13. The Times, Thursday, Jun 11, 1925; pg. 16; Issue 43985; col B The Bishop Of Oxford. Wisdom And Sympathy