Scoolmaster, born on 9 August 1910 at Oldham, into a Methodist family. He was educated at Hulme Grammar School, Oldham and Trinity College, Cambridge, where he took a 1st in the History Tripos. He was awarded a senior scholarship and a research studentship and won the Gladstone Prize and Thirlwell Medal. He was involved in the work of reconciliation and reconstruction in post-war Germany.
He taught at Culford School and Moseley Grammar School, Birmingham and was then headmaster of Quarry Bank High School, Liverpool and of Wolverhampton Grammar School from 1956 until retirement in 1973. He served as President of the Incorporated Association of Head Masters and a member of the Schools Council for Curriculum and Examinations.
He became a local preacher at 18 and as a student was influenced by the 'Cambridge Group', a forerunner of MethSoc. He was a member of the President's Council 1976-1979 and a lay member of the Council for Covenanting in the 1970s. He was Chairman of the governors of Rydal School and a governor and trustee of Westhill College, Birmingham. With his son John he was an honorary fellow of the Selly Oak Colleges. He wrote Methodism and Politics 1791-1851 (1935) and Padre Brown of Gibraltar, a book about the Rev. Frederick E. Brown DSO (1955). He died at Ludlow on 10 April 1993.