Alfred Averill

Alfred Walter Averill (7 October 18656 July 1957) was the second Anglican Archbishop of New Zealand, from 1925 to 1940. He was also the fifth Anglican Bishop of Auckland whose episcopate spanned a 25-year period during the first half of the 20th century.

Biography Born in Castle Church, Staffordshire he was educated at King Edward VI School, Stafford and St John's College, Oxford, where his course of study was Honour Theology. He rowed for his College and got his colours for playing both rugby and association football (soccer). He graduated in 1887, then he attended the Ely Theological College. before embarking on an ecclesiastical career with a curacy at St George's, Hanover Square.

In 1891 he accepted a position as an assistant curate from the vicar of Holy Trinity parish, Dalston in the north-east of London. He married Mary Weir on 30 November 1893 at Christ Church Lancaster Gate, London.

At the 1925 Synod, he supported amendment of the constitution of the Anglican Church of New Zealand so that it would enjoy full autonomy from the Church of England. and then interred at Purewa Cemetery in the Auckland suburb of Meadowbank.

Support of education

Before being appointed as the Bishop of Waiapu, he was a member of the governing body Christ's College, Christchurch. After his appointment as Bishop on Auckland in 1914, he became a member of the board of King's College, Auckland during the time the School moved from Remuera to its present location in Ōtāhuhu. Shortly before his death in 1957, he was appointed a Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George in the 1957 Queen's Birthday Honours.

Family Alfred was married to Mary (née Weir, died 5 November 1951, at Timaru, aged 86). Alfred's eldest son, Walter Averill, became a priest and served as Archdeacon of Timaru; a second son, Leslie Averill, served with the New Zealand Expeditionary Force towards the end of the First World War, and played a key role in the capture of Le Quesnoy in France. He later became a prominent medical administrator and community leader in Christchurch. A third son, Wilfred Selwyn Weir Averill, trained as a barrister and solicitor, practising law in Hawkes Bay. He died of septicaemia in Auckland in 1938.