Hook, WALTER FARQUHAR, ecclesiastical historian, was born in London in 1798, son of Dr James Hook, afterwards Dean of Worcester. He was educated at Winchester and Christ Church, Oxford, took orders in 1821, and, after holding some minor preferments, was appointed vicar of Leeds in 1837. Here, mainly by his energy and enthusiasm, no fewer than twenty-one new churches were built in Leeds, as well as twenty-three parsonages and twenty-seven schools, while the parish church was rebuilt at a cost of £28,000. In 1859 Hook was made Dean of Chichester by Lord Derby. His leanings towards Tractarianism brought him no little unpopularity; but throughout life he maintained a high ideal of devoted churchmanship. He died 20th October 1875. A memorial church at Leeds, which cost £25,000, and was designed by Sir G. G. Scott, was consecrated in 1880.
Dean Hook's works are An Ecclesiastical Biography, containing the Lives of Ancient Fathers and Modern Divines (8 vols. 1845-52); A Church Dictionary (8th ed. 1859); The Cross of Christ (1873); The Church and its Ordinances (4 vols. 1876); and Archbishops of Canterbury (12 vols. 1860-76). See his Life and Letters, by Dean Stephens (2 vols. 1878; new ed. 1896).