Rowland Hill Berkeley

Rowland Hill Berkeley, J.P. (1849-1905) was an English grocery merchant, factory owner and Liberal Unionist politician, who served as Lord Mayor of Birmingham, dying in office.

Life

Berkeley was born in late 1849 in Handsworth (then a village in Staffordshire, now a suburb of Birmingham), to Ann (née Hill) and John Berkeley, a coal dealer, both from Worcestershire.

He apprenticed as a grocer in Ashted Row, Birmingham, then set up his own grocery business, eventually operating throughout the city and neighbouring towns of West Bromwich and Walsall. and petitioned for another, for the invention of "A new or improved hydraulic apparatus for drawing corks."

Politics

Berkeley served on Birmingham City Council, being elected unopposed to Duddeston ward for the Liberal Unionist Party on 21 November 1892, having earlier served as chair of the Duddeston Ward Liberal Unionist Association. He served on the council's Gas Committee and chaired its Lunatic Asylum Commission of Visitors. that evening from "apoplexy" (now known as a haemorrhagic stroke), within minutes of collapsing. His dinner guests at the time included Edmund Whitcombe, superintendent of the Birmingham City Asylum, and the Berkeley's family physician and next-door neighbour, Dr Huxley, who despite their efforts were unable to revive him.

Former Lord Mayor Charles Gabriel Beale was returned to the post for what should have been the remainder of Berkeley's tenure.

Personal life

Berkeley married Eliza, née Jeffrey, and they had two daughters, Elsie Ann and Kate. All survived him.

Elsie (died 1967) married Edward Daniel Mason (died 1968) in 1911. Their son, Rowland Hill Berkeley Mason, known as Bill, was a successful documentary film director, and father of Nicholas Berkeley Mason, drummer in Pink Floyd.