James Wentworth Leigh (22 January 1838 – 5 January 1923) was an Anglicanpriest in the last decade of the 19th century and the first two of the 20th.[1] He was a very active Freemason, an enthusiastic temperance campaigner, and an ardent social reformer.
At the age of sixteen, he attempted to enlist in the British Army to serve in the Crimean War and after leaving university went on a tour with three friends of Egypt, Palestine and Constantinople before studying for ministry in the Church of England at Wells Theological College.[2]
He was an active and zealous Freemason, who rose to very senior rank within the organisation. Having risen through the ranks of his lodge, and his Provincial Grand Lodge, and attained appointment as an officer of the United Grand Lodge of England, in 1899 he was granted the honorary rank of Past Grand Chaplain, the most senior clerical appointment in Freemasonry. In 1906 he received a patent to act as Provincial Grand Master of Herefordshire, taking sole charge of all lodges in that county.[8]
^Horsley (The Rev'd Canon), JW (1906). "Notes on the Grand Chaplains of England". Ars Quatuor Coronatorum. Vol. 19. London: Quatuor Coronati Correspondence Circle Ltd. p. 196.
