William Henry
Channing, a close friend of the American
philosopher Henry David Thoreau, served as Chaplain of the US House of
Representatives and was a leading early
campaigner in America for women’s suffrage. Between 1854 and 1862 he lived in
Liverpool, preaching as a Unitarian Minister.
He was born in Boston, Massachusetts on 25th May
1810. His father died when he was an infant and responsibility for his
education fell to his uncle, a leading Unitarian theologian of the early 19th
century, William Ellery Channing. He graduated from Harvard in 1829 and from
Harvard Divinity School in 1833. Ordained into the Unitarian church he began
his ministry in 1835. Channing was a strong supporter of the early socialist
movement in America and at various times was editor of a number of radical journals.
He came to Liverpool in1854 and until 1857 was minister at
Renshaw Street Unitarian Chapel. In 1857 he succeeded James Martineau as
minister of the Hope Street Unitarian Chapel. The gothic chapel had been built
in 1848 and stood next to the original Philharmonic Hall, opened a year later
in 1849. The church was demolished in 1962. In 1862, following the outbreak of
the American Civil War, Channing returned to the USA. He was, however, to
return to England after the war and he died in London on 23rd
December 1884 aged 74.
Whilst in Liverpool he lived at 7 Montpelier Terrace, Upper
Parliament Street L8. This Regency terrace, dating from the 1820’s, stood between Grove Street and Bloom Street and
was demolished in the late 1960’s.
