Early Life and Family
Sumner was born in 1853 at Old Alresford, Hampshire, the son of Reverend George Henry Sumner, an Anglican clergyman, and Mary Elizabeth Sumner (née Heywood), also prominent in the Church of England and well known as the founder of the Mothers' Union.
After attending Eton, Sumner studied at Christ Church, Oxford, and in 1881 qualified as a barrister at Lincoln's Inn, London.
In 1883 Sumner married Agnes Benson, the sister of his college friend W A S Benson. Together they had five children - three boys and two girls. In 1897 Sumner retired from London and moved his family to Bournemouth on the south coast of England, ostensibly because of his wife's ill-health. In 1902 he acquired a plot of land at Cuckoo Hill near South Gorley, on the east side of the Avon valley, and designed and built his ideal family house. Sumner lived at Cuckoo Hill from 1904 until his death in 1940 at the age of 87. The house is now a care home.
Read more about this topic: Heywood Sumner
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