He was born in 1847 at Cawnpore, India, the second son of the colonial administrator Robert Montgomery, a future Lieutenant Governor of the Punjab.

Arthur Winnington-Ingram, Bishop of London, appointed him to the prebendal stall of Wenlocksbarn in St Paul's Cathedral in October 1902.

Appointments to the prebendal stalls of St Paul's gave voting rights in the Great Chapter of the church and carried an income, but was otherwise an honorary position.

[15] Described in his Times obituary as a man "always young in enthusiasm and open vision",[16] he died at home on 25 November 1932[7] and was buried in Moville churchyard.

Other descendants include Canadian author Charles Montgomery, who wrote a 2004 travel memoir in the steps of his great-grandfather, The Last Heathen: Encounters with Ghosts and Ancestors in Melanesia.