Octavia Hill
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Octavia Hill | |
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| Born | December 3, 1838 Wisbech, Cambridgeshire |
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| Died | August 13, 1912 (aged 73) Marylebone, London, England |
| Occupation | social reformer, Humanitarian |
Octavia Hill (3 December 1838 – 13 August 1912) was an English social reformer, particularly concerned with the welfare of the inhabitants of cities, specifically London, in the second half of the 19th century. Hill was a moving force behind the development of social housing, including Council housing, and she also campaigned for the availability of open spaces for poor people, which resulted in the establishment of the National Trust. She was a member of the Royal Commission on the Poor Laws in 1905.
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[edit] Personal life
She was born in Wisbech, Cambridgeshire, and worked closely with her sister Miranda Hill (1836–1910), who founded the Kyrle Society. Octavia was the eighth daughter of James Hill, corn merchant and banker, and Caroline Southwood Smith, the daughter of Dr Thomas Southwood Smith, the pioneer of sanitary reform. Both sisters worked for the preservation of open spaces.
[edit] Public life
Hill knew a great many notable Victorian artists and writers. To give but one example; at a party at George MacDonald's house John Ruskin formally started off a large dance with Octavia Hill as his dancing partner. It was Ruskin who funded her first ventures in housing reform.
She was influenced very much by the important theologian, Anglican priest and social reformer Frederick Denison Maurice. His son Colonel Edmund Maurice edited her letters, which give a good insight into her life. He published Life of Octavia Hill as Told in her Letters (London, 1913). Her publications include: Homes of the London Poor (1875) and Our Common Land (1877).
In 1859, she created the Army Cadet Force, an organisation to prepare youths for entrance to the army.
In 1895, the National Trust, more distinctly known as the National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty, was founded by Hill, Robert Hunter and Canon Hardwicke Rawnsley, prompted in part by the earlier success of Charles Eliot and the Kyrle Society.
[edit] Legacy
A monument to Octavia Hill is to be found at a Surrey beauty spot, on the summit of a hill called Hydon Ball (now owned by the National Trust). Shortly after her death, the family erected a stone seat there, from which walkers can enjoy fine views over the Surrey countryside. There is also the Octavia Hill Birthplace Museum in Wisbech.
In 1995, to mark the centenary of the National Trust, a rose was named in her honour.
There is an Octavia Hill Society, as well as an Octavia Hill Association, a small, Philadelphia-based real estate company that was formerly devoted to providing affordable housing to low and middle-income city residents. Octavia Housing and Care is also the name of a Kensington based Social Housing Landlord that continues the work of Octavia Hill and is led by Chief Executive Grahame Hindes.
[edit] Publications
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- Octavia Hill and the social housing debate : essays and letters (1998), IEA Health and Welfare Unit, ISBN 0255364318 (with Robert Whelan)
- Homes of the London Poor (2007), Kessinger Publishing, ISBN 1432654225
- Our Common Land, and other short essays (1877)
- House Property & its Management. Some papers on the methods of management introduced by Miss Octavia Hill, etc. Chiefly selected from her writings, and edited by M. M. Jeffery and Edith Neville (1921)
- Life of Octavia Hill as told in her letters Edited by C. Edmund Maurice (1913)
- Memorandum on the Report of the Royal Commission on the Poor Laws and Relief of Distress. (1909)
- Further Account of the Walmer Street Industrial Experiment (1872)
- Colour, Space, and Music for the People (1884)
- Octavia Hill: Early ideals. with Emily Southwood Maurice, Allen and Unwin (1928)
[edit] References
- Gillian Darley, ‘Hill, Octavia (1838–1912)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 [1] accessed 4 June 2006
- This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.
- In Margaret Drabble's The Millstone, the heroine Rosumund Stacy's baby is named after Octavia Hill
[edit] Other works
- Octavia Hill's Letters to Fellow - Workers 1872 - 1911: Together with an Account of the Walmer Street Industrial Experiment by Robert Whelan, Kyrle Books, (2005) ISBN 0954891406
- Josephine Butler, Octavia Hill, Florence Nightingale: Three Victorian Women Who Changed Their World by Nancy Boyd, Palgrave Macmillan, (1984) ISBN 0333376366
- Octavia Hill: a Biography by E. Moberly. Bell, Constable (1942) ISBN B000JFVEDS
