▶Date of birth:  1845        Place of birth: Ireland

▶Father:  Giles Shaw     Mother: Hannah Frances Anna Houghton

▶Spouse(s):  Fanny Shittler    Date(s) of marriage:  10 June 1873     Place(s) of marriage: St Mary’s Church, Cheltenham

▶Occupation: Clergyman (Anglican)

▶Lifestory: John Hall Shaw spent his first four years as a clergyman in Cheltenham, returning four years later as Incumbent of Holy Trinity. He was the son of Giles Shaw, of Celbridge, Ireland and Winterdyne, Worcestershire, and his wife Hannah Frances Anna (née Houghton). Most of his childhood was spent in Cheltenham, with his aunts, the Misses Houghton, of North Place, where he was living at the time of the 1861 census, aged sixteen, with his younger sister Anna Maria and his uncle, the Revd. Henry Hall-Houghton (who was also born in Dublin).

Shaw matriculated at Trinity College, Dublin, BA (Senior Moderator in Experimental and Natural Sciences, Large Gold Medallist, first class Divinity Testimonium) 1865, MA 1868, and was a Member of the Senate of the University. He was ordained Deacon (Gloucester and Bristol) in 1870; he was chosen to read from the Gospels at the ordination service, and afterwards was licensed Curate at St Mary’s Church, Cheltenham; he also acted as Curate to the “Temporary Church”, near St Mary’s, while St Matthew’s was being built.

Once in Cheltenham and still living at 11 North Place he began to involve himself in the life of the town, in 1871 attending a Protestant Trinitarian Benefit Society meeting and from 1872 serving as Treasurer for the Irish Church Missions, an auxiliary of the Church Missionary Society; he took a general interest in education within the parish. He was ordained Priest in 1871 (also Gloucester and Bristol), and in 1872 he was also incorporated MA from Trinity College, Dublin at Oriel College, Oxford. He married Fanny, fourth daughter of John Shittler Esq., of Elston, Wiltshire in 1873; their daughter did not survive infancy and their son died soon after his father’s death in 1897. The couple moved into 2 Western Villas, Christchurch, in the Bayshill area of Cheltenham.

In 1874 he left Cheltenham with his family, to become Vicar of Horsley with Shortwood and Chavenage in the south of Gloucestershire, near Nailsworth, at a stipend of £180 a year. In 1878 he returned, as Incumbent of Holy Trinity Church, near Pittville and, following the death of his wife in 1878, he remarried, to Georgette Matilda Mary, daughter of George Tinson, of Cheltenham; they had three daughters.

He advised his new parishioners that he would not be taking his salary or any other income from the parish, as he had sufficient wealth to support himself and his family; but he did require that it be paid into a Church Council fund, so as not to prejudice the salary of his successors. When in post at Holy Trinity he lived at 2 Wellesley Villas, Wellington Square in Pittville until 1883, after which he moved into Amberley House, between Wellington Square and Clarence Square.

While visiting Mumbles in Swansea in 1881 he saved someone who was drowning at sea, and for this he was presented with an award by the Royal Humane Society. He joined the Freemasons in Cheltenham, a member of the Good Templars Lodge (No 924), and found himself heckled at the Corn Exchange for his support of Sunday Closing. The following year he resigned his position at Holy Trinity, and exchanged exchange parishes with the Revd. Percival Smith, Vicar of Harborne, near Birmingham. In 1886 he became Vicar of St Paul’s, Balls Pond, Islington in London. He was presented by the Church Patronage Society in 1892 as Vicar of Ventnor, on the Isle of Wight, which had a net value of £200 and accommodation.

Shaw remained in Ventnor until his death five years later, at the Vicarage, Ventnor, in 1897, in his early fifties, after several years of poor health.

▶Moved to Pittville from:  Horsley, Gloucestershire      Moved from Pittville to: Harborne, Birmingham

▶Date of death: 4 May 1897       Place of death: Ventnor, Isle of Wight

▶Date of burial:   8 May 1897      Place of burial: Ventnor cemetery

▶Notes:        ID: 5853

Contributor(s):  John Simpson