John Bickersteth

John Monier Bickersteth KCVO[1] (6 September 1921 – 29 January 2018) was an English Anglican clergyman who served as the Bishop of Bath and Wells from 1975 to 1986, and Clerk of the Closet from 1979–1989.

Bickersteth descends from a clerical family over several generations; in total six family members have been Church of England Bishops.[2] His father was Rev. Canon Edward Monier Bickersteth OBE, and his mother, Inez Katharine Jelf Bickersteth,[3] was a friend of the actress Sybil Thorndike.[2] His uncle was Julian Bickersteth and his great-great-grandfather was Charles James Blomfield.

Educated at Rugby School and Christ Church, Oxford, he was ordained in 1951 and began his career with a Curacy at St Matthew Moorfields Bristol.[4] After a spell as Vicar of St Stephen's Church, Chatham he ascended to the Episcopate in 1970 as Suffragan Bishop of Warrington, and after five years was further promoted to Bath. From 1979 he was Clerk of the Closet for a decade. Bickersteth died in January 2018 at the age of 96.[5]