Philip Howard Frere

Philip Howard Frere (1813–1868) was an English academic and writer on agricultural matters.

Life He was the eldest son of William Frere and his wife Mary, daughter of Brampton Gurdon Dillingham. Educated at Eton College and Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1836 he gained a first class in the Classical Tripos. He took Anglican orders, but never held a benefice.

In 1837 Frere was elected a Fellow of Downing College, Cambridge and in 1839 became tutor and bursar there. Downing's endowments were mostly agricultural land, the management of which was the bursar's task. Frere knew farming from his father's estate at Balsham, Cambridgeshire, and he travelled in Europe. The family were left orphans, when Emily Frere died two years after her husband.