Benjamin Waugh

s.

Waugh was born, the son of a clergyman, in Settle, North Yorkshire and attended theological college in Bradford before moving to Newbury, Berkshire and then in 1866 to London.

Working as a Congregationalist minister in the slums of Greenwich, Waugh became appalled at the deprivations and cruelties suffered by children. Critical of the workhouse system, the Poor law and aspects of the criminal justice system as it affected children, he wrote a book ("The Gaol Cradle, Who Rocks It?", 1873) urging the creation of juvenile courts and children's prisons as a means of diverting children from a life of crime. He also served on the London School Board from 1870 to 1876.

He was also, from 1874 to 1896, editor of a religious periodical, "The Sunday Magazine", in which he published several of his own hymns.

as its first patron.

A house in Crooms Hill, Greenwich marks one of Waugh’s residences; 53 Woodlands Villas (today Vanbrugh Park) in the nearby Blackheath Standard area was another. He later retired, in 1905, to Westcliff in Southend, Essex, where he died three years later. A blue plaque in Runwell Terrace marks his residency there