John George Hodgins (1821 - 1912)

Descendants

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Biography

John George, born in 1821 in Dublin, was the son of William Hodgins and Frances Doyle. In 1849 he married Frances Rachel Doyle. They had five sons and a daughter. His second marriage in 1889 was to Helen Fortescue Scoble.

After emigrating to Upper Canada (now Ontario) with his uncle in 1832, John attended Victoria College in Cobourg in 1841. He began his career as a government clerk in Egerton Ryerson's Education Department. In 1846 he became chief clerk and rose to deputy superintendent in 1855. The following year he enrolled in the law course at the University of Toronto, completing his degree after four years of study. He never practised law, instead becoming the province's deputy minister of education in 1876. All told, he spent about 68 years of his life as a public servant.

In 1870 he became the honorary lay secretary of the Toronto diocese of the Church of England, a position he held for 25 years. He served as an officer in the Queen's Own Rifles, was a long-time secretary of the Upper Canada Bible Society, a vice-president of the Toronto Humane Society and president of the Irish Protestant Benevolent Society.

In 1861 he was elected a fellow of the Royal Geographical Society in recognition of his many geography textbooks. The University of Toronto conferred the honorary degree of LLD on him in 1870, and the French government decorated him with the Ordre des Palmes Académiques in 1879. He was awarded the Confederation Medal for his services to education in 1886, and in 1903 the British government made him a companion of the Imperial Service Order.^[1]

He died in 1912 and was buried at St. James Cemetery, Toronto.^[2]

Sources

1. ↑ Judson D. Purdy, “HODGINS, JOHN GEORGE,” in Dictionary of Canadian Biography, vol. 14, University of Toronto/Université Laval, 2003–, accessed December 8, 2018, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/hodgins_john_george_14E.html.
2. ↑ Find A Grave: Memorial #69957031

See also:

• "Canada Census, 1871," database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:M4Q1-BZQ : 24 October 2018), John G Hodgins, Yorkville, Toronto, Ontario, Canada; citing 1871; citing National Archives of Canada, Ottawa, Ontario.