[1] Born on 23 August 1823, son of Captain Peter Bowlby and Elizabeth Haslewood, he was educated at Wadham College, Oxford, where he graduated a Doctor of Divinity (DD).
He was Vicar of Holy Trinity Church, Dartford, from 1867 to 1874 and became Rector of St Philip's, Birmingham in 1875, a post he retained upon becoming the first suffragan Bishop of Coventry in 1891.
He was consecrated a bishop at St Paul's Cathedral on 29 September 1891, by Edward Benson, Archbishop of Canterbury.
[3][4][5] Bowlby married firstly, Catherine Salmon, on 29 September 1852, and they had five children.
After Catherine's death in 1875, he married secondly, Sarah Blowers King, on 21 September 1886.