Reverend Robert Lill De Burgh
(1801-1884)
21 August 1862

Volume 9, page 96, sitting number 11,381.

Born at Bath on 25 January 1801 and baptised on 8 February 1801 at Bathwick St Mary in Somerset, Robert Lill de Burgh was the second son of James Godfrey Lill de Burgh of Gaulstown, Co. Westmeath, in Ireland, who had taken the addition surname de Burgh on his marriage to Catherine de Burgh in 1794.

Educated at Eton and at St John’s College, Cambridge, Robert was ordained a deacon on 29 May 1825. From 1844 to 1874 he was the Vicar of Harmondsworth; from 1844 to 1879 he was also the Vicar of West Drayton. His family were connected with West Drayton and Hillingdon for over 150 years.

On 19 August 1834 at the parish church of Rochdale he married Julia Vavasour, daughter of Walter Vavasour of Crossfield (Preston Chronicle, 30 August 1834).

The couple appear on the 1851 census living at Hillingdon with one servant. In 1871 they were living at West Drayton with two servants.

Reverend Robert Lill de Burgh died, aged 83, on 27 December 1884 at The Lodge, West Drayton, and was buried in the churchyard near the east end of the church. He left an estate valued at £1402.

[From an album compiled by Arthur Rickards, son of solicitor Edward Henry Rickards. From the bookplate, Arthur seems to have started the album in 1864 when he was 21 years old.]