in 1899 she said: ‘In Marylebone, where I began work, nearly every family rented but one room: now there are hundreds of two- and three-roomed tenements. … The knowledge of sanitary matters had penetrated hardly at all, gross ignorance prevailed. … The Building Acts took cognisance of very few of the requirements for health and hardly any sanitary measures were enforced, or even were enforceable. … From these and many other causes a London court in 1864 was a far more degraded and desolate place than it can be now, even in the remotest and forlornest region, and in taking charge of it one had to do a variety of things oneself where now one finds the intelligent and willing co-operation of many other agencies.’ Among the duties of good management she enumerates: ‘Repairs promptly and efficiently attended to, references completely taken up, cleaning sedulously supervised, overcrowding put an end to, the blessing of ready-money payments enforced, accounts strictly kept, and, above all, tenants so sorted as to be helpful to one another.’ She held that an efficient manager required a thorough knowledge of finance and accounts, of the complicated system of rates and taxes in London, and of legal matters relating to leases and yearly tenancies. A further requisite, and quite as important, she considered to be the power of dealing with people at once wisely and kindly; throughout all the work, however strictly carried out, should run the golden thread of sympathy and helpfulness—jobs must be found for those who are out of work, help given in illness and misfortune, days in the country organized for all the tenants in turn. In these ways, and by the pressure of constant and consistent influence, the people are brought to treat their homes with respect, and to prefer living orderly lives. If some of these things now appear to be commonplaces, it must be remembered that this is largely, if not mainly, due to the teaching and influence of Octavia Hill.
A portrait by J. S. Sargent, painted in 1899 and presented to Miss Hill by her friends, is now in the National Portrait Gallery. Hydon Heath and Hydon's Ball, a tract of wooded land about three miles from Godalming, 92 acres in extent, was purchased after her death and dedicated to her memory.
[Letters and other writings by Octavia Hill; Charles E. Maurice, Life of Octavia Hill as told in her Letters, 1913; private information; personal knowledge.]
HODGKIN, THOMAS (1831–1913), historian, was the second son of John Hodgkin, conveyancer, by his wife, Elizabeth, daughter of Luke Howard. He was born on 29 July 1831 at Bruce Grove, Tottenham. His parents were quakers by descent and profession, and he received his early education at Grove House, Tottenham, a quaker school. Proceeding to University College, London, he took his B.A., with honours in classics, in 1851. He was originally intended for the bar, and was admitted at Lincoln's Inn in 1850, but within a short time he abandoned legal studies owing to weak health, and turned to banking, which he studied at Pontefract and Whitehaven. In 1859 he became a partner in the new banking firm of Hodgkin, Barnett, Pease, and Spence, at Newcastle. His connexion with this concern continued until it was absorbed (in 1902) by Lloyds Bank. In 1861 he married Lucy Anna, daughter of Alfred Fox, of Falmouth, by whom he had three sons and three daughters; they lived until 1894 at Benwell-dene in Newcastle, but in that year removed to Bamburgh Castle; finally, in 1899, they settled at Barmoor Castle in the same county. Hodgkin was at all times a devoted and active member of the quaker community and a public-spirited citizen of Newcastle. But from an early age he contrived to find time for archaeological and historical studies. He was a leading member of the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, and contributed many papers to that society's journal, Archaeologia Aeliana. Some fruits of this local work are to be seen in his History of England from the Earliest Times to the Norman Conquest (1906), probably the first history of the origins of Great Britain to be written from a Northumbrian point of view. But even in this work his antiquarian learning is subordinated to humaner interests. He resisted, for instance, the temptation to make his chapter on the Roman period a monograph on excavations and inscriptions. His English History is, however, overshadowed by the larger work, Italy and Her Invaders, the first two volumes of which appeared in 1879, the last in 1899. To the whole work we may apply the author's description of the first and second volumes; it was the fruit of ‘happy labour’ pursued without haste or rest in hours snatched from more practical activities. Hodgkin traversed a field which Gibbon had already surveyed, but described it in a new perspective. Sensitive to the urbanity of Roman culture,
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