Humphrey was perhaps the least academic of a family of exceptionally bright siblings. He was very unhappy at Newcastle Royal Grammar School to which he went, as did Giles, until 1918 thus missing the War. He was unsure what to do as a career and his father suggested work in a bank. This was a horrifying idea as Humphrey was naturally an outdoor man. His father's brother was land agent to the Duke of Northumberland and was very fond of Humphrey so offered to take him as a farm pupil. He was later very happy working on a dairy farm in Somerset under Arnold Pavlett.

It was at this farm that Humphrey became aware of a very strong vocation to be ordained but felt he would not rise to the academic standards required. His employer suggested he should see the Bishop of Salisbury, Sinclair Donaldson, who was delighted to offer him a place at Salisbury Theological College. He was ordained three years later and it was obvious that Humphrey was destined for pastoral service. On one occasion he had the chance to prove that he was special in front of his father. He had been invited by the Bishop of Lincoln to preach at a very large evensong and his father was a bit worried in case he did not succeed. Humphrey preached brilliantly and his father was radiantly happy with pride, at last recognising him for his true self.

Bishop Donaldson believed that young curates should have a hard curacy to determine their true vocation and after a two year curacy at Blandford Forum, having married Marjorie Alcock (a daughter of the organist at Salisbury Cathedral) Humphrey went to Australia for five years. Wongan Hills was in the middle of a farming belt, was very isolated and rough and covered an area the size of Yorkshire with very limited transport facilities. The centre of the parish was a hall used for every kind of public occasion. There was no church when he arrived, but when he left five years later a substantial church had been built and a thriving parish founded, which still flourishes today (2002). Funds didn't rise to provide an organ so Marjorie, a professional musician, accompanied the services with her 'cello and trained a small choir to lead the singing. Next PHH spent several years as vicar of the parish church of South Perth.

Their first two daughters, Susan and 113 Gillian, were born in Australia and also a son, Stephen, who sadly died when a few months old. Marjorie's health became a worry due to the heat and the stresses of building and running a parish, and bringing up a family, with none of the facilities we expect today, so they returned to England in 1938 and took up a post in Ramsbury, a farming village in north Wiltshire, where Humphrey did very well. Their third daughter, Rosemary, was born in 1939. During the war he became very involved with the American troops billeted in the village and was made Chaplain to the Women's Royal Army Corps when he was serving at Aldershot.

After four not very happy years at Clifton in Bedfordshire, Humphrey accepted a position at Bishopstone, another farming village, near Salisbury. Here he built up another excellent parish with a thriving youth club and achieved a reputation for uniting denominations - in particular the Methodists who closed their chapel in the village and shared joint services with the Anglicans. He became Rural Dean of the Chalk Valley at this time. While here, the anxiety disorder which had dogged Humphrey all his life became more acute and led to his retirement from the administration of a parish and a move to a flat at St. Nicholas Hospital in Salisbury - a very old charity established by the River Avon in c1200 which had rooms for men and women who had served the diocese. The community had a wonderful warden and doctor when they arrived and Humphrey soon became a Canon and Vicar of the Close (Parochus Clausi) where he had full pastoral care of the cathedral congregation and was appointed Chaplain to the hospital and several other institutions in the City.

Following Marjorie's death he was extremely well supported by the community, but in 1984 he went to live with his daughter Rosemary near Penzance, until his death in 1987. He and Marjorie are buried in The Garth in Salisbury Cathedral Close, next to her parents and twin sister. Humphrey was a man of absolute simple holiness and was a much loved priest believing absolutely in each and every individual. He is still remembered with great affection by those whose lives he touched, as his grand-daughter discovered when visiting Salisbury by chance 15 years after his death.

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