William Fremantle

Who was William Fremantle?

The Very Reverend William Henry Fremantle was an eminent Anglican priest in the last decades of the 19th century and the first two of the 20th.

The second son of Thomas Fremantle, 1st Baron Cottesloe, he was educated at Eton and Balliol. A Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford, he was ordained in 1855 and two years later became Vicar of Lewknor. He was then Chaplain to Archibald Campbell, Bishop of London, and went with him in the same post when he was appointed Archbishop of Canterbury seven years later. Appointed to be a Cathedral Canon at Canterbury in 1882, and Archdeacon of Maidstone in 1887, in 1895 he became Dean of Ripon. He retired in 1915 and died a year later on Christmas Eve 1916.

Fremantle married Isabella Maria Eardley, daughter of Sir Culling Eardley. Mrs. Fremantle took an active part in charitable work in the dioceses her husband was appointed to, and her work among the sick poor was well known. She died, aged 66, in July 1901.

Their second son Sir Francis Edward Fremantle was a Conservative politician.