Page:Dictionary of National Biography, Second Supplement, volume 3.djvu/584

 which the school still remained in St. Paul's Churchyard he greatly increased its reputation. In 1884 the school was removed to Hammersmith; a real expansion became possible, and the effect of Walker's organisation was seen in the rapid increase of numbers, and still more in the long series of notable successes gained by his pupils. The numbers rose from 211 in 1884 to 573 in 1888 and eventually to 650; in 1886 the first classical scholarship at Balliol was won by Richard Johnson Walker, the high master's only son, and for twenty years the success of his pupils at the universities and in every kind of open examination was one of the conspicuous facts in educational history. At Oxford the Ireland scholarship was won six times, the Craven eleven times, the Hertford eight times, the Derby five times; at Cambridge four Paulines were senior wranglers, six were Smith's prizemen; at the two universities twenty-one were elected to fellowships. From 1890 until the beginning of 1899 the high master and the governors of St. Paul's were engaged in a tedious struggle with the charity commissioners, whose proposals threatened to cripple the resources and to alter the character of the school chiefly by lowering the standard of the foundation scholarships. Walker's persistence and ingenuity were largely responsible for the issue, which was only reached after an appeal to the judicial committee of the privy council. The appeal came on for hearing in June 1896, but the judicial committee was spared the need of giving judgment. The commissioners gave way and on 25 Feb. 1899 they consented to frame a scheme in accordance with the wishes of the governors.

Walker took little or no part in general educational movements either in Manchester or in London; but in 1868 and 1869 he was public examiner at Oxford for the honours school of literæ humaniores, and in 1900 he sat with Dr. Warre of Eton on the commission for the education of officers in the army. In 1894 he was made an honorary fellow of Corpus; in 1899 he received the degree of Litt.D. from Victoria University. Walker, who had in 1869 declined the Corpus professorship of Latin at Oxford in succession to John Conington [q. v.], had a high reputation for accurate scholarship, and though he published nothing except occasional papers in the 'Classical Review,' he gave both direction and impulse to the philological work of Dr. W. G. Rutherford, J. E. King, C. Cookson, and other scholars of eminence, and also to the literary activities of Paul Blouet (’Max O'Rell'), another member of his staff at St. Paul's.

He became a freeman and liveryman of the Fishmongers' Company in April 1878, and was elected a member of the court in 1897; he was consequently appointed on the Gresham school committee and later became a governor of that school, in the reorganisation of which he took a prominent part.

He resigned the high mastership of St. Paul's in July 1905, and for the rest of his life resided at 7 Holland Villas Road, Kensington, within a mile of the school, which he never revisited. He died at his residence on 13 Dec. 1910, and was buried in the Kensington cemetery at Hanwell after a service in St. Paul's Cathedral.

By his devotion to accurate and vigorous teaching (though for many years he never himself taught a class) and by the remarkable success of his methods Walker did much to raise the standard of public-school education throughout the country. He was a man of great force of character, formidable in opposition alike by his determination and his judgment, but generous and sympathetic as a friend and adviser. From his Oxford days he was on terms of friendship with the leaders of the positivist movement — Congreve, E. S. Beesly, Cotter Morison, and Mr. Frederic Harrison; for Congreve in particular he had an unbounded admiration. He was the lifelong friend of Jowett, to whose influence he believed himself to owe much.

He married in 1867 Maria, daughter of Richard Johnson, of Fallowfield, near Manchester, who brought him a considerable fortune; she died in 1869. His only son, the Rev. Richard Johnson Walker, entered Balliol College, Oxford, in October 1887, and won the Hertford, Ireland, and Craven scholarships; he was for a time an assistant master at St. Paul's under his father, but resigned with him in 1905. He has since been mayor of Hammersmith.

A marble bust of Walker was executed by Mr. H. R. Hope Pinker in 1889 and exhibited in the Royal Academy of 1890; it stands in the library of St. Paul's School. On his retirement his portrait was painted by Mr. Will Rothenstein and hangs in the board room. A characteristic sketch of him by Leslie Ward ('Spy') appeared in 'Vanity Fair' on 27 June 1901 [The Times, 14 and 15 Dec. 1910; the Manchester Guardian, and the Guardian;