[2] He studied at University College London and after graduating entered into apprenticeship with his father's firm, which had been established in 1852 and specialised in water related projects.

[5] Hawksley, with his father, built the Catcleugh Reservoir in Northumberland for the Newcastle and Gateshead Water Company between 1899 and 1905.

[5] Hawksley became a member of the Smeatonian Society of Civil Engineers in 1897 and would serve as their president in 1911.

[9] The fund was given to the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, of which whose council he was a member, which used it to provide an annual lecture and medal the first of which was presented on 5 December 1913.

[9] Hawksley gave £4000 to Imperial College London's department of civil engineering which was used to construct a hydraulics laboratory shortly after the First World War.