Walter Hussey

John Walter Atherton Hussey (15 May 1909 – 25 July 1985) was an English priest of the Church of England who had a great fondness for the arts, commissioning a number of musical compositions and visual art for the church as well as amassing his own collection.

Walter Hussey, as he was known, was born on 15 May 1909 in Northampton, the younger son of Canon John Rowden Hussey and his wife Lilian. John Hussey was then vicar of St Matthew's, Northampton, a living which he had held since the church was built in 1893. As a small boy Walter attended The Knoll, a preparatory school at Woburn Sands, from where he won a foundation scholarship to Marlborough College in 1922. In 1927 he went up to Keble College, Oxford to read PPE (Philosophy, Politics and Economics), obtaining his BA in 1930. Before entering Cuddesdon Theological College in July 1931 he spent some time as a schoolmaster at Charleston, a preparatory school in Seaford, Sussex.

During that time he was in charge of the daughter church of St Paul's, Kensington, from 1935-6, returning to his first ministry at St Mary Abbots, Kensington for a few months as assistant curate. Within five years he succeeded his father as vicar of St Matthew's Northampton, a position he held from 1937 to 1955. As vicar of St Matthew's he celebrated the church's 50th anniversary by commissioning Rejoice in the Lamb from Benjamin Britten. He later organised a concert by Kirsten Flagstad. Other commissions included Henry Moore's Madonna and Child sculpture, a Litany and Anthem for St Matthew's Day from W. H. Auden, Lo, the full, final sacrifice from Gerald Finzi, Crucifixion from Graham Sutherland, and The Outer Planet from Norman Nicholson. In his book, Patron of Art, Hussey wrote 'Perhaps my succeeding him may suggest nepotism, but I don't think it was. I was not anxious to go there; it seemed that there was little one could do but let the parish down ... my various authorities advised me that it was right that I should go'.

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