Samuel Wilberforce

Samuel Wilberforce was born in 1805 at Clapham Common, London, the son of William Wilberforce, the leading campaigner against the slave trade. He studied at Oriel College, Oxford, where his friends included William Ewart Gladstone; he graduated in 1826 with first-class honours in mathematics. He married Emily Sargent in 1828 and was ordained in the Church of England. He became chaplain to Prince Albert in 1841, Dean of Westminster in 1845 and, later that year, Bishop of Oxford. His wife had died in 1841. As bishop he raised money to build and restore churches and opened a college to train clergy at Cuddesdon. He was one of the finest public speakers of his time. In 1860, at a meeting of the British Association in Oxford, he spoke against Charles Darwin's theory of evolution and famously asked Thomas Henry Huxley whether it was through his grandmother or grandfather that he claimed descent from a monkey. In 1869 he became Bishop of Winchester. He died after a riding accident in 1873.

Samuel Wilberforce is also an author in the library: author page and works.

Faith: Church of England bishop, successively of Oxford and Winchester. Source: Dictionary of National Biography (1885–1900) (via Wikisource)